Jacobs Beach
  • Published: 15 July 2011
  • ISBN: 9780224075091
  • Imprint: Yellow Jersey
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 320
  • RRP: $32.99
Categories:

Jacobs Beach

The Mob, the Garden, and the Golden Age of Boxing

Formats & editions
EBook
30 Nov 2011
Paperback
15 Jul 2011
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Nominated for the top Sports Book awards, this is the gripping tale of boxing's golden age when the mob held as much sway in the ring as the fighters, from award-winning writer, Kevin Mitchell

Gangsters have been around boxing for ever. When boxing took hold in Madison Square Garden just after the First World War, a new wave of criminals moved in: the Mob. It was then that Prohibition gave street legitimacy to organised crime right across America; and by the time Joe Louis arrived to breathe excitement through a country ravaged by the Great Depression, the wise guys were firmly entrenched at ringside. Mike Jacobs, the grizzled boss of boxing at the Garden for nearly twenty years, made the Brown Bomber the biggest sports star in the world, and a string of romantic writers ensured this would be remembered as the fight game's golden age. They mingled with underworld heavies along a strip of New York pavement near the Garden known only as Jacobs Beach.

Kevin Mitchell's gripping book is the unsanitised story of those times and that place, of Rat Pack cool and the fading of the Mob's peculiar glamour, brilliantly told through the eyes of the men who were there.
  • Published: 15 July 2011
  • ISBN: 9780224075091
  • Imprint: Yellow Jersey
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 320
  • RRP: $32.99
Categories:

About the author

Kevin Mitchell

Kevin Mitchell is the Observer's chief sports writer. He is the author of War, Baby, which was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year, and the co-author of Frank Bruno's autobiography Frank, which won the Best Autobiography category of the British Sports Book Awards.

Also by Kevin Mitchell

War, Baby
See all

Praise for Jacobs Beach

Lurid and fascinating tale of the powers behind the scenes in New York, then capital of the boxing world.

The Review

As punchy as the matches. Wonderfully evocative

Sunday Telegraph

A tour de force of reportage and research by an author who really knows his stuff

Independent on Sunday

Mitchell tells a vivid, gripping and very different fairytale of New York with verve and skill

Observer

This is Mitchell's natural territory ... he is the connoisseur of both the dark and glorious sides of the ring game

Daily Telegraph

A cigar-chomping read

Wall Street Journal

Despite not being a particular fan of the sport of boxing, Kevin Mitchell's compelling knowledge of the personalities involved in the fight game in the 20th century, coupled with a staccato writing style got my attention quickly and kept it to the very last page... Overall a really high recommendation as one of my favourite sports books for some time'

thebookbag.com

'It's an enthralling, eye-opening read, even for those with no interest in the sport'

Timeout.com
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