The History of Boxing

TEETHING BOARD

CONTINUING OUR SERIES DOCUMENTING THE HISTORY OF BRITISH BOXING, WE LOOK BACK AT SOME EARLY RESISTANCE TO A CONTROLLING BODY – AND HOW IT COST THE FIRST BN EDITOR HIS JOB

BY MILES TEMPLETON

DOING BUSINESS: A British Boxing Board of Control meeting in the 1930s

ON NOVEMBER 10, 1928, The Sporting Life published an article which was highly critical of the British Boxing Board of Control, stating that “Whatever else the British Boxing Board of Control may be, it is consistency itself in its maladroit handling of British championship problems. It is not more happy in this respect than the National Sporting Club, which has gone out of its way at times to create illogical and indefensible situations”.

The paper was scathing in its assessment that during the previous decade the heavyweight, light-heavyweight, lightweight and bantamweight championships were often in a mess, with two different champions emerging in each category, leaving a situation in which no-one knew who the actual champions were.

Writing in Boxing News, John Murray, the editor, added further fuel to the fire with his usual trenchant attitude: “It has been our considered opinion that the members of the Board have never been constitutionally able to see or to notice anything beyond their own noses. They have been unable to help themselves”.

Recognising this, within a matter of days the Board decided that change was required. The organisation needed an entirely different set of members, some revised rules and regulations, and the licensing of each boxer, manager, promoter, trainer and referee. In short, it planned to establish a much-improved body that could more properly control and regulate the sport.

Lord Lonsdale stated that he wished to act as president of the new Board, stating that: “I think the time has come when the control of boxing should be in the hands of the best producers and those most interested in it.

“It is not so much from the rules that I think advantage will be derived, but from the general conduct of the whole boxing community. There are some splendid men amongst them and if I can be any use in assisting to maintain the game in the interest of boxing, nobody would be more delighted than I”.