Jack London character is based on Hawaiian leper Kaluaikoolau, who in 1893 revolted and resisted capture from forces of the Provisional Government of Hawaii in the Kalalau Valley. An amateur boxer and avid boxing fan, London reported on the 1910 Johnson–Jeffries fight, in which the black boxer Jack Johnson vanquished Jim Jeffries, known as the "Great White Hope". In 1908, London had reported on an earlier fight of Johnson's, contrasting the black boxer's coolness and intellectual style, with the apelike appearance and fighting style of his Canadian opponent, Tommy Burns, 'what . . . [won] on Saturday was bigness, coolness, quickness, cleverness,
Hope Black Hope Black Hope Black ("née" MacPherson, 1919 – 25 January 2018) was an Australian scientist, a marine biologist and malacologist. In 1937 she started working at the National Museum of Victoria. Subsequently she became Curator of Molluscs at the museum in 1946. She was the National Museum's first female curator. When she married in 1965, she was forced to leave the museum, and instead became a science teacher for thirteen years. Appointed as Curator of Mollusks in 1946, Hope MacPherson was Australia's first female curator at the National Museum of Victoria. Her tenure was brought to a close prematurely, when