muscles

George "KO" Brown was born George Contas in Sparta, Greece, in 1890. During his career as a middleweight boxer he fought over 100 bouts, mostly in the United States, but several in Australia. He was also known as Chicago "KO" Brown. It's a bit tricky to find information about him on the Internet, as a lightweight boxer named Valentine Brown (or Braun), who fought during the same period, was also often referred to in the sporting press as KO Brown or Knockout Brown, and the same nicknames were later applied to other boxers. George "KO" Brown does have a bout list at BoxRec. Among his opponents in the ring was Mike Gibbons, who is seen in this photo from the Bain collection.

I started a biography at Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Knockout_Brown

Wow that is awesome!

yeah, especially considering there were no steroids back then. At least I think there weren't.

he looks like a marble statue - possibly from the lack of fake tan and baby oil that todays muscle-men would be sporting

Eugene Sandow was the most amazing and the greatest bodybuilder that ever lived! (Take that, modern athletes on steroids!)

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His right knee looks buckled. I would not want to mess with him, although I feel reasonably certain he is dead by now.

Another Bain/LOC photo of Bob Diry was posted on January 2, 2009: And this one in August, 2010:

That's a tough looking guy. Pre-steroid too.

On December 15, 1913, Diry, a middleweight, was knocked out by George Ashe in the third round of a contest at the National Sporting Club, in Brooklyn, New York. Diry was from Ireland, where his name was spelled (and pronounced) "Deery." He had won a fight in November, but this was his second loss since then, and he endured three more knockouts early in 1914, before hanging up his gloves for good. Diry's boxing record: boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=73885&cat=boxer New York Times story, December 16, 1913: (The Times calls him a German, and says that he had won several fights, but the record contradicts that statement.) query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9807E...

Hi Wystan. I tend to believe the Diry was indeed German, not Irish, as another NYT link credits him as the German middleweight champion (see his boxrec.com bio). The only source I'm finding that says he's Irish is the info at the top of his boxrec.com record, but I believe that's an error, and I'm also going to guess that whoever compiled his "official" record there got most if not all of the results from the same NYT links we're seeing.