BoxRec

Does anybody know if the late Jack `Doc` Kearns had any recorded fights.

He claims he had quite a few in his younger days but the Doc being the character he was you would have to take it with a large pinch of salt.

Jack Kearns has got to be one of the biggest characters the game has ever known.
Without Kearns we would never now have known Jack Dempsey.
And who`s to say what would have happened to Mickey Walker???

Here you go. There's at least one on record:

http://www.boxrec.com/boxer_display.php?boxer_id=193725

As you point out Kearns does say he had several fights but information is a bit thin as to who and when. A few months ago i collected some news items for a guy who was a good friend of his son and actually met Kearns on a number of occasions.

As far as i remember non of the items I found gave any details of fights.However I am sure that some info must be around given the history of the man and will see if I can find something.

Nice one Rob,
I have read his book `the million dollar gate` which I thought was excellent, and at the moment I`m reading Jack Dempsey`s autobiography, in this he mentions the Doc`s allegations as to the Willard fight and that the book was dropped after a few threats.

But how and when did these allegations by Kearns come out? The million dollar gate as far as I know was written shortly before the Docs death and the Doc was thinking of writing the book with these allegations 30yrs earlier, is there another book by Kearns?

Still looking for some fight details....I have some details about the allegations which I will provide some details on asap. I will email you them also.

I will send you the dempsey articles I have they are quite facinating to read and far to much to do a post on.

I am sure I did read some article about a fight but didn't bother to keep it ...which I regret . No shortage of material on him which comes as no surprise.

Thanks for that Rob

The allegations of the plaster of paris at Dempsey-Willard are bullshit. I do believe I have seen photos of Dempsey putting on the gloves in the ring during that fight.

Boxing Illustrated did a feature in the mid sixties on this, with Cleveland Williams following the pattern as told by Kearns and the result was that the plaster crumbled into dust as soon as he hit the heavy bag.

Yes, both Dempsey and Tunney gloved up in the ring, and as was the custom each camp supervised the other bandaging the hands.

i find it quite amazing that anyone gives any serious consideration to this idea of the plaster under the gloves. i would suggest that people who give this notion the following

get some plaster

bind it around your hands

put some gloves on

thump some thing/one

go to your local doctor

get called an idiot

How about this one? 1962 Ring Record Book, page 206: 3/18/1932, Jack Dempsey "W" vs Jack Kearns, Huntington, W. Va. (may have been exhibition but Nat Fleisher's book does not show it as such)

With the bad feeling between the both of them then I doubt they would have worn gloves