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Article: Dempsey's beating of Willard started Golden Age of Sport.(Sports)(The Way It Was)
- Article from:
- The Washington Times (Washington, DC)
- Article date:
- July 31, 2000
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2000 News World Communications, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Listening to referee Ollie Pecord's instructions under a broiling mid-afternoon sun in Toledo, the boxers appeared badly mismatched. Towering champion Jess Willard was 6-foot-6 and 260 pounds of taut, pale muscle. Challenger Jack Dempsey was 6-0 and 180, with a lean body burned to a deep bronze, but his expression showed concern.
"I thought I was going to be sick to my stomach," Dempsey would say later, according to biographer Roger Kahn in "A Flame of Pure Fire: Jack Dempsey and the Roaring '20s." "Willard wasn't fat [as some had predicted after four years of virtual inactivity] - he was in terrific shape. I said to myself, `This guy might kill me. I'm 24 ...