Jess Willard
Heavyweight Champion of the World
by Arly Allen
BOOK REVIEW By Kelly Nicholson
Near the end of 1908, the sporting world suffered trauma when a 30-year old black ex-stevedore named John Arthur “Jack” Johnson lifted boxing’s heavyweight championship from Tommy Burns in the remote venue of Rushcutters Bay near Sydney, Australia.
Johnson’s sass, talent, and lifestyle had white fans instantly clamoring for one of their own to win back what surely felt like their rightful possession. A few men tried and failed, whereupon there came, out of flat Kansas, an unaggressive yet formidable 6’6 specimen who now and again looked like he had the goods. He is given, at long last, his due with Jess Willard – Heavyweight Champion of the World. Authored by Arly Allen, with the assistance of Willard’s grandson James Willard Mace and a Foreword by ring historian Tracy Callis, it is a massive and painstaking effort, with footnotes rich and myriad, and it is a valuable one.
In 1915, under a blazing sun in Havana, Cuba, Jack and Jess waged a marathon war that constituted the best two hours of Willard’s professional life. Yet Jess began a descent into obscurity soon after, fighting seldom and losing his title in more explosive fashion than he had won it. Thus he would figure little into discussions of the game in years that followed. Allen now reconstructs the relatively unknown story of this man and recasts key events in his career – particularly his 1919 fight with Jack Dempsey – in ways that bid us to consider again his worth.
Allen captures the drama of Willard’s life in every facet: The lean years early in his marriage and fatherhood; his uneven climb in the heavyweight ranks; and his reign as champion, which brought upon him more trouble than he ever had imagined when he joined (albeit without malice toward Jack himself) the White Hope quest. He provides intricate details of the fighter’s financial ventures, legal battles, personality quirks, and vaudeville tours, as well as his seldom noticed effort to rebuild his career after the bout with Dempsey. In the process, Arly unearths telling scenes, such as Willard’s personal encounters with Johnson before and after the bout in Havana. The scope of his work is appreciable, yielding insight into a wider scheme of events shaping American culture, over Jess’ own lifetime, by way of law, medicine, warfare, and economy.
All told, this is an assiduous and keen-minded account of a more impressive athlete than most chroniclers hitherto have supposed. Jess was a man, as Allen demonstrates, far better fitted to farm and family than to ring combat and its machinations. Yet he was also arguably a better fighter than is generally conceded, and a man deserving of a more favorable estimate in sporting annals.