Jack Johnson (boxer)

John Arthur Jack Johnson , nicknamed the Galveston Giant was an American boxer, whoat the height of the Jim Crow erabecame the first African American world heavyweight boxing champion . Johnson was faced with much controversy when he was charged with violating the Mann Act in 1912, even though there was an obvious lack of evidence and the charge was largely racially based. In a documentary about his life, Ken Burns notes that for more than thirteen years, Jack Johnson was the most famous and the most notorious AfricanAmerican on Earth.

Johnson was born the third child of nine, and the first son, of Henry and Tina Tiny Johnson, two former slaves who worked blue collar jobs as a janitor and a dishwasher to support their children and put them through school. His father Henry served as a civilian teamster of the Unions 38th Colored Infantry, and was a role model for his son. As Jack once said, his father was The most perfect physical specimen that he had ever seen, although his father was only 5160ft 5160in and left with an atrophied right leg from his service in the war.

Source: Wikipedia