Born on August 5, 1895 in Camilla, Georgia, Tiger Flowers became the first black man ever to hold boxing’s World Middleweight Championship title.

Flowers moved to Brunswick with his parents as a child, but it was only after his move to Atlanta around 1920 that he began to train seriously as a boxer under manager Walk Miller. A lefty due to a broken arm as a child, Flowers was lightning fast in the ring, competing all over the country to rise in the ranks until in 1926, he earned the rights to fight world middleweight champion Harry Greb.  Flowers won this battle and a rematch with Greb, only to lose on points in December of that same year to Mickey Walker in Chicago.

Flowers is also remembered for his persona outside the ring.  Known for carrying around his bible and often quoting passages from it to reporters, he quickly became known as the “Georgia Deacon.”  His sobriety and religious devotion helped to expunge the memory of the more inflammatory Jack Johnson who preceded him.

Less than a year after snatching the world middleweight championship title from Greb, Flowers died on the operating table while having scar tissue removed from around his eyes.  Beloved by both black and white fans and a deacon at his church, Butler Street CME Church in Atlanta, his passing was mourned by over 75,000 funeral attendees.  Atlanta would not show grief of this magnitude again until the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968.

Flowers fought a total of 162 fights from 1918 until 1927 when he died, leaving behind a professional record of 135 wins (54 by KO), 17 losses and 8 ties.  He was ranked #5 All-Time Middleweight by Charley Rose and was inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame in 1976 and into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1993.