Investor's Business Daily, August 22nd, 2007
Jack Johnson never worried about what if.
Johnson, who fancied fast cars and long straightaways, was once asked if he thought about the possible consequences of a car crash.
"If and suppose -- two small words, but nobody has ever been able to explain them," Johnson said. "One man falls out of bed and is killed. Another falls from a 50-foot scaffold and lives. One man gets shot in the leg and is killed. Another gets a bullet in his brain and lives. ... I always take a chance."
His willingness to take risks helped make him the heavyweight boxing champion of the world at a time when much of the country was shackled by racist laws and beliefs.
Johnson (1878-1946) was fortunate in a couple of ways. First, he was born in Galveston, Texas. Though in the South, it was a port town and, like New Orleans, more tolerant of racial differences.
As Geoffrey Ward notes in "Unforgivable Blackness," his biography of Johnson, he also received substantial emotional support and doses of confidence at home.
His mother "told him again and again he was 'the best boy in the world' and assured him he could do anything he wanted if he wanted it badly enough," Ward wrote.
Johnson knew that entailed hard work. He pursued it from a young age, sweeping out the schoolhouse each day and rising before the sun to join the milkman on his route. For the latter job, he earned 10 cents a week, plus a pair of red socks.
He saw boxing as a way to rise above the general expectations of a young Southern black man. Fights were booked for 20, 30 and 40 rounds. There was no such thing as a neutral corner or a clean break from a clinch.
But from his first professional fight at age 17 -- he won and was paid $1.50 -- this was Johnson's world.
Soon, Johnson realized that the mountain had no intention of coming to Muhammad; Muhammad would have to go to the mountain.
"There was nothing more for me to do in Galveston," he said. "The purses offered me were truly minimal. ... So I decided to travel the world, to try to box from one coast to the other."
Although that seems an obvious decision, it was brave then. A young black man traveling around the country often put his life in jeopardy. He demonstrated his courage almost every time he entered the ring. Not because of the physical dangers of boxing, but the environment in which a black fighter boxed.
"In two decades as a fighter and a champion, Jack Johnson would never once enter the ring against a white opponent in front of a crowd that was anything but overwhelmingly hostile, and as the years passed and as his fame and notoriety grew, the curses and racial taunts he'd been hearing ... would sometimes be supplemented by threats to murder him," Ward said.
Johnson refused to kowtow. "At a time when whites ran everything in America, he took orders from no one and resolved to live always as if color did not exist," Ward noted.
Johnson knew he had natural ability -- but realized that he had a lot to learn. He worked as a sparring partner for established fighters, believing this experience would help him hone his skills.
He even learned from a cellmate. He and Joe Choynski were locked up by Texas Rangers for what they said was "engaging in an illegal contest." They sparred in jail; Choynski, a more experienced fighter, provided "lessons Johnson never forgot," Ward wrote.
Knowing that strategy was as crucial as raw power, Johnson built a reputation as a fighter who fought with his brains as well as brawn. He'd lull opponents with an easygoing manner, one observer noted. "He smiled and kidded in the clinches, and many thought he was careless. But all the time he ... knew every move the other made and was at all times the boss."
Keenly aware that promotion drew fans, Johnson made sure he garnered publicity. For a bout with Jack Jeffries (Jim Jeffries' kid brother) in 1902, he showed up in a pink robe. He predicted the round in which he would knock Jeffries out on a note in a sealed envelope.
In 1902, he won the black heavyweight championship, but white boxers avoided him. He knew the only way he'd get a shot at the title was to wage a PR war and force a fight. He followed champion Tommy Burns to England to "shame him out of King Edward's islands" and force him to fight.
Ultimately he chased Burns to Australia, where Johnson won the title in 1908.
Realizing the importance of balance, Johnson looked for ways to develop himself outside boxing. He had numerous outside interests, including classical music, and looked for new fields to conquer. He toured as a vaudevillian, tried auto racing and landed at least two patents, one for an improved wrench and another for a car anti-theft device.
Despite all the blows society dealt Johnson, he held on to his sense of humor. Once, during stormy trans-Atlantic sailing, a fellow passenger asked him why he wore an emerald on one hand and a ruby on the other."I always dress port and starboard when at sea," he replied. "Because in the night, when I'm out on deck and it's dark, people can see the lights and tell whether I'm coming or going."
This story originally ran on Nov. 23, 2004, on Leaders & Success.
