Bronx Beauty (nickname of lightweight boxer Al Singer)

American boxer and world lightweight champion Al Singer (1909-1961) was born on New York City’s Lower East Side, but lived in the Pelham section of the Bronx. He had two boxing nicknames—“Bronx Beauty” and “Bronx Bomber.”
   
“Bronx beauty” was printed in The Evening Gazette (Wilkes-Barre, PA) on June 8, 1929. “Al Singer, the Bronx Beauty” was printed in the Daily News (New York, NY) on September 7, 1929. “Al Singer, the Bronx Beauty” was printed in the Daily News (New York, NY) on October 29, 1929.
   
“Bronx bomber” was printed in the Buffalo (NY) Times on August 6, 1929. “The Bronx Bomber” was printed in the Scranton (NY) Times on July 10, 1930. “Lightweight history repeated itself when Singer, the Bronx bomber” was printed in the Portland (ME) Evening Express on July 26, 1930.
   
“Bronx Bombers” has been a nickname of the New York Yankees baseball team since 1928.
   
   
Wikipedia: Al Singer
Al “The Bronx Beauty” Singer (September 6, 1909 – April 20, 1961) was an American boxer who won the world lightweight championship in 1930.
   
Early life and career
Singer was born in a tenement on Broome Street, part of the Jewish section in New York’s Lower East Side on September 6, 1909. He was one of four sons and a daughter born to an ambitious ladies’ garment entrepreneur who would keep his large family in America’s middle class. Singer, an all round athlete who loved basketball, was discovered by boxing trainers Harry Drucker and Hymie Caplan after his tenth amateur bout which included a great showing in his first outing against the New York State Bantamweight champion, Jimmy Cruze. As an amateur boxer, he won the Metropolitan AAU featherweight title. Singer had unsurpassed grace and a studied style in the ring, and he could punch with authority, but unlike the great lightweight Benny Leonard, to whom he was often compared, he could not take a strong punch and was considered to have a “glass jaw”. His quick rise to fame, and equally quick demise could be explained by these competing characteristics.
   
Quick rise to boxing prominence
Debuting as a professional in Brooklyn with a knockout of Jim Reilly on July 2, 1927, Singer went undefeated in his first two years as a professional. His affectionate New York fans dubbed him “The Bronx Beauty” for both his looks and exceptional grace in the ring.
 
Newspapers.com
8 June 1929, The Evening Gazette (Wilkes-Barre, PA), pg. 9, col. 1:
AL SINGER WANTS
CRACK AT FERNENDEZ,
THEN FOR CHOCOLATE
(...)
A premature explosion of lethal on the none too well cemented chin brought to an abrupt conclusion the Canadian’s contending and furnished the puzzled experts with a scarcity of material on which to write of the Bronx beauty’s comeback.
 
Newspapers.com
6 August 1929, Buffalo (NY) Times, “Singer Will Be at Weight Meeting Keed” by Harry Grayson, pg. 11, col. 1:
The fraction is strange enough, but when you know that this is practically the natural poundage of the Bronx bomber the only reason for it seems to be the stubbornness of Louis Gutterriez, manager of the Patent Leather Kid.
 
Newspapers.com
7 September 1929, Daily News (New York, NY), pg. 30, col. 1:
ZAZZARINO SIGNS
FOR AL SINGER
Young Leonard Zazzarino, the Marion Mauler from Jersey City and latest junior lightweight sensation, yesterday signed to meet Al Singer, the Bronx Beauty, in a 10-round bout at the Garden Oct. 11.
         
Newspapers.com
7 October 1929, Daily News (New York, NY), pg. 39, col. 1:
ZAZZ A FEATHERWEIGHT SHARKEY
Singer Just a Bum
To Jersey Italian
By JACK FARRELL.
ORANGEBURG. N. Y., Oct. 6.—Any young fellow with a good left hook who can take a hard belt on the lug without turning his tootsies up has at least an outside chance of whipping Al Singer. Therefore you must concede to young Leonard Zazzarino, the fearless Italian from Jersey City, that chance when he starts against the Bronx Beauty next Friday night at Madison Square garden.
   
Newspapers.com
29 October 1929, Daily News (New York, NY), pg. 47, col. 1:
SINGER ENTERS LIGHTWEIGHT CLASS
AL WILL STARTS
AGAINST NEBO
AT 135 POUNDS
By JACK FARRELL.
REALIZING that he can no longer fight at 130 pounds and render a proper account of himself, Al Singer, the Bronx Beauty, will open his campaign for lightweight titular honors in Madison Square Garden, Nov. 15, when he meets Pete Nebo in the Garden on Nov. 29 at the same weight.
 
Newspapers.com
10 July 1930, Scranton (NY) Times, “Champion, Eleven Years a Scrapper, Defends Title Again,” pg. 26, col. 5:
Sammy out to have his work cut out for him in beating (AL—ed.) Singer, if he beats him. Al has been coming along at a great clip. The Bronx Bomber, since his surprise knockout at the hands of Ignacio Fernandez last May, has grown from a feather to a lightweight.
 
Newspapers.com
26 July 1930, Portland (ME) Evening Express, “Sports Slants” by Alan J. Gould (Associated Press Sports Editor), pg. 11, col. 1:
Lightweight history repeated itself when Singer, the Bronx bomber, beat Mandell with the first punch, even though it took a ew more wallops to put Sammy down for good.
 
Newspapers.com
21 April 1961, Courier-Post (Camden, NJ), pg. 22, col. 2:
Singer, 51, Dies,
Ex-Ring Champ
NEW YORK (UPI)—Al Singer, who held the world lightweight boxing championship for nearly four months in 1930, died Thursday of a heart attack. He was 51.
 
Singer, known as the “Bronx Beauty” during his boxing days, won and lost the title by a first-round knockout. At the age of 20 he knocked out Sammy Mandell in 1:46 of the first round at Yankee Stadium on July 17, 1930.
 
Singer in turn was knocked out at 1:06 of the first round by Tony Canzoneri at Madison Square Garden on Nov. 14 of that year. Singer later said that he fainted in the ring.
 
Among the other outstanding boxers he fought were Jimmy McLarnin, Kid Chocolate and Bat Battalino. Singer lost to all three.
 
The Jerusalem Post (Israel)
Six inducted into Jewish Sports Hall of Fame
Notable among them are Adriana Behar, a Brazilian beach volleyball player who won silver medals in the last two Olympiads.
By DANNY ALEXANDER Published: NOVEMBER 29, 2005 23:43
(...)
Singer, “The Bronx Beauty,” captured the World Lightweight championship briefly in 1930, before relinquishing it in the same year. During his four-year career Singer compiled a record of 60-8-2.
       
Forward (New York, NY)
The Secret Jewish History of Boxing
By Colin Tatz
March 14, 2017
(...)
Abraham “Al” Singer, known as “The Bronx Beauty,” was world lightweight champion in 1930, an interesting man because he wasn’t born to poverty but to the mobile middle class. His two brothers were connected with Abe (“Kid Twist”) Reles, chief hitman for Murder Inc, and Al wasn’t all that far off with Mob connections and the Jewish criminals dubbed the “Kosher Nostra.”
 
The Jewish Boxing Blog
MONDAY, JANUARY 18, 2021
A Look Back: Al Singer
The Jewish Boxing Blog is continuing a series called “A Look Back” in an effort to link the past with the present through a profile of notable former Jewish boxers.

July 17, 1930
(...)
Singer only turned professional the year after Mandell won the championship. Born twenty years ago to a lady’s garment entrepreneur and his wife, Abraham was one of five kids: four sons and a daughter. He spent his formative years living on Broome Street in New York’s Lower East Side, before the family found a fancier place in Harlem. The Singers next moved all around the Bronx when his dad’s business boomed and then settled in Pelham, a middle class neighborhood just south of Mount Vernon.
(...)
Singer’s boxing ability is a bit underrated too. His nickname is the “Bronx Beauty” because he is from the Bronx and he is a handsome man. But he also boxes handsomely, moving gracefully.