Aurelio Herrera - Gilbertgia.com

happen.” 84 The Herald implied it was not a problem for Herrera, a
featherweight, to fight Downey, a lightweight, but had the
newspaper meant to write “…he was now firmly convinced that
Downey was NOT the original lightweight Jack Downey…” ?
The 3,000 ticket holders at Walker’s Field expected to see
Aurelio Herrera fight a Jack Downey, and most of them didn’t care
which Downey it was as long as the fight was long and exciting.
For that matter, the organizers themselves might not have been
sure which Downey they had, but pre-fight ticket sales
undoubtedly pushed the match on.
It was a horrible mismatch. Jack Downey went down two
minutes and 32 seconds into the first round, and as the ref
pronounced “10”, the crowd screamed over and over, “Fake!”
Downey was unconscious for ten minutes, and Herrera broke a
bone in his hand. 85 The Deseret Evening News observed, “… to
satisfy the crowd, Herrera and his brother Mauro gave a fourround
exhibition of very fast work despite the little fighter’s
disabled hand. The way the two went at each other hammer-and-
84 Salt Lake Herald, Jul 2, 1903. At this time there was no exact upper-weight
for featherweights, but featherweights usually were not matched against
lightweights. The lightweight class was then 130-135. In 1920 the upper-weight
limit for featherweights was set at 126 lbs.
85 Los Angeles Times, Jul 2, 1903
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