American Boxing Essay

Prize fighting or boxing also known as “the manly art of self-defence” has been referred to by George Foreman as the sport to which all other sports aspire. Stripped to the brass-tacks, boxing is a hand to hand combat between two men that can be traced back to since before the dawn of history when primitive man established supremacy by the sheer power of his sinews. It was around BC 688 when prize fighting began to take shape as an organized sport finding acceptance as an Olympic game by the Greeks and gaining further popularity during Roman times. It gradually evolved from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century prize-fights in Great Britain, maturing and transforming into the art of ‘sweet bruising’ later in the US. This dramatically masculine

Boston's charismatic John L. Sullivan (1858–1918), was perhaps the most celebrated boxer of the era whose inimitable talent made him a star on the fans and critics circuits. His public acclaim helped enhance more widespread acceptance of the sport and to establish American dominance over British fighters. Nicknamed the ‘Boston Strongboy’, Sullivan straddled the realm of bare knuckle and gloved boxing, pivoting American attention to the sport enough to establish and secure its popularity for always. The mystical blend of his boxing prowess and flamboyant personality made the Boston Strongboy the nation’s first sports celebrity so much so that he has been attributed to perhaps being the first national icon after George Washington. Sullivan’s preference for using gloves gave the sport greater propriety and reputation. Boxing soon became legal in states where it had formerly been banned. Even so, the latter part of the nineteenth century witnessed patriotic contentions getting exchanged with ethnic rivalries inflaming extensive racial tensions between black and white boxers and resultant riots. (McKay, Brett & Kate (May