The sport of boxing is full of inspirational stories, where men, and now women have risen from nowhere to conquer the world. This tale is one that has to be one of the most remarkable.
Joe Harris was born on the 1st of December in 1945 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (some sources actually say Camden New Jersey). Like many athletes he came across the sport that made him famous by accident.
In 1989 he told the Chicago Tribune that he was ten years old working as a delivery boy when he knocked an ice cream cone out of the hand of man walking down the street. He thought it was amusing. The man did not, and chased him. Harris took refuge in a gym run by the Police Athletic League. ‘‘I escaped into a gym, and from then on it was my life,” he told the paper. He went on to win two Golden Gloves titles as an amateur.
Ten years later and with the nickname “Gypsy” Joe Harris made his professional boxing debut in November 1964 when he defeated Freddie Walker. From that day on in Philadelphia he was only ever know as “Gyspy” to the locals. After that win in his first professional bout he went on to win his first 24 bouts. He became one of the most popular boxers going around and in 1967, Harris was featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated. That may not mean much today but he was the first boxer to grace the cover who was neither a Heavyweight or a World Champion!
Gyspy had style and he had charisma. He was a showman. He would come to the ring in a robe that made him look like a court jester and it is said that he had bells attached to his boots. However it wasn’t all show, when the bell sounded he could back it up with performances that filled venues.
Mark Kram, who wrote the piece in Sports Illustrated summed up his style by writing, “His punches pile out from all angles, and they are thrown from any position. He is a machine gun and a jester, with a Chaplinesque walk and the brass of a pickpocket. Frequently, with his arms dangling by his sides, he gives you his chin to hit, and sometimes, in a corner, he will hold the rope with one hand and keep cracking you with the other.”
Nigel Collins another boxing writer wrote, “he would bend and twist his agile body into amazing positions, throwing punches from every conceivable angle. His style was an intoxicating blend of street swagger, classical boxing and improvisational genius.”
As Kram mentioned one of his famous ploys would be to stand in a corner of the ring with one arm draped along the top rope, the other would be hanging by his side. He would then invite his opponent in to have a crack at his unguarded chin. He was like a spider waiting for its prey. As they attacked he would duck and weave staying out of harms way before unleashing a powerful counter attack and skipping away from the corner leaving his opponent often bemused and frustrated. Sometimes even more than a little humiliated.
Another tactic he would use that was a crowd favourite was one used by the great Jersey Joe Walcott, the walk away. After an exchange he would suddenly turn and walk away. In that moment when he knew his opponent was lost and confused by his antics he would launch a vicious attack from a different angle, catching them unawares.
Many dismissed him as simply a showman, a flashy guy who was all show and no substance. However in 1966 against the number one Welterweight contender, Stanley “Kitten’ Hayward, he was to prove his doubters wrong. Gypsy was put on the seat of his pants early in the bout but then climbed up off the canvas to dominate, and the bout was stopped in the seventh round.
In 1967 he took on the then WBC and WBA welterweight champion Curtis Cokes at Madison Square Garden, in a non-title bout. It would be his only appearance at the Garden. Cokes was no mug and yet Gypsy bamboozled him and won a unanimous decision. Oh how he must have wished the World Title was on offer.
Despite these performances in the ring Gyspy was a challenge outside of it. He would drive his trainer Willie Reddish mad, as he would disappear for days on end. Often he would turn up at the gym three or four days before the bout, spar with the toughest guys at the gym and declare himself ready. Yet the scales were his enemy. Frequently the Athletic commission would have to fine him for turning up overweight. Not surprisingly by 1967 he was struggling to make the junior middle weight limit.
A rematch with Cokes was arranged, but never took place. The promoters of the fight, who later ended up in jail for counterfeiting currency had short changed Cokes out of his purse once. Cokes weighed in for the fight in Dallas, but Gypsy, who was unable to make the weight and being suspicious of the promoters had never left Philadelphia.
In 1968 Gypsy signed to fight Emile Griffith who had just lost his middleweight world title. Despite a sell-out crowd in his home town this was one night the magician lost his magic. Griffith’s trainer Gil Clancy said after the bout “I think Griffith was just a little too big, a little too strong for Gyspy Joe that night.”
It was his first defeat in 25 fights. Later that year he was signed to fight Manuel Gonzalez a Texan of Mexican descent. The fight was postponed initially due to Gypsy Joe not making the weight. When Gyspy Joe turned up for the pre-fight physical for the re-arranged fight that was when the curtain came down on his spectacular career.
The doctor discovered that he was totally blind in one eye, and his licence to box was revoked.At 22 years of age and with one defeat in 25 fights as a professional his career as a boxer was over.
Following the revoking of his licence the truth came out. A year after the incident with the ice cream cone, on Halloween, Gypsy Joe had ended up in a fight with another kid. The other kid picked up a brick and threw it at Joe. It hit him in the eye, leaving him blind in that one eye.
It has been said that the Philadelphia boxing community knew about his eye, but had opted to ignore it on account of his popularity and the money he brought in. It did not reflect well on the Pennsylvania Boxing Commission. As either they had allowed a boxer blind in one eye to fight professionally for four years, or they had carried out substandard medical examinations on the fighters.
Gypsy Joe never revealed if they did know or not, but what he did say was that prior to his examination he would memorise the eye chart so that they would be none the wiser.
He did tell the Chicago Tribune in that 1989 interview ”My camp knew I was blind. If you got a boxer, and he’s blind in one eye, and he goes into the ring and he be holding his own, and he can win and make you money, wouldn’t you let him fight? Wouldn’t you? I don’t blame them. How could I blame them? I was only doing what I wanted to do.”
Several years after having his licence revoked he hired a lawyer to try and have it reinstated. At the commission hearing one of the members judging his case also happened to be blind in one eye, and so the story goes removed his glass eye for all to see. With that Gypsy’s case was doomed.
While the first 22 years of his life had been glorious the next 22 would be the opposite. Like many who have entertained us in theatres, in stadia or in the ring, Gypsy was lost without a stage on which to perform, and fans to thrill. Boxing had been his life. He sadly turned to drugs and alcohol. He did eventually kick the drugs and according to those who knew him always had a cheery disposition and was happy to make others laugh despite being down on his luck.
In February 1988 he suffered the first of four heart attacks, the final one on March 6th proving fatal. Gypsy Joe had passed away aged 44. Many said he passed away the minute his licence was revoked.
”When they stopped me, I was broken,” he had told the Chicago Tribune. ”It was like taking a brick and throwing it at a mirror. To me, it was the deepest hurt. It was like a piece of me had died. They killed me.”
At his memorial service his ex-wife revealed that he always hoped that it would rain on the day of his fights. When she asked him why, he replied that it meant that God had given his blessing and that he would win. Fittingly it rained the day he was laid to rest.
It raises the question who are we to judge others?
Yes, today we talk about a duty of care, and as a result we put restrictions and procedures in place to protect each other, but maybe in our efforts to do what we believe is right we forget that the human spirit is remarkable at overcoming adversity, as Gypsy Joe Harris proved in the ring.
