Ep 37: How Jack Johnson, went from LOVED to HATED

There is a thin line between Love & Hate... December 26 1908 - The first African American World Heavyweight Boxing Champion was born. Boxing fights were social reflections for people during that day. A metaphor for race relations. A RETIRED CHAMPION, came out of retirement to stand for the white population A BATTLE OF THE CENTURY Listen for the cliffhanger... that had CONGRESS ban screening titled fights...

B Daht explains the rules of attending fights in the 1900s, + more about this sport's historical fact that brought the country to a silence, and this World Heavyweight Boxing Champion who did more than win fights, making some enemies along the way.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
On today's episode. If I didn't know, maybe you didn't either.
Let's talk about how black folks love Jack Johnson until
they didn't. I didn't know. You didn't get. I didn't know.
I didn't know. Maybe you didn't kid. I didn't know.
Maybe you didn't get I didn't I didn't know. I
didn't know. I didn't, So dig it. December twenty six,

(00:20):
nineteen oh eight, Jack Johnson became the first African American
World heavyweight boxing champion. He knocked out Tommy Burns. White
folks was upset and they didn't respect it because Tommy
Burns was only the champ because the previous champ, James Jeffries,
had retired. Fast forward with the nineteen ten James Jeffrey say, listen,
I'm sick all this talk about Jack Johnson. He came

(00:41):
out of retirement and said, and I quote, I'm only
going into this fight for the sole purpose of proving
that a white man is better than a Negro. Then
white folks so mad. When Jack Johnson ko Jeffers in
the fifteenth round sparked racial violence all across America twenty
five states, fifty cities, twenty deaths, hundreds of injuries, Congress

(01:01):
ended up banning the fight. You couldn't even watch it now.
See Jack Johnson was born in Galveston, Texas. They called
him to Galveston Giant. He died in a car wreck
in nineteen hundred and forty six. He was sixty eight
years old, living in Franklinton, North Carolina. After beating the
wheels off James Jeffries, he won sixty of a hundred
thousand dollar purse sixty five k in nineteen teen. That's

(01:23):
a little bit under two million in twenty three. Now,
Jack Johnson had three wives, all love. The was white,
and back in the early nineteen hundreds it was a
black heavyweight champ and a world heavyweight champ. See. Jack
Johnson worked his ways up the black sector and became
the black heavyweight champ. But once he became the world
heavyweight champl Jack Johnson wasn't fighting black folk no more,
and black folk was upset with Jack Johnson about that, Like, damn,

(01:45):
Jack Johnson, fight all those black people, then when you
get over there and fight them white people, you can't
fight black people no more, even though you know how
hard it is for black people to fight white people,
and you over there man in white women. Damn Jack Johnson.
Those things, along with being convicted in nineteen twelve for
transporting women back and forth over state lines for prostitution
and him eventually during a year in prison because of it,

(02:06):
just had black folks like, we're good on Jack Johnson
and I didn't know. Maybe you didn't either,