Combat Sports Historian and Martial Artist
After Jack Johnson became champion, a lack of strong contenders caused public pressure to mount on James J. Jeffires, the retired former heavyweight champion, to end his retirement and fight Johnson. Jeffries was considered the first and most credible of the “White Hope” contenders. In his prime, Jeffries probably couldn’t beat Johnson. At 35 years of age and nearly 300
Jack Johnson has always been a tough subject for me. I admire his courage and strength in confronting hatred and bigotry in a time when doing so put his life in danger. He refused to conform and accept a position of inferiority to white Americans. Yet, like many human beings he was a flawed man. He beat his first wife
This is a story about 1942-44 Hebert Street, which is located in the Old North St. Louis neighborhood of St. Louis, MO. Like many of its neighbors, this structure has seen better days. I became interested in the building because my great grandmother lived at this address in 1930. My maternal grandfather’s family lived in the northern part of St.
William P. Ellis was my great grandfather. Unfortunately, he passed away when my grandfather, Gilbert P. Ellis, was only two years old. My great grandmother did not know much about William’s family. The actual information Grandpa had on him was sparse, so William was the real mystery man in the family history up until 2006 or 2007. Grandpa had a
The idea for this post began germinating in my brain a couple of weeks ago, when I was in the store to spend my birthday money and found an article about self-defense positions. Taekwondo is my base style although we add lots of Judo, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and cane techniques into our system. I expected to see some realistic self-defense but