The headlines:
Deseret News, May 13, 1910: "Three thousand men, boys and women see prize fights: 34 city and county officials look on while three men are pounded into insensibility at Saltair; no attempt to invoke the law and stop the brutal exhibition."Salt Lake Herald-Republic, May 13, 1910: "Seething mass of fight fans crashes through Saltair Coliseum floor into water of lake, barely missing death."
The same event, two headlines. The greatly differing reports of the May bout between Cyclone Johnny Thompson and Pete Sullivan in the two Salt Lake newspapers characterized the stormy early history of professional boxing in Utah.
Totally ignoring a potential disaster that sent about 40 people through the floor and into the Great Salt Lake when a Saltair stairway collapsed under the weight of boxing fans, the Deseret News took the "high road," lambasting boxing as a brutal sport.
The News story featured a box that proclaimed 11 women were in the audience of 3,000, along with 1,000 "prominent and well-known citizens seen at random." Who made such a precise count, the article doesn't say.
Also on hand, the newspaper reported, were 34 deputy sheriffs and police, and city and county officials of Salt Lake City and Ogden who sat passively by and made no arrests or even attempts to maintain the law, even when one of the fighters "fell to the floor in a limp heap, rolling in his agony to the very feet of the sheriff's deputies."
Boxing was, in fact, one of few topics on which the Deseret News and its traditional rival, the Salt Lake Tribune, were united. The third city newspaper, The Herald-Tribune, made note of the fact shortly after the Thompson-Sullivan fight when another big bout was thwarted, in part because of resistance from the News and Tribune.
"The Deseret News and the Salt Lake Tribune have at last agreed on something," the Herald-Republic said. "They are united in an effort to prevent the Johnson-Jeffries boxing contest being held in Utah."
For weeks, all of the local newspapers chronicled the goings-on surrounding the proposed fight between James J. "Jim" Jeffries and John Arthur "Jack" Johnson. Promoter George L. "Tex" Rickard, the most famous of the era, announced that the proposed 45-round fight would be held at Saltair. Jeffries, undefeated champion, would come out of retirement to try to wrest the title from Johnson, the first black to hold the honor.
Almost simultaneously, Rickard's partner, John J. "Jack" Gleason, announced the big fight would be in San Francisco on July 4. For weeks, the fight between the two promoters eclipsed any prospective battle between the pugilists.
Salt Lake papers alternately announced that the bout would or would not be in Utah, depending on which of the promoters currently had the upper hand. Interested locals took advance bookings for up to 100 ringside seats from single individuals, and hotel space was spoken for by people from all over the country who anticipated the fight at Saltair.
Gov. William Spry was in Chicago, en route to a governor's conference in Washington, when he heard about the plans.
"There will be no fight in Salt Lake or any other place in Utah. I don't think it would be necessary to call out the militia, but I will take whatever drastic steps necessary to prevent it," said Spry.
Utah wasn't the only state that had laws against boxing matches. The sport had a long and brutal history, with many fights, especially before the turn of the century, continuing until one of the opponents could no longer rise from the floor. One Denver match went 102 rounds.
The Marquis of Queensbury rules, adopted in the late 1800s, had begun to have an effect, but a bout could still be a bloody, punishing event.
To the dismay of some and the joy of others, the Jeffries-Johnson match did not come to Utah in that 1910 summer. Some bitter Utahns concluded the whole thing had been a publicity stunt. But the fight didn't take place in San Francisco, either. The July 4th event was staged in Sparks, Nev., with Johnson knocking out his opponent in 15 rounds.
Time and mellowing did their work over the next few decades, and boxing took its place among Utah's legitimate sports. The state, in fact, spawned one native-son champion and another who claimed Utah as his adopted home - Gene Fullmer and Jack Dempsey, respectively.
Fullmer, a West Jordan kid, took the middleweight title on Jan. 2, 1957, by becoming the only boxer ever to knock Sugar Ray Robinson out of the ring. In a return match, the Utahn lost, knocked out in the fifth round. But he retook the title in a subsequent fight against Carmen Basilio.
In all, he successfully defended the title eight times. He retired on July 23, 1964. His impressive record of 55 wins (24 by knockouts), six losses and three draws earned him extraordinary stature in the sporting world, including induction into the Hall of Fame in 1974 and receipt of the New York Downtown Athletic Club's Marciano Award in 1983.
A biography says Fullmer "fought everyone in sight in his climb to the middleweight title," including the best-known fighters of his day.
Coloradan by birth but Utahn by preference, Jack Dempsey had a determination early in his life to be a champion. Before he was officially a fighter, he was a bouncer in a Bingham bar, where his reputation prevented a lot of trouble before it started.
Dempsey held the heavyweight title from 1919 to 1926 and became one of the most colorful sports figures of his day - a mix of legend and performance that persisted until his death in May 1983. Although he never became actively involved in the LDS Church, he was always proud to announce his membership, early accounts say.
From the time of his first victory, July 4, 1919, over Jess Willard, Dempsey made a good living from boxing, amassing more than $2.7 million for nine fights from 1919 to 1927. His greatest take from a fight was the one he lost to Gene Tunney in 1926 - $718,000 to lose the title. In a series of comeback bouts in the early 1930s, he fought several times in Utah.
Synonymous with the names of outstanding Utah boxers, including Fullmer, was the name of a man who made it happen for many of them. Marv Jenson was just a man interested in the sport when he opened a training center in the basement of his 12-room West Jordan home.
A mink farmer by profession, he had been Intermountain welterweight champ in 1937, and his intent at the beginning was simply to share what he knew with interested youngsters. Over time, his effort took on a life of its own and the Salt Lake Valley community was touted for producing more well-known and professional boxers than any town of its size anywhere in the country.
Through the years, problems in the sport, infighting among those who championed it and a loss of public interest relegated boxing to a spot further down the sports ladder. Die-hard fighters and fans still maintain an active program in Utah, but boxing's heyday appears past.