JEFF POWELL’S GREATEST FIGHTS
AMERICA AGAINST AN ANTI-NAZI GERMAN JOE LOUIS v MAX SCHMELING June 22, 1938, Yankee Stadium, New York
In this, the second in a series of 12 fights that shaped boxing history, I recount a battle fought with the world on the edge of war.
ALTHOUGH Adolf Hitler was trumpeting Max Schmeling as a hero of the Third Reich after his knockout victory over Joe Louis two years earlier, the German was anti-Nazi and remained so during the Second World War — now just over a year away. Louis had come back to win the world heavyweight title by defeating James J Braddock but said he would not regard himself as the true champion until he had beaten Schmeling. The fight was billed as a political clash between an America struggling to emerge from the Great Depression and a Germany that was risking provoking war in Europe by annexing Austria. Yet such was Schmeling’s distaste for being exploited by Hitler’s propaganda machine — and his loyal refusal to sack his Jewish manager — that his wife and mother were not allowed to travel to New York to support him in case he defected. Louis, who had trained on the links rather than the gym for the first fight, gave up women and golf to prepare. President Franklin D Roosevelt told him: ‘Joe, we need muscles like yours to beat the Germans.’ Louis would say: ‘The whole damned country was depending on me.’ Movie stars Clark Gable, Gary Cooper and Gregory Peck were among Hollywood celebrities in the 70,000 crowd at Yankee Stadium along with FBI chief J Edgar Hoover. Louis, at 24 eight years younger than the German, went for broke from the first bell. A barrage of left hooks followed by a right to the body had Schmeling doubled up and referee Arthur Donovan gave him a standing eight count. Louis then switched to the head, dropping Schmeling twice, and Donovan halted the fight after only two minutes and four seconds of the first round. The Brown Bomber’s body blows had fractured Schmeling’s spine. Schmeling would be drafted as a paratrooper during the war but was invalided out of the forces in 1941 after being wounded during the invasion of Crete. His anti-Nazi stance made him a hero in his country for a second time after the war. He invested in successful businesses and lived until shortly before his 100th birthday, in 2005. Louis did not fare so well. He lost his money and became a greeter at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. His old foe Schmeling became a friend, visiting him there once every year until Louis died in 1981, when he acted as a pallbearer at the funeral.