I've only been a member for such a brief period that I'm probably not qualified to give a good answer here but I'd love to read more about Charley Burley. He fascinates me for some reason, I don't know if it's his cool name. I watched that fight of his that was on YouTube, apparently the only footage available of him fighting. Then I read some short biography on his website... it just boggles the mind that he was, according to the stuff I've read, so avoided by the top fighters of his day, especially the greatest of them all... But then again I bet you guys have discussed him to death already here.
You wanna read his book mate, there's more than one, two i think, the one i read was 'Charley Burley, The Life and Hard Times of an Uncrowned Champion'. Still the best book i've read possibly ever on boxing. Unlike a lot of boxing books i seem to be reading lately it doesn't seem biased towards its subject, and if you would like to learn more about the era in particular then it is for you, if you are new to boxing as a fan on the whole then it maybe better to read more on the well known boxing 'folklore' type stuff before delving into that. But if you basically know quite a bit about the sport's history then get onto that book. I luvd it, so interesting. Burley doesn't qualify for this thread though as he gets a lot of heat from us people!
Thanks for the recommendation, sounds really good. A couple years back I used to be a lot more into boxing. And this particular era has always fascinated me, Robinson, LaMotta etc. I wonder if it's because of Raging Bull? I've seen that film so many times...
Spider Webb Fought the top middles of his time beating Giardello, Downes, Tiger, Boyd, Mimms, Pat McAteer, Rory Calhoun etc Gene Fullmer had his number though.
Maybe is, great film, would get anyone half interested in boxing on a more fanatical wavelength. You're welcome there as well.
I just did a search on Tom Sharkey, and found that the only thread available as of recent was the one I just started this morning. So what I'll do is paste the content of that thread below and see if it draws any interest. Haven't heard much about him on here, unless I just haven't been paying much attention. He retired with a very respectable record of 40-7-5-37. Had a big KO percentage. was only stopped 3 times in his career, mostly towards the end of it. Went a combined 45 rounds with Jim Jeffries in two fights. Beat a large slew of great fighters in Bob Fitz, Jim Corbett, Joe Choynski, Charles McCoy, Joe Goddard, Peter Maher. He also fought in an exhibition with Sullivan. seems like he crossed paths with just about everyone at one point or another... Sounds like a pretty darn good resume to me.... This content is protected Looks pretty fit from what I can see too..
Canada. He used to come to Liverpool quite a bit. Would of been about the time his book was published "The Impossible Dream"