Papa Jack

color of their skin. The boxers in the ring wailed at each other, not knowing

Boxing, an official sanctioned sport in the early 20th century, is a sport that is known as one of the most violent and physically demanding sports on the earth. Professional boxers that get paid to fight must be in top shape in order to preform at the highest level. Being a professional boxer is a tough life. Boxers train hard for many months leading up to one fight and either win, lose, knock out the opponent or even get knocked out. The sport has been around for centuries, but has most recently taken off over the last 100 years. It is a multibillion dollar industry with fighters taking home hundreds of thousands of dollars if not even millions of dollars for big matches. In his novel Papa Jack, Roberts tells the story of the famous African American boxer Jack Johnson. He details the boxers rise to fame and fortune and his downward spiral that would soon follow. In Papa Jack, Roberts displays life of a professional boxer through firsthand accounts with events that happened during Johnson’s life and shows how boxing not only influenced his life but also how he influenced the African American community.

Rhoden uses different writing techniques to get the reader to view black sports history from different perspectives. Throughout the reading, readers are learning that the history isn’t so much inspirational as much as a struggle and wants to focus on the victories as much as they focused on the defeats. This book seeks to tell the story of the rise and fall of the black athlete, but also to point the way toward redemption. The novel is driven by the purpose of finding light and bringing real power to the African American athletes. The history lessons imbedded in the 40 Million Dollar Slaves interlace the ropes of innovation and conflicts that today define sports today.

I see when I look at the history of Anthony Johnson that the hope for freedom of black people at the time wasn’t as grave as I would have thought. Anthony Johnson was

Tommy Burns was the new heavy weight champion and like Jefferies, he to was denying Johnson a shot at the title. This time Johnson was not having it. He followed Burns for two years from San Francisco to New York from Paris to London, mocking him to fight him. Burns would just state that Johnson was yellow, eventually it was said that King Henry himself called Burns a bluffer, I guess this got to Burns for in the end he agreed to fight Johnson for 30,000 dollars win, lose, or draw. This

James Baldwin “Sonny’s Blues” and “Battle Royal” Ralph Ellison are two stories by young african american men in the 50’s. Racial abuse was in abundance during this era. In both stories race has an important role however, in “Battle Royal” Ellison used race as the driving force of the story. In “Sonny’s Blues” Baldwin uses race as an important theme but is subtle as opposed to Ellison who directly addresses race as the issue. “Sonny’s Blues” and “Battle Royal” depicted the suffering of young black men in harlem, and illustrated the struggle of generation past and present; and the vicious cycle of the stereotype of african americans. African americans during this time endured in environment of hatred, but not only by whites but also by themselves, they hated who they were because they weren't white, in order for a person to be accepted in society or seen as valuable african americans believed they had to be white.

Spiritually, he was driven to get this bill passed. L.B.J. wasn’t going to let anyone get in his way. “Dick, you’ve got to get out of my way”(Dallek 415). Johnson spoke this to Senator Richard Russell at their conversation over the issue. They were both also longtime friends and colleagues (Dallek 415). This shows you that Johnson won’t let anyone try to influence him or talk him out of his decision. Sometimes especially friends tend to change people’s minds, but no one will change Johnson’s. “If that’s the price I’ve got to pay, I’ll pay it gladly” (Dallek 415). Shown in this quote, is that he will take anything that comes at him in reaction of the signing of the Civil Rights bill. Johnson is hard set on getting Civil Rights passed throughout the United

     This was a time when blacks were being discriminated against, the military was segregated, blacks were not allowed to play Major League Baseball. When he started boxing early in the 1930's hero worship was not achievable in any professional sports, there were none that were able

People are judged through their actions and characteristics, but racism can easily blur a person’s perspective. In Almost Free: A Story About Family and Race in Antebellum Virginia, Samuel Johnson, a former slave, fights for his freedom with the help of influential white friends he made throughout his life. Eventually he buys his freedom and petitions the court to stay in Virginia, where his family resides. Even after emancipated, he works hard to free his family and petitions the court in their cause. Despite his relationships, family values, and law abiding, Samuel Johnson’s skin color ultimately acts as boundary in his Virginia society.

Johnson followed Jeffries from town to town. “Jeffries, however, refused to fight a black boxer and instead decided to retire undefeated.”(Unforgivable Blackness). The Championship was handed over to a white named Tommy Burns, who as well declined to fight Johnson but eventually gave in at the cost of thirty thousand dollars. In the year 1908, Johnson knocked out Burns in the sixteenth round, to win the title and create history. “He was a fast and brilliant defensive boxer who fought at a time when white champions like John L. Sullivan and James Jeffries refused to fight black fighters. Jeffries retired rather than face Johnson, but he returned six years later when the clamor for a great white hope could not be ignored”(Sandomir D3). Even James Jefferies was beaten and and thus, Johnson had beat all that stood in his way, from bottom to the top. Through perseverance and relentlessness, Johnson had achieved his dream.

While attending school John did not only get good grades, he played basketball. The people in the African American culture in the 1960’s believed that the only way for a black person to get into college was to play sports for “the white man.” With many African Americans having this mind set, it pushed John to excel on

By the end of 1903, the newspapers were calling on Jim Jeffries to fight Johnson for the heavyweight title. Still, Jeffries refused to fight black fighters. In 1905, Jeffries retired after never having fought Jackson. The new champion would be Tommy Burns. As Johnson began chasing Burns around the country for a fight, he began dating yet another white woman named Hattie McClay. He was warned by his manager to be more tactful, but he refused. Over a ten year period, almost 850

When Johnson let the South back into the Union he helped to make all the people who had died for the right to equality for all worthless. President Johnson was from the south originally. He had been a poor white living in Kentucky, and so had learned to hate the rich, white Plantation owners. But he always felt above the slaves which later influenced his decision to let the very people he had grown up hating back in to the Union. When congress passed the 13th Amendment banning slavery many of the people in the south feared what would happen to them. Johnson, who related to the poor white folk, knew that they needed someone who they could say "at least I'm better than you" about. The only way he saw to do that was by letting the South have their lands and rights back so that they could do something about their former slaves. So the pardons started rolling out of the Round Office like a printing press. The Radical Republicans weren't happy about it but at that point they couldn't stop him. The south began to return to the way it was.

A fellow fighter is said to have “whimpered like a dog over his crushed hand (179).” The brutal action of undergoing a battle royal has the unseen indication that the cigar-smoking whites wanted to take the human out of the blacks and

Johnson very skillfully compliments the Negro man and then tells him, he has no right to think of himself as above any other race. She describes several different ways in her poem that a Negro could be arrogant in Harlem, but he is still not respected by himself or other cultures. She also alludes in her poem that the Negros in Harlem need to accept who they are and do not have to be like white people to be considered equal.