THE FLORIDA TIMES-UNION JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA SATURDAY, JULY 5, 1919

JACK DEMPSEY, NEW KING OF PUGILISTIC WORLD, FIGHTS MOST SENSATIONAL BATTLE OF CAREER

(By Frank G. Menke, Universal Service Correspondent.) _ Arena, Bayview Park, Toledo, Ohio, July 4. - Jack Dempsey is king of the pugilistic world tonight. And a greater champion never lived. _ The Utah gladiator, fighting the most sensational battle of his meteoric career, battered Jess Willard from a powerful, mighty looking human into a bleeding and awful mass in three rounds of fighting. _ Willard, after returning to his cor- ner, collapsed in his chair, was seized with fits of nausea and seemed to lapse into unconsciousness. _ Then his seconds ended the battle by tossing a towel into the ring. _ And by that token Dempsey rose to the sublime heights in his chosen pro- fession. _ Willard's showing was the most piti- ful of any champion of all time. Dempseys the most remarkable and most amazing in pugilistic annals. _ Throughout the nine minutes of fighting, Willard never landed a real- ly solid blow upon Dempsey. And through those nine minutes Dempsey hit Willard with such crashing, ter- rible force that long before the second round was over the crowd began to shriek to the referee: _ "Stop it, stop it." _ The echo of the first gong hardly had died away before Dempsey launched a terrible attack that quick- ly closed Willard's eye, smashed his nose, gashed his lips in many places, transformed his whole face into a bleeding horrible mass and made his body one splotch of red. _ It wasn't a fight, it was a slaughter. _ _Willard's Title Starts Slipping. _ The first two punches that Dempsey landed meant the end for Willard. The challenger, dodging several jabs of the giant, rushed in suddenly, whipped a mighty left to the stomach and fol- lowed with a flashing right to the body. _ Taps began to bugle then over the pugilistic greatness of Jess Willard. _ At that first blow landed upon the one time "concrete" stomach of the Kansasan, he sagged under the impact. And when that right hander landed on the jaw that Willard had termed so proudly "a concrete jaw" the cham- pion staggered, and then followed the most sensational incident ever wit- nessed in the first round of any cham- pionship struggle in all history. Wil- lard, hurt, and realizing it, tried to rush into a clinch, but Dempsey, with the ability of a panther, swept away and then rushed back against Willard. A left to the stomach, another, then a right and then a right to the head sent Willard reeling backward. Dempsey hurled another right hander at the giant and Jess Willard dropped to the canvas for the first time in his long ring career. _ The referee stood over him and be- gan to toll off the count. Willard took six and then stumbled to his feet. Dempsey charged - and Willard attempted a clinch, but Dempsey was not to be denied. Another ripping left went into Willard's stomach - and down he went again. He came up to be met with a volley of blows that sent him back - helpless - onto the ropes. _ Pecord did not begin a count - and therein, according to many ring crit- ics, he pulled a "boner." For the rules say that when a man is helpless and hanging on the ropes, with his heels off the flat of the ground, he can be considered a knock down victim. _ Dempsey stood off waiting - and no one knew for what. But at last Wil- lard, his face a smear of blood, drag- ged himself from the ropes and tried to fall into another clinch. But Demp- sey stood away and sent a right crashing to the head. Willard dropped again, but, dazedly climbed to his feet and staggered across the ring. Demp- sey followed and dropped him a fifth time. _ _Downs Willard Seventh Time. _ Once more Willard got up, only to be dropped by two lefts to the body and a right to the head. And then came the most peculiar incident that ever took place at a championship battle. _ While the big crowd shrieked in delirium, and while Willard grovelled at his feet, Ollie Pecord the referee, began to toll off the count. He seemed to have reached the fatal "ten," for he stopped counting and pushed Demp- sey back into his corner. _ At once pandemonium broke loose. The crowd, assuming that Dempsey had won with a knockout went insane in its action. It surged towards the ring and some in the ringside division tried to climb through the ropes and embrace Dempsey, who was standing in his corner. All the while Willard's seconds were assisting the giant back to his corner and trying with every means to bring him back to a sem- blance of his old self. _ "Dempsey wins - Dempsey wins," shrieked the mob. _ But Dempsey hadn't won - not then. _ For Pecord and some of the other folks ordered back the crowd that had attempted to climb through the ropes and almost before the crowd realized what had happened the fighters walk- ed to the center of the ring and be- gan squaring away for the second round. _ "What happened? What happened?" demanded the crowd. _ Then it was announced the Pecord hadn't quite completed counting out Willard before the bell rang. But no one heard the bell which was pro- nounced faulty by Pecord even before the battle began and which sounded but faintly. _ Dempsey, realizing that he was a cer- tain winner played things safely through the second round. He opened with a rush at Willard and smashed several ripping blows to the head and body, just to stun the champion a little more. One drive sent Willard reeling to the ropes; an- other drove him back near to Dempsey's corner. Then Dempsey slowed up a little and merely plugged away, not aiming so much for a knockout as to reduce Willard still further to a state of abso- lute weariness. _ And so was fought the second round with Willard pawing occasionally at Dempsey - and never hitting: with Wil- lard vainly attempting to clinch his way along. _ _Most Battered Champion of All. _ Willard looked a wreck when he came out for the third - and before it was ended he was the most battered cham- pion that the heavyweight division of the ring has ever known. Whirling from his corner with all the speed and agressive- ness of which he is capable. Dempsey went out to finish Willard in that round, and technically he did. _ Driving powerful lefts to the head, Dempsey closed Willard's right eye com- pletely and then increased the gash over the left to such a point that Wil- lard was almost blinded. Then Dempsey began driving for the jaw and stomach while Willard staggered around the ring and tried to avoid him. But the effort was useless. _ Once in that third, Willard attempted a rally - tried to fight back - but he quick- ly covered again, for as soon as he opened his closely held guard, Dempsey drove through with blows more vicious than before. _ Twice during that session Dempsey backed Willard to the ropes and once it seemed a certainty that just another blow would floor the giant for the long, long count. But before that blow could be struck the bell rang - and the fight was over. _ Willard tottered to his corner. It looked to many as though he never could make it. But with a dying heave, he landed in his chair. _ There his head sunk upon his breast. His seconds leaned over, looked anxious, tried to talk to him. And then they realized that the reign of Jess Willard as king of the boxing world was over. _ A towel was hurled into the ring. _ For a second there was silence from the crowd - and even Pecord stood as though petrified. But in a trice he leaped across the ring, yelling for Dempsey to come forward. Jack stepped forth, close to the center of the battlefield and Pecord raised the arm of Jack Dempsey which announced: "Jack Dempsey wins this fight on a technical knockout and so becomes heavyweight champion of the world."

THE FLORIDA TIMES-UNION JULY 5, 1919

THE FLORIDA TIMES-UNION JULY 5, 1919

DEMPSET WINS WILLARD A PITIABLE SIGHT GREATEST HEAVYWEIGHT SINCE JEFFRIES WILLARD'S STYLE OF LOSING WILLARD"S WIFE SORRY OF DEFEAT...

JACK DEMPSEY, NEW KING OF PUGILISTIC WORLD,
FIGHTS MOST SENSATIONAL BATTLE OF CAREER
THE FLORIDA TIMES-UNION, JULY 5, 1919
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