A biography of Jack Dempsey, Heavyweight Champion of the World from 1919-1926.

In the Ring With Jack Dempsey - Part I: The Making of a Champion, by Adam J. Pollack is the most thorough and detailed book ever written about former world heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey. This book (the first of two) chronicles Dempsey's life and career from its start up to his winning the world heavyweight championship, fight by fight, as told by those who saw the contests and reported on them at the time, utilizing multiple local next-day newspaper reports. This includes training, predictions, pre-fight hype, and discussions about the opponents. As with other books in the In the Ring series, this book also discusses the context of the times, the color line and race in boxing and society (offering the perspectives of both white and black-owned newspapers), World War I, Dempsey's personal and managerial choices, and how these topics affected the sport and Dempsey's life and career. Even new facts about the controversial Jim Flynn fight are revealed. Boxing fans will obtain knowledge and insight into Jack Dempsey like never before. 560 pages, with over 550 rare photos, illustrations, cartoons, and fight advertisements. Adam J. Pollack's In the Ring With series on the heavyweight champions of the gloved era also includes books on John L. Sullivan, James J. Corbett, Bob Fitzsimmons, James J. Jeffries, Marvin Hart, Tommy Burns, and Jack Johnson. Adam J. Pollack is a boxing referee, judge, and member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He also is an attorney practicing law in Iowa City, Iowa.

International bestseller! James Bond has nothing on Dusko Popov. A double agent for the Abwehr, MI5 and MI6, and the FBI during World War II, Popov seduced numerous women, spoke five languages, and was a crack shot, all while maintaining his cover as a Yugoslavian diplomat… On a cool August evening in 1941, a Serbian playboy created a stir at Casino Estoril in Portugal by throwing down an outrageously large baccarat bet to humiliate his opponent. The Serbian was a British double agent, and the money―which he had just stolen from the Germans―belonged to the British. From the sideline, watching with intent interest, was none other than Ian Fleming… The Serbian was Dusko Popov. As a youngster, he was expelled from his London prep school. Years later, he would be arrested and banished from Germany for making derogatory statements about the Third Reich. When World War II ensued, the playboy became a spy, eventually serving three dangerous masters: the Abwehr, MI5 and MI6, and the FBI. On August 10, 1941, the Germans sent Popov to the United States to construct a spy network and gather information on Pearl Harbor. He successfully made contact with the FBI in an attempt to warn the country, but J. Edgar Hoover blew his cover. Later, MI5 desperately needed Popov to deceive the Abwehr about the D-Day invasion, but they assured him that a return to the German Secret Service Headquarters in Lisbon would result in torture and execution. He went anyway... Into the Lion’s Mouth is a globe-trotting account of a man’s entanglement with espionage, murder, assassins, and lovers―including enemy spies and a Hollywood starlet. It is a story of subterfuge, seduction, patriotism, and cold-blooded courage. It is the story of Dusko Popov―the inspiration for James Bond.

Before there was Vegas, and long before there was "reality television," there was Times Square. For a century, it has stood as the blazing Crossroads of the World; the sometimes magical, sometimes tawdry, but always spectacular epicenter of American commercial culture. Times Square Style is a visual compendium of the energy and dazzle and glamour that made the Great White Way the most famous -- and notorious -- place in America's most famous -- and notorious -- city. From Ziegfeld's Follies and George White's Scandals to titanic signs with screaming type -- Drink Pepsi! Smoke Camels! Good to the Last Drop! -- to burlesques with dancing girls in short, short skirts, this book brings to colorful life a trove of arcane, lost, and otherwise forgotten promotions, signs, flyers, programs, posters, records, napkins, advertisements, billboards, and other works of ephemera large and small. Times Square Style is published on the centennial anniversary of this defining American place, with more than 200 color images and 25 vintage black-and-white prints.

The 1940s saw a brief audacious experiment in mass entertainment: a jukebox with a screen. Patrons could insert a dime, then listen to and watch such popular entertainers as Nat "King" Cole, Gene Krupa, Cab Calloway or Les Paul. A number of companies offered these tuneful delights, but the most successful was the Mills Novelty Company and its three-minute musical shorts called Soundies. This book is a complete filmography of 1,880 Soundies: the musicians heard and seen on screen, recording and filming dates, arrangers, soloists, dancers, entertainment trade reviews and more. Additional filmographies cover more than 80 subjects produced by other companies. There are 125 photos taken on film sets, along with advertising images and production documents. More than 75 interviews narrate the firsthand experiences and recollections of Soundies directors and participants. Forty years before MTV, the Soundies were there for those who loved the popular music of the 1940s. This was truly "music for the eyes."

A very rare WWII combative, "How to Fight Tough", has been reprinted and is now available! This reprint is a faithful reproduction of the original with original formatting and graphics and digitally-enhanced photographs. At the outset of World War II, boxing heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey was appointed as a lieutenant in the U.S. Coast Guard and given the job of director of physical fitness. His orders: "Make 'em tough!" His task: to teach rookie Coast Guardsmen how to fight down and dirty in the face of the very real threat of enemy troops infiltrating American shores. Get in the ring with "the Manassa Mauler" as he gives 18 fully illustrated lessons in the art of bashing and brawling on the battlefield, including Subduing an Armed Enemy, The Unbreakable Strangle, Beating the Punch, Hammering Your Way Out of a Stranglehold, The Belt Trick, Fooling the Smart Knife Man, Turning the Tables with a Bayonet and Breaking a Standoff. All students of nasty close-quarters combat in the tradition of Sykes, Fairbairn, Applegate and other giants of the World War II era will thoroughly enjoy this fascinating piece of history. "How to Fight Tough," written by the toughest man in America, is a simple, clear and complete illustrated text book on how to deal with the enemy-and subdue him-in any possible emergency.