There is no doubt in my mind that, where public interest and excitement were concerned, boxing was the biggest sport in British Honduras during the 1940s and 1950s. I think that there was this unique situation where, on the one hand, the sport had religious blessing, because the Golden Gloves tournaments here were organized by the Roman Catholic priests, but, on the other hand, because the sport was professional and involved gambling, it also had overwhelming appeal for the non-pious working class masses in the colony.
The Catholic priests who came to British Honduras as missionaries in those years were sons of Irish and German families in the United States who were working class immigrants. Their homes were in the American Midwest – Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, Missouri, etc. The priests those days in Belize were strong and active men. They were not wimpy intellectuals. Through Golden Gloves boxing, the priests became very popular with the Belizean masses. The religious, and then political, implications of that popularity are interesting to consider, but not now.
Amateurism ruled sports in British Honduras with an iron hand, but, at boxing’s highest level, people were being paid to fight. In other words, boxing was the only professional sport in colonial British Honduras, and it was the first sport in which our athletes reached regional and international quality. Personally, I do not consider that a mere coincidence. Where the 1940s are concerned, our elders still talk about the fame of Hankin Barrow (a distant cousin of mine through his Gibson mother) and Roy “Slim Terror” Cadle. Both Barrow and Cadle were “hot stuff” in Panama, where hundreds, perhaps thousands of Belizeans had migrated during World War II to work on the Panama Canal and associated enterprises.
The intensity of boxing in Belize, fuelled after the war by the workers returning from Panama, carried the sport to that peak of competition where we produced Ludwig Lightburn. In his prime, Ludwig was the undisputed British Empire and Commonwealth lightweight champion, and was rated as high as no. 3 in the world by RING magazine.
The story goes that Ludwig was “discovered” in Mexico City by an American boxing manager named Allie Clark. All the indications are that Clark had Mafia connections. The Mob controlled boxing in America, especially in New York City, where Clark took Ludwig to make his fortune. Clark got Ludwig big time fights in Madison Square Garden and elsewhere. In fact, his connections were such that he got Ludwig an article in SPORT, the leading sports magazine in the United States. (I read that article when I was a child, around 1957 or so.)
The word from Belizeans who saw Ludwig fight was that he would have taken out the world lightweight champion at the time, one Joe Brown. But the Mob “owned” Brown, thus controlling the championship. They preferred for Joe Brown to be protected from the likes of the dangerous Ludwig. Our boy, therefore, never got a crack at the title. Eventually, the only lucrative fights Clark could get for Ludwig were two overweight bouts with a welterweight (I believe Cuban) named Isaac Logart. These two fights, where Ludwig was giving up 11 or 12 pounds to a world class welterweight, were the fights, I think, which damaged him.
Clinton “Pulu” Lightburn, whose late dad, Bill, was Ludwig’s uncle, has told me that his father had told Ludwig that he should have gone to England instead of New York, and that if he had done so, Ludwig would have become world champion. We’ll never know, but for sure it appears Ludwig was sacrificed in the States.
Over the weekend, Mose told me that his uncle (my brother-in-law), Jeff Scott (Belize City’s most famous professional barber), had been able to acquire the video of one of Ludwig’s fights. Jeff is an Internet buff, and through this hobby he had struck gold, in the sense of an opportunity for us Belizeans to see with our own eyes the superb class and quality of our own Ludwig. This was one of the few fights that Ludwig ever lost, with an American southpaw by the name of Kenny Lane. Mose showed the first round on Monday morning, and will show the complete 10-round bout on Saturday night. The first round was enough for us to see how truly gifted the young Ludwig Lightburn was. (Incidentally, Ludwig is still alive in the States.)
There are many Belizeans alive who saw Ludwig fight here before he went north. But most of my personal generation never saw him fight. We only heard the fights on United States Armed Forces short wave radio. (Who will ever forget the announcer, Don Dunphy? He had a unique voice and presentation.) Now, after more than fifty years, we can see our boy. For me, this is truly incredible.
In conclusion, I have to say, to repeat I suppose, that there is an amateurist lobby in this independent nation which is still crippling the development of Belizean athletes and sports. I can’t believe that these people cannot see and appreciate for themselves that amateurism in the modern context is an elitist concept. In fact, I personally believe that the amateurist lobby in Belize rides a nepotistic wave which also contains currents of ethnic prejudice. I will not elaborate, but I had to get that in because this is a bone in my throat. You know that.
All power to the people.