Joseph Louis Barrow was born May 13, 1914, in a shack in the cotton-field country near Lafayette, Ala. The son of a sharecropper, great-grandson of a slave and great-great-grandson of a white slave owner became the first African-American to achieve lasting fame and popularity in the 20th century.

	Louis finished his career with a 68-3 record, including 54 knockouts.

Louis' family moved to Detroit in the 1920s, and he was learning cabinetmaking in a vocational school and taking violin lessons when a friend convinced him to take up boxing. He fought under the name Joe Louis so his mother wouldn't find out, and he was good, winning 50 of 54 amateur bouts.

Turning pro in 1934, Louis won his first 27 fights before falling victim to the heavy overhand right of Germany's Max Schmeling on June 19, 1936. Undeterred, he went on to become the first black heavyweight champion since Jack Johnson, knocking out James Braddock in the eighth round on June 22, 1937, before a Chicago crowd of 45,000 -- 20,000 of whom were black.

But Louis had some unfinished business. He needed to avenge his loss to Schmeling. Though Schmeling wasn't a Nazi, his victory over Louis had been hailed by Nazi leader Adolph Hitler as validation of the notion of Aryan superiority. With the world on the brink of World War II, the Louis-Schmeling rematch served as a metaphor, carrying heavy symbolic weight.

Joe Louis was invited to the White House to meet President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Schmeling took phone calls from Hitler urging him to win for the honor of the Third Reich.

On June 22, 1938, before a crowd of 70,000 at Yankee Stadium, Louis annihilated Schmeling in 2 minutes, 4 seconds, becoming a hero to all Americans, black or white.

"The Brown Bomber" would hold the heavyweight title from 1937, when he won it from Braddock, to 1949, when he stepped down. The 12-year reign, in which he defeated all 25 of his challengers, remains the longest in history. He finished his career with a record of 68-3, with 54 knockouts, according to The Boxing Register.

He died April 12, 1981, in Las Vegas.