George Herz, World's Champion Punching Bag Manipulator

[paranday]

Alan, had you heard of this guy ? I think you need to buy this.

The Only Act Using Ten Bags at a Time

http://www.ebay.com/itm/380804936313

[Zaza]

Sure... where was this months ago?

[paranday]

I know I know.

[Dutchman]

Just start gathering material for "Art of the Bag II".....

[Speedbag]

Alan, had you heard of this guy ? I think you need to buy this.

The Only Act Using Ten Bags at a Time

http://www.ebay.com/itm/380804936313

This makes me wonder a few things...

Who was the acts (or acts) using 9 bags that made George have to go to 10 bag?

Champion bag punchers were quite prominent back then....

http://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/entry/view/gilbert_alfred_carlton_1884_1961_/

A.C. Gilbert—the inventor of the Erector Set and other educational toys—was born on February 13, 1884, in Salem, Oregon. As a young boy, he was very athletic and once ran away with a minstrel show to become the "Champion Boy Bag Puncher of the World." Gilbert attended track meets at Willamette University and a magic show at the Reed Opera house, events that set the direction for the rest of his life.

Or perhaps Franks and Franks, lady bag punchers?

or the Vegges (pretty good show for nickel!)

or perhaps the Waldera's? (circus, 1923)

one thing is for sure, there is still a lot of speed bag history floating around out there we don't know about.... (I never thought about the circus silly me)

[Dutchman]

Ah yes "The Billboard". The "bible" of show business before it was divided into two publications (Billboard, and Amusement Business. The latter is now defunct).Now there is where we need to start seriously looking for all those bag punching acts that played the variety circuits.

[Speedbag]

Ah yes "The Billboard". The "bible" of show business before it was divided into two publications (Billboard, and Amusement Business. The latter is now defunct).Now there is where we need to start seriously looking for all those bag punching acts that played the variety circuits.

Amen to that.

You know, Dutch, it is a shame that none of these many baggers wrote down or filmed their skills or did anything else to document their abilities. It would have been great to read something from George Herz, A.C Gilbert, The Franks, the Vegges...et al, to know how they did what they did. Mostly I guess they just taught whoever was with them or part of their act, or whomever could spend enough time with them to figure out what they were doing. Seems to be a large gap of recorded knowledge and a great advancement in skill since the "Gus Keller bag punching 1903" and Harry Sebacks, 'Scientific Bag Punching' 1913 came out. I see nothing from 1913 until Dr. Schroeders "Boxing Skills, 1973" about the speed bag, particularly how to use it. Schroeder said he was pretty much self taught, figuring out things on his own. He may or may not have seen the early works, but I suspect he did. As a Ph.D research professor in Kinesiology, I suspect he had run across these works and tried to mimic the pictures, but he never said it if he did. His chapter on speed bag rhythms was very picture intensive, and I thought more text explanations would have been helpful as well as an actual system to write down what was possible, showing every rebound and where the variation points would be to move from one skill to the other.

The more history we find on these past baggers, the more I am convinced we are just trying to rediscover the "lost art" of the bag, for who knows how amazed we would all be to have any of these past baggers show up at a gathering and take a shot under the board. I am glad I took a shot at documenting what skills I had, and need to expand it to document all the variations that I have seen and learned (but no way perfected), since these recent crowd of young guns is coming up with new, unbelievable variations. Some of Speedy Tommy T, G-town fist rolling, Skunk (don't ask..), Vertical bagging...

I just wish there was something from these elder bag masters, AND I can help but believe their spirits are watching, thinking, "Hey, this bunch has potential"

If there is an "ART OF THE BAG II" the story continues, we seriously need to scour the archives of all texts, video and lost entertainment publications to find out about these folks. NO web searches I run on their names really shows up much, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Perhaps we are Speed Bag archeologists, and need to keep digging up the past

[Dutchman]

If we could find the kinescopes of the Sunday afternoon variety shows that populated the TV networks in the 1950's! I vividly remember several bag punching acts being featured. A lot of that history was just tossed out, much as the tremendous amount of old nitrate stock footage that dis intergrated in film vaults. The fact that the "Unusual Occupations" series survived is miraculous. How much material is buried in the Library of Congress? Who really knows?

[rkebles]

Alan, had you heard of this guy ? I think you need to buy this.

The Only Act Using Ten Bags at a Time

http://www.ebay.com/itm/380804936313

Hi,

George Herz was my grandmother's 1st cousin. She always said that he was an acrobat but now I see he was an athlete. He was born in Scranton, PA, and is buried there. He never married as far as I know. His father was Ambrose Herz from Germany and George took over the family business in Southside Scranton when his father passed. If anyone on here did buy the photo's from Ebay, and would be willing to sell the family photo also included in the package please let me know. I bid but missed out. Thanks, Roseann

[paranday]

Hi,

George Herz was my grandmother's 1st cousin. She always said that he was an acrobat but now I see he was an athlete. He was born in Scranton, PA, and is buried there. He never married as far as I know. His father was Ambrose Herz from Germany and George took over the family business in Southside Scranton when his father passed. If anyone on here did buy the photo's from Ebay, and would be willing to sell the family photo also included in the package please let me know. I bid but missed out. Thanks, Roseann

Roseann, maybe if you contact the seller they can forward your message to the buyer. Maybe they would sell you high quality scans of the photos if not the photos themselves. eBay may try to prevent you from sending your email address, you might have to be creative to get around that. Maybe your phone number can be passed more easily. Worth a try, I've had buyers scan stuff for me years ago, when I bid but lost.

Yours is a great story to hear, so happy that you posted here.

[spdyTommyT]

Hi,

George Herz was my grandmother's 1st cousin. She always said that he was an acrobat but now I see he was an athlete. He was born in Scranton, PA, and is buried there. He never married as far as I know. His father was Ambrose Herz from Germany and George took over the family business in Southside Scranton when his father passed. If anyone on here did buy the photo's from Ebay, and would be willing to sell the family photo also included in the package please let me know. I bid but missed out. Thanks, Roseann

Wow I could only wish to be a relation to one of the greats, champions of the past. I have literally had dreams about finding an old set up who’s I don’t know. But it has been a dream. I’d give anything, and I’d make sure your family got it back. Wow just wow and I live in that area now and am planning a trip to see George. In Scranton. Maybe he will tell me where things are. Seriously. I’m sorry you don’t have more memories of this unique man. Be well Roseann and I hope to meet you with gifts one day, thank you TommyT