John Arthur Johnson (March 31, 1878 - June 10, 1946), better
known as Jack Johnson and nicknamed the "Galveston ", was an
American boxer and arguably the best heavyweight of his generation.
He was the first black Heavyweight Champion of the World
(1908-1915), a feat which, for its time, was tremendously
controversial. In a documentary about his life, Ken Burns said:
"For more than thirteen years, Jack Johnson was the most famous,
and the most notorious African-American on Earth."
Johnson was inducted into the Boxing Hall of Fame in 1954, and
is on the roster of both the International Boxing Hall of Fame and
the World Boxing Hall of Fame. In 2005, the United States National
Film Preservation Board deemed the film of the 1910
Johnson-Jeffries fight "historically significant" and put it in the
National Film Registry.
