How John L. Sullivan Burst Into Fistic Firmament in the Eighties

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 91, 8 July 1927, Page 10

How John L. Sullivan Burst Into Fistic Firmament in the Eighties

VETERAN AMERICAN SPORTS WRITER RECALLS SULLIVAN'S METEORIC RISE—BEAT LUMBER JACK. IN THREE ROUNDS

It was on one evening in ISSI that the boxing world was first startled by the now famous John L. Sullivan. That evening the newspapers of America received a telegram from Troy, New York, which stated: “At precisely 10.15 this evening the Troy Terror ceased to be a terror.” Then the despatch went on to relate that the burly pug (whose name I have forgotten, writes T. Z. Cowles in the Chicago “Tribune”), who had lorded it for so long over the little city of Troy and had vanquished all-comers, had met his doom in the person of a new star on the boxing-boards. That new star was John Lawrence Sullivan, who had emerged from the classic shades of Beantown a veritable Hercules, beating down all who came before him. Nothing like this man Sullivan had even gained a place in the annals of pugilism. Nothing of his calibre and range and power had figured in pugilistic artillery. Up to the time of his debut, I had seen and measured up nearly all the headliners of the manly art who had been before the public since IS6S. Among them were Jim Mace, Tom Allen, Joe Coburn, Mike McCool, O’Baldwin, the “Irish Giant,” Glade, the Maori, and others who had come up as the grass and then were cut down and withered. FIRST FIGHT IN CHICAGO A few weeks after the Troy Terror had been deterrorised, John L. Sullivan made his first appearance in Chicago. He was billed to spar at McCormick Hall, on North Clark Street, on a Saturday night, and to give 50 dollars to 'hny man who could stay three rounds against him. I was sent to do the fight for my paper. Invited to visit the star of the evening in his dressing-room, we were brought face to face with John L. We found him stripped to the, waist; a man in the very prime of life. His eye was bright, his skin clear and smooth, his flesh hard as a clamshell; muscles that showed enough but not too much training; face genial in expression: thin lips indicating intense purpose and quiet determination; a body that might well have stood a model for the statue of Spartacus, the Gladiator. “They tell me,” he said, “that this man I am to go against is big and strong, and hard and fast. Well. I guess I’ll know what to do with him.” He did know, as events proved. MIGHTY LUMBERJACK Jack Byrnes, a lumberjack of the Michigan pineries, was the candidate for the 50-dollar purse and the honour of staying three rounds against the world-renowned fighter from Boston. He stood 6ft 2in and carried his 200 pounds like a bag of feathers. His hands were very big and his arms heavily muscled. Punches shot out from his broad shoulders like blows from a battering-ram. In attack he was prodigious, dangerous; in defence relatively unschooled: in ring tactics a blundering neophyte. COULD BOX, TOO Right here let it be said that some of Sullivan’s finical critics were very wide of the mark in Insisting that he was hardly as good as second-class as a boxer; that while a master in attack he was weak in defence. This was pure rot. The battle with Jack Byrnes exhibited to perfection Sullivan’s allconquering style and method. The first of the three-minute rounds was all leads and lunges by the lumberman. It looked as though Sullivan was going

to liave enough to do to keep out of danger. But he stood off every blow and did nothing at all in the wav of attack. The round ended without damage on either side.

Round two was the same storv of well-aimed and dangerous reaches bv the man from the pineries and th* same perfect parry and block bv th* Bostonian. As Sullivan stepped to tli--rear of the platform at the close 0 f this round he turned to me and said--This fellow thinks he can do &»*>' Huh!” It was quite a different Sullivan who opened the proceedings in the third round. His eyes had taken on a hard glint and his lips a cruel curve. The tighter was now going to tight. SULLIVAN STARTS TO FIGHT Full as ever of confidence and steam came Byrnes with his long arm lunges. Again Sullivan stopped them artistically. But he did much more than stop them. Things had assumed a stage when action was called for. A third of the three minutes had been ticked off by the referee's watch Sullivan found the opening he was -I- *!- -It tlt -vt -It -It -It -It -It -It -It -i- bfr

looking for, and straight went his right to the other man’s jaw with a power that Sullivan could give it. Byrnes threw back his head and dropped both hands to his sides.

This time there was no trifling. With that pursuing power that won him all the fights he ever won, Sullivan’s mighty left shot out with an up curve swing to the point of the other mans chin. Byrnes was literally knocked head over heels. He kept on tumbling backward until he tumbled off the stage and had to be helped on again. Responding mechanically to the fighting instinct that lingered in his benumbed brain, he staggered tows.rd the centre of the stage with open palms and outstretched arms pawing the f ir. Clearly he did not know what he was doing.

“Don’t hit him again. John,” said Referee McDonald.

“Oh, no,” was Sullivan’s quiet reply. “Take that man away and look after him. The fight is ended. Sullivan wins,” McDonald announced.

It was 40 minutes before Jack Byrnes got back to earth. So ended one of the most notable encounters in ring history, and one among John L. Sullivan’s most creditable victories.