A Book of American Martyrs(180)

(She knew that Edna Mae had received the money she’d sent because she had heard from Luke after her second fight. Her brother had started off congratulating her for winning her fights but his tone turned mean midway in their conversation and he’d ended up telling her that Edna Mae “wouldn’t touch a penny of the money you sent, she called ‘money from Satan’”—though she’d passed it on to Mary Kay Mack who “didn’t give a shit whose money it was as long as she could spend it on herself.”)

(Yes, Edna Mae, Anita, and Noah were still living with Mary Kay in that “run-down old house” on Depot Street. Edna Mae worked night shifts at the nursing home and attended church twice a week where she was, as Luke said, “somebody special”—not because of Luther but because of her devotion to the church and the right-to-life cause. Anita and Noah were in high school. Mary Kay had had to take disability retirement from work, she was near-crippled from arthritis. And he, Luke, was “probably going to be married”—he’d been living with a woman with two young children for a year—“Feels like it’s time.” Luke had laughed as if this was a joke or perhaps a somber reflection presented as a joke. After Luke hung up D.D. realized that her brother hadn’t asked a thing about her—only just a question about how much she’d be making from boxing if she “ever got on TV.”)

There was a third match, in Gary, Indiana, which D.D. Dunphy won in five rounds by a TKO but which was not televised on ESPN. There was a fourth match, in Wheeling, West Virginia, against a local female boxer with a 6–2 record which D.D. Dunphy won by a split decision after five grueling rounds.

It was said in her hearing That ain’t a she. That’s a he.

In the few newspaper accounts of D.D. Dunphy’s boxing performance it was said Here is a female boxer who lives up to her hype—“Hammer of Jesus.” Dunphy is a hammer!

In Dayton which was her “hometown” she began to be known. A radio talk show host, male, interviewed her on Good Morning, Dayton!—“Here is a female athlete who takes her sport as seriously as any male. ‘D.D. Dunphy’ does not boast, and ‘D.D. Dunphy’ does not waste her breath. How’d you get into this dangerous sport, D.D.? Can you elaborate?”

Her brain was blank. She could not remember—how had she become a boxer? Had it something to do with her father?

“Seeing boxing on TV. I guess.”

“Who are your influences?”

This she could answer. Gatti, de la Hoya, Roy Jones, Mike Tyson—“Not the way he is now but the way he was.” The words seemed to roll off her tongue, and seemed to be the correct words since the interviewer smiled.

“Did you ever meet Mike Tyson?”

“N-No . . .”

“Do you think that women’s boxing will ever approach the achievement of men’s boxing?”

Was this a trick question? She knew that the answer was no. But it would be a mistake to say this and so she said, hesitantly, “Maybe someday—not for a while.”

“And why is that, D.D.?”

“Because there are not many women boxers. Yet.”

“There is prejudice against women boxers, D.D., you probably know. People don’t want to see girls and women covered in blood, beating each other up. Comment?”

She wasn’t sure what to say. She sat biting at a cuticle of her thumbnail, waiting for the words.

“People think that women are ‘nurturers’—not ‘warriors.’ But of course, a woman should be allowed to participate in any sport that men participate in, that’s the current thinking. Agreed?”

D.D. nodded her head yes.

But this was radio! The interviewer gestured for her to speak.

“Y-yes . . .”

“You are on board, I’d guess, for females boxing in the Olympics?”

D.D. nodded yes.

“I mean—y-yes . . .”

“Though you didn’t have any amateur career at all, it seems. Would you have been better served, better trained, more prepared for professional boxing if you’d been able to box as an amateur? For instance, on a women’s Olympic team?”

D.D. tried to comprehend this. She did not want to say—she did not want to hint—that there was anything lacking in her training, or anything lacking in her career. What had the interviewer asked her, exactly? Her left ear rang just slightly from the fight. A dull throbbing pain at the base of her neck.

“Well, D.D.! Tell our radio audience: are you a dyed-in-the-wool feminist? Seems like a female boxer would be a feminist.”

Dyed-in-the-wool. She did not comprehend this nor could she interpret the interviewer’s broad smile.

“Yes. I guess so.”

“And are you pro-choice?”

“‘Pro-choice’—how?”

“Pro-abortion. Y’know, women ‘taking control of their bodies.’”

“I—don’t know. I guess not.”

“Not? You are not in favor of abortion?”

Shook her head no. The subject was distasteful to her, the interviewer took note and backed off.

“Well. It’s been great to have you on WOHI-radio this morning, D.D. Dunphy! Tell our radio audience when they can see you boxing next, will you?”

She knew the answer to this question. She recited a date, the name of an opponent, the location—Indianapolis, Indiana.