THE CABOT COVE OF THE DRAGON LADY
Cambria, CA– When I left the house at 10:30 AM, Google Maps, they said the best way to get to Cambria, CA, where boxing promoter Lorraine Chargin’s funeral service was being held, was to drive to Monterey and from that point forward take the Highway 1, the coast highway south to Cambria. Ironically, the last time i drove the coast was a decade ago and at the insistence of Lorraine herself.
WAS I EVEN GOING TO MAKE IT ON TIME?
After three instances of traffic being stopped for construction, there was this clown driving 35 MPH in a no passing zone three cars head. Outside of that, the ride down the coast seemed to take the edge off of the fact that I was going to a funeral service for Mrs. Lorraine Chargin, the wife of promoter Don Chargin, quite simply the “toughest dame” I ever met. From the 1960s until she left us, Lorraine and husband Don, the pair were, to quote a tune from Natalie Cole, the daughter of Nat King Cole, Inseperable!
LOTS OF NIGHTS AT THE SACRAMENTO RADISSON HOTEL
Having worked on and off with the Chargin’s for a quarter century, I remember in 1982 after beating pro prospect Keith Rucker, Don asking me if i wanted to turn pro, I respectfully declined. Soon thereafter, I would meet Lorraine Chargin, of whom I feared even though I had never met her. Think about it, this is a woman who did not shy away from her “Dragon Lady moniker, and as I’m standing at the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium, she’s running the show, and I can see that grown men were either in awe or scared of her.
WAS I ON LOCATION FOR MURDER SHE WROTE?
As I drove into Cambria, I thought I was on the set of the TV show Murder She Wrote. Thinking we were instead in Cabot Cove, MN, I was looking for Angela Lansbury riding her bicycle. After cruising the center of town I made my way to Bramble’s Restaurant, Lorraine’s favorite town eatery and the site of her service.
ONLY ONE FIGHTER I NOTICED PRESENT
There were better than 100 people there, Philadelphia promoter Russell Peltz and his wife, San Francisco surgeon Smith Ketchum, Norm and Debbie Caplan, Richard DeCuir, Miguel Diaz, Bruce Trampler, Richard Schaffer, his Golden Boy crew sans Oscar De La Hoya, and perenial funnyman Stan Gordon, just to name a few attendees. The only former champion of the Chargin’s I ran into was ex-WBA 140 lb. titleholder Loreto Garza.
SPEECHES BROUGHT TEARS TO MANY!
After hearing several people talk glowingly of Mrs. Chargin, and that’s what I called her when there were people in the room that were not “on the in,” I too began acumilating water in my tear ducts. At that point I was ready to succumb to the emotional reality that somebody I knew and respected, that boxing’s Dragon Lady had indeed left the building.
DRIVE BACK LESS STRESSFUL
On my way back home, I thought about some of the fun times Lorraine, myself, Don, and their late business partner Sid Tenner, used to have. In closing, Lorraine Chatgin was described to perfection by the the aforementioned Russell Peltz, “Lorraine was like the old Mafia, if you crossed her, that was it!” Yes boxing fans and famly friends, the Dragon Lady may have left the building, but she will never be forgotten!
Pedro Fernandez