12 Rounds in Lo's Gym: Boxing and Manhood in Appalachia

by Todd D. Snyder

Overview

Questions of class and gender in Appalachia have, in the wake of the 2016 presidential election and the runaway success of Hillbilly Elegy, moved to the forefront of national conversations about politics and culture. From Todd Snyder, a first generation college student turned college professor, comes a passionate commentary on these themes in a family memoir set in West Virginia coal country.
 
12 Rounds in Lo’s Gym is the story of the author’s father, Mike “Lo” Snyder, a fifth generation West Virginia coal miner who opened a series of makeshift boxing gyms with the goal of providing local at-risk youth with the opportunities that eluded his adolescence. Taking these hardscrabble stories as his starting point, Snyder interweaves a history of the region, offering a smart analysis of the costs—both financial and cultural—of an economy built around extractive industries.

Part love letter to Appalachia, part rigorous social critique, readers may find 12 Rounds in Lo’s Gym—and its narrative of individual and community strength in the face of globalism’s headwinds—a welcome corrective to popular narratives that blame those in the region for their troubles. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781946684127
Publisher:	West Virginia University Press
Publication date:	02/16/2018
Edition description:	1st Edition
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Todd Snyder is associate professor of rhetoric and writing at Siena College and author of The Rhetoric of Appalachian Identity. 
 

Table of Contents

Prelude

Mountain Violence

Part I Corner Men: The Eden Story of Lo's Gym Boxing Club

1 Fighting Noah Milton 9

2 Tough Men 25

3 Lo's Gym 41

4 Flex and the Rumble on the Hill 57

5 Street Preacher 72

Part II Counterpunchers: Parables of Coal Country Pugilism

6 The Unlikely Reincarnation Story of Rick Cogar 97

7 Jeremiah and the Three Bears 116

8 Ring Girls 133

9 Appalachian Underdogs of the Squared Circle 149

Part III Split Decisions: Stories from the Championship Rounds

10 Prizefighters 169

11 Hillbilly Jefferson 185

12 Premature Stoppage 200

Dedication: Fighting Naton Leslie 219

Notes 223

Index 229

Editorial Reviews

Snyder’s discerning eye and well-tuned ear help turn his exploration of boxing in coal country into a resonant account of work, church, masculinity, family, and more. It’s on the lowest levels of the fight world—DIY gyms, Toughman competitions, amateur cards at local venues—that the social and cultural embedding of boxing in everyday life comes most vividly alive, and Snyder introduces us to some unforgettable scenes and characters.”
—Carlo Rotella, author of Cut Time: An Education at the Fights
 

"An affecting testimonial to the power of action and of storytelling—to say nothing of a good right hook—to make real change."
—Kirkus Reviews

 


"This is a very special book, both in its focus on one man who did work that mattered and in its portrayal of a distressed region whose economy is based on a dying industry."
—Booklist, starred review
 


“This memoir will appeal to many readers: those in gender studies who study manifestations of masculinity, scholars who examine the collapse of the coalfields and the rampant unemployment found in Central Appalachia, and West Virginians who possess a fierce pride in the Mountain State and celebrate small-town triumphs.”
—Jeff Mann, author of Loving Mountains, Loving Men

From the Publisher

2017-12-24
Spirited memoir of life in a West Virginia backwater, where fight clubs keep youngsters from going off the rails.It was a kid named Noah Milton—or maybe "his name was Noah and he was from Milton, West Virginia"—who was, writes Snyder (Rhetoric and Writing/Siena Coll.; The Rhetoric of Appalachian Identity, 2014), "the first person to kick my ass." It wouldn't be the last ass-kicking he received at the hands of beefy rednecks while standing up to his opponents in the rings of his father's gym. He got knocked down, and he got up, always remembering his dad's advice: "when you crawl through the ropes, you can't hide from the truth," whether it reveals you to be a fighter or a coward. Steeped in English literature, Snyder views the contest through a refined lens. While thinking of Beowulf, for instance, he recounts one neighbor, a "dope-smoking hippy" who bought the ring where Larry Holmes fought a storied bout, then had it painted red. A college friend is likened to Frankenstein's monster, and he to the good doctor himself, since Snyder, delivered from temptation by virtue of logging time wailing the tar out of his contemporaries, was teaching the young man his tricks. "He was the type of guy who'd find a fight if one didn't come looking for him," writes the author appreciatively. Snyder has succeeded in melding the worlds of literature and the sweet science. As he writes, his first college essay was on how Joe Louis figured in Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, even as his father, who hit on the idea of boxing as a means of warding off juvenile delinquency, earned honor for his contributions at Lo's Gym. Though the circumstances and surroundings are grim in meth-lab coal country, Snyder retains a pleasing but not Pollyannaish optimism throughout.An affecting testimonial to the power of action and of storytelling—to say nothing of a good right hook—to make real change.

Kirkus Review