Attell Defends Against Reagan

During his first run as World Featherweight Boxing Champion, Abe Attell was based out of St. Louis, Missouri.  Besides having his camp in St. Louis, Attell defended his title several times at St. Louis’ West End Athletic Club.  At the time, St. Louis was the largest city west of the Mississippi River in the United States.

Born Abraham Washington Attell on February 22, 1883, 20-year-old Attell was considered the World Featherweight Champion even though the title had been vacated by Young Corbett the previous year.  Attell was matched with Johnny Reagan for a 20-round bout on Thursday, September 3, 1903.  The winner would be the undisputed champion.

Former heavyweight champion James J. Corbett was one of the newspaper contributors covering the match.  His account of the bout was carried in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s September 4, 1903 edition.

Both men entered the ring under the 122-pound limit.  However, Attell was the much bigger man.  Johnny Reagan would have most of his success in the lighter, bantamweight division with a 118 pound weight limit.

Corbett was extremely impressed by Reagan’s defensive abilities.  He said Reagan was very hard to hit even for a clever boxer like Attell.  However, his admiration ended there.

The bout was probably rather dull to watch.   For most of the contest, Atell rushed at Reagan with blows, which would have knocked Reagan out if they landed.  However, few ever landed.  By the end of the fight, Attell was so tired, he could barely pursue Reagan.

Reagan was uninjured but had landed very little offense during the entire fight.  Knowing that the bigger Attell could knock him out, if he caught him, Reagan stayed far out of the striking range.  He landed a few light punches but nothing to damage Attell or impress the judges for that matter.

At the end of the 20 uneventful rounds, the judges gave Attell a unanimous decision.  None of the ringside pundits disagreed.  All observers gave the fight to Attell for his relentless pressure.

Abe Attell continued to fight out of St. Louis until he was suspended for fight fixing in 1904.  He moved back to the West Coast, where he finished his career as one of the top featherweights of all time.

Johnny Reagan had much more success as a bantamweight.  He also used St. Louis as his home base and remained there until his untimely death at 35 years of age in January 1912.

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Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch, September 4, 1903 edition, p. 9

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