Jack Johnson (boxer)

John Arthur Johnson (March 31, 1878 – June 10, 1946), nicknamed the "Galveston Giant", was an American boxer who, at the height of the Jim Crow era, became the first black world heavyweight boxing champion (1908–1915). His 1910 fight against James J. Jeffries was dubbed the "fight of the century".John L. Sullivan, cited in: Christopher James Shelton, Historian for The Boxing Amusement Park, Johnson defeated Jeffries, who was white, triggering dozens of race riots across the U.S. According to filmmaker Ken Burns, "for more than thirteen years, Jack Johnson was the most famous and the most notorious African American on Earth".Ken Burns, ''Unforgivable Blackness'' He is widely regarded as one of the most influential boxers in history.

In 1912, Johnson opened a successful and luxurious "black and tan" ( desegregated) restaurant and nightclub, which in part was run by his wife, a white woman. Major newspapers of the time soon claimed that Johnson was attacked by the government only after he became famous as a black man married to a white woman, and was linked to other white women. Johnson was arrested on charges of violating the Mann Act—forbidding one to transport a woman across state lines for "immoral purposes"—a racially motivated charge that embroiled him in controversy for his relationships, including marriages. Sentenced to a year in prison, Johnson fled the country and fought boxing matches abroad for seven years until 1920, when he served his sentence at the federal penitentiary at Leavenworth.

Johnson continued taking paying fights for many years, and operated several other businesses, including lucrative endorsement deals. He died in a car crash in 1946 at the age of 68. In 2018, Johnson was posthumously pardoned by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Early life

Johnson was born on March 31, 1878, the third child of nine born to Henry and Tina Johnson, former slaves who worked service jobs as a janitor and a dishwasher. His father had served as a civilian teamster of the Union's 38th Colored Infantry. He was described by his son as the "most perfect physical specimen that he had ever seen", although Henry had been left with an atrophied right leg from his service in the American Civil War.

Growing up in Galveston, Texas, Johnson attended five years of school.Ward, Geoffrey C. Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson. New York: A.A. Knopf, 2004. Print.PG20. As a young man, Johnson was frail, though, like all of his siblings, he was expected to work.

Although Johnson grew up in the South, he said that segregation was not an issue in the somewhat secluded city of Galveston, as everyone living in the 12th Ward was poor and went through the same struggles.Ward, Geoffrey C. Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson. New York: A.A. Knopf, 2004. Print.PG.21 Johnson remembers growing up with a "gang" of white boys, in which he never felt victimized or excluded. Remembering his childhood, Johnson said: "As I grew up, the white boys were my friends and my pals. I ate with them, played with them and slept at their homes. Their mothers gave me cookies, and I ate at their tables. No one ever taught me that white men were superior to me."

Jack Johnson's mother Tina was a huge influence in Jack's life. When Jack was younger he was known as a coward, and his sister Lucy would protect him. After Jack came home bruised and crying, his mom warned him that if he were to get beat at school, then she would whip him worse at home. Her method was to scare him and for him to learn the lesson that he needed to protect himself. The lesson was received by Jack, as he never lost a fight to a schoolboy again.

After Johnson quit school, he began a job working at the local docks. He made several other attempts at working other jobs around town until one day he made his way to Dallas, finding work at the race track exercising horses. Jack stuck with this job until he found a new apprenticeship with a carriage painter by the name of Walter Lewis. Lewis enjoyed watching friends spar, and Johnson began to learn how to box.Ward, Geoffrey C. Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson. New York: A.A. Knopf, 2004. Print.PG23 Johnson later declared that it was thanks to Lewis that he became a boxer.Ward, Geoffrey C. Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson. New York: A.A. Knopf, 2004. Print.PG24

At 16, Johnson moved to New York City and found living arrangements with Barbados Joe Walcott, a welterweight fighter from the West Indies. Johnson again found work exercising horses for the local stable, until he was fired for exhausting a horse. On his return to Galveston, he was hired as a janitor at a gym owned by German-born heavyweight fighter Herman Bernau. Johnson eventually saved enough money to buy boxing gloves, sparring every chance he got.Ward, Geoffrey C. Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson. New York: A.A. Knopf, 2004. Print.PG26

At one point, Johnson was arrested for brawling with a man named Davie Pearson, a "grown and toughened" man who accused Johnson of turning him in to the police over a game of craps. When both of them were released from jail, they met at the docks, and Johnson beat Pearson before a large crowd. Johnson then fought in a summer boxing league against a man named John "Must Have It" Lee. Because prizefighting was illegal in Texas, the fight was broken up and moved to the beach, where Johnson won his first fight and a prize of one dollar and fifty cents.

Boxing career

Johnson made his debut as a professional boxer on November 1, 1898, in Galveston, when he knocked out Charley Brooks in the second round of a 15-round bout, billed for "The Texas State Middleweight Title". In his third pro fight on May 8, 1899, he faced " Klondike" ( John W. Haynes, or Haines), an African American heavyweight known as "The Black Hercules", in Chicago. Klondike (so called as he was considered a rarity, like the gold in the Klondike), who had declared himself the "Black Heavyweight Champ", won on a technical knockout (TKO) in the fifth round of a scheduled six-rounder.

Johnson vs. Choynski

On February 25, 1901, Johnson fought Joe Choynski in Galveston. Choynski, a popular and experienced heavyweight, knocked out Johnson in the third round. Prizefighting was illegal in Texas at the time and they were both arrested. Bail was set at $5,000, nearly $200,000 in 2023, which neither could afford. The sheriff permitted both fighters to go home at night so long as they agreed to spar in the jail cell. Large crowds gathered to watch the sessions. After 23 days in jail, their bail was reduced to an affordable level and a grand jury refused to indict either man. Johnson later stated that he learned his boxing skills during that jail time. The two would remain friends.

Johnson attested that his success in boxing came from the coaching he received from Choynski. The aging Choynski saw natural talent and determination in Johnson and taught him the nuances of defense, stating: "A man who can move like you should never have to take a punch".

World colored heavyweight champ

By 1903, though Johnson's official record showed him with nine wins against three losses, five draws and two no contests, he had won at least 50 fights against both white and black opponents. Johnson won his first title on February 3, 1903, beating Denver Ed Martin on points in a 20-round match for the World Colored Heavyweight Championship. Johnson held the title until it was vacated when he won the world heavyweight title from Tommy Burns in Sydney, Australia on Boxing Day 1908. His reign of 2,151 days was the third longest in the 60-year-long history of the colored heavyweight title. Only Harry Wills at 3,103 days and Peter Jackson at 3,041 days held the title longer. A three-time colored heavyweight champion, Wills held the title for a total of 3,351 days.

Johnson defended the colored heavyweight title 12 times, which was second only to the 26 times Wills defended the title. While colored champ, he defeated colored ex-champs Denver Ed Martin and Frank Childs again and beat future colored heavyweight champs Sam McVey three times and Sam Langford once. He beat Langford on points in a 15-rounder and never gave him another shot at the title, when he was either colored champ or the world heavyweight champ.

Johnson vs. Jeanette & Langford

Johnson fought Joe Jeanette a total of seven times, all during his reign as colored champion before he became the world's heavyweight champion, winning four times and drawing twice (three of the victories and one draw were newspaper decisions).

After Johnson became the first African-American Heavyweight Champion of the World on December 26, 1908, his World Colored Heavyweight Championship was vacated. Jeanette fought Sam McVey for the title in Paris on February 20, 1909, and was beaten, but he later took the title from McVey in a 49-round bout on April 17 of that year in Paris for a $6,000 purse.

During his reign as world champion, Johnson never again fought Jeanette, despite numerous challenges, and avoided Langford, who won the colored title a record five times. In 1906 Jack Johnson fought Sam Langford. Langford took severe punishment and was knocked down 3 times; however, he lasted the 15-round distance.

On November 27, 1945, Johnson finally stepped back into the ring with Joe Jeanette.

World heavyweight champion

Johnson's efforts to win the world heavyweight title were initially thwarted, as at the time world heavyweight champion James J. Jeffries refused to face him, and retired instead. However, Johnson did fight former champion Bob Fitzsimmons in July 1907, and knocked him out in two rounds.

Johnson finally won the world heavyweight title on December 26, 1908, a full six years after lightweight champion Joe Gans became the first African American boxing champion. Johnson's victory over the reigning world champion, Canadian Tommy Burns, at the Sydney Stadium in Australia, came after following Burns around the world for two years and taunting him in the press for a match. Burns agreed to fight Johnson only after promoters guaranteed him $30,000. The fight lasted fourteen rounds before being stopped by the police in front of over 20,000 spectators, and Johnson was named the winner.

After Johnson's victory over Burns, racial animosity among whites ran so deep that some, including renowned American author Jack London, called for a " Great White Hope" to take the title away from Johnson. While Johnson was heavyweight champion, he was covered more in the press than all other notable black men combined. The lead-up to the bout was peppered with racist press against Johnson. An editorial in the ''New York Times'' ("Pugilists as Race Champions") expressed a concern that the fight would "have the deplorable effect of intensifying racial antagonisms and of making race problems more difficult of solution":

If the black man wins, thousands and thousands of his ignorant brothers will misinterpret his victory as justifying claims to much more than mere physical equality with their white neighbors. If the negro loses, the members of his race will be taunted and irritated rovokedbecause of their champion's downfall.

As title holder, Johnson thus had to face a series of fighters each billed by boxing promoters as a "great white hope", often in exhibition matches. In 1909, he beat Tony Ross, Al Kaufman, and the middleweight champion Stanley Ketchel.

Ketchel and Johnson were friends. The match with Ketchel was originally thought to have been an exhibition, and in fact it was fought by both men that way, until the 12th round, when Ketchel threw a right to Johnson's head, knocking him down. Quickly regaining his feet, and very annoyed, Johnson immediately dashed straight at Ketchell and threw a single punch, an uppercut, a punch for which he was famous, to Ketchel's jaw, knocking him out. The punch knocked out Ketchell's front teeth; Johnson can be seen on film removing them from his glove, where they had been embedded.

"Fight of the Century"

In 1910, former undefeated heavyweight champion James J. Jeffries came out of retirement to challenge Johnson, saying "I am going into this fight for the sole purpose of proving that a white man is better than a Negro". He had not fought in six years and he also had to lose well over 100 pounds to get back to his championship fighting weight. Efforts to persuade Jeffries to "retrieve the honor of the white race" began immediately after the Burns–Johnson fight.Orbach, Barak
The Fight of the Century: On the Exploitation of Social Divides
, ''NYU Journal of Law & Liberty'' (2020) Initially Jeffries had no interest in the fight, being quite happy as an alfalfa farmer. On October 29, 1909, Johnson and Jeffries signed an agreement to "box for the heavyweight championship of the world" and called promoters to bid for the right to orchestrate the event.

In early December 1909, Johnson and Jeffries selected a bid from the nation's top boxing promoters — Tex Rickard and John Gleason. The bid guaranteed a purse of $101,000 () to be divided 75 percent to the winner and 25 percent to the loser, as well as two-thirds of the revenues collected from the sales of the right to film the fight (each boxer received one third of the equity rights). Although it was well understood that a victory for Jeffries was likely to be more profitable than a victory for Johnson, there were no doubts that either way the event would produce record profits. Legal historian Barak Orbach argues that in "an industry that promoted events through the dramatization of rivalries, a championship contest between an iconic representative of the white race and the most notorious lack fighterwas a gold mine".

Jeffries mostly remained hidden from media attention until the day of the fight, while Johnson soaked up the spotlight. John L. Sullivan, who made boxing championships a popular and esteemed spectacle, stated that Johnson was in such good physical shape compared to Jeffries that he would only lose if he had a lack of skill on the day of the fight. Before the fight, Jeffries remarked, "It is my intention to go right after my opponent and knock him out as soon as possible". While his wife added, "I'm not interested in prizefighting but I am interested in my husband's welfare, I do hope this will be his last fight". Johnson's words were "May the best man win".

Racial tension was brewing in the lead up to the fight and to prevent any harm from coming to either boxer, guns were prohibited within the arena along with the sale of alcohol and anyone who was under the effects of alcohol. Apples and all other potential weapons were barred. Behind the racial attitudes which were being instigated by the media was a major investment in gambling for the fight, with 10–7 odds in favor of Jeffries.

The fight took place on July 4, 1910, in front of 20,000 people, at a ring which was built just for the occasion in downtown Reno, Nevada. Jeffries proved unable to impose his will on the younger champion and Johnson dominated the fight. By the 15th round, after Jeffries had been knocked down twice for the first time in his career, Jeffries' corner threw in the towel to end the fight and prevent Jeffries from having a knockout on his record.

Johnson later remarked he knew the fight was over in the 4th round when he landed an uppercut and saw the look on Jeffries face, stating, "I knew what that look meant. The old ship was sinking". Afterwards, Jeffries was humbled by the loss and what he had seen of Johnson in their match. "I could never have whipped Johnson at my best", Jeffries said. "I couldn't have hit him. No, I couldn't have reached him in 1,000 years".

The "Fight of the Century" earned Johnson $65,000 (over $ million in dollars) and silenced the critics, who had belittled Johnson's previous victory over Tommy Burns as "empty", claiming that Burns was a false champion since Jeffries had retired undefeated. John L. Sullivan commented after the fight that Johnson won deservedly, fairly and convincingly,

Riots and aftermath

The outcome of the fight triggered race riots that evening—the Fourth of July—all across the United States, from Texas and Colorado to New York and Washington, D.C. Johnson's victory over Jeffries had dashed white dreams of finding a "great white hope" to defeat him. Many whites felt humiliated by the defeat of Jeffries.

Black Americans, on the other hand, were jubilant and celebrated Johnson's great victory as a victory for racial advancement. Black poet William Waring Cuney later highlighted the black reaction to the fight in his poem "My Lord, What a Morning".

Race riots, initiated by whites and blacks, erupted in New York, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Atlanta, St. Louis, Little Rock and Houston. In all, riots occurred in more than 25 states and 50 cities. At least twenty people were killed in the riots and hundreds more were injured.

Film of the bout

'' The Johnson–Jeffries Fight'' film received more public attention in the United States than any other film to date and for the next five years, until the release of ''The Birth of a Nation''. In the United States, many states and cities banned the exhibition of the Johnson–Jeffries film. The movement to censor Johnson's victory took over the country within three days after the fight.

Two weeks after the match former President Theodore Roosevelt, an avid boxer and fan, wrote an article for '' The Outlook'' in which he supported banning not just moving pictures of boxing matches, but a complete ban on all prize fights in the US. He cited the "crookedness" and gambling that surrounded such contests and that moving pictures have "introduced a new method of money getting and of demoralization".

In 2005, the film of the Jeffries–Johnson "Fight of the Century" was entered into the United States National Film Registry as being worthy of preservation.

The six fights for which the major films were made, starring Johnson, were
# Johnson–Burns, released in 1908
# Johnson–Ketchel, released in 1909
# Johnson–Jeffries, released in 1910
# Johnson–Flynn, released in 1912
# Johnson–Moran, released in 1914
# Johnson–Willard, released in 1915

Maintaining the Color Bar

The color bar remained in effect even under Johnson. Once he was the world's heavyweight champ, Johnson did not fight a black opponent for the first five years of his reign. He denied matches to black heavyweights Joe Jeanette, one of his successors as colored heavyweight champ, Sam Langford, who beat Jeanette for the colored title and the young Harry Wills, who was colored heavyweight champ during the last year of Johnson's reign as world's heavyweight champ.

Blacks were not given a chance at the title because Johnson maintained that he could make more money fighting white boxers. In August 1913, as Johnson neared the end of his reign as world heavyweight champ, there were rumors that he had agreed to fight Langford in Paris for the title, but it did not happen. Johnson alleged that Langford was unable to raise the $30,000 for his guarantee.

Because black boxers with the exception of Johnson had been barred from fighting for the heavyweight championship, Johnson's refusal to fight African-Americans offended the African-American community since the opportunity to fight top white boxers was rare. Jeanette criticized Johnson, saying, "Jack forgot about his old friends after he became champion and drew the color line against his own people."

Johnson v. Johnson

When Johnson finally agreed to take on a black opponent in late 1913, it was not Sam Langford the current colored heavyweight champ that he gave the title shot to. Instead, Johnson chose to take on Battling Jim Johnson, a lesser-known boxer who in 1910 had lost to Langford and had a draw and loss via KO to Sam McVey, the former colored champ. Battling Jim fought former colored champ Joe Jeanette four times between July 19, 1912, and January 21, 1913, and lost all four fights. The only fighter of note who he did beat during that period was the future colored champ Big Bill Tate, whom he KO-ed in the second round of a scheduled 10-round bout. It was Tate's third pro fight.

In November 1913, the International Boxing Union had declared the world heavyweight title held by Jack Johnson to be vacant. The fight, scheduled for 10 rounds, was held on December 19, 1913, in Paris. It was the first time in history that two blacks had fought for the world heavyweight championship

Jack Johnson, the heavyweight champion, and Battling Jim Johnson, another colored pugilist, of Galveston, Texas, met in a 10-round contest here tonight, which ended in a draw. The spectators loudly protested throughout that the men were not fighting, and demanded their money back. Many of them left the hall. The organizers of the fight explained the fiasco by asserting that Jack Johnson's left arm was broken in the third round. There is no confirmation of a report that Jack Johnson had been stabbed and no evidence at the ringside of such an accident. During the first three rounds he was obviously playing with his opponent. After that it was observed that he was only using his right hand. When the fight was over he complained that his arm had been injured. Doctors who made an examination, certified to a slight fracture of the radius of the left arm. The general opinion is that his arm was injured in a wrestling match early in the week, and that a blow tonight caused the fracture of the bone.

Because of the draw, Jack Johnson kept his championship. After the fight, he explained that his left arm was injured in the third round and he could not use it.

Title loss

On April 5, 1915, Johnson lost his title to Jess Willard, a working cowboy from Kansas who started boxing when he was 27 years old. With a crowd of 25,000 at Oriental Park Racetrack in Havana, Cuba

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