With great gusto, White Center is embarking on revitalization. Led by the replacement of the 65-year-old war housing at what is now called Greenbridge, street improvements, new businesses coming in, a spanking new Jim Wiley activity center being dedicated, a brand new park and an active group of young people at work seeking a brighter and better town there seems to be exciting fervor in the air.

Browsing through some ancient back copies of the paper last week I spotted a story about a White Center citizen who put our community on the map half a century ago. A prizefighter named Harry "The Kid" Matthews.

Harry Matthews was about the same age as I when I first met him. He lived with his wife and 5-year-old daughter Connie in a house just off Delridge on Myrtle Street. The house is still there and it is where I went to interview him and snap the first picture I ever took for the White Center News. It was in 1952.

I posed Connie wearing one of her Dad's big boxing gloves, hitting her Dad on the jaw.

Deacon Jack Hurley was his near mythical manager and after watching our young pugilist wrap up an impressive record of wins without ever making any real money made a pact with Harry, which gave him half of every fight purse. Win or lose.

Harry grumbled a bit about this but Jack knew his fighter's skills and potential. He knew that there was no money or interest in light heavies. The big money was in the heavyweight division. No matter how many wins Harry had he would never crack open the bank unless he could put his 175 boy in the ring with 210 pound Rocky Marciano, the reigning heavyweight world champ.

He booked the match and White Center celebrated the upcoming event with a banquet in beautiful downtown White Center. We gave Harry a salmon rod and reel and we gave Jack Hurley a fresh 12-pound salmon. He was not amused. He didn't know what to do with it as he lived in the Olympic Hotel.

For entertainment we showed a movie of Harry's glorious victory over Irish Bob Murphy a world ranked light heavy.

When Harry got in the ring with Marciano he dazzled the world and the undefeated champ for the first round. Bobbing and weaving, beating the Brockton brawler badly on points .In the second round he made a fatal error. According to Hurley. "He went amateur on me."

He was baffling Rocky by constantly turning to his left as he danced around. Then he momentarily turned right and got nailed by a murderous left hook .

That power smash sent him crashing onto the canvas. He struggled halfway up by grabbing the ropes but never made it. He was game but out of his class.

Jack later got him into the ring with a burly barrel of a fighter, England's heavyweight champ Don Cockell. He was, coincidentally, from White City near London fighting a Kid from White Center. He outweighed Harry by 25 pounds. They had two fights. The first at Sick's Stadium, the only fight I witnessed, and he lost. He injured his back and could not come out for the eighth round. I was devastated.

His second fight he lost by a decision

That ended his career as a prizefighter .

But he had some other talents. He opened a tavern on Capitol Hill and invented an electric caddy mounted on a rail behind the 50-foot bar so his bartender never had to run back and forth with the beer.

He also invented a device that mounted under a car, which enabled a driver to parallel park in an empty space without jockeying. Push a button and four small wheels dropped down and push another button and the car moved sideways into the space.

It was a big day when Henry Kaiser, dam builder, automaker, came to White Center one day at Harry's request.

The demonstration took place in front of the Roxbury furniture store on 16th Southwest. A huge crowd was on hand to witness this marvelous idea in action.

It worked smooth as glass and we were all awed by our local genius. All but the tycoon. Henry said he liked the idea but there was too much extra weight to haul around and it would cost a fortune in gasoline.

But The Kid was not down for the count yet. He then opened a welding shop (he was very good with a torch) on Delridge near Barton and spent a few years making mail box posts out of heavy chain links welded together.

He died in his sleep in California at the age of 83.

He made us world famous for a while.

Jerry may be reached at publisher@robinsonnews.com