By Ken Hissner: When it comes to great fighters who were never champions the first one that comes to mind is Sam “The Boston Bonecrusher” Langford.
Some never won titles because they never got into a title fight. Some got title fights but got robbed of the decisions.
Langford’s record was 178-30-38 with 126 stoppages. He turned professional in 1902 in Boston. He was born in Weymouth, Nova Scotia, Canada. Fighting in an era where blacks had a problem getting title fights, they had their own rankings called “colored” champs, such as Jack “The Galveston Giant” Johnson, who was the first black heavyweight champion.
The “colored” fighters fought one another. For instance, Langford fought Harry Wills 18 times, Sam McVey 15, Joe Jeanette 14, Jeff Clark 13, and Jim Barry 12 times.
Known patronizingly as “The Boston Tar Baby,” Langford was only 5’7” tall and rarely scaled more than the middleweight limit, but he routinely gave away chunks of weight to heavyweights in order to keep busy.
Despite his fine record of almost 300 fights (210-44-52 also reported), he was never given a crack at a world title, although he faced many men who were or became champions. His career lasted until 1924 when he was virtually blind. He later went completely blind and lived in obscure poverty until a newspaper highlighted his plight and raised enough to keep him in modest comfort until his death in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on January 12, 1956.
Even Johnson, upon winning the world title, “drew the colored line,” not wanting to give fellow blacks a title shot. He finally did when he defended against the No. 7 ranked colored fighter Battling Jim Johnson ending in a 20 round draw in Paris, France.
Other colored fighters Langford fought whose records at the time I will show were former lightweight champion Joe Gans, 136-8-17, whom he defeated over 15 rounds in 1903 when Langford was 16-1-7.
In a non-title fight, though both weighed in within the welterweight limit, Langford fought to a disputed draw with then-champion Joe Walcott, 87-15-17 though newspaper people had Langford, as a clear winner.
In 1906 when Johnson, 35-5-6, defended his colored title, he defeated Langford. In 1910 Langford, in a non-title fight, defeated middleweight champion great Stanley “The Michigan Assassin” Ketchel, 48-6-3 over 6 rounds. Ketchell had several fights before this dropped Johnson though was stopped in twelve rounds for the heavyweight title.
In 1914 Langford knocked out another great colored fighter Harry Wills, 22-1-4. Wills claimed heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey ducked him, but Dempsey declared, “I only feared one fighter, and that was Sam Langford!”
Another great fighter never to get a title fight was middleweight Charley Burley from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 83-12-2 with 50 stoppages.
In 1938 Burley won the colored welterweight title defeating Cocoa Kid 100-28-5. In 1944 he stopped Jack Chase, 63-11-7, for the California middle title. He defeated future world champs Fritzie Zivic, Billy Soose, and Archie “Old Mongoose” Moore.
Another great whom Burley fought was Holman Williams, some seven times, each winning three and one no contest. Burley was never stopped in 97 fights.
The third fighter, as previously mentioned, was Holman Williams, 146-31-11, with 36 stoppages from Detroit, Michigan.
Williams was considered the greatest technician that ever lived.
Legendary trainer Eddie Futch cited Williams and Charley Burley as the two greatest fighters he ever had the privilege to see and was quoted as saying that he would rather watch Williams shadowbox than watch most other fighters in action. “He had the finesse of a Ray Robinson but no punch,” said Futch.
All three, Langford, Burley, and Williams, were inducted into the International Hall of Fame.