John Martinez and the gloves

By kiki

Around 1977, my son Frankie was fighting the main event at the Olympic Auditorium, and around 8:30, Norm Lockwood came into the dressing room and handed me the gloves. I gloved Frankie up so he could begin warming up. Forty minutes or so later, Lockwood stuck his head in the dressing room and yelled, "ring time" I told Frankie, "let's go," "wait! Wait! I have to take a piss," Frankie said to me; well, we didn't have time to take one glove off so he could take a piss, this fight was on live TV, and the TV people had everything down to the minute, so I looked at my assistant, the late John Martinez, he looked at me. He said, "no, no, no, not me! "I said, "yes, yes, yes, that's what I'm paying you for (I wasn't paying him). I'll wait outside" - Most fighters get butterflies in their stomach; Frankie got 'em in his bladder.

I put my arm around John when they came out of the dressing room. I asked him, "Well, John?" his reply was, "you sonofabitch" I told him, "don't worry, John, I won't tell anybody, and I'll buy you a beer and a hot dog after the fight for been such a nice guy" By the following day all our friend knew about it!!

John and Bob

                                                     John and Bob

By kiki

In 1980 my brother Mando and I were planning a 7-day motorcycle road trip for Memorial Day. About ten days before the start of our trip, I ran into my friend Bob King, and I mentioned our upcoming trip to him; and knowing that he rode a motorcycle, I asked him if he would like to go, he told me he would think about it and that he would get back to me later with an answer. He called me a few days later and said that, yes, he would ride with us. He then asked me if he could invite a friend named John. I told Bob, “of course, invite him and others if you want to.”

We got together at my place on the Saturday morning of the Memorial Day weekend to start our trip. Bob and his friend John came early, and once everybody had arrived and had had some coffee, we got on the road. We rode all over NoCal during the week. By Friday, we were about 150 miles from home. We planned to ride home Saturday, so we needed to find a campground to spend our last night on the road, which we did at Lopez Lake, north of San Barbara.

As we set up our tents, Bob came to me and told me that he and John were heading home that night. I asked him why, and he told me that John had told his live-in girlfriend in the morning that we had started our trip, that he was going to the store to buy the newspaper and cigarettes, and that he would be right back !! So he was gone for a week buying the newspaper and cigarettes … LOL!!!!