59 Fun Facts About Joe Louis

What was Joe Louis's famous nickname?

The Brown Bomber. Sportswriters ran through alliterative coinages such as the Mahogany Mauler and the Chocolate Chopper before this one stuck.

What was Joe Louis's full birth name?

Joseph Louis Barrow. In one telling he wrote his first two names so large on an amateur entry form that the surname would not fit; in another he dropped it so his mother would not learn he was boxing.

Louis and Jesse Owens were born eight months apart in which state?

Alabama. Both sharecroppers' sons went north as boys in the Great Migration, and each later embarrassed Nazi racial theory: Owens on the track in 1936, Louis in the ring in 1938.

To which city did Louis's family move in 1926, where he grew up and learned to box?

Detroit. His stepfather had gone ahead for work in the car plants, and the family followed in the Great Migration when Joe was 12; he took up boxing at the city's Brewster Recreation Center.

Which instrument was Louis meant to be learning with the lesson money he secretly spent on a boxing gym?

Violin. His mother paid for the lessons to keep him off the streets, and he reportedly boxed as plain Joe Louis so that she would not find out where the money was going.

Which car company employed Louis for a time at its River Rouge plant?

Ford. He worked as a labourer at its vast Rouge works, then quit factory life at 20 to box for money; three years later he was heavyweight champion of the world.

Before he ruled boxing's top division, Louis won his 1934 national amateur title in which weight class?

Light heavyweight. He took the national AAU title at 175 pounds in 1934, turned professional the same year and fought as a heavyweight from his first paid bout.

How much did Louis earn for his professional debut, a first-round knockout of Jack Kracken on 4 July 1934?

$59. His next purses were $62 and $101, yet within two years he had earned about $370,000 in the ring, a fortune in the Depression.

Who was Louis's trainer, nicknamed Chappie?

Jack Blackburn. A former lightweight who had served time for manslaughter, he doubted a Black heavyweight would get his chances, yet he and Louis grew so close that each called the other Chappie.

Which rule was among the Seven Commandments Louis's managers set for his conduct?

Never be photographed with a white woman. His managers gave the list to the press; it also told him never to gloat over a beaten opponent and to keep a dead pan for the cameras.

Which earlier Black fighter's flamboyant lifestyle cast a shadow that Louis's handlers worked to counter?

Jack Johnson. The first Black heavyweight champion had gloated over the white opponents he beat, and the backlash kept Black fighters from a title shot for 22 years, until Louis.

Louis's 1935 knockout of Italy's Primo Carnera was cheered by Black Americans as a symbolic win for which threatened nation?

Ethiopia. Mussolini was preparing to invade one of the few independent Black-ruled countries, so the giant Carnera stood in for fascist Italy when Louis stopped him in six rounds.

What did Louis do just hours before knocking out former champion Max Baer in September 1935?

Got married. He wed Marva Trotter in a Harlem apartment a few hours before the bell, then stopped Baer in four rounds with his bride watching from ringside.

Promoter Mike Jacobs signed Louis in 1935 as his weapon against which venue's monopoly on big-time boxing?

Madison Square Garden. Jacobs ran a rival club set up with Hearst sportswriters, among them Damon Runyon, and Louis was the star attraction he needed to break the Garden's hold on the sport.

Which flaw in Louis's style did Max Schmeling exploit to knock him out in 1936?

A low left hand. Schmeling told reporters beforehand that he had seen something: Louis dropped his left after jabbing, and right-hand counters over it put him down for good in the 12th round.

What new hobby distracted Louis from training before the first Schmeling fight?

Golf. He took it up in camp and spent long hours on the course, then entered the ring a 10-to-1 favourite and suffered the first defeat of his professional career.

Whom did Louis knock out in the eighth round on 22 June 1937 to win the world heavyweight title?

James Braddock. He floored Louis early and was knocked out in the eighth, but lost well: his deal for the fight gave his camp a 10 percent cut of the winner's promotions for the next ten years.

In which city did Louis win the world heavyweight title in June 1937?

Chicago. A New York arena held a contract on the champion's next defence, against a different challenger, so the fight was taken west to Comiskey Park, home of baseball's White Sox.

Which Harlem Renaissance writer recalled marching, cheering, yelling and crying at Louis's victories?

Langston Hughes. He wrote that thousands on relief poured into the streets after each win, and that no one else in America had ever had such an effect on Negro emotions, or on his own.

How did Louis's first title defence, against Welshman Tommy Farr in 1937, end?

A 15-round decision. Louis won it on points: the Welsh coal miner had been lined up to fight Max Schmeling until Louis's promoter outbid the German, and he became one of only three challengers to last the distance.

Which president is said to have felt Louis's biceps and told him America needed such muscles to beat Germany?

Franklin D. Roosevelt. They met in the spring before Louis's 1938 rematch with Germany's Max Schmeling, over three years before America entered the war, and his win made him a hero to Black and white Americans alike.

About how long did Louis need to beat Max Schmeling in their 1938 rematch?

About 2 minutes. It took 124 seconds: Schmeling was knocked down three times before his corner threw in the towel, in front of a crowd of more than 70,000.

Max Schmeling, who later helped pay for Louis's funeral, grew rich in postwar Germany from which drinks company?

Coca-Cola. The man once paraded as proof of Nazi racial theory ran a West German bottling franchise for the American giant, and sent money to his old rival when Louis fell on hard times.

About how many Americans heard the 1938 Louis-Schmeling rematch on the radio?

70 million. By the usual estimate more than half of a nation of 130 million tuned in, because the bout had been built up as a battle between democracy and Nazism.

What collective nickname was given to the opponents Louis beat in his defences between January 1939 and May 1941?

The Bum of the Month Club. The joke hid a record: at the height of the run Louis defended his title once a month, a schedule no heavyweight champion had ever attempted.

Which two-ton challenger knocked Louis down with a left hook in June 1939 before being stopped in the fourth?

Tony Galento. The New Jersey tavern owner trained for the cameras on beer and cigars and promised to 'moider da bum', then really did put the champion on the canvas before the referee rescued him a round later.

Which former champion of the next division down led on two scorecards before Louis knocked him out late in round 13?

Billy Conn. The lighter man outboxed Louis for 12 rounds, then ignored his corner and tried to slug it out for a knockout; two seconds from the bell, he was the one counted out.

Weeks after Pearl Harbor, Louis risked his title against Buddy Baer and gave his whole purse to which cause?

The Navy Relief Society. He knocked Baer out in the first round and the fund received $47,000; two months later he put the title up again, this time for the Army's relief fund.

Which famous boxing line did Louis coin before a title fight?

He can run, but he can't hide. Louis said it of a lighter, faster challenger who planned to outbox him, and backed it up by knocking the man out.

Joining a segregated Army in 1942, Louis said America had plenty wrong with it, but nothing which dictator could fix?

Adolf Hitler. Louis enlisted as a private soon after Pearl Harbor, and used his fame inside the Army to press for fairer treatment of Black soldiers.

Which phrase from a 1942 dinner speech by Louis became a famous wartime slogan?

We're on God's side. The line from his short dinner speech was reported across the country, and the Army made the champion the face of its drive to recruit Black soldiers.

Which future baseball pioneer's Officer Candidate School application did Louis help push through during the war?

Jackie Robinson. Louis used his fame to get the stalled applications of several Black soldiers moved, five years before one of them broke major league baseball's colour bar.

Which fellow boxing great toured Army camps with Louis on his wartime exhibition circuit?

Sugar Ray Robinson. The younger man had idolised Louis as a boy, and on tour with the Army's Special Services the pair boxed for the troops while pushing back against segregation in the camps.

Which decoration, rarely given to enlisted men, did Louis receive in 1945 for his contribution to morale?

The Legion of Merit. It recognised 96 exhibition bouts before some two million troops, and it carried a practical reward: the medal qualified him for immediate release from the Army.

Which veteran challenger knocked Louis down twice in December 1947 yet lost a disputed split decision?

Jersey Joe Walcott. The verdict was so disputed that Louis gave him a rematch the following June and knocked him out in the eleventh round; Walcott finally won the title himself three years later, aged 37.

About how many times in a row did Louis successfully defend his world heavyweight title?

25, by the usual count, was more than the eight champions before him had managed between them: Jack Dempsey, the idol of the 1920s, defended the title just five times in seven years.

What ended Louis's long reign as heavyweight champion in March 1949?

His retirement. Nobody had taken the title from him in almost twelve years, so the vacant crown was fought for by other men; the next year he returned to boxing to try to regain it.

What forced Louis to fight for the heavyweight title again in 1950?

A back-tax bill. Though his later purses went towards the debt, penalties and interest kept it growing until it stood at more than $1 million.

Who outpointed the 36-year-old Louis over 15 rounds in September 1950 to keep the title?

Ezzard Charles. He had held only one governing body's version of the title until this one-sided win over Louis earned him recognition as champion of the world.

Who knocked Louis through the ropes and out of the ring in October 1951, ending his career?

Rocky Marciano. The unbeaten challenger took no joy in it and is said to have wept in the dressing room afterwards; a year later he was heavyweight champion himself.

Louis's fights grossed more than $4.6 million; about how much of it did he himself receive?

$800,000. Half of every purse went to his two managers, his training expenses came out of his own half, and he gave much of what was left away.

Joe Louis Punch, one of the many businesses that failed under Louis's name, sold what?

A soft drink. Louis kept trying his luck in business: in 1969 he and an old rival he had twice beaten in title fights set up a company to run a chain of food shops.

To make money after boxing, Louis took up which other sport professionally in the 1950s?

Professional wrestling. He wrestled only briefly and without much heart for it, then stayed in the business for years as a referee of wrestling and boxing matches.

Which Las Vegas hotel gave Louis a job greeting tourists in his later years?

Caesars Palace. He attended a heavyweight title fight there on the last night of his life, and died of a heart attack the next morning.

Which Republican did Louis endorse and campaign for in the 1940 presidential election?

Wendell Willkie. Louis warmed up the crowd at his rallies in Harlem, though the Republican went on to lose the election in a landslide.

Which Harlem mobster is said to have paid off a $50,000 lien against his friend Louis?

Frank Lucas. The heroin trafficker later played by Denzel Washington in American Gangster called Louis a great friend, and the old champion sat in court through his trials.

In which cemetery was Louis buried with full military honours in April 1981?

Arlington National Cemetery. He did not meet its eligibility rules, so President Reagan waived them, and Max Schmeling, his old rival, helped to pay for the funeral.

Joe Louis Arena, open from 1979 to 2017, was built as the home of a team in which sport?

Ice hockey. The summer after it opened, the arena also hosted the Republican convention that nominated Ronald Reagan, the president who later waived the rules to give Louis a soldier's burial.

A sportswriter in which Canadian city is credited with adapting Louis's nickname for the local football team in the 1930s?

Winnipeg. A Winnipeg Tribune reporter coined the new name in print with the boxer in mind, the club soon adopted it, and it has played under that name ever since.

What does Robert Graham's 1986 memorial to Louis, suspended in a pyramid-shaped frame, depict?

A clenched fist and forearm. The 24-foot bronze arm, known locally as The Fist, was made to stand for the power of his punch, in the ring and beyond it.

In 1993 Louis became the first boxer honoured on which everyday US item?

A stamp. The 29-cent postage stamp was issued on 22 June 1993, 55 years to the day after he knocked out Max Schmeling in their rematch.

Which boxing magazine named Louis its Fighter of the Year four times?

The Ring. It first gave him the award for 1936, the very year Max Schmeling handed him his first professional defeat, and again for 1938, 1939 and 1941.

Sportswriter Jimmy Cannon famously said Louis was a credit to his race, and then specified which one?

The whole of humanity. Answering those who called him that, Cannon turned the phrase around: 'Yes, Joe Louis is a credit to his race, the human race.'

Which champion summed up the mourning for Louis in 1981 with the words 'Joe Louis, everybody cried'?

Muhammad Ali. The man who called himself The Greatest told a reporter that a famous billionaire had died without a tear being shed, while everybody, Black and white alike, had loved Joe.

Which numbers boss from Louis's home city became his manager in 1934 and later brought in a partner?

John Roxborough. He ran the numbers in the city's Black neighbourhoods, brought in fellow gambler Julian Black as co-manager, and published the list of rules that shaped Louis's public image.

For its title role, the 1953 film The Joe Louis Story cast which kind of newcomer?

A real heavyweight boxer. Coley Wallace, a Louis lookalike, had as an amateur handed a future undefeated heavyweight champion his last defeat, and the film cut his scenes together with footage of Louis's own fights.

Which honour was Louis awarded in 1982?

Congressional Gold Medal. The same act honoured the bandleader Fred Waring and the Western novelist Louis L'Amour, and praised the boxer for lifting the nation's spirit at one of its most critical times.

Which ballpark staged both of Louis's fights with Max Schmeling, in 1936 and 1938?

Yankee Stadium. Schmeling won there in 1936 and lost there two years later before more than 70,000 people, leaving for hospital with a fractured spine.

Hours before he died in April 1981, Louis attended a title defence by which heavyweight champion?

Larry Holmes. Louis, in a wheelchair since heart surgery in 1977, watched him outpoint Trevor Berbick in Las Vegas on the Saturday night and collapsed at home the next morning.