Bill Farnan

Name: Bill Farnan
Alias: The Foundry Worker
Birth Name: William Francis Farnan
Hometown: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Birthplace: Kyneton, Victoria, Australia
Died: 1891-03-14 (Age:39)
Height: 175cm
Pro Boxer: Record

Bill Farnan was born on September 23rd 1851, at the McIvor Diggings, Victoria, Australia. When he was still a baby his family moved to South Melbourne. Farnan took to working in a foundry after he left school.

His work in the foundry helped him to develop a strong, muscular and powerful body. He continued to work in the foundry during his boxing career, though he would stop working a week before his fights.

Standing at 5'8" tall and weighing around 170 pounds, Farnan was an extremely tough man, who just loved to fight for the sake of fighting, but he was also surprisingly a teetotaller. He developed a reputation for having a murderous punch in each hand. His style was that of a pure slugger, who relied on brute force, immense strength and ferocious power to smash his opponents into oblivion, however his one drawback was that he was slow in the ring. It has been said that three quarters of his TOTAL bouts ended in knockout wins for him.

Farnan's greatest moment of glory happened on July 26th 1884, when aged 32 years old, he took on the immortal Peter Jackson at the Victoria Hall in Bourke street, in Farnan?s home city of Melbourne. At stake was the inaugural heavyweight title of Australia, under Queensberry rules and a side wager of 100 pounds each. In the first round Farnan was knocked down quickly by the Sydney based boxer. He copped plenty of punishment for the first two rounds from the brilliant Jackson who was 23 years old. In the third round however, Farnan's body punches started to trouble Jackson. Near the end of the third round Farnan hit Jackson with a thunderous right hand into his ribs. Jackson was in dire straits when the bell rang to end the round. Jackson was dragged to his corner, and when he couldn't come out for the fourth, Farnan was adjudged the winner by knockout.

Farnan and Jackson had a rematch on September 4th at the Haymarket in Sydney. Farnan again hit Jackson with vicious punches and had him in deep trouble until the 6th round when Jackson?s supporters saved their hero from another knockout by rioting, which caused the police to stop the fight. The official result being a draw. Bill Farnan lost his title in 1885 to his fellow Victorian Tom Lees, who was an ex-policeman. They fought in the outer northern suburb of Heidelberg, Victoria. Lees won by knockout in the ninth after hitting Farnan with a controversial blow. They had a rematch at the Williamstown racecourse, which attracted a massive crowd. After fighting for some time the police stopped the fight. The next day, the fight was moved to the Melbourne suburb of Essendon. They fought for fifteen more minutes before Lees again knocked out Farnan. Farnan had his last bout against the great Frank Slavin, who later lost to Jackson. Slavin demolished Bill Farnan within two rounds.

Farnan?s health was deteriorating rapidly, and he passed away in the Melbourne suburb of Kew on March 14th 1891, aged 39 years old. He is buried in the Melbourne general cemetery. Also buried in that cemetery are some other notable pugilists, such as Dan Creedon, Starlight Rollins, Bill Lang, Walter McGowan, Tut Ryan and Archie Kemp. Even the great American wrestler of the late 1800?s Clarence Whistler is buried there.

Bill Farnan has a unique and very special place in the history of boxing by being the first ever, Australian Heavyweight Champion under Marquess of Queensberry rules.

Bill was the first gloved Australian Heavyweight Champion under the Marquess of Queensberry rules.

Reference sources

• Portrait of Bill Farnan, heavyweight boxer, (between 1878-1887) - held and digitised as part of the Arnold Thomas boxing collection by the National Library of Australia