Walcott, “Jersey Joe”

(b. 31 January 1914 in Merchantville, New Jersey; d. 2 February 1994 in Camden, New Jersey), professional boxer who at age thirty-seven became the oldest fighter to win the sport’s heavyweight championship title (1951), a record he retained until 1994.

Walcott was born Arnold Raymond Cream. His father, Joseph Arnold Cream, was an immigrant from the West Indian island of Barbados who worked as a laborer for the Pennsylvania Railroad. His mother, Ella Edna Amos, was a New Jersey native and homemaker. Walcott was the fifth of twelve children, and his father, who taught him the fundamentals of boxing, died when Walcott was fourteen. His formal education ended early, but he quickly acquired his pugilistic skills, later recalling that he and his pals “boxed up and down the street from morning to night. I fought as soon as I could walk. My father sparred open handed with me in the yard.” Additionally, it was his father who impressed upon him the first commandment of the fight game: outsmart the other guy first.

By age eighteen Walcott was married to Lydia Talton, the daughter of a Baptist minister, with whom he had six children. Economic hardship befell Walcott early in the Great Depression years. After a variety of odd jobs (in a road crew, a soup factory, and an ice and coal truck), and after being forced to accept federal assistance, Walcott began to supplement his income by professional prizefighting. The local boxer Roxie Allen, impressed by Walcott’s courage following a sparring session with him at Battling Mac’s Gym in Camden, New Jersey, arranged for Walcott’s professional debut. After knocking out Cowboy Wallace in the first round in Vineland, New Jersey, the underage Walcott (then sixteen) received f 7.50 for his efforts. He adopted a new name in memory of his father’s boyhood hero, Joe Walcott, the “Barbados Demon,” a turn-of-the-century welterweight champion (1901–1906). “Jersey Joe” Walcott would run off a string of twelve consecutive victories, all in preliminary bouts, before suffering his initial setback.

Jack Blackburn, who later gained fame as the trainer of Joe Louis, recruited Walcott for his stable of Philadelphia area fighters. Under Blackburn’s tutelage, Walcott’s distinctive cagey, deceptive style emerged. He learned his trademark step-back right-hand lead from Blackburn, whereby he feinted turning away only to pivot and “sneak in” a right-hand punch. Walcott fought a scant seven bouts from 1939 through the mid-1940s and later recalled that he was a “hungry fighter who took matches for coffee and cake” and was repeatedly refused bouts, as promoters told him “all-Dixie” cards sold few tickets. During World War II Walcott was employed as a “calker and chipper” at the Camden shipyard and also as a sparring partner for the new heavyweight champion, the “Brown Bomber,” Joe Louis.

In 1945 and 1946 Walcott scored impressive wins over top competition, including Curtis Sheppard, Joe Baksi, Lee Oma, the second-ranked contender Jimmy Bivins, and the rugged Joey Maxim. Sportswriters began to clamor for a world title shot for Walcott, by then a seventeen-year ring veteran. His opportunity came on 5 December 1947 against the aging champion Joe Louis at the old Madison Square Garden in New York City. Originally scheduled as an exhibition fight, it was later made into a title bout. Walcott was so lightly regarded at the time that he was an overwhelming ten-to-one underdog. The fight has since entered the pantheon of legendary bouts. After flooring the champion twice in the early rounds with lightning right-hand leads, Walcott lost a controversial and widely unpopular split decision. Sportswriter James P. Dawson noted in the New York Times that although the champ “retained his title, Louis was nearer dethronement than he had ever been in his ten-year reign as the world’s premier boxer”; furthermore, “he was outmaneuvered, at times out boxed, always outthought, and generally made to look foolish.” After the final bell rang, Louis, under the impression he had relinquished his title belt, fled the ring. He returned to learn that he had won and was overheard apologizing to his former sparring partner, “I’m sorry, Joe.”

The legendary sports columnist Jimmy Cannon was quoted lamenting that if the “winner had not been a beloved American icon, the outrageous decision would have prompted a congressional investigation.” Under instructions, Walcott had backpedaled the final two rounds, claiming, “they told me in my corner that I was way ahead and that all I had to do to win was to avoid any risk in the last round. If I had thought it was as close as it turned out, I’d have traded punch for punch in the fifteenth.” Don Dunphy, the great ringside announcer, later mused on Walcott’s retreating strategy: “It made me recall the criticism Billy Conn had received for mixing it up with Louis in the last couple of rounds. He’d lost. Walcott was criticized for not mixing it up and he lost, too.” Walcott would lose another decision when his appeal to the New York State Athletic Commission was rejected within the week. In a June 1948 rematch at Yankee Stadium, Louis knocked out Walcott in the eleventh round and then retired from the ring.

In June 1949 Ezzard Charles defeated Walcott by decision in Chicago to capture the vacant National Boxing Association (NBA) heavyweight throne. In March 1951 he again defeated Walcott via decision, this time in Detroit. The boxing fraternity was puzzled over the announcement of a third Charles-Walcott bout, and the event took on the name the “Why Fight?” Why, wondered commentators, was Walcott receiving a fifth shot at a title that had eluded him in four previous attempts? Walcott’s twenty-one-year dream came true on 18 July 1951 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. There he vindicated himself with a ferocious left hook to Charles’s jaw that dropped the champ for the ten count. A six-to-one underdog prior to the fight, Walcott rewrote the record books with this historic victory. At the age of thirty-seven years and six months, he became the oldest man to win the heavyweight title; the former oldest titleholder was Ruby Bob Fitzsimmons, who was thirty-five when he leveled Gentleman Jim Corbett in Carson City, Nevada, in 1897. The following June, Walcott successfully defended his title, beating Charles by decision in Philadelphia.

Walcott’s next title defense came against the wild-swinging and undefeated Rocky Marciano in an epic battle in Philadelphia’s Municipal Stadium. The writer A. J. Liebling referred to the September 1952 struggle as “one of the stubbornest matches ever fought by heavyweights.” In a bout that Marciano later said was the toughest of his career, Walcott dropped the young challenger in the opening round with his patented left hook; this was the first knockdown suffered by Marciano, the “Brockton Blockbuster,” in forty-three fights. Dominating the bout and way ahead on points, Walcott seemed a certain winner by the late rounds. However, in what some ring historians consider the most famous right-hand punch in boxing history, Marciano’s short, straight blow landed flush on the aging champion’s jaw and Walcott crumbled to the ring floor, out cold. The epic thirteen-round fight is still considered one of the greatest title bouts of all time. Walcott retired from the ring after Marciano scored a first-round knockout in a rematch in Chicago the next year.

During his checkered career, Walcott, the superb ring technician and crafty counter puncher, fought sixty-seven times for pay. He won thirty by knockout, eighteen by decision, and one by foul; he dropped eleven decisions, was knocked out six times, and fought one draw. He continues to hold the dubious distinction of having lost six heavyweight championship bouts, the most of any fighter in history. In 1994, forty-five-year-old George Foreman eclipsed Walcott’s record as the oldest heavyweight champion by defeating Michael Moorer in Las Vegas for the crown.

Although Walcott earned over $1 million in purses, he lost most of it through poor investing. He was awarded the Edward J. Neil Trophy in 1951 as fighter of the year, and was elected to both the Ring Hall of Fame (1969) and the International Boxing Hall of Fame (1990). Overcoming his humble beginnings, Walcott was the picture of perseverance. A devout Christian, he credited his ring longevity to never having smoked or drunk alcohol. In addition, Philadelphia fight promoter J. Russell Peltz stated that Walcott endured hardships while overcoming racism, claiming, “he accepted a lot of what the black fighters had to accept… back in those days, it was like the Negro Leagues in baseball before Jackie Robinson. Black fighters had to fight among themselves. There were the occasional breakthrough like Joe Louis, but most of them never made it out of what was called the Chitlin’ Circuit.”

After his retirement, Walcott appeared in another role for which he is remembered, presiding as the referee in a bizarre ring spectacle: the March 1965 Muhammad Ali— Sonny Liston title rematch in Lewiston, Maine. In front of 2,400 fans in a converted high school hockey rink, Ali dropped Liston with what many ringside observers claimed to be a “phantom” punch in the first round. Ali, refusing to go to a neutral corner, delayed the start of the ten count over the fallen former champion. Walcott was startled and confused. He let the fight resume, but Nat Fleisher, publisher of Ring magazine, called out from his ringside seat that Liston had been down for the ten count. Subsequently, Walcott halted the contest and pandemonium ensued. The infamous fight has been shrouded in a cloud of controversy ever since.

In the 1980s Walcott became chairman of the New Jersey State Athletic Commission and, later, sheriff of Camden County, New Jersey, becoming the first African American to hold that position. Walcott died as a result of complications from diabetes at age eighty at Our Lady of Lourdes Medical Center in Camden. He is buried at the Sunset Memorial Park in Pennsauken, New Jersey. He was survived by all six of his children and many grandchildren.

Current Biography 1949 traces Walcott’s childhood and early career. Bert Randolph Sugar, 100 Years of Boxing (1982), and Jeffrey T. Sammons, Beyond the Ring: The Role of Boxing in American Society (1988), offer historical insights, biographical detail, and expert analysis. Don Dunphy at Ringside (1988) offers a breezy account of the Louis and Marciano fights by an expert ring analyst. The New York Times provides detailed and useful round-by-round accounts of his title fights against Joe Louis (6 Dec. 1947) and Ezzard Charles (19 July 1951). Numerous tributes appeared in various issues of the Camden Courier-Post following his funeral. There is an obituary in the New York Times (27 Feb. 1994).

Jeffrey S. Rosen