George Dixon: The Short Life of Boxing's First Black World Champion, 1870–1908

With George Dixon: The Short Life of Boxing's First Black World Champion, 1870–1908, Jason Winders has finally provided the world with a treatment of the trailblazing pugilist worthy of his accomplishments. Winders is a journalist in London, Ontario, Canada, where he also completed a PhD in sport history at Western University. Unlike other histories of Dixon, Winders's treatment is more than a mere chronicling of a boxing career. It transports the reader beyond boxing, weaving the nuances of nineteenth-century American life into the narrative to provide a portrait of Dixon that flows with the social currents of his times. It is impeccably researched and beautifully written. Winders's work as a journalist shines through in his prose and pacing. Winders is blunt about the evidence (or lack thereof) surrounding Dixon's earliest years. While others have tried to cobble together some semblance of a narrative, creating debates about everything from his place of birth to his first bout, Winders instead focuses on placing Dixon—in broad strokes—within the context of Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Boston, Massachusetts, during the late nineteenth century.After detailing Dixon's meteoric rise through the boxing ranks, smartly using his so-called draw against Cal McCarthy as the spark that gave flame to Dixon's pugilistic credibility, the following chapter, aptly titled “Rise,” takes the reader across the Atlantic for Dixon's victory over British champion Nunc Wallace. Such success on an international stage elevated Dixon's position within the Black community. “More than a fighter,” writes Winders, “Dixon came to represent hope” (57). Cal McCarthy, of course, still considered himself the world champion and went so far as to intervene and spark debates when announcers declared Dixon to be the titlist. All that was settled in 1891, however, when Dixon knocked out McCarthy in twenty-two rounds of fighting, earning the Bostonian a place on the cover of the National Police Gazette, then America's leading fistic publication. With victories over the British and American claimants to the world featherweight championship, few could doubt Dixon's credentials as the best in the world or the first Black champion in any weight class. But, as Winders notes, “championships were rarely defined along clear lines” (60).As the champion, and especially as a Black champion, Dixon had to constantly reaffirm his status. Thus, he set his sights on Australian champion Abe Willis, adding yet another nation's title to his claim, dispatching the overmatched hopeful inside five rounds. It is in this chapter of championship unification—“Rise”—that Winders's talent for meaningful contextualization shines through, connecting Dixon to everything from debates about scientific racism to the history of Black American prize fighters like Tom Molineaux. Winders helps the reader to understand not just Dixon and the plight of Black boxers during his career but the broader struggle of the Black laborers inside and outside the ring. Yet, there was one notable absence in the chapter, and that was some reference to the impact of Bill Richmond, the first Black boxing star to emerge from the United States and the trainer and mentor of Molineaux, on the future trajectory of Black prize fighters. Indeed, the absence of Luke G. Williams's book Richmond Unchained: The Biography of the World's First Black Sport Superstar in Winders's bibliography is one of the few oversights than can be noted in his otherwise stellar research.The most engaging part of Winders's book is chapter four—“No Hamlet Without Hamlet”—in which he reconstructs the Olympic Club's famed 1892 “Carnival of Champions” in New Orleans, where Dixon broke the city's boxing color line and ensured seats, albeit segregated, were provided to Black fans. Winders does well to identify the fissures in the Black press over Dixon's decision to fight in New Orleans, with some outlets arguing that the Canadian should boycott such offers in solidarity with the Black Australian heavyweight Peter Jackson, who was barred from fighting by authorities of the same club. When Dixon defeated Jack Skelly at the “Carnival,” however, the Olympic promptly announced that it would not host any further interracial boxing. Nonetheless, the fight had immense historical significance. “More than any other,” writes Winders, “the journey to fight this bout showcased Dixon as a figure of transition, not only in boxing, but also in the societal landscapes of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries” (158).Winders's handling of Dixon's demise, how the sporting fraternity so easily tossed aside the fading pugilists, is the best treatment yet of the tragic chapter in the Canadian's career, as is his examination of present-day commemorations of Dixon. Where the book could be improved is in its analysis (or lack thereof) of Canadian responses to Dixon during his career. Certainly, newspapers like the Acadian Recorder provided accounts of how Dixon's fights were perceived over the telegraph, which could be used to provide a more robust retelling of his career in the context of his homeland. Such a critique, however, does not change the fact that Winders's book is the single most important volume ever published on Dixon, giving the pioneering boxer a treatment he so obviously deserved. This is the best boxing book I have read in a decade.

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