Bob Fitzsimmons Appreciation Thread

Did Fitzsimmons really knock out 7 people in one night or something?

I saw that in taht old Jeffries documentary but dont know if its true

 

You are right about that Janitor.

Here is an account of Fitz easily handling the man who knocked out part of Jack Johnson's teeth. Not a full on fight, admittedly, but still amazing.

http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/37850311?searchTerm=fitzsimmons spar&searchLimits=

 

and Just to further beef up Fitz' record, here is more proof that former Fitz victim Jack Bonner was more than just a 1 or 2 fight novice when Fitz beat him. Bonner was considered (according to this article although it wasnt to concurrent admittedly) as one of the contenders to Fitz' vacated middleweight title when Fitz one the heavyweight title.


http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/38406776?searchTerm=fitzsimmons bonner fight&searchLimits=

And when Bonner did fight Tom Ryan for the "world" championship, he was very game and far from disgraced.

http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/32456209?searchTerm=fitzsimmons bonner fight&searchLimits=

 

I don't know if it's generally known, but Johnson was a sparring partner for Fitz early in his career.

 

Note that Savage says that a punch to his heart left him with pain in his thumb, tongue and toe!

Scary stuff!

 

Johnson could not avoid Savage's left?

 

Yes, Fitz did it in Chicago, and took 19 rounds to finish all seven men. The fighters were Joe local types.

Fitz and Jeffries went on tour and Ko'd lots of guys who history did not bother to record.

 

I have never found a newspaper report on this.

But they were supposedly Joe local types over 200lbs werent they?

 

As far as I am aware, no proof for this story has ever been produced. It featured in a short video on this forum, Appolack among others, said there was no evidence to support it.
If any has been turned up it would be nice to see it ,otherwise it remains a fable.

The link below features a rather pathetic re-enactment of the 1st Jeffries,Fitz fight, its only interest is that Jeffries himself, gives a short blow by blow commentary of the finish.Fans of Jeffries,such as Mendoza should find it interesting ,I should think ,[if they have not allready heard it.]
http://www.eastsideboxing.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3259
It's the second from the left, after the featured video.

 

Fitz stopped 3 men on the 12th of April1893, in Philadelphia,all three were described as Light heavyweights.

 

This has probably been posted before, but before the ancient Fitz, who like Sugar Ray Robinson, Jack Johnson and many other all time greats eventually succumbed to the heat when he fought Bill Lang, after dominating the fight, it is interesting that in training for this fight, Fitzsimmons had an exhibition (which was probably not to different to a fight in modern terms) with Tommy Burns, who himself was once world Champion. The ancient Bob Fitzsimmons appeared to get the better of Tommy Burns, in front of 8000 people, according to this report. Not really meaning of anything, but of itself, this is a pretty good effort by any old man.

http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/57596193?searchTerm=fitzsimmons spar&searchLimits=

 

Boucher, is this the wrong link? I seemed to get Fitzsimmons vs Corbett on that link.

 

Bob Fitzsimmons is a g.

He would have been fighting from 135-160 today, remember. (150 back then = 135 now, with weigh in 24hr beforehand.)

Knocking out heavyweights while weighing like 160, wtf is that??? Guy was a beast and is one of my all-time favorite fighters, hands down.

 

http://news.google.com.au/newspaper...BAJ&pg=7020,744597&dq=tom+sharkey+fight&hl=en

It seems that when a young 19 year old bob Fitzsimmons came to Australia and fought the "unknown" Brownsmead, Brownsmead was not exactly a nobody. In fact, according to this article, Brownsmead was in fact a highly celebrated "heavyweight" boxer. Not a bad scalp to have for a middleweight (and perhaps much lighter) boxer, it seems.

 

http://books.google.com.au/books?id...epage&q=edgar lee masters fitzsimmons&f=false

I have have never seen any comment whatsoever about the ability of Geof Thorne, who was knocked out in a round. But it seems that Geof Thorne was in fact the South African heavyweight champion. that on its own would be an impressive victory for any other middleweight in history.

It also seems from reading that articles about the time of Ruby Robert, that the fight that was seen and described may not have actually been listed on Cyberboxing zone, so Fitzsimmons probably knocked him out more than once.