File:Crossing The Color Line Stanley Ketchel.pdf

Summary

Info on Sept. 2021 Stanley Ketchel book: Crossing the Color Line by Vernon Gravely

According to an Oct. 2021 email to IBRO Members:

A new boxing book was published this past September that ... IBRO members may be interested in. It's called "Crossing the Color Line-Stanley Ketchel's Challenge for Jack Johnson's Heavyweight Crown." by Vernon Gravely.

I've had a life-long fascination with Ketchel, having read several books and dozens of articles about him. Vernon Gravely's book, though, is something special. Not only is it a capsule history of boxing in the early 1900's, the book is filled with information about long forgotten boxing personalities, such as Billy Jordan, Willis Britt, Hype Igoe, Tad Dorgan, and several others. All of it filled with rare photos, poems, and original newspaper illustrations.

The center of the story is, of course, all the intrigue that was involved before the Johnson-Ketchel fight actually took place on October 16, 1909. Stanley Ketchel's life story has been told many times before, but never with such a treasure trove of new information.

Two of our nation's greatest writers also wrote about the "Michigan Assassin." Ernest Hemingway wrote a short story in the 1920's called "The Light of the World." It's a fictional account of two "ladies of the evening " discussing how they both loved the great Stanley Ketchel. John Lardner, son of the legendary sports writer, Ring Lardner, wrote an article for the May 1954 issue of True magazine titled "Ketchel Was a Wild Man." It was re-titled "Down Great Purple Valley" several years later. It opens with what has been called by another sports writer, Red Smith, the greatest novel ever written in one sentence. "Stanley Ketchel was 24 years old when he was fatally shot in the back by the common-law husband of the lady that was cooking his breakfast." This new book proudly takes its place with these two classics.