The Mercy Home for Negro Orphans is a fictional place based on the orphanage where my mother stayed for a time. The True Vine Baptist Church is a fictional depiction of the church my mother attended as a child living in Elmira.
My father also grew up in Elmira, in a family with limited means. His father left the family to find work in cities outside Elmira. My grandfather worked away from his loved ones, like Otis’s daddy.
The Claremont Hotel was not in Philadelphia, though it is a common hotel name.
The Brown Bomber Box Campaign is also fiction, informed by the marketing and promotion smarts of boxing manager Mike Jacobs, who often found unconventional and inventive ways to raise Joe Louis’s profile with the public.
Inspired by this and other true events, Bird in a Box is mostly a book about the power of the human spirit, and how one man’s triumph brought glory to so many people.
—Andrea Davis Pinkney
REAL PEOPLE AND PLACES IN BIRD IN A BOX
The Apollo Theater. Constructed in 1914 on Harlem’s 125th Street, the Apollo Theater featured live stage shows, often introducing new singers who later would go on to become famous. The theater quickly became known as the place “where stars are born and legends are made.” Ella Fitzgerald got her start at the Apollo as one of the first winners of the popular Amateur Nite at the Apollo talent contests. The Apollo still features up-and-coming singers and is one of Harlem’s noted historic landmarks.
Max Baer (1909–1959). Known as “Madcap Maxie,” Baer was one of the most charismatic boxers of his time. Folks admired Baer for his movie-star good looks and his showmanship in the ring. He was hailed as having one of the hardest punches in heavyweight history. After retiring from boxing, Baer became a screen, radio, and vaudeville actor. Baer was the father of Max Baer Jr., also an actor, known for his role as Jethro on the popular sixties television series The Beverly Hillbillies.
Jack Benny (1894–1974). Jack Benny was a vaudeville stage performer who later became a national radio personality with The Jack Benny Program, a weekly radio show that ran from 1932 to 1948 on NBC and from 1949 to 1955 on CBS. Benny was popular for his comedy routines that often took everyday situations and made them funny. After his radio show, he hosted a popular television program.
James Braddock (1905–1974). James Walter Braddock was known for his powerful right-handed punch, though his boxing career went through several ups and downs. Like many during the Great Depression, Braddock struggled to support his family, and his responsibilities often took him away from boxing. He suffered from injuries to his hands, which also affected his ability to fight consistently. Because of his skill in winning fights in which he was the underdog, Braddock gained the nickname “Cinderella Man.”
Duke Ellington (1899–1974). Edward Kennedy Ellington, called the “King of the Keys” by his fans, was a world-renowned jazz pianist. In 1927 Duke Ellington and His Orchestra began a highly successful run at Harlem’s Cotton Club. He also played at the Savoy Ballroom. Ellington was a leader in swing jazz, and through a career that spanned fifty years, he wrote, produced, and performed thousands of compositions, many of which became hits that remain popular today. These include “Caravan,” “Sophisticated Lady,” and “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing).”
Ella Fitzgerald (1917–1996). Ella Jane Fitzgerald never knew her father and suffered the death of her mother when she was a teenager. Soon afterward, Ella joined the Chick Webb Orchestra. Under Chick’s care, Ella’s career soared. She became a vocal virtuosa, best known for her scat singing. She went on to become one of the leading ladies of jazz, winning more than a dozen Grammy Awards, and in 1979 was named by President Jimmy Carter as one of the most talented American performers who ever lived.
Mike Jacobs (1880–1953). Boxing promoter Michael Strauss Jacobs is said to have been the most powerful promoter in the sport from the mid-1930s until he retired in 1946. Though he was well known in boxing circles, Jacobs’ career took a dramatic turn in 1935 when he met with the managers of Joe Louis, who was an up-and-coming heavyweight contender at that time. Louis had been managed by a group of men from his hometown of Detroit, Michigan, but chose to work with Jacobs as his boxing career gained momentum. The hiring of a private railroad car to take Joe on a tour of exhibition matches really happened. “The Brown Bomber Box Campaign” is a fictional creation, though Jacobs advanced Joe’s profile and fame in many creative ways. It was Mike Jacobs who promised a heavyweight champion title shot to Louis at a time when racial barriers kept black boxers from obtaining a world championship. In 1982 Jacobs was posthumously elected to the World Boxing Hall of Fame, and the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1990.
Bob Pastor (1914–1996). Born in New York City, Pastor was a boxer who became famous for entering the ring twice against heavyweight champion Joe Louis. Pastor was enrolled in New York University, but he gave up college to pursue his career as a fighter. In sixty-five bouts from 1935 to 1942, he had a record of 53–7–5, with seventeen knockouts. Pastor had one fight for the heavyweight title, when he went up against Joe Louis in Detroit on September 20, 1939. After retiring from boxing, Pastor joined the Army, where he trained ski troops.
Charlie Retzlaff (1904–1970). Known by his fans as “The Duluth Dynamiter,” Retzlaff was a heavyweight professional boxer from Duluth, Minnesota, who remained undefeated through his first twenty-one fights.
The Savoy Ballroom. Located in Harlem on Lenox Avenue between 140th and 141st Streets, the Savoy was a popular nightclub and dance spot from 1926 to 1958. Known as “The Home of Happy Feet” by those who frequented the dance floor, the Savoy also featured live jazz orchestra performances and vocal selections that were broadcast live for radio audiences. Swing Time at the Savoy is a fictional radio show name, though each week radio listeners could tune in to enjoy an array of selections coming from the ballroom.
Max Schmeling (1905–2005). German boxer Maximillian Adolph Otto Siegfried Schmeling fought Joe Louis on two occasions. Both fights brought boxing to international attention, because of their social and political significance when the Nazi regime in Germany was at its height. Schmeling was never a supporter of the Nazi party, but he cooperated with the government’s efforts to soften negative views of the Nazis. However, it later became known that Schmeling risked his life to save the lives of two Jewish children in 1938. Schmeling was heavyweight boxing champion of the world between 1930 and 1932.
Jack Sharkey (1902–1994). Born Joseph Paul Zukauskas in Binghamton, New York, Jack Sharkey had solid success in the ring. In an effort to gain more publicity, Zukauskas came up with the stage name Jack Sharkey by combining the names of two of his idols, heavyweight boxing icons Jack Dempsey and Tom Sharkey. Sharkey was a daring fighter who often took on opponents who had more experience than he did. He was the only man with few boxing credentials who was brave enough to face two reputable opponents—prizefighters Jack Dempsey and Joe Louis.
Madam C. J. Walker (1867–1919). Born Sarah Breedlove, Madam C. J. Walker was an entrepreneur who became the first black female millionaire. Walker built an empire by developing and marketing a line of hair-care products for African American women. Walker was also known for her civil rights activism and her philanthropy, leaving two-thirds of her estate to educational institutions and charities, including the NAACP, the Tuskegee Institute, and Bethune-Cookman College.
Fats Waller (1904–1943). Thomas “Fats” Waller was a pianist, bandleader, and jazz musician known for playing stride piano (a jazz piano style) and organ music. He was the son of the pastor of Harlem’s well-attended Abyssinian Baptist Church, where he learned to play the organ. Waller is best known for his recordings of the jazz hits “Honeysuckle Rose” and “Ain’t Misbehavin’.”
Chick Webb (birth year disputed–1939). William Henry “Chick” Webb was a leader in swing jazz. He was born somewhere between 1902 and 1909. As a child, Chick contracted spinal tuberculosis, which stunted his growth and left him with little use of his legs. He w
as less than five feet tall, but he took the music world by storm with his drumming. In 1927, at the suggestion of Duke Ellington, Webb formed a quintet called the Harlem Stompers. He started playing at the Savoy Ballroom, where crowds came to hear his flamboyant drum rhythms. In 1931, he formed the Chick Webb Orchestra. The band became the house band for the Savoy, with such songs as “Stompin’ at the Savoy,” “If Dreams Come True,” and “Blue Lou.” The song “Harlem Congo” was arranged by guitarist Charlie Dixon. It was recorded in November 1937 after it had gained popularity from being performed by Ella Fitzgerald in front of live audiences and played on the radio several months before.
RESOURCES
For further enjoyment:
Adler, David A.
Joe Louis: America’s Fighter.
New York: Harcourt, 2005.
Bak, Richard.
Joe Louis: The Great Black Hope.
Boulder, CO: Taylor Trade Publishing, 1995.
Hughes, Langston.
I Wonder as I Wander - An Autobiographical Journey.
New York: Hill and Wang, 1993.
Libby, Bill.
Joe Louis, The Brown Bomber.
New York: Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Books, 1980.
Lipsyte, Robert.
Joe Louis, A Champ for All America.
New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1994.
Margolick, David.
Beyond Glory: Joe Louis vs. Max Schmeling, and a World on the Brink.
New York: Knopf, 2005.
Mead, Chris.
Champion—Joe Louis, Black Hero in White America.
New York: Scribner, 1985.
Myler, Patrick.
Ring of Hate: Joe Louis vs. Max Schmeling:
The Fight of the Century.
New York: Arcade Publishing, 2006.
Video:
HBO Sports Presents: Boxing’s Best.
Video:
The Great Depression & The New Deal.
Schlessinger Media,
United States History Video Collection, 2003.
Video:
The Joe Louis Story.
Xenon Entertainment Group, 1992.
DISCUSSION GUIDE
List what you’ve learned about Hibernia Lee Tyson. Circle the top three things about her that you believe are the most important to the story.
Decide what are the three most important facts about Willie’s life. Discuss your choices.
What are some things that make Otis feel better? What do you do to feel better? Who takes care of you when you feel bad?
Describe Hibernia’s relationship with her father. Does he seem strict to you or not? What, if anything, do they have in common?
Why does Otis’s dad move to Philadelphia without his family? What does he ask Otis to do for him?
Why does Willie let Ricky Tate knock him out with one punch even though he loves to box?
What happens when Otis’s dad comes home from Philadelphia to visit the family?
Describe the incident that forces Willie to leave his home and arrive at Mercy. Why does his mother stay? What are the long-term effects of this incident on Willie?
True Vine Baptist Church is like a second home to Hibernia. What does Hibernia like most about church? Who joins the congregation, and what does she ask of the pastor?
Describe Mr. Sneed and Mrs. Weiss’s argument as Otis overhears it. Whose philosophy do you agree with more? Which one do most of your teachers subscribe to?
How does the radio become a connection between Otis and Willie? What does it offer to each boy? Is there anything in your life that is as important as the radio?
What does Hibernia discover in her father’s Bible? How does it make her feel? What do you think she should do?
Lila shares the three S’s for gift giving—sincere, soon, and sweet. Do you agree with her? How does Otis’s attempt to use it on Hibernia work out?
What does Willie find on Christmas Eve? In what ways would you compare him to what he found?
Over time, Willie learns to expand the use of his hands. What two things does he learn that help him?
Why does Mr. Sneed snatch the Philco from Otis and Willie? How is he repaid for his cruelty? How is it eventually recovered?
Describe what happens at the Brown Bomber’s Box Campaign. Does this event change Hibernia’s relationship with her father? What does she learn?
Why is the career of Joe Louis so important to the African American community? Is boxing more than just a sporting event or not? Why? How does it bring all the characters in the novel together?
In the end, what happens to each of our characters? Predict where each of them will be in five years. What about in ten? What evidence from the novel makes you think this?
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Writing a novel is like calling folks to a sewing circle and asking each of them to stitch their own unique patches into the quilt you envision. I was blessed with the guidance and advice of many wonderful people who helped me bring Bird in a Box to fruition by lending their time and expertise, and by each providing an important stitch to this book’s tapestry.
I wish to thank Richard Holbrook and Richard Weigle, librarians at New York City’s Paley Center for Media (formerly the Museum of Television and Radio), for allowing me to spend countless hours in the center’s media library archive listening to commentary of Joe Louis fights and for directing me to the proper chronology of boxing matches and those that were the most pivotal in Joe Louis’s career. Thank you, Rachel Dworkin, archivist at the Booth Library, Chemung County Historical Society, for helping me to reconnect with Cyclone Williams through his photographs and letters. Thank you, Joe Mink, sports reporter from the Elmira Star-Gazette, whose writings offered valuable source material on the boxing history of Elmira, New York. True appreciation goes to Craig Hamilton of Jo Sports, Inc., an expert in the field of boxing memorabilia, for finding me a pair of authentic boxing gloves from the late 1930s that I now own and cherish, and for showing me a pair of the actual boxing gloves worn by Joe Louis.
Thank you to the late John Keats, from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications, for reading so many drafts of my works and for offering me one-on-one editing tutorials and advice on the crafting of a novel. Thank you, Keats, for always having an open door.
Rebecca Sherman of Writers House, you are a beacon of good sense, keen editorial insight, and grace. I extend heartfelt thanks to Megan Tingley and everyone at Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, especially to my tremendous editor, Alvina Ling, and also Connie Hsu, for reading countless drafts and revisions, for always coming to me with brilliant ideas for making Bird in a Box better each time, and for encouraging me to dig a little deeper into the novel’s essence and characters. I am appreciative of the fact-checking research assistance of Elizabeth Segal and of the copyediting talents of Pamela Marshall and Marie Salter, who each brought clarity and correctness to the facts and word usage throughout the book.
Thanks to Saho Fujii, for conceiving and designing a gorgeous book jacket. And thank you to Sean Qualls, for bringing my characters to visual life with your evocative illustrations.
The fellowship of writers is an essential tool for an author. Thank you, Marilyn Nelson, and everyone at the Soul Mountain writers’ retreat in East Haddam, Connecticut, for allowing me to inhabit your sacred walls so that I could escape my city life to find the quiet needed for writing and editing.
As an author of historical fiction, I spend countless hours at the library, reading, researching, refining, discovering. I wish to thank those librarians who, through the years, have been “book angels,” providing me with spot-on information and going to the ends of the earth to help me nail the research materials I need. Thank you to my late friend, historian Susan Snedeker, for reading each and every word of my books and for always knowing exactly where to find the correct historical reference information to flesh out my stories.
When writing historical fiction based on one’s family, relatives are
invaluable. Thank you to my aunt Rosa and uncle Darryl Clark, for first introducing me to the photograph of boxer Cyclone Williams and for igniting my interest in his story. Thanks to my cousin, historian and newspaper reporter, Larry Ransey, for sleuthing out facts about Elmira’s boxing history and the history of African American boxers in the upstate and central New York regions. Deep gratitude to my late grandmother, Marjorie Frances Williams, for rounding out the story of Cyclone’s life and aspirations. To my mother, Gwendolyn Davis, and to my late father, Philip J. Davis, thank you for sharing so many stories from our family tree, for providing colorful details of your lives during the Great Depression, and for always encouraging me to share stories with others.
To my children, Chloe and Dobbin, thank you for your continued patience and understanding as Mom spends so many hours glued to her writing desk. And to both of you, for being such astute readers and for offering me your opinions on what works and what doesn’t.
To my incredible husband and soul mate, Brian Pinkney, thank you, my darling, for granting me the time and space to create. Thank you for keeping our kids fed, entertained, happy, and busy on Sundays and late nights when I desperately needed to write, and for allowing me to swim to my heart’s content so that I could enter “the zone” required for crafting a book of this length. Without you, no quilt is worth stitching.
Christine Simmons
ANDREA DAViS PiNKNEY is the New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty books for children, including Sit-In, one of many collaborations with her husband, illustrator Brian Pinkney. They live in Brooklyn, New York, with their two children.
Bird in a Box Page 14