Joe Louis vs. John Henry Lewis

Jeffries and Dempsey openly drew the color line at some point with statements to the press.

When did Louis? That was my point. When did he make an announcement drawing the color line? For example, he in fact did fight Roscoe Toles and until boxrec decided it was an exhibition, it was listed as a fight by sources such as the Ring Record Book by those who were there at the time. Louis KO'd Toles in six.

Mike Jacobs might have preferred matching Louis with white fighters, but except for Toles, there weren't black fighters in the top ten until the WW2 era when Louis was in the service and fighting no one.

 

Second time, actually. Jack Johnson vs. Battling Jim Johnson in Paris, 1913.

Johnson vs. Johnson and Louis vs. Lewis, though.

 

Louis fought Roscoe Toles prior to his match with Primo Carnera. Due to an odd contract stipulation with Carnera, Louis was not allowed to have an official bout before their encounter. By all intent purposes the Toles fight was official and often listed that way for many years. If you look at the BoxRec schedule you can see the frequency at which Louis fought and then notice the time gap from the last listed bout before Carnera bout. That gap Louis fought 3 opponents. Toles being one of them.

Louis fought many exhibitions during the war time including against many black boxers. He fought as much as 90 times and I believe the wear and tear is visible pre war post war Louis. During this time he fought Elmer Ray a vaunted contender of the era and defeated him 3x including once by KO.

 

I have only ever seen this same tiny clip of the fight.