I was at a show in the early 1990s and found a pair of 1948 Leaf cards: Benny Leonard and Barney Ross. The Leonard references that he was a Jew and I'd vaguely heard of Ross before. I could not imagine two Jewish champion fighters; we don't do that. Manage fighters, sure. Do their taxes; we are so there. If you want a lawyer for a boxer a member of the tribe is likely. But an actual Jewish boxer? I bought the cards and took them home to show my father. He looked at the Ross card and said "I think my cousin Ray fought him." I was stunned and point out that if he had a cousin Ray who was a pro boxer then I had a cousin Ray who was a pro boxer. Shortly after that I picked up a few boxing exhibits. Then eBay comes along and I find dozens of Jewish boxer cards. I bought the Ring pictorial history of boxing to learn more and was a dead man.
My collecting still is ethnocentric. If I have a choice in a type card from a set I will opt for a Jewish fighter. Like my N310 examples are Choynski. And of the half dozen fighters I collect one is Leonard.
ETA: cousin Ray is my avatar. My father was right; he did indeed fight Barney Ross:
04-27-2014, 05:42 AM
I blame my father
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