Ringside Report Looks Back at Boxer Benjamin “Evil Eye” Finkle (1897-1985)

By Donald “Braveheart” Stewart

Stare downs after the weigh in, after the press conference, after almost anything to provide the standard picture are now… standard. An opportunity for one fighter to assert their dominance, get into their opponent’s head or simply show that they have no fear are a macho element of the fight game that remains part of the circus of the buildup and the crowds bay for it.

Imagine though if you had such a look, a particular stare, that you knew ALWAYS won you that fight?

Benjamin “Evil Eye” Finkle, 5-1-2 was, allegedly, that very man. Born in 1897 in Brooklyn, New York, he was managed by Brooklyn Tommy Sullivan. Sullivan himself was a featherweight of some note, having fought 135 times and who, according to the Monroe Monitor after his last fight in 1913, that “Sullivan has been in the ring with some of the best known fighters in the country during his long career as a fighter, and he said that none of them had a harder punch than Hussey.” Hussey was his last opponent who knocked him out in the first round!

Finkle was to fight far less professionally than his manager but in so doing he became a notable personality with his celebrity status assured because of what was claimed to be this particular evil eye trick!

He was born, as so many boxers were, into abject poverty. At the tail end of the 19th century – he was born in 1897 – that can be understood as being particularly harsh. Making money as a street vendor for newspapers, he found a ready-made gym in the street. It was a tough environment and he had to learn to physically protect his earnings by keeping the local thugs at bay. After one of these fights, he was noticed by Sullivan and given the opportunity to get out of the environment he was surviving in, Finkle was quick to accept his opportunity.

Sullivan turned him professional at the tender age of only 14!

But almost as soon as he turned professional, there was a problem. Perhaps due to his education – formal education had made no dent in Finkle – on the street, Finkle was a mauler. He used all he could to win and pushing, clinching and holding were no spectacle for the fans of the day. He was no draw.

By his 8th professional fight, his last, he was well enough known for such tactics that when Jack Rainy, his opponent was again on the receiving end of such rough house tactics, referee Harry Sharpgrew had seen enough and Finkle lost by foul.

He was a retired professional fighter. But his time with the ring was only just beginning.

Finkle moved on to become a manager.

It was, as his boxing career had been, hardly a sparkling career of note, as he managed one fighter. Patsy Flanagan. It is believed that Flanagan boxed less than Finkle did – only 7 times – but Flanagan gave Finkle legendary status. Finkle told anyone who would listen that his right eye, which was a little bloodshot had “evil” powers. Many of Flanagan’s opponents reported being quite bothered by Finkle’s look and the beginning of his evil eye effect was born.

Finkle moved on to become the “Hex Man”.

Having tasted management, Finkle drew himself back into the corner of some of the biggest names, often attracted by his status and his legend. It included a number of the biggest trainers and managers in the business – Angelo Dundee, Doc Hearns, Swifty Morgan, Lew Diamond – who managed the new personality of Evil Eye Finkle, and Dumb Dan Morgan.it led him to be in the corners of some legendary fighters – Sugar Ray Robinson, Jack Dempsey, Bob Foster, Floyd Paterson and Willie Pastrano.

It is reported that for the modest sums of between $50 and $300 you could hire the evil eye to be in your corner!

It was during the 1930’s and ‘40’s Finkle achieved this legendary status, and then the war, during which he served in the army in England and in Scotland, interrupted his celebrity status. But by the time the Japanese were bombing Pearl Harbor, he was already immortalized in cartoon by Al Capp as “Evil Fleegle” in the Lil Abner comic strip. His notoriety led to many claims, from hexing promoters who stopped him from entering fights who fell off ladders the day after, of wild rumours of fight managers paying Finkle off so that fights go ahead as evenly matched ones and a story that world champion, Joey Archibald got through most of his world title fights with “The Hex Doctor” employed to do what he did best!

After the war he continued to appear at ringsides and made one appearance on television, on the CBS show, We The People, where he provided all the viewers at home with his “look”. By the 1950’s his hex man status was waning and though he continued to feature at boxing shows, his cigar chomping presence was mostly confined to the Miami Beach shows where he had moved to.

The rest of America had moved on.

Until 1973.

Floridian heavyweight Ron Casey had him in his corner when taking on undefeated Al Migliorato. Casey had never won a fight and was now taking his secret weapon, Finkle, into the contest. It didn’t work. Casey was knocked out.

But in the August of that same year, John L. Johnson had him in his corner in the fight against Carlos Dunstan. It worked. Perhaps all it needed was belief as Johnson was to report after the fight, “he told me to go out and get him, but I already had. I knocked him out in the third round. I believed in Finkle’s powers.”

His status was assured even more in the corner for Sherman “Big Train” Bergman when he got 1st round knockouts of both Raymond Brown and Leroy McFadden. Both were allegedly overheard in their dressing rooms saying, that it, wasn’t the punches of Bergman that did them in, but the “Evil Eye” of that Benjamin Finkle.

On the 3rd of January, 1985,without much fanfare, in his adopted home in Miami, Finkle was to shuffle off this mortal soil, leaving behind legendary stories, the likes of which we may never see again…