BoxRec

>>>whats the name of his autobiography<<

He has a couple of autobiographies and many biographies...one was written in 1960 with a couple of ghost writers and another was written in 1977 with his daughter, the 1977 is simply called "Dempsey," the 1960 is "Dempsey: By the Man Himself." Both are pretty good, but there have been several other biographies written about Dempsey...the best of which is "Jack Dempsey: The Manassa Mauler" by Randy Roberts. Nat Fleischer wrote two seperate bio's as well, one in the 1930s “Jack Dempsey: The Idol of Fistiana” (I think) and the other in 1972 “Jack Dempsey”and Gene Schoor wrote one called "The Jack Dempsey Story." I have all of those, but there are a few that I still need to get, the Roger Kahn "A Flame of Pure Fire,” which I have heard is poorly researched. Toby Smith wrote “Kid Blackie: Jack Dempsey’s Colorado Days,” “The Million Dollar Gate” was by Doc Kearns telling the story. The others are “The Long Count,” “A Pair of Jacks: Jack Dempsey & Son,” “Blood, Sweat and Jack Dempsey,” “When Dempsey Fought Tunney,” “Massacre in the Sun,” and “Round by Round.” So as you see there is an abundance of written material about Dempsey, but the ones that I would suggest would be "Jack Dempsey: The Manassa Mauler" by Randy Roberts, “Jack Dempsey” by Nat Fleischer (1972), Both autobiographies that I mentioned and perhaps a “Kid Blackie,” although I have never seen it so I don’t know how researched it is, but it would seem like it would have had to be very researched since there is not a lot about Dempsey during those years.

theone-- what about louis? certainly he packed a heavy punch.. but yeah this has become off topic..

I have three different autobiographies of Jack Dempsey, all
very interesting. The best biography on Dempsey is by
Randy Roberts, but I don't think that Roberts did enough
research. As a result, there are a number of inaccuracies
and omissions in the said book.

In all of the biographies and autobiographies of Jack
Dempsey, there are accounts of Dempsey's first
bout with Fireman Jim Flynn that don't "jive" with
a ringside report found in a Salt Lake City
newspaper by the late Bob Soderman. For
instance, the ringside report said that Dempsey
was knocked out early in the first round by a right
to the jaw. In other words, Bernie, his brother,
didn't save Jack from more punishment by
throwing in the towel. Moreover, there
was some talk about Dempsey "going into
the tank."

Bob also found that Dempsey had a manager named
A. J. Auerbach at the time of the first bout with Flynn.
Auerbach, a businessman in Salt Lake City, isn't
mentioned in ANY biographies or autobiographies
on Dempsey. While living in Los Angeles during
the 1920s, Dempsey saw a decent middleweight
named Herman Auerbach in action at local
venues. It was mentioned in at least one report
that Herman's father managed Dempsey at one
time.

Think of this.......Dempsey had some other managers
who were characters besides Jack Kearns. Both
Fred Winsor and John "The Barber" Reisler had
interesting careers in the fight game.

Dempsey had TWO managers who had sons who
became decent boxers. Besides Auerbach, there
also was Reisler, whose son, Johnny, fought in
both New York and California during his career.

- Chuck Johnston

Chuck,

very interesting, i appreciate you giving us your 2 cents, i will def. look for that book and take into mind the innacuracies.

It's a great question. There are a number of things to take into consideration. Jack was white, he sold a lot of tickets and really made boxing the number one sport in the world. He embodied how America wanted to see itself at a time when the nation was really on the way up. And as an individual he had a lot of charisma. All these things make it obvious that Jack was always going to be a legend. All these things will have coloured the way his fights were reported on and how he was/is percieved.

BUT... He really took the division on before becoming champ. He cut a swagger through the division a bit liek Louis, Listion and Tyson would. It's is often also forgotten that he wasn't that popular earlier in his career. he was considered to be a draft dodger and this was played up in the Carpentier fight (Georges was a war hero).

I think he's top 10. He should have fought Wills and signed for it twice and Harry was probably just over the brow of his peak by then.

Actually, Dempsey did not become a beloved figure until he uttered those words following his defeat to Tunney..."Honey...I forgot to duck" which seemed then to endear him to everyone.

BrocktonBlockbuster49 wrote: i could go on and on, but fact is

marciano hit harder, his right hand was the hardest punch of the two and ended most of his fights with one punch.
but, fact is dempsey was the greater puncher. just cause marciano hit harder doesnt mean he was a better puncher than dempsey.

One punch knockouts do not necessarily make you a hard puncher. Sven Ottke knocked Anthony Mundine out cold with one shot to the temple. Does that make him a devastating puncher? Shavers landed countless head shots to Tex Cobb and couldn't hurt him, does that mean he doesn't have power? It took Foreman 6 knockdowns to finish Frazier, does that mean he didn't have one punch power?

When taking in anything about a fighter, you must take everything from their careers and fights into account. A fighter coming forward will take more damage from a punch than one standing still, the toughness and willingness of his opponent, the history of KO losses of his opponents career, the number of bouts of his opponents, and so and so forth.

The fact is, Dempsey hurt Willard and Firpo with almost every shot he threw. He kayoed the most guys in the first round at heavy including Fred Fulton in 18 seconds, nobody is even close to his 1st round kayoes. You can really wear a guy down in a long tiring, less than three minute round.

And if you want to go by one punch knockouts, some of Dempsey's have already been mentioned. Sharkey, Tunney was down for 14 seconds from probably the only clean shot Dempsey landed in 20 rounds, Fulton, etc.

barry wrote:Actually, Dempsey did not become a beloved figure until he uttered those words following his defeat to Tunney..."Honey...I forgot to duck" which seemed then to endear him to everyone.

Demspey was really a witty guy, wasn't he? I was like his comment responding to Sharkey's criticism of hitting him when he looked away...

"What was I supposed to do, send him a letter?

Cracks me up every time.

barry wrote:Actually, Dempsey did not become a beloved figure until he uttered those words following his defeat to Tunney..."Honey...I forgot to duck" which seemed then to endear him to everyone.

thats not true.. he was always loved.. thatrs why everyone was rootin for dempsey in the first fight, and why they did not take him in liek they did to dempsey.

Rory McCloskey wrote:

barry wrote:Actually, Dempsey did not become a beloved figure until he uttered those words following his defeat to Tunney..."Honey...I forgot to duck" which seemed then to endear him to everyone.

thats not true.. he was always loved.. thatrs why everyone was rootin for dempsey in the first fight, and why they did not take him in liek they did to dempsey.

In the Carpentier fight jack was not liked by the public. It's hard to appreciate it now but he was not a popular champion at first.

Ezzard wrote:

Rory McCloskey wrote:

barry wrote:Actually, Dempsey did not become a beloved figure until he uttered those words following his defeat to Tunney..."Honey...I forgot to duck" which seemed then to endear him to everyone.

thats not true.. he was always loved.. thatrs why everyone was rootin for dempsey in the first fight, and why they did not take him in liek they did to dempsey.

In the Carpentier fight jack was not liked by the public. It's hard to appreciate it now but he was not a popular champion at first.

That's correct. As I recall Dempsey was generally regarded as a draft dodger, so his management released a publicity photo of Jack working at a shipyard, supposedly during the war. But unfortunately, Jack was wearing shiny black formal shoes, indicating the photo was staged (which it was), and things got even worse for a while. I'm not exactly what helped Jack to become popular, but certainly his ring performances might have helped. And he was very popular by the time he defended against Tunney.

theone-- what about louis? certainly he packed a heavy punch.. but yeah this has become off topic..

Agreed. But he was more of a great combination power puncher. walcott stated that Louis threw harder combintions but marciano was the harder one shot puncher. i believe sharkey said the same about louis and Dempsey.