When Women’s Boxing Was the “Maine” Event in the 1970s

(Margie 'KO' Dunson of Portland, Maine)

The state of Maine is best known for its lobster and lighthouses, the natural beauty of Acadia National Park, and being home to Stephen King. Boxing, not so much. Except that one time when the city of Lewiston played the unlikely role of host to the 1965 Ali/Liston rematch in a rinky-dink hockey arena when Boston officials ultimately balked for fear of disturbances originating from within the mob or the Nation of Islam.

Ten years later, Maine would incorporate itself in a small but not insignificant way into the flourishing landscape of women’s boxing by opening the doors of its venues to a handful of female prizefighters who were defiantly blazing trails through the wilderness of a sporting establishment that for much too long had been willfully negligent in its ability—or, you might say, responsibility—to see the forest for the trees.

Having jointly filed their applications three months prior, Lady Tyger Trimiar and Jackie Tonawanda were both unanimously denied professional boxing licenses by the New York State Athletic Commission in January 1975 under rule 205.15 which stated that “No woman may be licensed as a boxer or licensed to compete in any wrestling exhibitions with men.” On June 8, Tonawanda became the first female boxer to compete at Madison Square Garden, albeit in a mixed gender exhibition against a male kickboxer named Larry Rodania, who she knocked out in the second round. Not unlike virtually every other aspect of Jackie’s life and career, the legitimacy of this bout was dubious at best. And by no means would the subterfuge end there.

Claiming in the press to have been undefeated in 28 fights to that point, Tonawanda was scheduled to compete in the first women’s boxing match in Maine on Monday, October 13, 1975 at the Augusta Armory. Promoted by Jimmy Gagnon, who operated out of Lewiston, the show was set to open with six amateur bouts and conclude with Tonawanda boxing a six-round exhibition with an adversary fighting out of Virginia alternately identified as Dynamite Lil and Diamond Lil.  

For starters, who was Diamond or Dynamite Lil? With recorded documentation difficult to come by, your guess is as good as mine. There was ‘Dynamite’ Diane Clark, who Tonawanda would lose a split decision to four years later in her only verifiable prizefight, but she was born in Washington DC and lived in New York, not Virginia where the papers said Dynamite Lil hailed from. And anyway, Clark never mentioned being billed under such a name or contesting a bout against Tonawanda prior to their 1979 light-heavyweight title fight. There were two individuals who used the alias Diamond Lil, neither of whom, it goes without saying, are likely candidates to have been Tonawanda’s mystery opponent. One was Katie Glass, a midget wrestler from South Carolina who was trained by, and later lived with, the Fabulous Moolah. The other was a drag queen, stage performer, singer, writer, and gay right’s activist born Phillip Forrester in Savannah, Georgia.

With that matter unresolved, it was reported without explanation in the October 14 edition of the Morning Sentinel out of Waterville, Maine that the card which was supposed to have taken place the night before had been relocated to their city and rescheduled for the following Monday. It seems the real reason was that Tonawanda was a no-show. This would hardly be an isolated incident, but it appears as though the October 20 card in Waterville went ahead as planned, and with Jackie Tonawanda as an active participant no less. Dynamite or Diamond Lil too, for that matter.

Pioneering female sports journalist Betty Cuniberti, writing for the San Bernardino County Sun on October 27, 1975, provided this account: “Following a second-round knockout in a scheduled six-round bout in Maine last week over a woman from Virginia, Miss Tonawanda was granted a license in Maine. She maintains that the license gives her the right to fight outside Maine too.” Cuniberti quotes Tonawanda as saying, “According to the law, the way I see it, if you have a license to box in one state, then that license is supposed to be honored in other states.” The fallacy of this statement notwithstanding, Jackie continued, “I plan to have two more fights in Maine then move to Las Vegas for a bout there, where I hope to obtain another license.”     

Tonawanda was slated to be back in Maine in November to battle newcomer Gwen Hibbler in one of two women’s bouts at the Portland Exposition Building. The other matchup was a hometown showdown between Cathy Russo and Margie ‘KO’ Dunson. On fight night, Tonawanda was conspicuous, if predictable, by her absence. Portland Evening Express sportswriter Frank Sleeper remarked that Jackie “is now known in Maine more for her failure to appear than anything else.” He then estimated, “Miss Tonawanda, unless my figures are wrong, has been due to fight in Maine four times and appeared just once.”  

Born and raised in Alabama along with eleven siblings, Margie Dunson never received a formal education. She moved to Maine where she took up boxing under the guidance of South Portland promoter and tavern owner Eddie Griffin. Even back then, Dunson seemed to be waging an existential tug of war between the bar stool and the boxing stool. “There are really not enough sports in this city. I can’t find a bunch of girls to go down to the Y and play ball with. They’d rather go into the bar and sit around,” said Dunson before detailing her questionable training regimen. “I jog, and I punch the bag, and do sit-ups and drink a little beer to keep me going.” Dunson’s battles with drugs and alcohol would intensify after her boxing career and, in 2008, she would stand trial for aggravated assault after stabbing a male friend during an alcohol-fueled Super Bowl party. The charges were dropped when the victim, John Jackson, appeared at the Cumberland County Courthouse in an obvious state of intoxication and was unable to provide reliable testimony. Spared twenty years of prison time, Dunson embarked on a journey toward sobriety.

Her Thanksgiving night opponent, Cathy Russo, grew up in Portland and was an avid New England sports fan who cheered on the Red Sox and Patriots. She worked in construction and as a meatcutter for a local butcher and was an animal lover cherished by those who knew her as “an unforgettable character with a big heart.”

Attendance for boxing matches at the Exposition Building had dipped significantly in recent years, but they managed to lure approximately 2,000 spectators through the turnstiles on Thanksgiving night to see local light-heavyweight fan favorite Pete Riccitelli make a comeback after four years away from the ring, as well as the two women’s bouts featured on the card. Witnessing female prizefighting was a first for the city of Portland. It would not be the last, despite the wishes of Maine Boxing Commission chairman Duncan L. MacDonald, who paid a personal visit to the attorney general’s office to try and put a stop to what he referred to as “a travesty.” MacDonald’s endeavor was rejected as “discrimination,” and the show would go on.

Substituting for the truant Tonawanda was fellow New Yorker Ina Stevens, who Gwen Hibbler neutralized with an active jab to win a four-round decision in what was described as a “sedate” affair. This is thought to be the first fight for Hibbler who, in the months to come, would change her last name to Gemini and oppose Lady Tyger in a pair of historic bouts. We will touch on those again in a moment. A more spirited though less technically proficient effort was put forth by Portland’s own Cathy Russo and Margie Dunson, who were fighting for regional bragging rights. Russo and Dunson traded nonstop haymakers for the duration of their three-round skirmish, with Margie throwing the occasional body blow for good measure, and the action was said to have been “more exciting than most of the male bouts here.” Russo was awarded the unanimous decision, after which one of her aunts sitting ringside commented, “It was her first fight, and I hope it’s her last.” It wouldn’t be. In fact, Russo and Dunson would become reacquainted inside the squared circle a year and a half later. Stay tuned for more on that.

After being turned down by the New York State Athletic Commission, Harlem’s Lady Tyger ventured north of the border in December 1975 to make her pro debut in Quebec, Canada by outpointing Debra Babin. The following month, she and Gwen Gemini engaged in back to back bouts in Connecticut and Pennsylvania, the first time women had been permitted to box in both states, even if it was stipulated that decisions would not be rendered in either case. On February 26, 1976, a stopover in Portland, Maine to go toe to toe with Margie Dunson was the next commitment on Lady Tyger’s tireless winter odyssey.

“People think I’m taking out my aggression in the ring or on the bag, but I don’t think I am. I look at boxing as an art,” Tyger told Molly Bolton of the Portland Evening Express, who referred to the bald-headed boxer as “Black Kojak.” Tyger had a great sense of humor, and still does, and wasn’t bothered by the remark. In fact, she says she got a kick out of it. “They thought I was crazy—that a woman wanted to box. But finally, I was accepted,” she continued. “We’re in there to do our best.”

Dunson gave it her best against Lady Tyger but was outhustled and outworked and pulled a muscle in her shoulder at the end of the third round. The injury was severe enough that the fight was stopped and Tyger awarded the TKO victory by default. The undercard featured one other women’s bout which saw Gwen Gemini return to the Pine Tree State to duel to a three-round draw with fencer turned boxer Cathy ‘Cat’ Davis, although Gemini bloodied Davis’ nose in the process. “When I get into the ring, I only see my opponent. I love competition,” Gemini stated. “I’ll go as far as I can in boxing. I’m not afraid of hurting anybody. I know if I don’t hurt them, they might hurt me.”   

Asked to share his opinion of the female bouts, sixty-one-year-old fight fan Vernon Orchard said, “They put on a pretty good show, but I don’t think too much of women in the ring.” By contrast, front row spectator Lorraine Richardson, twenty years Orchard’s junior, raved that “it’s fascinating seeing women trying to beat each other’s brains out.”

All four women who competed on the February 26 card at the Expo Building would be back in Portland in seven weeks’ time, with three of them seeing ring action. The April 16 show, which Vern Putney of the Evening Express ridiculed as “more vaudeville than serious boxing,” saw Cathy Davis score a second-round knockout of novice Bobbi Shane from Philadelphia with a right hand that even the sardonic Putney had to admit was “no love tap.” Lady Tyger and Gwen Gemini had traveled to Maine to appear on standby in case of no-shows by either Davis or Shane or both, and Gemini wound up serving as a last-minute recruit to square off against Margie Dunson. Gwen would win a three-round decision with her friend Tyger watching from a ringside seat. Vern Putney couldn’t seem to help himself, doubling down on his scorn by calling this “the worst boxing card presented here in modern memory.”

Portland, Maine was becoming something of a home away from home to Cat Davis, whose actual home was Hopewell Junction, New York, although she originally hailed from New Orleans. Like Lady Tyger and Jackie Tonawanda before her, Davis’ petition for a professional boxing license in New York was met with only obstinate resistance. In 1978, her lawsuit would result in the decades-old ruling of the New York State Athletic Commission that barred women from competing in the prize ring to be overturned on the grounds that the gender-biased decree was unconstitutional. Tyger, Tonawanda, and Davis were granted their licenses on September 19, 1978, but that was still two years away at the time of Cat’s pair of return trips to Maine which would wrap up the bicentennial year of 1976.

The Portland Exposition Building hosted Thanksgiving festivities for a second year in a row, with attendance falling dramatically to a mere 700 fans on this night compared to the turnout of 2,000 in 1975. Margie Dunson, who wasn’t faring terribly well in her own hometown, might have wished she had opted to stay home feasting on leftover turkey and mashed potatoes like so many other Portlanders. Instead, Cathy Davis feasted on Dunson, stopping her in the third round.     

Just one week later, promoter Sam Silverman reluctantly made Davis the headliner at the Expo Building to defend her supposed “women’s world lightweight championship” in an eight-rounder against JoAnn Lutz of Phoenix, Arizona. Lutz claimed to have won six fights, all by knockout, and lost only once—by decision to Lavonne Ludian in Las Vegas. “I like swimming, tennis, and baseball. But boxing is uppermost, the only thing that matters now,” said Lutz. “My only interest is the title.” The lightweight title Davis was advertised to be putting on the line December 2 was presumably a fictional creation of her less than scrupulous manager, Sal Algieri. Be that as it may, Cat knocked out JoAnn Lutz with a right to her jaw and a left to the body at 1:04 of the fourth round.  

Life both inside the boxing ring and out in the real world had been particularly unkind to poor Margie Dunson and she was in a bit of a desperate need of a win somehow, somewhere. Margie would get it at the Exposition Building on May 26, 1977. Dunson’s first encounter with Cathy Russo on Thanksgiving night 1975 ended in a decision that didn’t go her way, but Margie saw to it that the judges’ scorecards would not be a factor this time around. Returning to the scene of that disappointing loss, and others still, Dunson employed an “unrelenting attack” which forced Russo to decide that enough was enough and remain on her stool after the third round. It must have felt good for Margie Dunson to win one.

Redemption is not easy to achieve. Nor should it be. It is hard to fight for and harder to hold on to. But the aftereffects, fleeting as they can sometimes be for the individual, can last generations and inspire others to accomplish objectives we can only dream of.

“It is something great and greatening to cherish an ideal. To act in the light of truth that is far away and far above,” said Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, the Civil War commander of the 20th Maine infantry whose valorous bayonet charge led to a tide-turning victory for the Union Army on Little Round Top during the Battle of Gettysburg. “To set aside the near advantage, the momentary pleasure, the snatching of seeming good to self, and to act for remoter ends—for higher good, and for interests other than our own.”

 

Sources:

Tonawanda Is Denied License (Lewiston Daily Sun, January 22, 1975)

Woman’s main Bout (Lewiston Daily Sun, October 7, 1975)

Don’t Mess (Kennebec Journal, October 9, 1975)

Women’s Champ In Bout Mon. (Lewiston Daily Sun, October 13, 1975)

Women Boxing Show at the Armory Oct. 20 (Waterville Morning Sentinel, October 14, 1975)

Women Boxing at 8:30 (Waterville Morning Sentinel, October 20, 1975)

Betty Cuniberti. Women’s Sports (San Bernardino County Sun, October 27, 1975)

‘KO’ Shows Ring Tools (Portland Evening Express, November 26, 1975)

Frank Sleeper. Girls Rekindle Boxing Interest (Portland Evening Express, November 28, 1975)

Vern Putney. This Boxing Bout Gets Badmouthed (Portland Evening Express, February 26, 1976)

Molly Bolton. In This Corner (Portland Evening Express, February 27, 1976)

Riccitelli Meets Stephens (Portland Evening Express, April 15, 1976)

Vern Putney. Why Must The Show Go On? (Portland Evening Express, April 16, 1976)

Jack Saunders. Rose Marks Thanksgiving (Portland Evening Express, November 26, 1976)

Vern Putney. The Cat Defends Title Tonight (Portland Evening Express, December 2, 1976)

Vern Putney. Davis, Burgess Win (Portland Evening Express, December 3, 1976)

Vern Putney. Macka Proves You Can Go Home Again (Portland Evening Express, May 27, 1977)

Former Boxing Champ Goes On Trial For Assault (Lewiston Sun Journal, January 24, 2008)

Catherine “Cathy” Russo Obituary (Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, September 24, 2012)