What were the feats of the Boston Strong Boy? A.K.A. John L. Sullivan

I thought he could lift beer barrels over his head or something?

 

I think the story goes he lifted one of these back onto its tracks :

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he shot fireballs from his eyes and thunderbolts from his arse

 

Quite true , but this was after he had drunk their contents.

 

The real story is that, blind drunk, on a train journey, he staggered out onto the small platform at the back of one of the carriages, to relieve himself, fell off the speeding train into a farmer's field ,this happened near Springfield, Illinois. and a reference to it can be found in," Unforgivable Blackness".

 

He could leap away from black contenders with a single bound.

 

If the story is based on a real event then it probably looked more like this:

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Or better still:

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He was that ******* hard he could drink 80 pints of beer without being sick.

 

Sullivan went up to 300lbs because of the booze ,he was probably heavier than the railway carriage he is supposed to have lifted

 

His refusal to fight black contendors was as much borne out of the contempt he had for them as it was a case of ducking. Not that either trait is particularly admirable.