When the ring announcer at tonight's "Fight Against Leukemia" boxing exhibition introduces the first segment of an 11-match card between pugilists from New York and Boston, a burly Harvard junior in a natty, three-piece suit will heave a sigh of relief and probably sit still for the first time in three months.
But George Jackson, president of the Harvard Black Student Athletes Association, will also have reason to shine with pride; for the first blow stuck will symbolize the successful completion of an odyssey in boxing promotion that would make Don King blush with envy.
"We wanted to change the orientation of the association away from merely assessing athletic issues as they related to Harvard blacks and undertake a community oriented program," Jackson said during a brief pit-stop for dinner at Lowell House. Add those hopes to Jackson's personal desire (as a former high school boxer at Fordham Prep in New York City) to "bring boxing back to Harvard," and you have the ingredients that produced tonight's fundraiser for the Boston chapter of the Leukemia Society. (Three dollar tickets are available at the door or at 60 Boylston St.)
As anyone who has dealt with the Harvard bureaucracy knows, many a brainstorm has gone out to sea in a tornado of red tape. Jackson also knew that if he didn't do his homework in advance, administrators would view his "boxing extravaganza" as nothing more than an unfeasible pipe-dream. After all, intramural boxing at Harvard had been banned in the early 1970s.
"I anticipated a lot of negative reaction when I went to talk over my proposal with Jack Reardon," Jackson, who missed the 1978 football campaign (he plays middle guard) due to torn cartilage in his left knee, said. But he impressed the athletic director with a thorough knowledge of insurance requirements for the rustic IAB, the University's rules on the matter, and an itemized cost breakdown for the benefit. Jackson also had on-the-job experience organizing a Labor Day boxing benefit in Erie, Pa., with Harvard's U.S. Marine Corps champion boxer Ron Di Nicola.
While Jackson was trying to convince Harvard, he also had to turn around and sell the Boston Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) on the idea. Although initially unenthusiastic, the local boxing officials were impressed that Jackson had already lined up several New York Golden Glovers through Dick Mc Guire, his football trainer and boxing instructor at Fordham Prep. A 40-year veteran of the fight game, McGuire helped Jackson convince the Boston AAU of the project's feasibility.
Jackson continued to hustle ("I don't like the connotation of that word--just call me a mover," George said when I brought up the term) and lined up all concerned--Harvard, the boxers from Beantown and the Big Apple, and the Leukemia Society. The only thing noticeably absent was money.
That's when Jackson just happened to meet the premier boxing afficionado in New England--Harvard alum Peter Fuller (of Cadillac fame)--at a meeting of the Visiting Committee on Athletics. A start-up grant from the Fuller Foundation and advertising sponsorships gave Jackson the operating expense money needed to haul in the Boston Garden's portable boxing ring for tonight's affair.
"Robbie Sims (the half-brother of Marvin Hagler), winner of the outstanding fighter award at the New England AAU championships and a definite Olympic contender, will head the card," Jackson said excitedly, as he peddled tickets in the Lowell dining hall. Hundreds of phone calls and miles of legwork later, George Jackson not only sounds like, but is, the promoting wunderkind of boxing at Harvard.
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