Al 'Bummy Davis': A Classic Forum Evaluation?

I too have many Bummy Davis photos, I'll post some.

 

Al Davis/Fritzie Zivic, second fight at the Polo Grounds.

 

Davis/Zivic.

 

Very hard puncher.

 

My mom is from Brownsville. My late grandfather was good friends with Bummy Davis. He actually wound up owning the bar where Bummy was killed. From all that I have read the guy had one of the greatest left hooks in the sport and was a real stand up guy.

 

I too , a youngster lived in the mean streets called Brownsville
which spawned the infamous "murder Inc." hired killers of Brooklyn those days. The bar where Bummy was murdered was called Duddy on Remsen Ave in Bklyn, NY. Davis just recently sold the bar to a new owner, and that fatal night he visited the bar at night to shoot the breeze...Well 4 gunman barged into the bar ordering the few customers to stick their hands up. Bummy
replied"leave the owner alone as he just bought the bar", to no avail. Well Bummy flattened 3 of the gunmen, but the 4th robber shot Al Davis fatally in the neck and ran out of the bar with the
truly tough but mortally wounded Davis in pursuit on Remsen Ave, where Bummy collapsed and died, a true hero. Bummy remains the best left hooker I ever saw, though he had an orthodox stance with his left hand extended. Man, how he could hit !!!

 

Your dad's name was Bummy?

 

tremendous left hook but he was a converted southpaw like Frazier and Kooney, not much of a right hand but a tough guy and Brownsville legend. Bummy came from Avroomy Vroomy to the more American Boomy to Bummy, it stuck....he died trying to help a friend ....he was a tough guy as was his brothers in different area's Mob guys, Murder INC. his brother Big Gangy got 30 to life for a triple homicide

 

Reading these posts is like taking a history lesson! I'd love to see some film of Davis in action if there is any. They don't make 'em like that anymore.

 

Speaking of Bummy Davis...When I was a young boy, my older cousin took me to see the young sensational lefthook artist Bummy Davis who was training at the back of an ex fighter Charley Beecher's pool room on Livonia ave in Brownsville, where a ring was set up. My dad warned my cousin and I to keep our mouths shut as there were "gangsters' there connected with the fight game in Brownsville. At this time in history the head of Murder Inc.
Lepke Buchalter was wanted for murder and was on the lam from the cops.
Eventually Lepke surrendered to Walter Winchell hoping to cop a plea, but he was electrocuted instead. Well my cousin and I went to the pool hall, quietly
went to the gym in the rear and saw large men wearing fedoras smoking stogies and through the haze and smoke saw Bummy Davis with his vaunted left hook, and later left without incidence...Omerta was our motto that long ago afternoon. Later on my dad and I saw Bummy fight many times including his ko of the 8-1 favourite Bob Montgomery, and loss to Beau Jack. I saw Bummy and his wife in a luncheonette on Pitkin Ave, a few weeks before he was shot dead fighting off 4 stickup men in a bar he once owned...A genuine tough guy was Bummy and his mobbed up brothers...

 

good stuff Burt, although I was not from Brownsville, I was born in Bed Sty and met many people from Brownsville. I was much younger but knew a lot of the old timers, friends of Bummy and I knew Schoolboy Bernie Friedkin (who drew with 3 world champs) and was KO'd by Bummy. I used to go to the fights when Bernie was a boxing Judge and I met a lot of the oldtimers, judges,etc.....good people

 

Ah, Bernie Friedkin was a neighborhood rival of Bummy Davis, a great boxer, but light puncher who I met with his wife several times, a few years before he died. So you were from Bed Sty in B'klyn. I had a girlfriend from that section who lived on Marcy and Throop so many years ago. I had a friend, a welterweight named Morris Reif who was also a terrific puncher who was matched with Bummy, but the fight fell through...Ah memory's...

 

all the streets you mentioned bring back memories from my Brooklyn days. I met some very good people from East New York, Brownsville, some real Damon Runyon characters. Funny Funny people. You lived the good old days Burt, different world.

 

Bernie fought my next door neighbor Jimmy Lancaster in the late 30s both @ Broadway Arena and Ridgewood Grove. Best Jimmy could do was a draw in one of the three bouts that they had. Also, Jimmy was TKO'd by Bummy @ Broadway Arena in that era. Jimmy lost more than he won, but fought some good fighters in his day like Scalzo, Shapiro, Larkin, etc. Bummy lost only 10 fights but two were to Jimmy's friend Al Tribuani. Both bouts were tenacious and Tribuani always considered Davis his toughest foe as he had previously fought Notch, Jenkins, Armstrong, etc, prior to Bummy. After their second bout they partied at a local nightclub like old pals.