Jack Johnson (boxer)
John Arthur Johnson, 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. His 1910 fight against James J. Jeffries was dubbed the "fight of the century". 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". He is widely regarded as one of the most influential boxers in history.
In 1912, Johnson opened a successful and luxurious "black and tan" restaurant and nightclub in Chicago, which in part was run by his wife, a white woman. Major newspapers of the time soon claimed that Johnson was attacked by the federal 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 federal 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. 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. 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. Johnson later declared that it was thanks to Lewis that he became a boxer.
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.
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 John "Klondike" Haynes, an African American heavyweight known as "The Black Hercules", in Chicago. Klondike, who had declared himself the "Black Heavyweight Champ", won on a technical knockout 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.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 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 because 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.