Friday, May 27, 2005

More on tough Jews...

I haven't blogged here for a while but having finally gotten some responses I guess these things work :) Anyway, I had an interesting time in Philadelphia recently and it's kind of a follow up to my post on "Tough Jews, Tough Messiahs" - at the Jewish Museum there was an exhibit on Jewish boxers. Yes, there were quite a few in the early 20th century. I think about 1/3 of all boxers were Jewish in the 1920s. In the beginning sometimes the Jews took Irish names but after enough Jews had entered the field, some of the Irish started taking Jewish names. Check out the exhibit here. It featured a lot of paintings by Charles Miller who actually has a website at www.jewishboxers.com, as well as newsreel footage, posters, actual gloves and trunks and other items.

And you gotta love the name they gave the exhibit: "Sting Like a Maccabee" !