By Dennis Taylor
The heavyweight champion was the most-admired athlete in the world at the turn of the 20th Century, thanks to the charisma and machismo of the legendary John L. Sullivan. But John L. got old, and along came Bob Fitzsimmons, a colorful Brit, and James J. Jeffries -- "The Boilermaker" -- an indestructible American, to create a rivalry still worth remembering a century later.
Christopher James Shelton, our inimitable boxing historian, joins us on The Ringside Boxing Show to tell some truths and debunk myths about those early days of The Sweet Science, painting a vivid picture of what boxing and the heavyweight division were like in the days when horses and horseless carriages shared American roadways.

Our conversation with Chris is preceded by a breakdown of a busy weekend of boxing (Charlo, Hurd, Santa Cruz, Mares and Groves all made progress toward bigger fights), plus a report on the UK boxing scene from our British correspondent, Paul McLaughlin.

Dennis Taylor is host of The Ringside Boxing Show, editor/publisher of www.ringsideboxingshow.com, and co-author (with John J. Raspanti) of the West Coast Boxing Hall of Fame's 2017 Boxing Book of the Year, "Intimate Warfare: The True Story of the Arturo Gatti and Micky Ward Boxing Trilogy," currently on Amazon's Bestsellers list.