Reminds me of Newark Patsy Kline's bout with Abe Attell, where, according to Kincaid, the majority of newspapers favored Cline. Maybe Luckett Davis got the notes wrong when he entered them, I don't know. http://boxrec.com/show_display.php?show_id=213089
That's why I changed it to a win for Cline. I can't find a single NY paper that gave the decision to Johnson. It's Cline almost all the way, with a couple papers calling it a draw. The Black NY papers like the New York Age are ridiculously slanted towards any and every Black fighter. I find the Pittsburgh Courier and Baltimore Afro-American to be much more balanced publications (haven't perused the Chicago Defender as much). Has that been your experience as well?
I can't say that I used them much. I don't remember seeing NY Age covering boxing in the 1900s, and in the 1910s there weren't too many notable black fighters fighting in New York, were there? Not sure if the NY Globe (not the Commercial Advertiser one) covered boxing either, even in the 1910s. Although, I suppose, they might have contained some useful information on Langford, Johnson, Jeannette and McVey, but I didn't research them that much (Langford after the 1900s that is). Still, I suppose, the NY Age and the Indianapolis Freeman votes should be listed, for a more complete picture. The Freeman's report seemed to be the most detailed one of the ones I've found.