Joe Louis got married, then KO'd Max Baer in front of Babe Ruth

Some great tidbits of info re: Louis vs Max Baer.
Long article, download.
https://www.freep.com/story/sports/2017/08/04/joe-louis-terror-in-the-city-of-champions/538882001/

Some info:
"Members of the fan club tried to get Louis to postpone the weddding date, figuring the nuptials would distract him from the Baer fight. Club officer Johnny Tears recalled how nervous he was before his own wedding and imagined Louis might be the same. “Maybe Joe shouldn’t marry for a week after the fight,” he said. Louis and Trotter decided differently. The day of the fight, Tuesday, Sept. 24, two hours before the opening bell, they were wed in a New York apartment by Trotter’s brother, a minister. Several friends and family members joined them. “Marva … looked like something you’d see in a fairytale book,” Louis said.

Immediately after, he left for Yankee Stadium.

In June, Max Baer had unexpectedly lost his heavyweight title to Jimmy “Cinderella Man” Braddock. The defeat humbled him. He no longer spouted off about how he would destroy Louis. He respected him now. Leading up to the bout, Baer had limited his clowning and trained seriously. He had engaged sparring partners who had faced Louis, and consulted the advisors of Louis’ previous victims. Baer knew that a second straight loss would severely limit his income, if not end his career. In the days before the match, he went back and forth on his projections, sometimes mildly predicting victory, other times being ambiguous about the outcome. More than a few observers thought he was frightened. Baer had, after all, seen the Brown Bomber demolish opponents.

At Yankee Stadium, Baer threatened to cancel if the boxing commissioner didn’t waive the rules and allow extra padding over his knuckles. “These are the gloves we’ll use or there will be no fight,” Baer said before storming off to his hotel with his entourage. Louis had come too far for the fight to be scrubbed. “Give Max anything he wants,” Julian Black told the commissioner. “We don’t care.”

The open-air stadium filled with 84,000 paying customers and possibly an additional 9,000 others. More than a thousand police officers were on site, too. In his dressing room, Baer told ex-champ Jack Dempsey, who had been working with him, that his hand was injured. He didn’t want to fight Louis. “He’ll slaughter me,” Baer said. Dempsey responded that it didn’t matter if both his hands were broken. “You’re not quitting now,” he said.

The Louis-Baer event was huge, spectacularly so for a non-title bout. The gate approached a million dollars. Around the ring, which had been erected near second base and was flooded in light, an army of celebrities congregated. There were major stars of sports, entertainment and politics: former President Herbert Hoover; governors and mayors; Babe Ruth; Ernest Hemingway; champion Jimmy Braddock; actors James Cagney and Edward G. Robinson; ex-champs Gene Tunney, Jack Sharkey, Primo Carnera, and the blue-bereted, gold-toothed Jack Johnson; and so many more. Tigers manager Mickey Cochrane stood with a pair of binoculars around his neck. He had skipped the ball game and flown to New York.

At the fight’s start, with the cold autumn air above the ring clouded with cigar and cigarette smoke, Louis looked across at Baer in dark trunks adorned with a white Star of David and saw a man “scared to death.”