Any Fans of Golden Era Boxing?

[HistoryCopper]

I understand that boxing has, rightfully so, lost most of its popularity. Plenty of people don't like it for lots of valid reasons. However, boxing's golden age just happens to coincide with the Golden Era. In the 1920s, Jack Dempsey got more headlines than Babe Ruth. Before that, when Jack Johnson became the first black heavyweight champion, race riots broke out across the country. Joe Louis had his rematch with Max Schmeling in 1938 and an estimated 70 million people tuned in via radio to listen. This is a higher percentage of the population than watched the 2015 Super Bowl which holds the record for most viewed Super Bowl ever. For once, white Americans cheered for a black fighter who took on "Hitler's guy" (though Schmeling actually wasn't a big fan of Hitler). This was, of course, a decade before Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in baseball.

Both of my grandfathers boxed in the military (one Army and one Marine). I learned to box at an early age and did so up until my early 20s, though not professionally as I had neither the skill nor the inclination. They grew up idolizing Jack Dempsey and they ignited a passion for boxing in the 20s and 30s which I still have today. So I was just wondering if anyone else was interested in Golden Age boxers/boxing.

Lee

 

[Fading Fast]

As you noted, I'm not a fan today for many reasons, but followed the sport up through the '80s and have gone back and read about the fights / fighters / boxing's cultural impact in the GE and have watched films of Golden Era boxing. I love how popular it was, how it felt like a real sport and how, for whatever reason, it seemed more competitive with more great fighters going up against each other.

 

[MikeKardec]

My father (53 when I was born) was also a boxer, in his case in the 1920s and then a trainer, second and manager, in the 1930s. He had some modest professional success in small towns across the west but did coach an Army Golden Gloves team that did very well just before he went overseas during WWII. He did a bit of boxing journalism too but, again, it was mining and logging towns, no big cities. I've never boxed more than to punch a bag but I'm very interested just because it was a big part of his life a long time before I was born.

One interesting thing I've learned trying to research his career: Prior to WWII record keeping in the boxing world was VERY spotty. It looks quite buttoned up when you check the records but that's just a thin veneer of the most professional fighters in the best covered cities, which were not always the biggest cities ... professional fights in places like NY and LA could be lost to time simply because of the volume of bouts exceeded the ability to report.

Because people in those days were virtually untraceable, boxers would also use multiple names, each depending on how good they thought they would do against another fighter or based on their perception of their own state of conditioning ... that way they could curry the record of certain "identities" to allow them to seem to have a very good record. My father had several names, sometimes because certain ethnicity were "in" in certain times and places. In the early 1920s Jewish boxers were considered to be notably tough guys up from the streets so he had a Jewish seeming persona, later he reverted to a tried and true Irish sounding name. he also had a name for when he wanted to not be remembered (when he had to fight for the money but, because he wasn't eating well, figured he would lose) and several for when he though the odds were on his side.

 

[HistoryCopper]

That is quite true. Some Jewish fighters fought under Irish names and vice versa. Back then, professional fighters, even title holders, fought 8-10 times a year on occasion which added to the proliferation of big name bouts which drew all the media attention. Today, a professional may fight twice in a year at most. I hate the fact that boxing matches are no longer carried on the radio! (Though SiriusXM did sign a deal with PBC to carry a few bouts.) That said, I'm not a big fan of modern boxing......anything after the mid 1950s, though I do watch on occasion.

One of my grandfathers was 5'6 and maybe weighed 130 pounds if he was soaking wet. He was a fighter pilot in the Marine Corps during WW2 and also boxed. Since he was a Dempsey fan as a kid, he taught me to fight out of a crouch like Dempsey did owing to the fact that I am 6'4 and only around 185 pounds. Naturally I did not get my height from him!

I never had the heart to tell either of my grandfathers, but I kind of liked Gene Tunney more than Jack Dempsey! I fear I may have been disowned if I said that.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I was fascinated by Muhammad Ali growing up, who's probably the last pro boxer to really penetrate the public consciousness to the extent that the fighters of the Era did -- everyone living in the US knew who Ali was, just as everyone in the Era knew who Joe Louis was -- but seeing what happened to him sort of soured me on the sport as a sport.

But I very much enjoy listening to the boxing broadcasts of the Era -- Clem McCarthy was an outstanding sportscaster, and his sense of excitement is such that he even makes the weigh-ins sound compelling. The best fight broadcast I've ever heard, though is the Carnera-Baer fight of June 19, 1934, as called by Graham McNamee. It was McNamee's last big assignment as a sports broadcaster, and he goes out with a real bang. Real edge-of-the-chair listening.

My father was also a boxer, of the canvasback variety, very briefly in the 1960s. Served him right, too.

 

[Fading Fast]

^^^ Always thought that Baer, like the young George Forman and, maybe even, Mike Tyson properly managed - meaning, intelligently managed by someone with his long-term career interests at heart and - equally important - someone that the boxer respects enough that he will follow the manager's advice - could have been one of the best ever. That said, it is possible that Baer just didn't have the dedication, commitment or focus that it takes to be one of the best - but I thought he had the physical skills.

 

[HudsonHawk]

During his day, Joe Louis was probably the most famous athlete in the world. Great heavyweights that followed kept boxing on the front page, but as the heavyweight division has gone to hell, so has boxing's appeal. Few people can tell you who the heavyweight champ is today, even though the man who just lost the title a month ago held it for 15 years. Boxing probably won't regain it's popularity in the US until there's a US heavyweight champion again.

 

[filfoster]

Golden Age boxing, as I understand it, was what the NFL is today, for the average Joe-bucket-from-the-illegal-pony-keg.

 

[bluesmandan]

I love the old boxing matches. I grew up as Ali was retiring, Sugar Ray Leonard popped in and out, and Tyson ruled and we were all begging for the Tyson/Holyfield match that would never happen (until long after it was really relevant!) All the "great" boxers were long gone. I loved to watch Tyson, but his star ingloriously faded with all the craziness and weight gain and jail time, etc. I don't care for Ali at all. Ropadope. Boring and NOT boxing, a borderline cheater imo. But watch an old boxing match... Dempsey, Louis, Tunney, etc... they aren't boring with non-stop clinching. They're actually boxing. Totally different sport in many respects. I'm glad they have different rules today to protect the fighters better, but the "big" matches today aren't worth watching. It's like watching an NFL game with non-stop flags being thrown. Boring and frustrating to watch. I quit watching football years ago. Sigh.

The truth is that these days, for modern sports, I'd rather watch a golf tournament than a boxing match or an NFL game. How retarded is that? ESPN Classics, here I come...

 

[skydog757]

Boxing consumed itself. Instead of five or six weight classes there became scads of them (light welter, bantam, super featherweight, etc.) and just how many sanctioning bodies are there now? By trying to make nearly every card feature a title fight of some kind, being a champion meant very little. Is there really an Undisputed Champion anymore? I used to love boxing, but they just cheapened what it meant to be "The Champ". And the truly great fighters really don't want to fight one another because they can continue to be the champion of the WBA, WBC or whatever and knock over tomato cans for pay per view money. The only major fights that seem to occur anymore are done for the BIG payday towards the end of careers (and the rematches, of course).

It really is a shame, since boxing, horse racing and baseball used to be the major sporting events of the era and they translated perfectly over the radio.

 

[HudsonHawk]

Boxing consumed itself. Instead of five or six weight classes there became scads of them (light welter, bantam, super featherweight, etc.) and just how many sanctioning bodies are there now? By trying to make nearly every card feature a title fight of some kind, being a champion meant very little. Is there really an Undisputed Champion anymore? I used to love boxing, but they just cheapened what it meant to be "The Champ". And the truly great fighters really don't want to fight one another because they can continue to be the champion of the WBA, WBC or whatever and knock over tomato cans for pay per view money. The only major fights that seem to occur anymore are done for the BIG payday towards the end of careers (and the rematches, of course).

It really is a shame, since boxing, horse racing and baseball used to be the major sporting events of the era and they translated perfectly over the radio.

There are currently five "legitimate" championship sanctioning bodies: WBA, WBC, WBO, IBF and The Ring Magazine. Tyson Fury won the WBA, WBO, IBF and Ring titles from Wladimir Klitschko just a few months ago (the IBF stripped Fury of the title because he agreed to a rematch with Klitschko before fighting their #1 contender), and is considered to be the lineal champion or what you might describe as "The Champ". Klitschko held all titles other than WBC for 15 years, and the only reason he didn't hold the WBC title was because he refused to fight it's champion, who happened to be his brother (Vitali Klitschko, current mayor of Kiev, Ukraine). The last few decades has been the most consistent period in the heavyweight division in a very long time.

 

[skydog757]

So there are 5 "legitimate" sanctioning bodies and 17 to 18 different weight classes for a conservative total of 85 separate titles? Plus, there are many Regional Champions within the "legitimate" bodies (North American Boxing Federation, NAB Association, etc.) And every sanctioning body maintains their own list of of contenders and ranks them in whatever order they determine? That's a pretty subjective process. It used to be that a Title Fight was an event; now it's just another Friday night. I respect the individuals who participate and excel in a highly demanding sport, but I just don't care for boxing as I once did. You can point to the rare individuals who own several or most of the titles in their weight class, but the process seems too capricious and finacially driven anymore. Or perhaps I'm more jaded these days.

 

[HudsonHawk]

Yes there are a lot of weight classes, though most have been around well over a century. Sugar Ray Robinson and Rocky Marciano were both "Champs" at the same time and would have never fought each other. Not that I don't agree it gets a bit ridiculous in having so many sanctioning bodies, it's just that it's actually gotten a lot better over the last 20 years or so. No doubt the desire to have more "championship" fights has driven the division. Again, I think if/when there is an American unified heavyweight champ again, I'd expect boxing's appeal to sharply increase.

 

[skydog757]

I agree that boxing needed to clean up it's act, a lot of the scoring seemed ludicrous or had an agenda. I also agree that an American Heavyweight Champion would draw a lot of eyes; people like to see something of themselves reflected in a fighter and Heavyweights tend to get more attention. The most exciting time that I remember in boxing was the Ali/Frazier/Foreman/Holmes/Spinks and Shavers (there were others as well) era. Better to have a number of great fighters rather than just a few. Hearns, Leonard, Duran, Hagler and Benitez kept the 1980's interesting. I still do watch boxing when I don't have to pay $50+, but I don't follow it with the same enthusiasm. There have been some very good fights available on cable, but it's not appointment television for me anymore.

Now Horse Racing's Triple Crown? I never miss 'em.