No Max Baer in the Jewish Sports Hall of Fame

kovit · Post by **kovit** » 20 Oct 2007, 08:13

I would like to know after I looked at every Jewish athletes' name in the Sports Jewish Hall of Fame, I was wondering why they didn't induct former World Heavyweight Champion Max Baer, wassup with that?

BoxBuzz · Post by **BoxBuzz** » 20 Oct 2007, 15:32

decagon it appears to me that if you have this sort of detailed knowledge your dedication to the sport borders on disturbing.

Jaclem · Post by **Jaclem** » 21 Oct 2007, 00:33

..decagon is quoting Ray Arcel, who is better known for the quote, but actually it was sports writer bugs baer (no relation) who said it first.

re: max being jewish....i've written here several times on this issue and i'm not going to get into it again. just this..when schmelling fought baer, there was a lot of antagonism because of hitler's raging anti-semitism, so baer came into the ring wearing the star of david on his trunks to add to his being the crowd favorite. shrewd move. he continued to wear it...i'm not sure how long, hell, maybe to the end of his career. i haven't looked at baer/louis for a long time, or baer carnera or baer whoever. those who are curious enough and have these easily available films can check it out.

boxbuzz knows all this, but he just couldn't resist.

Goodnight, Irene · Post by **Goodnight, Irene** » 21 Oct 2007, 00:43

The star of David trunks were present against Louis in 35.

Graham Brett · Post by **Graham Brett** » 21 Oct 2007, 05:49

kovit wrote:I would like to know after I looked at every Jewish athletes' name in the Sports Jewish Hall of Fame, I was wondering why they didn't induct former World Heavyweight Champion Max Baer, wassup with that?

Because he wasnt Jewish. So he shouldnt really be in there.

It wasa marketing tool.

Same with that kid today Greenberg is it. He is not in Baers legue and he is not Jewish either. Well I hear his father is but his mother is a russian christian.

Another marketing tool. Wake up and smell the coffee.

BoxBuzz · Post by **BoxBuzz** » 21 Oct 2007, 12:02

By not acknowleding the source I assumed Decagon had first hand knowldedge .....(since he has browbeat me in the past for not being ultra vigilant when it comes to giving due credit and asking specific permission for words to be used.) I am shocked, dismayed and dissapointed that decagon has some "hypocrtical" dynamics within his personna. Who knew?

I think "Jewish" is both a genetic aspect and a religious aspect correct? Baer had legitimate claim to 1/2 or (possibly less) to one of those aspects. At least from what I have read. So though it may have had some "marketing" seeds it also was semi grounded in reality.

Unless someone else has better knowledge.

Brute · Post by **Brute** » 23 Oct 2007, 03:06

From memory Max was not a practising Jew, but wore the Star of David to annoy Hitler. Like a lot of Americans, Max was probably angry about Avery Brundage leaving a lot of good Jewish American athletes out of the USA Olympic team to the 1932 Berlin Olympics to appease Hitler. So he wore the Star of David against Louis? Hitler was still German Chancellor, wasn't he?

pundit · Post by **pundit** » 24 Oct 2007, 09:19

Brute wrote:From memory Max was not a practising Jew, but wore the Star of David to annoy Hitler. Like a lot of Americans, Max was probably angry about Avery Brundage leaving a lot of good Jewish American athletes out of the USA Olympic team to the 1932 Berlin Olympics to appease Hitler. So he wore the Star of David against Louis? Hitler was still German Chancellor, wasn't he?

It was essentially a marketing tool. Baer had a Jewish grandfather but had grown up in an entirely non-Jewis environment. He wore the Star of David for the first time in 1933 in the "Battle of the Maxes" against German ex-champ Max Schmeling -- only months after Hitler had come to power amidst anti-Jewish violence in Germany. However, people were suspicioius of Baer's marketing trick, hence he vowed to wear the Star of David in EVERY fight from now on -- and he did for a while.

P.S.: the Berlin games were in 1936 only. Baer was in negotitiations with Schemling's management for a re-fight in 1934 IN GERMANY, btw, but the plan fell through after Baer got his shot at Carbera.

wouter · Post by **wouter** » 24 Oct 2007, 10:06

pundit wrote: Baer was in negotitiations with Schemling's management for a re-fight in 1934 IN GERMANY, btw, but the plan fell through after Baer got his shot at Carbera.

The fight was supposed to take place in Amsterdam (which ofcourse isn't in Germany).

pundit · Post by **pundit** » 24 Oct 2007, 10:13

wouter wrote:
pundit wrote: Baer was in negotitiations with Schemling's management for a re-fight in 1934 IN GERMANY, btw, but the plan fell through after Baer got his shot at Carbera.
The fight was supposed to take place in Amsterdam (which ofcourse isn't in Germany).

I thought what they speak in Amsterdam is pretty much a German dialect...

Think you are right -- thanks.

Friedie · Post by **Friedie** » 24 Oct 2007, 10:16

pundit wrote:
P.S.: the Berlin games were in 1936 only. Baer was in negotitiations with Schmeling's management for a re-fight in 1934 IN GERMANY, btw, but the plan fell through after Baer got his shot at Carnera.

The refight Baer/Schmeling was planned as a title-fight one year later in autumn 1935, after Schmeling came back with wins over Walter Neusel and Steve Hamas. Promoter would have been Walter Rothenburg (b.t.w. a half-jew). The location would have been Amsterdam in the Netherlands. But after Baer lost his title surprisingly to James Braddock and another defeat against Joe Louis followed, Schmelings (jewish) Manager Joe Jacobs made a contract for Max to fight Louis instead of Baer cause that - he thought - was a shorter way for Schmeling to regain the title.

pundit · Post by **pundit** » 24 Oct 2007, 10:22

Friedie wrote:
pundit wrote:
P.S.: the Berlin games were in 1936 only. Baer was in negotitiations with Schmeling's management for a re-fight in 1934 IN GERMANY, btw, but the plan fell through after Baer got his shot at Carnera.
The refight Baer/Schmeling was planned as a title-fight one year later in autumn 1935, after Schmeling came back with wins over Walter Neusel and Steve Hamas. Promoter would have been Walter Rothenburg (b.t.w. a half-jew). The location would have been Amsterdam in the Netherlands. But after Baer lost his title surprisingly to James Braddock and another defeat against Joe Louis followed, Schmelings (jewish) Manager Joe Jacobs made a contract for Max to fight Louis instead of Baer cause that - he thought - was a shorter way for Schmeling to regain the title.

Guys you're knocking me out of my boots for the one phrase that I wrote down before checking the facts

-- you're right, too, of course. Baer vs. Schmeling II was not planned for 1934 in Germany, but for 1935 in Amsterdam. Thanks for putting this straight.

Woller · Post by **Woller** » 24 Oct 2007, 11:51

During vacation in Germany this summer I bought Volker Kluge´s book on Max Schemling. It states that Rothenburg actually first tried to have the Schmeling v Baer fight in Berlin, but it was vetoed by the Nazis. Then he tried for Wembley stadium in London, but Baer lost to Braddock before anything got serious.

Woller

Friedie · Post by **Friedie** » 24 Oct 2007, 15:40

A second Baer/Schmeling fight would've been very interesting.

wouter · Post by **wouter** » 25 Oct 2007, 03:47

Decagon wrote:
wouter wrote:
pundit wrote: Baer was in negotitiations with Schemling's management for a re-fight in 1934 IN GERMANY, btw, but the plan fell through after Baer got his shot at Carbera.
The fight was supposed to take place in Amsterdam (which ofcourse isn't in Germany).
A few years later it was.

Yes, the great Dutch army gave the Germans hell for five days.

Brute · Post by **Brute** » 28 Oct 2007, 05:00

pundit wrote:
wouter wrote:
pundit wrote: Baer was in negotitiations with Schemling's management for a re-fight in 1934 IN GERMANY, btw, but the plan fell through after Baer got his shot at Carbera.
The fight was supposed to take place in Amsterdam (which ofcourse isn't in Germany).
I thought what they speak in Amsterdam is pretty much a German dialect...

Think you are right -- thanks.

Dutch is not Deutsch. If you want to push the point, English is a Germanic language.

pundit · Post by **pundit** » 28 Oct 2007, 10:56

Brute wrote:
pundit wrote:
wouter wrote: The fight was supposed to take place in Amsterdam (which ofcourse isn't in Germany).
I thought what they speak in Amsterdam is pretty much a German dialect...

Think you are right -- thanks.
Dutch is not Deutsch.

Thanks for enlightening me

If you want to push the point, English is a Germanic language.

Well yes, but English split away from the continental Germanic languages with the Anglo-Saxon invasion in the 6th and 7th centuries. While Dutch, as far as I know, didn't exist as an own language until the 17th century. Before that it was indeed a German dialect, and I understand it's still fairly similar -- German speakers can read Dutch newspapers, for example, and vice versa.

wouter · Post by **wouter** » 28 Oct 2007, 11:23

pundit wrote:German speakers can read Dutch newspapers, for example, and vice versa.

Very much not true. Altough most of the Dutch can understand German a little, that's only because it's taught in highschool over here.

pundit · Post by **pundit** » 28 Oct 2007, 11:57

wouter wrote:
pundit wrote:German speakers can read Dutch newspapers, for example, and vice versa.
Very much not true. Altough most of the Dutch can understand German a little, that's only because it's taught in highschool over here.

That's what my German friends tell me (that they can read Dutch papers OK, and that it is the only language they can decipher without training).

wouter · Post by **wouter** » 28 Oct 2007, 12:03

pundit wrote:German friends

German FRIENDS???? You'remaking this up, right?

pundit · Post by **pundit** » 28 Oct 2007, 12:08

wouter wrote:
pundit wrote:German friends
German FRIENDS???? You'remaking this up, right?

No -- my cousin is married to a German and lives there.

Jaclem · Post by **Jaclem** » 28 Oct 2007, 15:29

..when i was a kid, dutch and german were interchangeable when my grandfather spoke of them. specifially boxing related - when schmeling and louis fought, he always referred to max as "the dutchman," though of course he knew he was german. I don't know if this was a general thing, or just my grandfather. vaudeville had comedy acts that were often referred to as dutch, but i think they were considerd german, but i'm not sure.

pundit · Post by **pundit** » 28 Oct 2007, 15:58

Decagon wrote:
pundit wrote:friends
He's definitely making it up.

Don't die from jealousy.

dagosd2000 · Post by **dagosd2000** » 29 Oct 2007, 22:45

kovit wrote:I would like to know after I looked at every Jewish athletes' name in the Sports Jewish Hall of Fame, I was wondering why they didn't induct former World Heavyweight Champion Max Baer, wassup with that?

You can also throw this in. Max had made a movie in 1933 with Myrna Loy called The Prizefighter and the Lady. Max was closing in on Carnera's title(Carnera was in the film). The point is MGM produced the film and Louie B. Mayer owned the studio. Max was also thinking of an acting career and Mayer,being Jewish,was the most powerful man in Hollywood. Wear that Star of David Max. After Max lost to Louis a lot of people including the Jewish public thought Max lacked heart and he lost face, and perhaps a big career in the movies.

Maxie's Gal · Post by **Maxie's Gal** » 29 Oct 2007, 23:40

kovit wrote:I would like to know after I looked at every Jewish athletes' name in the Sports Jewish Hall of Fame, I was wondering why they didn't induct former World Heavyweight Champion Max Baer, wassup with that?

I cover Max Baer's Jewishness on my website - http://www.maxbaer.org. - on the FAQs page and I cover his family ancestry in detail on the EARLY YEARS page. My research comes from actual genealogy records at ancestry.com, from records I personally obtained at various state archives, from actual newspaper articles at newspaperarchives.com and from detailed phone conversations with a Baer family historian.

Here's the scoop on Max's Jewishness:
Max was fully half Jewish from his paternal line. However, because "Jewishness" is traced through the maternal line, Max isn't Jewish at all in the eyes of practicing Jews. Max's grandfather, Achille or Aschell Baer, was a Jew from Alsace-Lorraine, France, near the Germany border. The Baer family historian actually visited Alsace-Lorraine and discovered that the Baer family home and the synagogue that Achille's mother would have gone to still exist. The Jewish section of an area cemetery is full of Baer tombstones. Achille Baer emigrated from France to Wyoming Territory about 1864. According to family history, Achille engaged the services of a marriage broker to find a wife. A photograph of Frances "Fanny" Fischl, a Jewess from Prague in Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) caught Achille's eye. The two met and were married, on August 7, 1869 in nearby Laramie, which was still part of the Dakota Territory. It is suspected by family members that the only way the couple could communicate would be in Yiddish, since both came from different countries with far different native tongues. Max's father, Jacob was born in 1875 in Michigan. Jacob married Dora Bales, an Iowa girl of German-Scots-Irish descent on Christmas Eve of 1904 in Nebraska. Jacob and Dora negligently raised their children in the Catholic faith, but allowed the children to practice whatever faith they chose.

Prior to the Schmeling bout, the fight's promoter, Jack Dempsey, and Max's manager, Ancil Hoffman, thought that wearing the Star of David on his trunks would make Max more popular in New York. The press was soon rampant with "is he or isn't he Jewish ?" questions. Max's mother Dora reportedly snapped one day at the endless queries and stated that "You can tell those people in New York that Maxie has got a Jewish father and if that doesn't make him Jewish enough for them, I don't know what will."

Hope this helps,
Cat
http://www.maxbaer.org

No Max Baer in the Jewish Sports Hall of Fame

No Max Baer in the Jewish Sports Hall of Fame

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Re: No Max Baer in the Jewish Sports Hall of Fame

Re: No Max Baer in the Jewish Sports Hall of Fame