Mar 10, 2011 - Sale 2239

Sale 2239 - Lot 485

Price Realized: $ 270
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 400 - $ 600
(SPORTS--BOXING.) JOHNSON, JACK. Jeffries-Johnson. Chromolithographic point-of-purchase placard, 10x14-1/4 inches; considerable early damp-staining; with some wear to the corners. New York: Pictorial News Co., 1910
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Billed as the "Fight of the Century," the match between World Champion Jack Johnson, black, and James Jeffries, "The Great White Hope," was symbolic of the larger issue of racial tension that existed in America forty-seven years after the Emancipation Proclamation. In 1910, the former undefeated heavyweight champion James J. Jeffries came out of retirement to say: "I feel obligated to the sporting public at least to make an effort to reclaim the heavyweight championship for the white race. . . I should step into the ring again and demonstrate that a white man is king of them all." The fight took place on July 4, 1910 in front of 20,000 people, at a ring built just for the occasion in downtown Reno, Nevada. Johnson proved stronger and more nimble than Jeffries and in the 15th round, after Jeffries had been knocked down twice for the first time in his career, his people called it quits to prevent Johnson from knocking him out. That evening, instead of 4th of July fireworks, the nation saw race riots from one end of the country to the other.