Jack Johnson, Rebel Sojourner

by Theresa Runstedtler

  Still, many African Americans saw postwar Cuba, with its nearby location, arid land, good climate, and multiracial population, as an ideal destination for black emigrants. Some argued that black Americans needed to assert their influence on the island before white American prejudice became an integral part of Cuban politics and culture. Black civil servants, educators, and missionaries from organizations such as the African Methodist Episcopal Church signed up to work on the island's reconstruction. The concurrent escalation of negrophobic violence in the United States only increased black American interest in Cuban emigration.39

  Cuba's promise lured black American sportsmen, businesspeople, professionals, clergy, tourists, and performers. Independent black baseball teams had been barnstorming throughout the island since 1900, and by 1907 black American players had begun to join Cuban rosters.40 In March 1912 Madame E. Azalia Hackley, a famous black American singer, writer, philanthropist, and activist, traveled to Cuba to raise money for her fellow black classical musicians. “America's queen of song” gave a spirited press interview in Havana, contrasting race relations in the U.S. South with those of the island. “Now what, with the unclean system of dealing with our [black] travelers, and the immoral designs which are forever in the minds of the southern white men regarding our women and the very lax way in which the health authorities regard the welfare of the race in the south,” she noted, “one will not wonder at my being so enthusiastic over the extreme cleanliness and equality shown in Cuba to those of my race.”41

  Others focused on the island's economic opportunities. In the same month as Hackley's Cuban sojourn a group of Chicago's leading black men organized a banquet dedicated to exploring the benefits of investment on the island. Professor Charles Alexander urged the attendees, “Cuba is really the future hope of those ambitious colored men and women who really are seeking a home where there is no color line, and where the possibilities of making an independent living are greater than in any other country.”42 The evening's keynote speaker, William L. Barth, even hoped that “in a short while the island of Cuba would become one of the possessions of the United States,” causing land values to skyrocket.

  Unlike Barth, other black Americans remained suspicious of U.S. annexation, worried that white American racism would infiltrate the island. Popularly known as the Race War of 1912, the summertime uprising of many mixed-race and Afro-Cuban people in the eastern provinces confirmed that the island was in the midst of racial turmoil.43 As one African American reporter saw it, Cuba's Race War was the “yield of the harvest from the seed of [white American] race prejudice.” After fourteen years of U.S. intervention Cuba's interracial relations had worsened and the Cuban government was considering legislation to prohibit black and Asian immigration to the island, even as it subsidized European immigration to whiten the nation.44

  Yet the so-called Race War of 1912 was not just a case of outside intervention gone wrong. Even before the United States invaded, the island already had in place a two-tier racial system that separated white from nonwhite by virtue of visible black ancestry. The military occupation had simply exacerbated existing racial inequities as U.S. officials put conservative white and light-skinned Cubans in positions of power. These elites often instituted policies that discriminated against Afro-Cubans. They also manipulated the new nation's founding myth of racial equality not only to justify the status quo but also to repress Afro-Cuban cultural expression and political mobilization. Pointing to the absence of legal segregation, the general tolerance of race mixing, and the upward mobility of prominent mulattoes, white Cuban elites blamed Afro-Cubans for their own socioeconomic problems.45

  Frustrated with this state of affairs, Afro-Cubans began to organize, and in 1908 they founded the Partido Independiente de Color (PIC). However, with its platform of Afro-Cuban equality and working-class empowerment, the PIC was outlawed in 1910. By 1912 party leaders had come to believe that only armed protest would bring the PIC official recognition in Cuba. They simply wanted the right to organize for Afro-Cubans' full integration into the political, economic, and social life of the island.46

  Taking a page from their white American counterparts, the Cuban elite couched the PIC's protest in narratives of black savagery versus white civilization, branding it a “race war” directed against the island's white population. The uprising had rekindled longstanding fears of an Afro-Caribbean conspiracy to make Cuba a black republic like Haiti. The mainstream Cuban press also revived the ominous specter of the black male rapist, rousing white men in the defense of the sanctity of their women and their families, and by extension the Cuban body politic. An editorialist for El Día even argued that Cuba should consider adopting the United States' racial practices of lynching, segregation, and disfranchisement to better control its own black population. The white repression of the protest was both swift and deadly. Not only were there mass arrests, but the racialized hysteria led to the indiscriminate massacre of thousands of Afro-Cubans.47

  Even in the wake of this violence, many black Americans still held out hope for the fledgling nation. “If the present [Cuban] president can hold out and put the administration on a sound financial basis and carry out his policies, there is no reason in the world why they should not paddle their own canoe,” an editorialist for the Chicago Defender declared in 1914. Yet this would require steering against a strong current of white American culture. With the “advent of the ‘Yankee,'” Cuba, especially the Cuban elite, was “absorbing more of his bad than his good traits.” The island needed to “shun annexation” to maintain its integrity as an inclusive multiracial nation.48

  The Willard-Johnson match provided a perfect test case for determining which way Cuba's leaders would navigate. Johnson arrived in Havana on 21 February 1915, and by late March both he and Willard had set up their training camps in the city.49 The rush of publicity surrounding the match was giving boxing a newfound popularity among the locals. As Johnson attested, “The growing number of individuals who attend my training sessions, as well as the applause they dedicate to me each time I perform a fast and elegant movement…gives me the authority to believe it.”50 Although initially marketed to U.S. visitors, boxing was quickly becoming a Cuban favorite.

  The white hope fight was set to take place at the Oriente Park racetrack at Marianao, an open-air stadium that could hold roughly twenty thousand spectators. Its U.S. promoters expected Cubans to buy up the cheaper seats, while the private boxes and ringside tickets would be sold principally to U.S. sportsmen.51 An advertisement in the Havana Daily Post urged U.S. expatriates and Cuban elites alike, “This is Havana's chance to become the Sporting Mecca of the World. Do your share!”52 A lot was riding on the fight both from the standpoint of Cuba's international reputation as a modern nation and its future as a profitable center of big-money boxing.

  White hope matches had already served to publicize and enrich frontier cities in the United States, including Reno, Nevada (Johnson versus Jeffries, 1910), and Las Vegas, New Mexico (Johnson versus “Fireman” Jim Flynn, 1912). Local officials had banked on the fact that hosting a white hope fight would confer a status of civilization and whiteness on their rough and multiracial communities.53 They also hoped the fight publicity would bring in businesses and investors to boost their local economies.

  Cuban officials and U.S. promoters saw the same potential for profitable cross-promotion in Havana. As a new nation, Cuba was endeavoring to fashion itself as a civilized body comprised of civilized citizens. This involved using the latest techniques of social science (anthropology, criminology, and eugenics) to improve a population supposedly degenerated by its slave and colonial past.54 Social Darwinism and positivism undergirded Cuban fans' (particularly the elite's) understandings of race in general and the interracial fight in particular. Attuned to this context, U.S. promoters emphasized both boxing's and the match's regenerative possibilities for the nation. A white hope fight would not only put Cuba on the map of the civilized world, but it would also provide fre
e advertising for the island as a fun and adventurous space for U.S. tourists.

  Yet this plan was not without complications. The potential for racial unrest simmered beneath the surface as Cubans of different stripes chose sides. Cuban officials threw their support behind the white hope fight, giving it the air of a state event. President General Mario García Menocal received “elaborately engraved” tickets for a special ringside box to share with his friends and cabinet officers. Next to Menocal's box was another set aside for the U.S. minister to Cuba, William Gonzales. The governor of Havana province, the mayor of Havana, and the commanding general of the army also scored their own private boxes.55 On the day of the big fight the Cuban congress took a holiday, and twenty of Havana's leading stores closed in the morning so that the owners and employees could attend. “The entire sport world favors Willard to bring home the bacon and title to the white race,” the Havana Daily Post declared, while La Lucha noted “that [Cuban] public opinion in general sympathizes with and supports Willard.”56

  Afro-Cubans embraced Johnson as their race hero. “Hundreds of negroes, the best sports on the island, are anxious to attend the fight, but cannot afford the admission charge,” the New York Times reported. “In many cases they are scraping every penny together in their eagerness to see the Samson Johnson facing the white Goliath.”57 The epic match held a particular appeal for Cuba's working-class as “streetcar drivers…coachmen, and even the guys in the streets” were seen “stretching their arms and doing all kinds of pirouettes as if they were ‘training' for a boxing ‘match.'”58 As the white American sportswriter Damon Runyon observed, “On every corner brown-skinned small boys are seen squaring off at one another by way of illustrating the American amusement.”59

  Even though Cuban authorities had authorized the Willard-Johnson match, they claimed they would ban all future fights between local whites and blacks. “They say they are not concerned with foreign race problems, but have their own to deal with,” a reporter for the New York Times explained. “They are not taking any chances of untoward happenings on Monday, however, as Militia will be freely disposed about the race track where the arena has been constructed.”60

  The racial dimensions of the fight also put Havana on the radar of white and black Americans alike. In late March a sensational story circulated in the mainstream U.S. press about a Cuban manicurist named Monica Valdez who lost her job when she refused to wait on Johnson's wife, Lucille. After an exchange of “heated words,” Valdez reputedly grabbed Lucille by the hair, dragging her and punching her in the face. The other women working in the salon called the police to break up the fight. Johnson demanded an apology, and although the salon owner apologized, Valdez refused to back down. According to the Milwaukee Free Press, “She flung a wet towel in the proprietor's face, told the champion what she thought of him, and left the place.”61 Johnson was incensed and threatened to sue, while Cuba's “white element” stood behind Valdez. Fearing that news of the catfight would incite “race trouble,” the Cuban police forbade any publication of the incident in the local press.62 The story still managed to catch the eye of a group of white citizens in Denison, Texas, who expressed their solidarity with the “little Cuban maicurist [sic]…who had the courage to give up her position rather than attend to Jack Johnsons [sic] wife.” W. N. King, secretary of the Denison Chamber of Commerce, had even written to the U.S. minister Gonzales for help in sending a $10 donation to the embattled Valdez.63

  The upcoming match seemed to be threatening both racial peace and U.S. power on the island. Captain Cushman Albert Rice, a white American ranch owner and soon to be the president of the National Sporting Club of Cuba, had traveled to New York City back in February, when he cautioned a group of men at the Army and Navy Club about the island's instability. “Now let me say for myself as well as every man of means on the island that a bout between Jack Johnson and Jess Willard will not be tolerated for a single moment,” Cushman declared.64 This was not just a local matter, but one that could potentially affect white American control of the island's resources. “Our interests are too valuable to allow the flames of race feeling to be fanned into a riot,” Cushman advised. “If I find that they propose to pitch a battle ground for the pair I will rally all the powerful interests at my command to fight the proposition.” He and other white American investors feared that an Afro-Cuban uprising would disrupt business as usual. “We don't want any civil war and that's what it would mean if a black started to muss up a white man,” Cushman cautioned. The ranch owner knew from experience that the Afro-Cuban laborer was not afraid to exercise his rights: “You can tell him to get a move on in the fields; he'll either quit or stick a knife in you.” Referring to the Race War of 1912, Cushman warned, “You know they went off into the woods to run a government of their own about three years ago and we had to go out and shoot them. We don't want that. We don't intend to do anything that would put the idea in their heads again.”

  Lester Walton of the New York Age countered Cushman's characterization of Cuban race relations. Like many other black Americans, he believed that white Americans had infected the island with their well-honed racism. “Not many years ago color prejudice was unknown in that country,” he claimed, “but as is invariably the case, the invasion of Americans, with their contagious notions on the color question, has inflamed the whites against the blacks.”65 Walton asserted that as soon as the Afro-Cuban decided to “show a spirit of independence and demand his manhood rights,” Cushman and his cronies would have another thing coming. Yet, in emphasizing the shared plight of Afro-Cubans and African Americans at the hands of white Americans, Walton effectively glossed over Cuba's own deep-seated racial problems.

  Other black American correspondents provided triumphant reports of Johnson's popularity in Cuba. “In all, those who speak of him, speak of him as a polished gentleman,” boasted a reporter for the Chicago Defender.66 Although Willard apparently attracted little attention in Havana's streets, Johnson drew crowds as he and his wife, dressed to the nines, toured around in an automobile. Cuban journalists reportedly favored the black American heavyweight because of his friendliness and accessibility. During his training sessions Johnson put on a real show for his Cuban fans. He “sparred” with President Menocal's son and with the moving picture actress Miss Dixie.67 Rumors circulated that Menocal had even placed a wager on Johnson. However, in a letter to Minister Gonzales the president countered these rumors and threatened to put an end to boxing in Cuba if reporters sent any more false and slanderous stories abroad. Betting on a black prizefighter was apparently considered conduct unbecoming a chief executive of a nation.68

  On 5 April 1915 an audience of roughly thirty thousand spectators, including around one thousand women, squeezed into and surrounded the Oriente Park racetrack generating a box office of $110,000. Since streetcar lines could not accommodate the crush of fans, some Cubans walked the twelve miles from Havana.69 As a band played ragtime in the background, “groups of soldiers and barefooted natives dotted the distant green landscape,” and American “black derbies” mixed in with the Cubans' “bobbing straw hats.”70

  Even though promoters had billed the event as a tourist attraction for white Americans, around twenty-five thousand of the spectators were actually Cuban. A number of black Americans were also sprinkled throughout the stands. Still, most in the crowd were Willard supporters, and many had placed bets on the white hope.71 As Herbert Swope of the Chicago Daily Tribune described the scene, “Never in the history of the ring…was there such a wild, hysterical, shrieking, enthusiastic crowd [as] the 20,000 men and women who begged Willard to wipe out the stigma that they…believed rested on the white race.…Nowhere was the feeling stronger than in Cuba, whose race hatred is near the surface, although the negro is ostensibly received on parity with the white.”72 Many fans in the venue waved white flags as symbols of their racial affiliation in the impending fight.

  For the first seven rounds the black champion controlled the match, using hi
s ring dexterity to make the giant Willard look awkward. As the crowd chanted, “Yellow, yellow, yellow,” Johnson shouted back, “I wish I was…then everybody would think I was white.”73 From the eighth to the tenth round Willard managed to get some shots in and his fans began yelling, “Kill the black bear!”74 By twentieth round the action had slowed and Johnson appeared to be tiring. Over the next six Willard started to take control of the fight, and in the twenty-sixth round he felled Johnson with a blow to the chin. Johnson lay on his back with his right arm shielding his eyes from the sun, causing many observers to speculate later that the fight was fixed. After twenty-six rounds of intense slugging in the heat, Willard came out on top, scoring a knockout against the infamous black American. It was the first time that Johnson had lost to a white man since becoming the world heavyweight champion in 1908. The search for a white hope was finally over.

  Cuban soldiers piled into the ring, drawing their sabers and revolvers to protect both fighters from the rush of fans.75 “Something approaching a race riot followed,” recounted Runyon. “Thousands paraded the race track, chanting, 'Viva El Blanco!'…[while] blacks drew off in little groups.” Swope even claimed that white American postfight celebrations were “mere apathy” compared to those of the Cubans.76

  Many Cubans took great satisfaction in knowing that their capital city was the site of the notorious black American's downfall. Cars returning to Havana after the match flew white flags, spreading the word that the new world champion was white. Later, “cheering crowds” of Cuban fans followed Willard wherever he went, waving “flags and linen handkerchiefs tied to sticks,” patting him on the back, and throwing flowers at him. As the sun set, the streets of the capital remained “ablaze” in Willard's honor, and the citizens of Havana even organized a victory dinner and reception.77 Willard certainly did not disappoint, for he declared that he would never fight another black man.