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283 pages

English

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For more than one hundred years the Lonsdale Belt, first awarded in 1909 by the legendary National Sporting Club and since 1936 by the British Boxing Board of Control, has encircled the waists of all the great names in British boxing history: Freddie Welsh and Ted 'Kid' Lewis; Benny Lynch and Jimmy Wilde; Freddie Mills, Randolph Turpin and Terry Downes; Henry Cooper, Barry McGuigan, Lennox Lewis and Joe Calzaghe. Drawing upon a wealth of sources - interviews and reminiscences, boxing-board minutes and programmes, contemporary magazines and newspapers, even archive film, sports historian John Harding tells the absorbing and fascinating story of the belt's origins and development and how the system the belt represents has continued to provide an unambiguous measure of excellence in the chaotic and often murky world of British professional boxing.

Sujets

Reino Unido

History of sport

United Kingdom

Boxing

Great Britain

Xian de Boxing

Royaume-Uni

Informations

Publié par	Pitch Publishing Ltd
Date de parution	01 septembre 2016
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781785312540
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	3 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0374€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2016
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
John Harding, 2016
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the Publisher.
A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library
Print ISBN 978-1-78531-195-6
eBook ISBN 978-1-78531-254-0
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Contents
Introduction
Acknowledgements
Foreword by Mike Costello
The Origins of the Boxing Belt
A Belting Good Idea
The Belts are Established
Peerless Jim and the East End Kid
The Digger and the Bombardier
A Golden Era
Cochrane s Heavyweight Follies
Not So Roaring Twenties
Boxing Politics and the Colour Bar
Dickson s Yankee Invasion
The Rise of the Regions
The End of the NSC
The Board Takes Over
Freddie Mills and the Rise of Solomons
Before the TV Age
Jewels in Solomons s Crown
A Communications Revolution
Legends of the Sixties
Levene Supreme
Black is Beautiful
Heavyweight Odyssey
Grass Roots Revival
Warren Butts In
Simply the Best of Times, Simply the Worst
The 1990s. A Daunting Decade: Part One
The 1990s. A Daunting Decade: Part Two
A Century of Belts: Part One
A Century of Belts: Part Two
Old Traditions; New Horizons
The Glittering Prize
Appendix 1
Appendix 2
Bibliography
Index
Photographs
Lord Lonsdale (left) and Jimmy Wilde.
Introduction
I N November 2011, British lightweight champion Anthony Crolla arrived at the press conference for his title fight with Willie Limond carrying the Lonsdale Belt in a small, square silver case. He laid it out on the table. Light glinted off the golden surfaces. I m no touching it, said Willie, shaking his head. Yet he walked towards the table cautiously. I ll take a look at it though. It s the most prestigious belt, just look at it, he whispered. Being in its presence and British champion, that sounds good.
Limond s show of respect for the belt (which he would eventually wear in 2014) was not an act. Like every other professional, Limond fights for money and there are plenty more lucrative alternatives to British titles available to boxers these days. With four recognised sanctioning bodies - the WBA, WBC, IBF, and WBO - and 17 divisions, there are potentially 68 world title belts, creating opportunities for smart match-making. As Barry Hearn has said, As a promoter, it s always nice to have a belt of some sort on the line in a televised fight. Also, fighters want to be fighting for a belt of some kind. However, as Limond s reactions suggest, there are belts - and then there is the Lonsdale Belt.
Now over 100 years old, Lord Lonsdale s trophy stands equal to all the other icons of excellence in British sport such as golf s Claret Jug, cricket s Ashes urn, football s FA Cup, tennis s Rosewater Dish, and rugby union s Calcutta Cup, among many others.
To wear the belt is to link oneself with some of the greatest names in the history of the fight game. To win one outright is to possess a tangible piece of sporting history, a guarantee of sporting immortality while to miss out on securing one s own belt has been a regular source of distress to some of Britain s finest boxers.
The great Ted Kid Lewis was probably the best example of a British boxer who won fame and titles at every level but who, for commercial reasons, consistently spurned the chance to win a Lonsdale Belt outright. Towards the end of his life, when all the money he d earned had long since gone, his son sought out a belt to give his father as a final prize, the one thing he always regretted not possessing.
However, the belt has a broader significance. It was created by the old National Sporting Club as a means of organising a chaotic sport that regularly teetered on the brink of self-destruction. Boxing has endured and survived many crises down the years, defended first by the NSC and subsequently by the British Boxing Board of Control. Without those organisations and the belt that symbolises their authority, the game would most certainly have died. Like a golden thread, Lonsdale s Belt has weaved its way through British boxing history.
This is its story.
John Harding
2016
Acknowledgements
I HAVE many people to thank for help and advice during the writing of this book, the research for which goes back some 20 years or so. Alan Roderick, Arthur Watkins, Brian Donald, Brian Nobile, Fred Deakin, Bill Matthews, Stan Shipley, Pat Woods, Dr Donmall, Sid Mander, Doug Hindmarsh, Peter Jones, Edward Robinson (at Fattorini s), Victor Barley (at Mappin and Webb), Bert Daly, Martin Sax, Alex Daly, Gruffyd Jones, Gary Luscombe, Jack Doughty, Philip Paul in the USA, Andy Ward and Joe Aitcheson: all provided either information or pointed me in the right direction.
The late Frank Duffett spent many hours chatting to me in his tiny AMPRO sports shop at Waterloo - once such a distinctive feature of the British boxing scene but now, alas, demolished. Frank also lent me programmes and photos from his collection and I am grateful for all his help.
The late Morton Lewis talked of his famous father, Ted Kid, and of promoting the sport in the post-war years; Sam Burns and Jarvis Astaire recalled Jack Solomons and the 1960s; while at the British Boxing Board of Control, Ray Clarke OBE and John Morris were extremely helpful, allowing me access to the board s minutes and memorabilia.
Bernard Hart of the original Lonsdale Sports concern read the manuscript and gave helpful criticism, John Gilbert did an invaluable job making an untidy manuscript readable in the first place, while the late Boxing News editor Harry Mullan was unfailingly kind and generous in allowing me unlimited access to the paper s files and photos.
The following belt owners all provided fascinating information and photos: Mrs Jack Hood, Tommy Mellis, Sam Bowater, Cmdr Dick Pearson (Woolwich Officers Mess), Major (Retired) R.M. Begbie (Royal Artillery Barracks Larkhill), Elsie Shephard, Kitty Flynn, Mrs Maria Traynor, Alan Stratton, Ed J. Brown, Mrs Nel Tarleton, Miles Templeton and Jack Trickett, while a special mention must be made of Mr Wolfenden, who passed on Tommy Bloggs s belt cuttings and drawings to the BBBoC and thus helped preserve a unique fragment of sporting history. Chas Taylor was a great help to me, not least in passing on comments and corrections to the text made by the late boxing historian, Vic Hardwicke.
The late Ron Olver was of particular help, ever willing to supply a name or a telephone number, while his numerous articles in Boxing News (not to mention his Old Timers page) were essential reading, a history of British boxing in themselves.
I would also like to acknowledge the following journalists for providing brilliant coverage of the game down the years and whose work has been essential in helping form this book: Steve Bunce, Srikumar Sen, Alan Hubbard, Brian Viner, Ken Jones, Hugh McIlvanney, Gareth A. Davies, Colin Hart, and many more. I must also pay tribute to the late Gilbert Odd, whose idea this book originally was; a great boxing writer and journalist and an enthusiast for the sport.
I would like to thank Kerry Moore and Tom Fattorini for a generous sponsorship on behalf of Thomas Fattorini Ltd.
Finally, I would like to thank Robert Smith, general secretary of the British Boxing Board of Control. Robert was himself a fine boxer who represented England as a Junior International and who boxed professionally. He has given me great support and advice throughout the production of this new edition.
Foreword by Mike Costello
BBC Radio s Voice of Boxing
F ROM my privileged vantage point just a few feet from the spit-bucket, raw emotions leave enduring memories.
On the night of 30 May 2015, at the O2 Arena in London, I was sat in position with the BBC Radio team preparing to commentate on Anthony Joshua s latest display of destruction on his way to winning a version of the world heavyweight crown.
Down the bill, Nick Blackwell made nonsense of many a pre-fight prediction when he stopped John Ryder in seven rounds to claim the British middleweight title. How Blackwell cried, his reaction fuelled by a blend of disbelief and elation. And his tears were matched by those of his brother Dan, a trouper who had lost more than 40 fights, on the other side of the ropes.
When Lonsdale s Belt was buckled around his waist, Blackwell stared down as if to say, Please let this be true.
When he said in a post-fight interview that he couldn t remember the last time he had cried, his sentiment rang out as a heart-warming endorsement of how the significance of one of sport s most cherished prizes endures.
Two decades and more have passed since John Harding s first edition of this book added to the rich history of boxing literature with the definitive history of the belt - bringing us tales of Kid Lewis, Lynch and Wilde, of Turpin, Downes and Cooper. The likes of Hatton, Calzaghe and Froch have now grafted their way on to the same Roll of Honour, sustaining the credibility, the integrity and the glory of the institution created by their forebears.
For some, Lonsdale s Belt ranks as a stepping stone. For others, it represents the ultimate aim. But, in changing times, the relevance holds firm.
Lord Lonsdale would be proud to know that fighters, and writers, still care.
1
The Origins of the Boxing Belt
And she loosed from her breast that inlaid belt of hers, in which al