Jack Johnson, Rebel Sojourner Read online

  Although Canadian authorities were eager to curry favor with the United States by “fetching Johnson under ‘the disorderly’ and ‘undesirable person’ rule,” Johnson still managed to evade their grasp.16 He and Rhodes had a brief brush with the law in Hamilton, Ontario, when police arrested them and took them to court. Two local lawyers helped to secure their release by arguing that there was still no official decree from the United States demanding Johnson's return.17 He and his nephew then continued on their journey to Montreal, Quebec. Since Johnson had already purchased a ticket from Chicago to Le Havre, France, via Montreal, he was technically a “tourist in transit” passing through Canadian territory, and therefore safe from deportation. The new Mrs. Johnson had also quietly traveled to Montreal to join her husband on their passage to Europe.18 An enemy of the state, Johnson was on the lam.

  The black heavyweight was not alone in his decision to flee the United States. Johnson went into exile alongside a growing contingent of black American boxers who took their prizefighting, sparring exhibitions, and vaudeville tours overseas. Although most of these African American pugilists were not fleeing the United States for any specific legal or political reasons, their departure was a clear rejection of white American racism, for they sailed across the ocean in pursuit of greater liberty, respect, and economic prosperity. In the United States they often found themselves shut out of lucrative boxing matches and theatrical engagements, whereas in Europe they discovered a rising demand for their diverse talents. Yet even as black sportsmen searched for a space of exile beyond the color line, it was their color that ultimately shaped their opportunities abroad.

  As they traveled they confronted and provoked the question of race in a number of contexts. Their itinerant existence on the margins of mainstream society exemplified the incompatibility of black freedom and Western modernity. Denied access to more conventional and stable forms of employment, they often found themselves pushed into the transnational marketplace of racial spectacles. They were wanderers “in an expanded West but not completely of it.” The “striking double-ness” resulting from this “unique position” as, at once, second-class citizens and sought-after objects of white curiosity proved to be a source of both success and suffering for men like Johnson.19 Despite the demand for their talents abroad, they kept coming up against the racial boundaries of modernity.

  Molded by their ambiguous status, they became cosmopolitan renaissance men. Frank Craig, “The Harlem Coffee Cooler,” an African American prizefighter in turn-of-the-century Britain and France, was one of the few who permanently expatriated to Europe. When English patrons invited Craig to London in the 1890s, his spectacular feats both in and out of the ring inspired public discussions about race and physical ability. Although at first British sportsmen questioned “what degree of boxing excellence might be expected in a debutant whose mother was an American Indian and whose father was a Cuban negro,” Craig proved his courage and skill against white fighters. In addition to his ring prowess, Craig reputedly spoke English, Spanish, and German, and he was also adept at swimming, cycling, roller skating, dancing, and playing the mouth organ. A consummate performer, he even became a smash hit in British music halls, helping to popularize the cakewalk.20 With his fight purses and the money he earned from his stage performances, Craig bought several London taverns. He enjoyed flaunting his wealth and often drove around with his white wife in an open carriage, wearing expensive clothes and sparkling diamonds.21

  For Craig and those who followed in his foreign footsteps, the line between sport and theater was blurred. Many of them made as much money, if not more, on the stage as in the ring. The next generation of African American prizefighters gave rise to what some European sportswriters called the Coloured Quartette, a group of four internationally renowned and seemingly unbeatable African American heavyweights that included Johnson, Sam Langford, Sam McVea, and Joe Jeannette.22 Alongside these major stars a corps of black journeymen also ventured overseas in the early 1900s, including the likes of Eugene Bullard, Aaron Lester Brown (the “Dixie Kid”), and Bob Scanlon. As they developed thriving careers as touring athletes and entertainers, they came to embody an alternative vision of racial progress.

  Even before they left for Europe, the majority of these hardscrabble pugilists had already spent their boyhoods wandering across North America in search of opportunity. Born in Weymouth, Nova Scotia, in 1886, Sam Langford, “The Boston Tar Baby,” rode the rails stowed away on break beams and in boxcars. “I was a tramp when only a boy,” Langford once told a British reporter. “I guess it was the roughand-tumble I had then that has made me so strong and hard now.”23 Langford's early adventures as a hobo definitely groomed him for the grueling international life of a professional boxer. Likewise, born in Columbus, Georgia, on 9 October 1895, Eugene Bullard had roamed across the state as a youngster, crossing paths with a variety of folks, including a band of European gypsies.24 Bullard later claimed that his friendly encounter with the gypsies had convinced him that a “social order tolerant of racial difference was possible” and that the chance for a better life existed on the other side of the Atlantic.25

  With little formal education or access to steady work, black men gravitated to prizefighting since it was one of the best-paying professions open to them at the time. Langford eventually settled in Boston, where he started off as a janitor and then became a sparring partner at the Lenox Athletic Club.26 One evening he was hanging around outside a Boston boxing arena trying to get in to see the bouts when the promoter ventured out in search of more fighters. Langford jumped at the chance to make some cash. “I was mighty hungry, I tell you, and was willing to do anything for a meal,” he recounted, “so I ups and tells him if he'll give me five cents…for something to eat, I'll box for him.” Langford took the nickel, filled up on doughnuts, and proceeded to knock out his opponent. The easy money convinced him to pursue a career in boxing.27

  Joe Jeannette, a New Jersey native born on 26 August 1879, also began prizefighting because of economic woes. He told a British sportswriter, “I started life breaking in young horses for a large coal company, but my mind was centred on being a veterinary surgeon.” Unfortunately, the small salary he earned for breaking horses stood in the way of his studies. “So, being always fond of boxing,” Jeannette recalled, “I determined to scrape up the necessary money in the ring.”28 Initially a means to finance his education, prizefighting became Jeannette's primary occupation.

  Although Bob Scanlon started out as a maritime worker and itinerant laborer, the harsh realities of unemployment eventually pushed him into the boxing business. Born Benjamin Lewis in Mobile, Alabama, on 7 February 1886, Scanlon at the age of sixteen moved to Mexico, where he worked as a cowboy for a year. He then crossed the Atlantic, slogging away as a ship's cook. Discharged in 1903 in Renfrew, Scotland, Scanlon later traveled to London, where a porter ran off with his luggage, leaving him destitute. After surviving rough times in the metropolitan capital, he journeyed to Cardiff, Wales, where he found another position aboard a ship. When he returned to Cardiff a few years later, he was once again jobless and had no prospects. Scanlon left for Pontypridd, Wales, hoping to labor in the coal mines, but he was unable to secure employment. Instead he found work in a boxing booth at a local fair, where he took on all comers for a small fee. From there it was a short step to the much more profitable world of professional boxing.29

  The high demand for black pugilists in Europe coupled with the oppressive state of U.S. race relations pushed Johnson and many of his contemporaries overseas. Incidents of racial violence outside the ring drove some abroad. A popular welterweight named Dixie Kid, born in Fulton, Missouri, on 23 December 1883, left the United States in 1911 after enduring an eight-month jail sentence for defending himself against a white man in Philadelphia.30 The following year, when a white boy cut Bullard's favorite suit pants with a razor, the sixteen-year-old vowed that he would travel to Europe and become a boxer like his hero Jack Johnson. Bullard caught a
train to Norfolk, Virginia, where he stowed away on the Marta Russ for its three-week voyage across the Atlantic. When the ship reached Aberdeen, Scotland, the captain gave Bullard £5 and sent him ashore. At first Bullard was shocked at the friendliness of the local whites, who addressed him endearingly as “darky” or “Jack Johnson.” Although he was viewed as an exotic novelty in Aberdeen, Bullard found that his new neighbors did not have the same contempt for him as white American southerners. Over the next two years he held a variety of jobs, from longshoreman to fish wagon vendor to midway attraction, eventually making his living as a vaudeville performer and professional boxer in Britain and France.31

  American racism inside the ring propelled even the most successful black prizefighters overseas. When white American boxers ignored their challenges, black pugilists often chose to leave the country in search of new competitors and larger purses. Langford's earnings increased dramatically when he traveled to fight in Britain, France, Australia, and Mexico. During his early days as a professional boxer in the United States he received a paltry $150 to $200 per bout. Even his largest U.S. purse was only around $3,000, for his fight against the white heavyweight Gunboat Smith. However, in 1909 Langford earned $10,000 for meeting Ian “Iron” Hague in London, and he secured his next biggest purse of $7,500 in Australia. Money was not Langford's only reward for his foreign venture. He also had the opportunity to compete for and win the heavyweight championships of Australia and Mexico.32

  Langford's contemporary Sam McVea, a Texan born on 17 May 1883, spent so much of his career abroad in England, France, Belgium, Australia, and South and Central America that he gained the moniker “Colored Globe Trotter.” McVea made his biggest mark fighting in Europe, particularly in France, where fans affectionately dubbed him L'Idole de Paris (The Parisian Idol). Tired of meeting the same black opponents multiple times in rings throughout the United States, Jeannette also decided to try his luck in Europe. In 1909 he accompanied his Irish-American manager Dan McKetrick to Paris, where he had a string of fights against McVea.33 All of these men publicly embraced their newfound fame and fortune overseas, indulging in fashionable suits, fast cars, and white women.34

  Profiting from the success of these traveling athletes, African American managers and promoters also began to make their way across the Atlantic. An Indianapolis native and famed blackface comedian, Billy McClain became the booking agent for several African American boxers and performers in Europe, including McVea. McClain had left the United States in 1904, and, like many of his African American clients, he found his niche in the realm of entertainment. Known for being a bit of a braggart, he often sent back glowing descriptions of his overseas travels, including his enjoyment of high-powered automobiles and European women.35 Maintaining that he was the “first and only Negro promoter of any note in the world,” McClain felt that “it devolved upon him to show his mettle.” He served as a “Ballet Master” and managing director at prestigious venues in London, Paris, and Brussels. In 1910 he also established a boxing gym in Brussels where some of the best pugilists in Europe reputedly trained. The multitalented promoter gained a facility with several European languages, enabling him to better guide his clients' transnational careers.36

  Thanks to his journeys, McClain had also acquired a much more comprehensive view of the race question. “I am satisfied that the people of all races are for themselves,” the black impresario declared. “In order that the Negro should become a factor in the world and take his place among men he must free himself from the abominable subservience to others which permits him to be treated as he is today.”37 From champions to journeymen to managers, black sportsmen embraced a transnational existence that challenged the traditional scripts of racial uplift and U.S. citizenship. These rebel sojourners were, as Claude McKay later described himself, “bad nationalists.”38 While abroad, they developed a critical eye for white American racism along with the confidence and creativity to protest it. Their well-publicized experiences outside the United States gave their black American fans a picture of life in the world beyond the confines of Jim Crow America.

  NARRATIVES OF EXILE

  Johnson, his wife, and his nephew Rhodes traveled first-class aboard the steamship Corinthian, arriving peacefully in the French port of Le Havre in July 1913. As the black champion disembarked, he greeted a gathering of European reporters and proceeded to explain his side of the story. His account of this public address, titled “Mes malheurs” (My misfortunes), initially appeared in La Boxe et les boxeurs, and the Chicago Defender subsequently translated it for African American readers. “Since my return from France to America I must say that I have been the most persecuted man in the whole world,” Johnson announced. “The Americans, decidedly unable to stomach my victory over Jeffries and the relatively important sums I have won…seem sworn to destroy or ruin me. There has not been a day when I was not the victim of some plot, of some ridiculous accusation, which invariably ended in a great loss of money for me.”39 Since leaving the United States, however, Johnson's luck seemed to be changing. He claimed that the officers and passengers on board the Corinthian had treated him with respect, sympathizing with his plight as a persecuted man. Johnson graciously concluded, “I have always been welcomed in France and I hope that the Parisians are reserving a good welcome for me again this time. I count on settling permanently in their city and never returning to the United States.”

  FIGURE 10. Rather than go to jail after his Mann Act conviction, Johnson went into exile abroad. Jack Johnson and his wife Lucille embarking on a vessel, 1913. © Roger Viollet / Getty Images.

  Widely covered in the black press, Johnson's exile provided African Americans from all walks of life with an optimistic story of escape from the racial injustices they faced on a daily basis. As tales of his foreign travels circulated on street corners and in barbershops and saloons, they took on a life of their own in black communities across the United States. Johnson became a cultural conduit through which African Americans could ponder the role of race in the wider world. The black champion used the foreign press to highlight the hypocrisy and brutality of white America on the world stage. In this way, his flight fit within a much longer history of black exile and the development of international alliances in the face of white American discrimination.

  Johnson and his fellow black sportsmen were an integral part of a developing discussion on the global state of the race question in the African American press. In addition to acting as his uncle's road manager, Rhodes became Johnson's full-time publicist, sending laudatory reports of the champion's overseas endeavors to the Chicago Defender. The Defender played up this transatlantic connection, claiming that it offered readers “the most authentic accounts of ‘Jack Johnson’s Doings Abroad.'”40 This was a particular point of prestige for the Defender, since most African American newspapers during this period did not have the funds to hire foreign correspondents. Their international news tended to come from two sources: reprinted or rearticulated reports taken from the white American press and letters from subscribers who happened to be living or traveling abroad. The fact that Johnson's nephew was the source of these special reports did not seem to detract from the newspaper's excitement at having access to regular updates. Even the newspaper's founder and editor in chief, Robert S. Abbott, later ventured overseas for a personal visit with the black champion.41

  This interest in Johnson's travels was just one part of the Defender's broader vision of cultivating in its readers a more optimistic and cosmopolitan outlook. Next to reports of racist white southerners objecting to educated negroes and lynch-happy rednecks in the Midwest, the Defender often featured news of black successes in Europe. It prided itself on giving “more foreign news of the race than any paper in America.”42 Around the same time that Johnson arrived in Le Havre, the Defender also featured travel articles promoting Paris and the historic town of Ghent, Belgium, as ideal tourist destinations.43 Johnson's journeys as well as other transatlantic reports of racial tolerance hel
ped to raise Europe's profile among African Americans.

  With its British circulation sold from Daw's Steamship Agency in London, the Defender also attempted to vindicate black America in the eyes of white people abroad. Since white American correspondents for the British press sought to “magnify the faults of the colored Americans,” the newspaper became a kind of countervoice. The editorial team vowed to show the outside world that not only were African Americans progressing as a race, but also that black men were continuing to be murdered simply because they dared to defend their households. These transatlantic efforts appeared to be working. An African American reader studying in Europe wrote that he was pleasantly surprised to find a copy of the newspaper in Glasgow, Scotland.44

  Johnson, charged with the responsibility of telling all his foreign friends about the Defender, was the newspaper's most popular spokesman in England. Copies of the Defender sold out every week in London, attracting widespread attention. The British reputedly admired the black weekly because of “its bravery and fearlessness on behalf of its colored Americans.”45 Its many ingratiating reports of English civilization certainly did not hurt its cause. Comparing its transatlantic mission to that of the legendary black abolitionist Frederick Douglass, who had traveled to London to garner support for the freedom of African American slaves, the Defender declared that this time the “power of the press [came] to speak in their behalf.”