Consign Your Best Items with Lelands. We Also Pay Cash on the Spot! Learn More Here.
Olympic Club Boxing Memorabilia Collection - Sourced from Olympic Club Boxing Instructor
The Olympic Club was a private athletic and social organization in New Orleans, Louisiana, and for a time in the 1883-97 period was, according to boxing writer S. Derby Gisclair, the "epicenter of the boxing world." The Olympic Club had a 10,000-seat arena, and hosted a number of famous fights, including the shocking victory of Bob Fitzsimmons over Jack Dempsey in 1892, and three World Championship bouts in a three-day Fistic Carnaval from Sept. 5-7, 1892. Presented is a memorabilia collection that includes a ledger with over 150 pages of newspaper clippings, accounts, and tickets from fights (the most valuable part of the piece), along with a stock certificate belonging to the boxing instructor whose collection this is. Also, part of the offering includes 73 checks. The ledger measures 7.25x12.1". Essentially the ledger has been used as a scrapbook. Most of the newspaper clippings from the ledger are approximately 100 years old. There are many clippings about Heavyweight Champion Jack Dempsey. There are also clippings concerning boxers Gene Tunney, Jack Sharkey, Primo Carnera, Tony Canzoneri, Max Baer, Max Schmeling, and many others. Baseball stories and box scores are also in the ledger. Of course, a few of the pages are partially torn, and the pages and clippings show the expected foxing and darkening caused by the passage of time. Some of the clippings have come loose or are partially detached. On page 6 of the ledger-turned-scrapbook, is a group of four prized tickets to important fights at the Olympic Club: 1) A 3x5" full ticket to the March 2, 1892, fight between Peter Maher, the Champion Heavyweight of Ireland, and Robert Fitzsimmons, the Champion Middleweight of the World. Fitzsimmons won. 2) A 2.75x4.25" full ticket to the September 5, 1892, Featherweight Championship of the World contest between African American George Dixon and Jack Skelly, with Dixon being victorious. 3) A full ticket to the September 6, 1892, World Lightweight Championship fight between Billy Myer and Jack McAuliffe, won by McAuliffe. This full ticket measures 2.5x4.9". 4) A full ticket to one of the most memorable fights in history, the September 7th bout between challenger "Gentleman Jim" Corbett and World Heavyweight Champion John L. Sullivan, who was almost 34 years old and not in shape. The famed Sullivan was the last of the bare-knuckle Heavyweight Champions, and under the Marquess of Queensbury rules, the fighters used boxing gloves. The 26-year-old Corbett's more "scientific" approach to boxing, coupled with his superior speed and conditioning, enabled him to knock out Sullivan in the 21st round. The full ticket (measuring 3x4.25") has a few small stains and some creasing. Also included is a 10.75x8" stock certificate that gives one share of stock in the Olympic Club, for $25, to R.(?) L. Curry, the boxing instructor whose collection comprises this offering. The stock certificate has a bent back corner and a few uneven edges. There is also evident foxing and darkening because of its age. There are also 73 checks in this collection. The names of the boxers who endorsed the checks on the back: Jack Burke - who participated in the longest fight in boxing history, a 110 round "no contest" against Andy Bowen at the Olympic Club - Stanton Abbott, Willie "Billy" Madden, "Denver" Ed Smith, Ernest Roeber, Tommy Warren, Tommy "The Harlem Spider" Kelly, and Tom Callaghan.
Past Sports Card, Memorabilia, Non-Sports Card and Collecitble Auction Items
Other past auction items that may be of interest to you.
1966 Muhammad Ali-Cleveland Williams Fight Poster
Dempsey and Firpo Lithograph by George Bellows (1923-24)
John C. Heenan Presentation "Heenan v Sayers" Scrimshaw Shell (1860)
1926 Tunney vs. Dempsey Fight Program.
1887 John L. Sullivan Lorillard Card
Joe Louis WWII Mini Poster (7x10”)
Muhammad Ali Memorabilia & Autograph Collection (15)
