In the small hours of May 16, 1955, my father woke me in the darkness, lit a candle in the scullery, plugged in his old crystal radio set, and told me to listen to a world heavyweight title fight taking place thousands of miles away in San Francisco. Don Cockell of Balham, south London, was challenging Rocky Marciano of Brockton, Massachusetts, for the world heavyweight championship. Most of the sound which came whistling through the static was that of Marciano’s eight-ounce gloves thudding relentlessly into Cockell’s head and body.
Marciano kept knocking down the resilient Briton, who stubbornly kept getting up. The one-sided battle continued until the ninth round, when Rocky nailed him to the canvas for good with a booming right hand that seemingly connected while Cockell was already on his knees.
When the BBC radio commentator put a post-fight question to the champion, Marciano offered a gracious, if galling, tribute: "Britain can be proud of her boy Don Cockell."
My father, Jack Powell—whose toughness had carried him safely through the hazardous amphibious landings and muddy trenches of the Second World War as well as countless physical scraps inside and outside the ring—slammed his fist down on the kitchen table in disgust. "As if keeping beating us ain’t enough," he growled, "they have to bloody patronise us."
I was 13 years old at the time. Not until I reached 50—and Marciano had long since cemented his legacy as the only heavyweight champion in history to retire completely undefeated—would Lennox Lewis finally end our century-long wait for a British successor to the legendary Bob Fitzsimmons.
That immense, seemingly endless eternity was flooded instead with a succession of revered American icons. The golden age of heavyweight boxing gave us the monumental rivalries and spectacles that defined the sport: the Fight of the Century and the Thrilla in Manila, both unforgettable wars between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier; the Rumble in the Jungle featuring Ali and George Foreman; the shocking Upset of the Century by Buster Douglas over Mike Tyson; the historic clashes of Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunney; Joe Louis trading blows with both Max Schmeling and Jersey Joe Walcott; and Ali’s stunning dismantling of the fearsome Sonny Liston. That was a bygone era when the Star-Spangled Banner flew proudly over America’s mocking dismissal of Britain’s fighting contingent as "Britain’s Horizontal Heavyweights."
Even British heroes like Henry Cooper, who remained remarkably perpendicular against ‘The Greatest’ before losing to cuts, received scant recognition across the Atlantic for how he famously knocked Ali down and almost out with his legendary left hook, affectionately known as ‘Enery’s ‘Ammer, during the first of their two major stadium encounters.
So, oh, how we gloated years later when we watched Riddick Bowe ignominiously dump his WBC belt into a London dustbin rather than face Lewis, who was thereby elevated to his first world title by decree. We rejoiced when Lennox definitively validated his status by beating Oliver McCall in September 1995, and we proudly acclaimed ‘Lenny the Lion’ when he etched his name into history as our only three-time world heavyweight champion.
We breathed a collective, massive sigh of relief when Frank Bruno finally defeated McCall at an emotional Wembley Stadium to become world champion, just as we fretted anxiously for him when he genuflected umpteen times on his way to the Las Vegas ring for a second crushing defeat by Mike Tyson that brought an end to his brief reign.
Even so, British heavyweight boxing was clearly transitioning from a prolonged famine to an unprecedented feast. Historically, the United States can boast an impressive 53 champions all-time in prize-fighting’s marquee division, stretching all the way back to the immortal John L. Sullivan in the late 1880s. But the United Kingdom has accelerated dramatically from having just a single active heavyweight champion in 2003—when Lewis bloodied and defeated Vitali Klitschko—to a running total of 11 today, even if one excludes the asterisks attached to Michael Bent, Herbie Hide, and Henry Akinwande, who wore the WBO belt before that organization achieved full, universal recognition.
David Haye subsequently built upon the Lewis legacy when he bamboozled Russia’s towering seven-foot giant Nikolai Valuev, successfully emulating Evander Holyfield’s historic feat of rising from undisputed cruiserweight king to conquer the heavyweight division.
While the formidable Ukrainian brothers Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko temporarily broke decades of American domination, both Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua later followed in the footsteps of Lewis by vanquishing Wladimir Klitschko in epic encounters. Britannia’s rule at the summit was subsequently and stunningly interrupted by Oleksandr Usyk, who revived the Kyiv-born dominance with two dazzling victories apiece over both the ‘Gypsy King’ and AJ, followed by another double success over their heir apparent, Daniel Dubois.
Yet, Oleksandr ‘The Great’ Usyk’s abrupt relinquishing of the division’s major belts has immediately opened the gateway to an astonishing UK renaissance. This modern era is defined not by American heavyweights ruling the roost, but by Britons fighting each other for the sport’s most glittering prizes.
This weekend at the O2 Arena, Daniel Dubois and the amazingly reconstructed white-collar boxer Fabio Wardley will reprise their brutal brand of war for the now highly-respected WBO title, with ‘Dynamite’ Daniel stepping in as the reigning champion. The winner of this explosive showdown is widely expected to go on and meet—in the not-too-distant future—whoever finally emerges victorious from the long-awaited, repeatedly delayed settlement between Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua. Though it comes belatedly, that prospective matchup is so full of fascination that it has commanded ticket prices higher than the gross national product of several developing nations.
By that time, young rising star Moses Itauma should have fully recovered from a drastic loss of stamina and a blown IBF title shot against Croatia’s Filip Hrgovic, allowing him to resume his march toward leading the next generation of British contenders. Meanwhile, German WBC champion Agit Kabayel will soon find himself squarely in the crosshairs of this formidable British vanguard.
With all of these major names—barring Joshua—currently operating under Frank Warren’s promotional stable, there are plenty more domestic blockbusters waiting to be made. This stands in stark contrast to the western horizon, where only one marquee heavyweight of true promise, Jared Anderson, can be seen struggling to recapture past American glories.
To think that American boxing observers and media used to belittle their own last heavyweight champion of note, Deontay Wilder, as "just a puncher." He proved to be the most devastating puncher the division had seen since Iron Mike Tyson himself. How deeply boxing fans across the Atlantic must be wishing today that Tyson Fury had not decisively ended the Bronze Bomber’s five-year run of devastating knockouts during the murderous final act of their legendary trilogy.
Throughout the glorious history of American boxing, the world heavyweight champion served as the ultimate cultural symbol of national manhood. Today, however, the United States lays claim to none of the major alphabet belts.
External cultural and economic factors are clearly at work in this shift. The vast majority of strapping young American athletes—whether graduating from college athletic programs or seeking professional pathways out of inner-city neighborhoods—are increasingly gravitating toward basketball, American football, and baseball, rather than enduring the brutal head-bashing of the boxing ring on the mere off-chance of securing generational wealth.
American boxing is currently reduced to pinning its fragile hopes on a brash young Mexican-American welterweight, Ryan Garcia, off the back of his destructive performance against a humiliated Conor Benn. Meanwhile, the prestigious Blue Riband of the prize ring has been triumphantly hoisted on this side of the Atlantic.
It seems things are not quite so Yankee-Doodle-Dandy for American boxing anymore, gentlemen.
