A History of Women's Boxing

by Malissa Smith

41. “Women Boxers Stir Emotions in Even Bout.” Redlands Daily Facts, March 10, 1977, p. 12. [Newspapers.com]

  42. “‘Princess’ to Seek Work Welter Crown.” Times Standard, March 17, 1977, p. 15. [Newspapers.com]

  43. Sue TL Fox. “The Father of Women’s Boxing: Bill Dickson.” Women Boxing Archive Network. May 20, 1999. [WBAN.com]

  44. Sue TL Fox has a partial copy of the letter sent to Theresa Kibby on the Women Boxing Archive Network website. [WBAN.com]

  45. “Big Money for Lavonne.” Nevada Evening Gazette, May 15, 1977, p.17. [Newspapers.com]

  46. Don Terbush. “‘Princess’ Hit Jackpot.” Times Standard, April 24, 1977, p. 17. [Newspapers.com]

  47. Independent Press-Telegram, April 17, 1977, p. S6. [Newspapers.com]

  48. Sue TL Fox. “In Sue Fox’s Own Words.” Women Boxing Archive Network. [WBAN.com]

  49. Pedro Abigantus. “The Sweet Science, A Woman’s Place Is in the Ring.” Chicago Sun-Times, February 7, 1994, p. 94. [Newslibrary.com]

  50. Lacy J. Banks. “Women’s Matches Stir Furor.” Chicago Sun-Times, July 27, 1987, p. 118. [Newslibrary.com]

  51. “Women Boxer Banned in Cincinnati Rings.” Hays Daily News, January 2, 1977, p. 18. [Newspapers.com]

  52. Malissa Smith interview with Sue TL Fox, September 27, 2013.

  53. Sue TL Fox. “Women’s Boxing World Ratings 1977–1986.” Women Boxing Archive Network. [WBAN.com]

  54. “Shades of Muhammad Ali!” Silina Journal, December 20, 1976, p. 1. [Newspapers.com]

  55. “Gilmore Repaid Thoughtful Young Girl’s Help.” Corpus Christi Times, January 24, 1977, p. 38. [Newspapers.com]

  56. “Amber Hunt Loses 1st Bout to Bobby Banks in Salt Lake.” Ogden Standard-Examiner, February 19, 1977, p. 7. [Newspapers.com]

  57. “Amber Jim Files Suit.” Ogden Standard-Examiner, November 22, 1977, p. 16. [Newspapers.com]

  58. Kelly McBride. “Young Girl Aspires to Greatness in Era Filled with Possibilities.” Spokesman-Review, March 23, 1997, p. B13. [Newslibrary.com]

  59. “Women Practice Boxing.” Reading Eagle, p. 63. [Googlenews.com]

  60. “Female Boxers Bitter.” Rapid City Journal, April 8, 1978, p. 11. [WBAN.com]

  61. “Judge KOs Lady Boxer.” Ludington Daily News, February 9, 1982.

  62. “Woman Boxer Not Afraid of Men.” Daily Leader, January 21, 1982.

  63. “Battles Sex Bias in Ring.” Argus-Press, January 21, 1982.

  64. Ibid.

  65. Lafler v. Athletic Bd. of Control. No. G82-45 CA1. United States District Court, W.D. Michigan, S. D.

  66. “Female Barred from Competition: Boxer Disappointed at Ruling.” Times Daily, February 12, 1982.

  Chapter 8

  These Ladies Love the Ring

  You know that in five years of research at the University of Arizona, they’ve found that women’s pain tolerance is higher than men’s and that their leg strength, pound for pound, is stronger than men. It all revolves around childbirth. I tell you, women’s boxing is going to catch on.

  —Lady Tyger Trimiar, 1980[1]

  I always respected women and have been a supporter of women’s lib. But in the boxing ring, no. I can’t stand to see women cutting each other up and spilling blood in the ring.

  —Floyd Patterson, commissioner, New York State Athletic Commission, 1978[2]

  As the decade of the 1970s came to a close, it was hard to believe that women’s boxing had come so far in such a short span of time. Multiple jurisdictions had legalized the sport and women were successfully pushing the limits—even extending bouts from four round to upwards of ten rounds. Women were continuing to sue for the right to box in those locales where boxing was still restricted to only men, and there was a sense that their lawsuits would eventually prevail, given the recent track record.

  Watching Barbra Streisand on the big screen in her comedic turn as a boxing manager in her 1979 film The Main Event may well have seemed incongruent, but—if nothing else—it was a commentary on the changes that had been wrought over the decade: Women had gained the right to be inside velvet ropes and were planning to stay.

  Even public television had broached the subject when they aired a documentary by filmmaker Jane Warrenbrand entitled Cat, A Woman Who Fought Back, tracing Cathy “Cat” Davis’s journey to become a licensed boxer in the state of New York. The film went so far as to show Cat in the ring—giving audiences who might otherwise never have observed a gloved female bout the opportunity to watch a women’s fight in action.

  New women’s boxing organizations sprang up: conferring championship titles, promoting opportunities, and advocating for the sport. Those female fighters who had managed to stay in the game through the late 1970s were now poised to benefit by winning championships and finding themselves with a greater number of venues to ply their trade.

  By the early 1980s, however, the women’s side of boxing began to perceptibly fall off the radar. It was no longer a new sensation, and while fights still played out in local markets and even ended up on television, there seemed very little indication that the sport would continue to grow in popularity. Women’s boxing was also succumbing to the kinds of controversies that had long plagued the men’s side of the game, even touching women’s boxing’s first national star, Cathy “Cat” Davis.

  Such things as fixing fights, mismatches, overstating fight records, and other unsavory aspects of the business infiltrated women’s boxing, sullying whatever positives there were in the sport, and making it more difficult to gain recognition and acceptance. The major promoters of the day also steered clear of women’s fights, questioning the quality of the fighting and the amount of money that could be made. The downturn in the economy and a falloff in support for men’s boxing may also have played into the calculus of the decline.

  The period at the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s also saw the rise of Toughman and Toughwoman fighting contests, pitting novice boxers against each other (some of whom were less than novices, having had no training whatsoever). As a test of strength, fortitude, and as some would say, stupidity, the contests were wildly popular. For many women they offered an opportunity to actually box (after a fashion), and had tremendous appeal for women fighters who were having difficulty finding boxing matches—not only for the fun of it, but as a chance to earn cash prizes.

  As the decade progressed, and the fitness craze that had begun in the 1970s began to truly take hold, boxing also became popular as a form of exercise with more and more gyms offering opportunities for women to hit the bag. This included some of the more serious boxing gyms that found the general decline of interest in boxing meant there were fewer men coming into the gyms. By opening their doors to a new female clientele these gyms were not only bringing in a greater cash flow, but also catering to an entirely untapped market of enthusiasm for the sport—an enthusiasm that was to have an effect on gym-based competition as it entered the “white collar” era.

  The Good and the Bad: Boxing’s First “Golden” Girl

  Cathy “Cat” Davis began making a name for herself in boxing in 1976. Originally from Winnfield, Louisiana, she had fenced at Louisiana State University and won several championships (some sources claim she went to the University of New Orleans).[3] The five-foot, ten-inch blonde with Farrah Fawcett hair initially got interested in boxing to cross-train for fencing and as a form of exercise. She moved to New York to further her fencing opportunities and for a hoped-for fencing scholarship, and eventually met up with trainer Sal Algieri who coached youngsters at a local PAL club in Hopewell Junction, New York, about thirty minutes south of Poughkeepsie.

  Algieri, a former boxer with a checkered past (having admitted to taking a fall in at least one fight in Sydney, Australia), had been a spectator at the 1975 fight in Connecticut between Lady Tyger and Gwen Gemini. A few weeks after the fight, Algieri put out a call—published in the Evening News in nearby Beacon, New York—“recruiting women between the ages of 17 and 22” who were “interested
in becoming professional women boxers.” He told the paper he believed “women’s professional boxing will become a big thing in the United States in the near future.”[4] While he subsequently denigrated the skills of both Lady Tyger and Gwen Gemini, telling a reporter “both of them didn’t know what they were doing,” he had been clearly hooked on the potential of bringing female boxers into the sport as professionals at the time he placed the notice in the paper.[5]

  Responding to an inquiry from Cat Davis, Algieri was immediately smitten and began training her at his gym in Hopewell Junction. Given that Davis was already a competitive athlete who’d been an admitted tomboy growing up, she caught on very quickly, impressing Algieri with her work ethic and her strong left jab.

  Soon Algieri began arranging exhibition fights for her. He also helped set up the Women’s Boxing Federation (WBF)—in part (as has been substantiated) to promote Davis’s fights and provide a mechanism to confer championship titles, a very smart bit of promotion. Al “Scoop” Gallello, a former boxer, well-known boxing “operator,” and Sal Algieri’s former manager when he fought in the pros, was tapped to head the WBF while Algieri was listed as a consultant.[6]

  As previously noted, Davis fought Bobbi Shane in Portland, Maine, in May 1976—winning by KO. Although it was not Davis’s debut fight, it is the first fight listed on her current record of fights. Unofficially, she had also fought a woman named Jean Silver, defeating her by KO in the second round, although not much else is known.

  Her next official contest was negotiated as an eight-round “championship” match in Seattle, Washington, against Nickie Hanson (or Hansen), allegedly an Arizona-based fighter. A press release issued before the fight by the promoter Global Productions Limited had claimed that Davis and Hanson were “two of the finest women fighters in the world,” and further claimed that Nickie Hanson had a 7-0 record coming into the bout. (Very little other information has been uncovered about Hanson except that she also lost a fight to Davis the following April in Pennsylvania.)

  The press release also provided further information on the WBF, noting it as “a recently-formed organization created to bring some form to the rapidly-growing area of women’s boxing.” It also claimed the WBF’s four directors were “former featherweight champ Willie Pep, Al Braverman, Paddy Flood and Dee Knuckles” with the note that Knuckles also served “as co-chairman for the WBF’s West Coast affairs.”[7]

  The crowd at the venue numbered eight thousand on fight night, with a lot of expectant fans eager to see an eight-round women’s title bout. Hanson didn’t last long, though, going down by KO in the second round of the fight to give Davis the WBF lightweight title. Once Davis’s win was made official by the ring announcer, she was “presented with a five-foot-high championship trophy” conferred upon her by the WBF.[8]

  Prior to and after Davis’s fight with Hanson, Algieri put together other matches for her, for which she was getting paid anywhere from $200 to $500 per fight, plus expenses in some instances. By this point the two had also become romantically involved—their intended nuptials were announced in a Liz Smith gossip column, a testament to how quickly Davis’s star rose.

  Boxing Promoter Lou Duva, looking to see what women’s boxing was all about, took an interest in Davis shortly after the Hanson fight in June. He had seen Davis knock out Las Vegas-based fighter Joanna Lutz after only nineteen seconds of the second round of a bout held at the Silver Slipper.[9] Duva had been struck by the exuberant fight fans that were overflowing the second-floor venue and was eager to translate some of that success to women’s fights on the East Coast. He had it in mind to put together an exhibition bout between Cat Davis and Arizonian Jean Lange (the same Jean Lange who fought Carol Svendsen).[10] The plan was to hold the event outdoors at the Hinchliffe Stadium in Patterson, New Jersey, and then contact Athletic Commissioner Althea Gibson to see about getting the bout sanctioned on that basis.

  Gibson, who’d been taught to box by her father and had already weighed in on women’s boxing in California, agreed to give it a go. Before a crowd of twenty-four hundred excited fans, Davis and Lange squared off in a four-round exhibition that was a co-feature of the main event.

  Lange proved no match for Davis and was felled by a stiff left jab that had followed “two rights to Lange’s chin.” The combination of punches sent Lange to the canvas twenty seconds into the second round. A reporter speaking with Gill Fuller, an associate of Althea Gibson, quoted him in a less-than-flattering article about the bout: “[Gibson] said she would have to take a long look at any other women to be sure they were really fighters before she sanctioned any other bouts.”

  Duva, on the other hand, was ecstatic, while his son Don Duva gushed, “We had one of our largest crowds ever because of the women.”[11] Years later, Lou Duva said that Althea Gibson and the then New York State boxing commissioner James Farley Jr. met in a room at the stadium after the fight to talk about whether to confer licenses on female fighters. Duva said, “I honestly thought it was better for women to go into the amateur shows or the Olympics rather than go right into professional [boxing]. They needed to have more experience. Then you could go ahead and issue them a license.”[12]

  Davis, who was beginning to gain notoriety, continued to fight—most notably with Margie Dunson in a series of four contests that spanned the twelve months from November 1976 to November 1977. In that period Davis also amassed an impressive record of wins, but it was difficult to know which fights were actually sanctioned professional bouts and which were only exhibitions, given that Algieri, through the WBF, maintained the records.

  The first bout between Davis and Dunson was held in Dunson’s hometown of Portland, Maine, at the Exposition Building. Cat Davis was able to defeat her handily, taking the fight by KO in the third round. Dunson had previously fought Lady Tyger and Gwen Hibbler, losing both bouts. It is unknown what other fights she might have had before meeting Davis, or what boxing experience, if any, she’d had before launching her professional career.

  Their next meeting was in Allentown, Pennsylvania, in February 1977. That bout ended when “Davis floored Dunson after 48 seconds were gone in the second round of a bout scheduled for six, two-minute rounds.”

  Dunson had just “stunned Davis with a hard right to the blonde’s left eye, [when] Davis countered with a left-right combination, sending Dunson to the deck for the full count.” Dunson was apparently flattened by the blow and was said to have needed help not only getting back to her corner, but to the dressing room.

  The bout had been promoted by John Florio and was another case where a Davis fight was the featured bout on the card alongside the main event. Florio claimed having the Davis v. Dunson fight brought in double the usual number of fight fans, and he promised to put on more women’s bouts in the future.[13]

  Davis and Dunson also fought a month later at the Wagner Ballroom in Philadelphia. This time around the contest was promoted by Barry McCall, with Dunson losing by KO at 1:54 into the third round—her third straight loss to Davis. A hand-typed note about the battle by an unknown writer described Davis as having thrown a “series of overhand rights until Dunson went down,” although Davis ended up “with a swollen knuckle on her right hand from banging Dunsons [sic] face.”[14]

  Their fourth and final fight was set for November 11, 1977, in Fayetteville, North Carolina—a co-feature under the main event: a heavyweight bout between Sandman Parker and Terry Denny. Both women were listed on the advertisements as “Women World Champs”: Cat Davis as a lightweight champion and Margie Dunson as a welterweight champion. As confirmed by the November Women’s World Federations rankings in Boxing Illustrated, both were title holders, although where and when Dunson had “won” her title was a mystery, given her purported win-loss record.

  The fight card, promoted by Ringside Promotions Limited, was only the second fight night in the state of North Carolina since boxing was legalized (the state had banned the sport in 1890). As could be readily predicted, Davis was victorious agai
n—this time taking “exactly 2 minutes 34 seconds of the first round” to send Dunson to the canvas. Speaking with a reporter, Davis explained her win saying, “I know that if you put two boxers out there and one has four or five years’ experience and the other is just starting you’re going to have a boring match.”[15] Given that the pair had started out in boxing at around the same time and had already fought three previous times, it was not hard to surmise that Davis’s explanation was disingenuous at best. Both women were, however, being paid and questions about the manner in which Davis won her bouts were raised again and again as her career continued.

  In parallel with her boxing outside New York State, as early as March 1976 Cat Davis had applied for a license to box in New York State, but was turned down. She applied again in June 1977, and with no license in the offing, Algieri helped her obtain counsel to see what her options might be. In the end Davis and her team decided to pick up the gauntlet—first thrown down by Jackie Tonawanda and Lady Tyger Trimiar in 1975—and sue the New York State Athletic Commission (NYSAC) in 1977. She was able to prevail and won her suit six months later in December.

  Davis’s case had been predicated on two separate points. The first contention was that the regulation of boxing was not within the scope of the NYSAC. The second and more potent contention was that she was being denied equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution and Section 11 of Article I of the New York State Constitution, the same argument advanced by Jackie Tonawanda (Garrett)—reportedly using the same court papers as the basis for the suit.[16] The NYSAC had countered “that women should not be licensed as boxers for the reason that there is insufficient administrative experience . . . to support the promulgation of boxing standards.” The state further argued “women’s boxing would cause sensationalism and subject women boxers to exploitation.”