Boxing And The Spanish Flu.

Interesting

So many early fighters died of pneumonia too. Endemic disease was just so much higher then, I'd always figured it made the pandemic have less effect on society, but I never seriously looked into it.

Perhaps it's social effects are understated.

 

Yes I got my copy Sunday,bloody expensive now.

 

It’s why I don’t get it anymore as well.

 

In writing the Greb book I came across quite a lot of boxers who died of the Spanish Flu and several events that were postponed or cancelled due to the outbreak. I suspect many more boxers than have been officially tallied died of the Spanish Flu because you see an unusual amount of relatively young healthy boxers or ex boxers dying in 1917-1918 of "pneumonia" or similar illnesses which were likely actually Spanish Flu.

 

Sam McVey was one.

 

And Battling Jim Johnson.

 

Yes McVey had pneumonia on his death certificate.It was a strange disease in that the young and fit proved the most vulnerable to it. Of course with so many young men in transit because of WW1, conditions were perfect for it to spread.

 

Did it arrive with your Marks and Spencer catalogue?

 

No ,my Cotton Traders one.

 

Great topic.

In regards to Greb, wasn't the 2nd wave during his amazing 1919 campaign? Also, think of Dempsey and his run to the title thru this time. And these guys were traveling by train all over the country to fights in crowded arenas... with little understanding regarding transmission and hygiene... 700,000 dead in the US at a time the population was less than a third of what it is today.

 

Scary. I was watching a documentary on the Spanish Flu a few weeks ago, people would show symptoms in the morning and die that night. Just devastating.

 

Sam McVey died on December 23, 1921, well after the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic ended.

Mexican Joe Rivers (real name: Joseph or Jose Ybarra) and his young wife, Pauline Slert Ybarra, came down with the flu-related causes during the pandemic.. Pauline died while Joe recovered.

According to a news item in the October 15, 1918 edition of the San Francisco Examiner, Harry Pelsinger and Johnny McCarthy, two fairly well-known San Francisco boxers of the time, were confined to their beds due to the Spanish Flu.

Jim Stewart, a heavyweight, and Terry Martin, a middleweight, died of flu-related causes during the pandemic. According to his record, Martin fought Harry Greb twice. Other boxers who died from flu-related causes during the pandemic were Young Dundee (bantamweight from Maryland, real name: Salvatore Ranzino), Frank "Frosty" Darcy (welterweight from Australia, younger brother of Les Darcy), Al Thomas (a welterweight from New York), Joe Tuber (a bantamweight from Philadelphia) and Joe Stein (a middleweight from New York).

In at least one news item, Professor Mike Donovan was listed as a victim of flu-related causes during the pandemic, but he died on March 24, 1918. It is possible that he was one of the earliest American victims of the new strain of flu, but there is some doubt.

I believe that there were far more boxers and former boxers who died from flu-related causes during the pandemic than was reported in the newspapers. It is thought that 1/4 or 1/3 of the world population came down with the flu during the pandemic. In the U.S, it is quite possible that 25 million to 33 million people came down with flu at the time. An estimated 675,000 Americans died of flu-related causes during the pandemic at a time when the U.S. had population of a little over 100 million.

- Chuck Johnston