Word: knocker
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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...trying it. However Max Baer, while helping his father in the butchering business in California, sometimes slugged cattle unconscious by punching them in the short ribs. Jack Dempsey, the late James J. Corbett and other pugilists have tried their hand at steer-knocking in the Chicago stockyards. The knocker wields a 3-lb. hammer, swings it down on the steer's skull, just above and between the eyes. The object is not to kill but to stun the animal to facilitate shackling for slaughter. It is a feat of skill rather than of strength. Neither Dempsey nor Corbett could match...
...fading autumn sunshine. A young Frenchman mounted the steps of a house in a Paris suburb and touched the knocker. His dress was one of conscious affectation, that of a dandy of the Restoration; he was eighteen years old, and his elbow was crooked around a thin manuscript. A kindly neighbor in his country home had secured for him an invitation to meet Saint-Beuve, the great literary critic, and read some poetry to him. Saint-Beuve's library was soon vibrating to the warm emotional tone with which a young man reads poetry, particularly when the poetry happens...
After the repast the little gathering went upstairs. They must show the Vagabond a dormitory room. On the way one of the number knocked at a door. "Get the hell out, I'm studying," was the shocking answer. A think grimace was pasted on the lips of the knocker. They would have revenge. Two Victrolas were commandeered and set to playing on the door stoop--"Something To Remember Me By." Then a few fire crackers were shot off to give the thing a tinge of reality. The scoundrels slunk off to their rooms to study...