MKK, what a pack of bull droppings the quote from many alts, it's all, the most one sided tirade of non-truths there is. I would break it down cos it's all tripe. But I will save it for many alts to come on here and argue that what he posted wasn't his own spin on facts, and opinion.
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/a...ack dempseys career frank menke&searchLimits= Here is some Dempsey stories of fights against two coloured fighters from very early in his carreer. Should be of interest to quite a few people.
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/215883452?searchTerm=frank menke&searchLimits= There is a bit of a different take on Harry Wills, suggesting that for 4 years he was avoiding the best fighters.
I remember one paper saying his manager had been feeding him on a diet of ,"well chewed meat",I liked that phrase and have pinched it a couple of times myself.
Has anyone seen any compelling evidence of this? I was briefly fishing through old newspaper articles and didn't come across a single one arguing that it would be bad or inappropriate for Dempsey to defend his title against a "colored" or "Negro" fighter. I saw a bunch of articles implausibly arguing that Wills needed to prove himself worthy in the ring, but nothing outright recommending a color line. On the other hand, I did see several articles that were critical of various white fighters who had drawn the color line... [bump]
Were people against Jeffries fighting Johnson? There were race riots after that one, and the main political shift since then was the rise of the KKK.
Estelle Taylor didn't help the prospect of Dempsey fighting period. He was in Los Angeles getting soft. Hanging with that fast crowd, drinking whiskey! Listening to Rock an Roll Music and bad mouthing his Country I Bet!!