The Leather Pushers
by H. C. Witwer
Grosset & Dunlap
New York, 1921
with illustrations from the Photoplay
This is a classic boxing novel and a great read. I'll give a hearty approval to anything penned by Witwer. The novel went to the screen in Hollywood serials all through the 20s.
IMBD gives
The Leather Pushers (1922)
A series of six two-reel episodes, each individually titled: #1: Let's Go (1922); #2: Round Two (1922); #3: Payment Through the Nose (1922); #4: A Fool and His Honey (1922); #5: The Taming of the Shrewd (1922); #6: Whipsawed. A second series of six more two-reelers, appropriately titled The New Leather Pushers (1922), followed immediately: #7: Young King Cole (1922); #8: He Raised Kane (1922); #9: The Chickasha Bone Crusher (1923); #10: When Kane Met Abel (1923); #11: Strike Father, Strike Son (1923); #12: Joan of Neward (1923). A third series of six more episodes, still titled The New Leather Pushers (1923), followed: #13: The Wandering Two (1923); #14: The Widower's Mite (1923); #15: Don Coyote (1923); #16: Something for Nothing (1923); #17: Columbia, the Gem and the Ocean (1923); #18: Barnaby's Grudge (1923). A fourth series, still titled The New Leather Pushers (1923), but with Billy Sullivan replacing Reginald Denny in the leading role, followed: #19: That Kid from Madrid (1923); #20: He Loops to Conquer (1924); #21: Girls Will Be Girls (1924); #22: A Tough Tenderfoot (1924); #23: Swing Bad the Sailor (1924); #24: Big Boy Blue (1924).
(An additional film with the same title came out in 1940--I'll cover it at a later time period.)
In post 218 of this thread Austin rates some of the characters of this novel based on a reprint of one of the chapters.
Bear’s 4-Fs (Fictional Fighters of Film and Fiction)
I rerated two of Austin's four fighters. Dynamite Jackson in the chapter Austin based his rating on seems like a mere sparring partner. In the novel his is a phenom with a ko streak and Kid Roberts only earns his title shot after stopping Jackson. I also tweeked Austin's version of Roberts upward to a 10 and made him a little more of a bleeder. Kid Roberts was the Rocky of the 1920s. My version of Roberts uses his real name Kane Halliday.
Dynamite Jackson HW 6 Slugger
Kane Halliday HW 10 Either