Joe Gans

by Colleen Aycock

  The San Francisco Examiner shows boxers in action in one of the first newspaper representations of Joe Gans. Such primitive drawings gave image hungry readers graphics to look at when photographs were not readily available. Depicted as the black boxer, Gans was featured in the lightweight bout with Mike Leonard of New York (the “Beau Brummel of Fistdom”) on May 19, 1897, in the “Olympic Boxing Carnival” showcasing rising stars of the ring at Woodward’s Pavilion. An audience of 2500 paid $2, $3, or $5 seats to view contestants, which included Jim Jeffries in a heavyweight battle with Harry Baker of Chicago. The caption under Gans reads, “Gans Lands His Left.” Leonard and Gans split the $1750 purse although Gans soundly defeated his opponent.

  The last battle of the year, on November 29, was also the last boxing exhibition to be given at the concert hall of the Academy of Music in Baltimore. The evening was filled with unusual entertainment.36 There were 3 preliminary bouts followed by Gans and Englishman Staunton Abbott. No decisions were given by the referees; the crowds determined the contest winners. Herford also introduced a bag-punching contest between the boxers. Frank Farley, known as the “Adonis” of Maryland for his good looks and physique, won a large gold medal for the championship for skillful display on the bag. Gans, who came in second, won a bag, and William Anty won third in the 3-minute contest. After the bag contest Gans left such red marks on Staunton’s face and body from his “terrible straight left jab” followed by right hooks that sent Staunton to the floor that the Englishman’s seconds threw up the sponge after 2 minutes of the 5th round. Gans ended the year in print as the “colored lightweight champion.” At the close of 1897, Gans could already boast of an accomplished career, even though he wouldn’t make his mark in most history books until 1900. And, he had done so as a black man in a white man’s sport. But he was only beginning. The only thing left for him to win was the world’s title. Gans would have to win another year’s worth of fights before New York’s boxing fraternity would bless him as a contender to the throne. But 1898 would see him in a different league. His first fight of the year would take him to Cleveland, Ohio, drawing the largest crowd in the city’s history, in his 20-round bout against Frank Garrard. Police stopped the fight in the 15th round as George Siler (the same referee for the Corbett-Fitzsimmons fight at Carson City) was about to “give the decision to Gans.”37 By the end of the year and after beating “Kid” McPartland in November 1898, The New York Times declared, “He is now in line for a fight with Lavigne and others of the first class.”38

  And so Gans proceeded in a straight line to boxing immortality. Traces of the mystique of fighters in Gans’ day can be found in the expressions used, such as for Kid McCoy’s “cork-screw punch” and Robert Fitzsimmons’ “solar plexus punch,” which became household terms. Barbados Joe Walcott coined the expression “the bigger they are, the harder they fall.” Gans would also be immortalized for coining the phrase “bringing home the bacon” in reference to another battle. And the style and skill that Gans developed, simply called “straight hitting,” would be passed down through the ages.

  In boxing parlance, Gans was known as a “true boxer,” which meant that he put science and craft at the forefront on all occasions. Throughout his boxing career he would be known for his brainy ability to size up and attack his opponent and defend himself with great economy. Boxing authority Tad Dorgan of the New York Evening Journal would summarize his style, “It certainly must be said that Gans, when fully extended is a boxer of rare merit. He never seems to become ruffled when in action. There is no wasted motion about his system of attack. He stands straight, and makes use mainly of short–arm blows. His best punch, probably, is a kind of down chop with the right, and he knows how to send it through the smallest of openings.”39

  Gans’ ring craft laid the foundation for the moves that are taught to this day by boxing trainers throughout the world. Gans was the first to fully realize how much leverage and power could be achieved with a minimum of physical effort. The foundation of Gans’ style was his stance and the balance it provided. Simple in concept, difficult to execute, the Gans stance maintained feet always at 45-degree angles, weight centered so that it could be easily shifted by moving left to right or backward and forward.

  Gans’ ring craft laid the foundation for boxing moves that are taught today. The Old Master demonstrates in Chicago how to pull back from a punch while maintaining perfect balance (Chicago History Museum, Photographer: Chicago Daily News, 1907).

  Jack Johnson, who copied his own stance from Gans, said it was “the key to all scientific boxing.” Gans even predicted Johnson’s rise to the heavyweight throne. “Jack Johnson is also in this class [of straight hitters], and to my mind Johnson will soon be the superior of all the big men.”40 Years later Johnson would predict Joe Louis’ loss to Max Schmeling. “His stance is all wrong. He is open to right hands.” Louis’ was a puncher’s stance, both feet and weight going forward. Gans’ stance, by contrast, was more akin to a fencer’s stance, allowing for mobility and quick escape.

  Gans’ uppercut, ideal for fending off a low charging opponent (Chicago History Museum, Photographer: Chicago Daily News, 1907).

  Today, not only boxing coaches but karate instructors as well are apt to teach the punching techniques and clever defense perfected by the Old Master, Joe Gans. With feet at 45-degree angles, elbows in, a quick twisting motion of body and left hand can shoot a straight jab at an opponent, providing openings for other punches. It is also a defensive move, used to block a right-handed punch. Gans’ quick guard and powerful punch were immortalized in the painting by American artist George Bellows. In Both Members of This Club, the viewer gets a vivid look at the overpowering strength of Joe Gans and his famous “right punch after blocking a lead.”41

  With weight on his back foot, a boxer can cross his right fist through an opponent’s guard or over his left, achieving tremendous force. A quick shift of weight from left to right, hooking the left arm, and POW, a left hook crashes against the opponent’s jaw, or to his mid-section. All of these punches were perfected by Gans. Perhaps the punch Gans developed best was his uppercut, a quick shift right, followed by an upward swing, up and through the opponent’s guard.

  A modern how-to book on boxing reads like a dissertation of the techniques and moves perfected by Joe Gans. Joe may have learned a thing or two from Bob Fitzsimmons and other contemporaries, but in each case he raised what he learned to a higher level. Gans was at ringside when Fitzsimmons first came to Baltimore in 1895. He spent several weeks following the famous future heavyweight champion, studying his moves. The Fitzsimmons uppercut, a brutal blow indeed, was raised to an art form as sophisticated as ballet by Gans. Fitz, standing straight with his head exposed, would trade punches and bull his way until he maneuvered his opponent’s elbow high enough so he could dig a shot under the ribs. Gans, with feet always at perfect 45-degree angles, would time his opponent’s rushes, slip neatly to his right, then drive the uppercut through his opponent’s guard.

  Joe Louis was a disciple of Gans. In the mid 1930s, with Nazi Germany and the “master race” on the upsurge, Louis arose as a black hero who would provide a powerful symbolic victory over Aryan supremacy. When Joe Louis knocked out Max Schmeling in 1938, America rejoiced. The extent to which Joe learned his awesome repertoire of punches from Joe Gans’ “straight-hitting” is commemorated in the Hollywood rendition of The Joe Louis Story. Jack Blackburn, a three-time ring opponent of Joe Gans, is portrayed in the movie as a father figure for Louis. Several times in the movie, in teaching Louis to box, the Blackburn character invokes the name of Joe Gans.

  The accounts of Gans’ ring triumphs in the first decade of his career indicate that for the most part he dominated his opposition, scoring knockouts at will, sometimes carrying an opponent just to provide a longer show for the paying public. Early on, the papers started a steady stream of references to Gans’ “cleverness.” The newspapers wrote of Gans as if he were some ring magician. He handled his oppone
nts as easily as the Harlem Globetrotters handle their basketball opponents. As one reporter summarized his ability as a prize-fighter, “Gans had it all his own way, he could have dropped his man at any stage of the game.”42

  In addition to his boxing science, Gans was known for his iron-man endurance. Today, a professional boxer’s training regimen includes running three to five miles in the morning, skipping rope, hitting a variety of bags, and sparring. Running develops endurance and “wind,” rope skipping develops balance and timing for footwork, and bag-work develops punching ability and hand-eye coordination. Boxers today may also utilize weight training to build strength. Training has gone high-tech in the 21st century. Yet the maximum number of rounds in the present day is twelve, which in Gans’ day was considered a short fight.

  In the day of “finish fights” and 45-round bouts, boxers would regularly do ten to twenty miles of road work per day. Fighters from the Gans era expressed criticism of the “sissified” depression-era fighters who trained with headgear and 16-ounce gloves. Boxers transitioning from the bare-knuckle era typically wore 5-ounce gloves, like ski gloves today. Boxers in the thirties didn’t learn how to block or slip punches, according the old-timers, because in training they would let punches graze their heads, not worried about cuts because of the security provided by the extra padding. It is amusing to think of depression-era fighters as “pampered,” as they were described by men from Gans’ era.

  Gans had the ability to fight 40 rounds and more against top opposition and emerge without a mark on his face. Today there is hardly a brisk fight without cuts or bloodshed. It is more due to the deterioration of defense than to the improvement in hitting ability. Gans’ career provided one of the best proofs that necessity is the mother of invention. He fought the toughest, hardest hitting men of his day, and usually fought an average of two fights a month. He needed to replenish his funds constantly because of his greedy manager and the fact that he usually got the short end of the stick because he was black.

  And so it went for Gans, who won almost 100 recorded fights before he was ever allowed a title match, a majority by knockout. Some ring historians credit him with a higher total. Before the turn of the century, he had lost two disputed decisions and one brawl against George “Elbows” McFadden, one of the dirtiest fighters in the history of the ring. He later beat McFadden and also avenged his two disputed losses. By the dawn of the 20th century, Gans was the top lightweight contender, poised for the rocky ride that would be the strange year 1900.

  6

  Saving an Eye, Losing a Title

  Broadway turns into Highway 130 leaving New York City. The famed street has been called the “graveyard of hopes” and the “front porch of opportunity.” As it rolls westward, the road leads to Buffalo, which in 1900 was the home of 25-year-old Frank Erne, the Swiss-born world lightweight champion of the day. Erne was a fistic luminary in the Northeast, having gone undefeated in the prize ring from 1891 until 1897. In ’94 he battled to draws against famed boxers George Siddons and Solly Smith. In ’95 he battled to a standstill both George Dixon and Young Griffo. Down in Baltimore the black phenom Joe Gans also fought both George Siddons and Young Griffo to draws. In a rematch with Siddons, November 28, 1896, Gans knocked him out in the 7th round. Gans won his next four matches before March of 1896, but was still awaiting the chance to fight the now-famous Erne.

  Heading for a Show-Down

  These two rising stars both began prizefighting in 1891 and were of similar ages, Gans only a year older. They had been scheduled to meet at the Manhattan Athletic Club on March 12, 1896, the Marylander’s first opportunity to fight in New York. Dal Hawkins was originally scheduled to fight Erne that day, but when Hawkins dropped out, Herford grabbed the date for Gans. However, the 1896 Gans-Erne bout would not take place. Gans wife died suddenly, leaving behind two small children. Herford wired Erne’s manager saying that Gans would not be able to make the weight agreed upon due to the pressure of his personal affairs. Gans could not go into training to reduce an extra pound and a half. Erne answered through his manager that he would fight Gans at “any weight.”1 Herford took the offer at its face value, but when Gans and his manager arrived at the clubhouse for the fight, Erne was not there. Gans would have to wait four more years before getting another opportunity to fight Erne, when it would then be for the lightweight title.

  After skipping out on the ’96 match with Gans, Frank Erne beat George Dixon on November 26, 1897, to claim the featherweight championship.2 He earned a chance at the lightweight title but it slipped through his gloves in a draw with champion George “Kid” Lavigne on September 29, 1898. Lavigne had won the world title in London, in June 1896, in an elimination bout against Dick Burge. (The initial title holder under the Marquis of Queensberry rules, Jack McAuliffe, had retired undefeated.) Lavigne, aka the “Saginaw Kid,” was a formidable title-holder (and also a newsmaker when Andy Bowen died after their bout at the Auditorium Athletic Club in New Orleans in 1894). Lavigne successfully defended his title 11 times over three years against such tough opponents as Jack Everhardt, Kid McPartland, Eddie Connolly, Joe Walcott, and Jack Daly. Gans tried unsuccessfully to get a match with Lavigne during his title reign.3 Erne fought a rematch with “The Kid” and won the title on July 3, 1899, in a battle that saw Erne decisively beat Lavigne over twenty rounds. For Gans to have an opportunity at the title after Erne’s win was no small feat. It was more like a miracle, one that Gans owed to the magic of his manager. Unlike Lavigne, who entertained numerous title contenders, Erne allowed only two challenges to his hard-won championship during his reign, one given to “New York” Jack O’Brien, on December 4, 1899, and the other to Joe Gans.

  It was indeed a great time to be a champion. In the age of ragtime and syncopated rhythms, New York’s Broadway stages were graced by actresses of overpowering sensuality, such as Evelyn Nesbit, who inspired both the images of the Gibson Girl and the girl in the red velvet swing.4 Their raw sexuality was matched in the realm of male sex symbols only by professional boxers. Gentleman Jim Corbett (frequently described as a tall, broad-shouldered statue of ivory), Frank Erne, John L. Sullivan, and other white pugilistic champions were the rock stars of the era.5 Their fame drew box-office dollars to theaters where their lectures, exhibitions, or mere appearance (half-naked in their boxing attire) were sensational attractions for society crowds stepping out of the Victorian era. The handsome Erne was considered not only one of the greatest fighters in the world, but also an up-and-coming stage superstar. And, during his world title reign, he was determined to keep both his good looks and his crown.

  In 1900 so much attention and talent was concentrated on the lightweight battlers of the ring that the world lightweight championship was as coveted as the heavyweight title. As one Baltimore writer put it, when interest shifted from the heavyweights to the lights, the lightweight limit provided the perfect specimen for the sport in that it “precludes the idea of lumbering heft or insignificant smallness.”6 During the last two decades of the nineteenth century, boxing was dominated by a quartet of great heavyweights: John L. Sullivan, Jim Corbett, Bob Fitzsimmons, and James J. Jeffries. By 1900, when Joe Gans received his first title shot, Jeffries’ reign was dull from lack of competition, and the heavyweight division boasted no new blood to speak of other than in the up-and-comer named Jack Johnson who would one day set the world on fire with his cool and deadly boxing skills and his fast life. Johnson would not win the world heavyweight title until 1908 in Australia and would not fight Jim Jeffries in America until 1910.

  In 1900, fistic enthusiasts recognized the little giants more so than at any time before or since. Frank Erne was one of the titans among the lightweights, regarded by many as the best fighter, pound-for-pound, plying his trade at that time. And of course there was Joe Gans, who had fought a long and hard road for a decade in search of his place in the sun in American life and boxing history.

  In that day, the weight categories in which professional pugilists sough
t championships were quite fewer than the plethora of weight classes and associations of today. By 2007 Ring magazine listed some 60 so-called world champions. In 1900 there were only six world boxing titles.7 Furthermore, the best fighters were in the lower-weight classes. Jack Johnson, the greatest heavyweight of the early century, has stated that the smaller battlers—Gans, Walcott, and Dixon—were the greatest fighters ever.

  Overcoming the Color Barrier

  Before Gans won his title shot, a type of apartheid ruled boxing, wherein white champions “drew the color line.” After 1892, black fighters were for the most part simply not given the chance to insult the white race by being a champion in the manly art of self-defense. After Canadian-born George “Little Chocolate” Dixon defeated the white boxer Jack Skelly in the same New Orleans tournament where John L. Sullivan lost his heavyweight crown to Gentleman Jim Corbett, the New York Herald wrote, “The colored people on the (New Orleans) levees are so triumphant over the victory of the negro last night that they are loudly proclaiming the superiority of their race, to the great scandal of the whites, who declare that they should not be encouraged to entertain even feelings of equality, much less of superiority.”8 So when Gans earned his title shot against Erne, widely regarded at the time as perhaps the world’s best fighter, it was nothing less than remarkable. As several proponents of keeping the “color line” distinct stated, they did not approve of “mixing the coffee with the cream in the boxing ring.” But Herford was making friends with the match-makers.