The Jack McAuliffe story begins when he was 14. He attended school in Bangor, where he was known as a tough rascal, handy with his fists. The big boys stayed clear of this little guy who had the reputation of being the best fighter in the school.

One day, the story goes, a teacher ordered young Jack to stay after class because of some infraction of the school rules. The teacher, a stern and wiry Scot, felt that detention wasn’t enough and that the youngster needed a whipping as well. Switch in hand, the teacher went toward the kid. That proved to a big mistake.

Young Jack ducked the first swing and then with a deft thrust, yanked the switch from the man’s grasp. With a howl of rage, the teacher doubled his fists and charged the lad. A rousing, but short-lived brawl followed. The kid laid the big Scot flat on his back with several well-directed blows.

“Ye fought fair, laddie,” the teacher said, his cracked lips grinning. “I won’t be takin’ that away from ye. I’m thinkin’ ye have the makin’s of a good fighter, lad.”

Jack McAuliffe went on to become one of the most remarkable fighters the ring has produced. He not only won the world lightweight championship, but ruled the division for ll years – the longest reign of any lightweight champion in boxing history.

The great champion was born in Cork, Ireland, on March 24, 1866. His family immigrated to Bangor when he was still a child. The boy was only 16 when he fought his first wage-earning fighter in the cellar of a local storehouse.

After moving with his family to the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, N.Y., the youngster took a job in a cooperage where his co-workers were future boxing legend Jack Dempsey and a promising young fighter named Jack Skelly.

Both men took the kid from Bangor under their wings and taught him the finer points of the manly art. McAuliffe’s New York debut took place July 1, 1884, when he won a three round decision over an opponent named Bob Mace. Inside of 12 months, McAuliffe had garnered the U.S. amateur featherweight and lightweight titles.

The youngster, full of confidence, then challenged the professional lightweight champ, Jimmy Mitchell. Mitchell refused to take the challenge. In the immediate days following, McAuliffe rang up a string of victories, knocking out Jack Hopper in 17 rounds, Billy Frazier (of Eastport) in 21 and Harry Gilmore in 28. McAuliffe, the kid who got his fight start at the age of 14 by decking a school teacher, took possession of the lightweight title in 1887.

McAuliffe startled the boxing world in 1887 when he and England’s Jem Carney went a brutal 74 rounds at Revere Beach, Mass. A mob of fans broke up the fight when they stormed the ring and the referee declared the match a draw. Carney’s followers, who had bet heavily on the Englishman, claimed their man had been robbed, that McAuliffe’s fans had orchestrated the disruption to save their man, who was clearly losing.

A couple of years later, McAuliffe, engaged in another bloody, controversial fight – a 64-round match against “Streator Cyclone” from the midwest, Billy Myer. Though McAuliffe broke his left arm early – in the 13th or 14th round – he continued to fight and managed to keep his unbeaten string intact with a draw. He squared accounts with Myer in 1892 at New Orleans, when a knockout punch in the 15th round took the wind out of the “Cyclone.”

After a six-round exhibition fight against a warrior named Kid Lavigne in New York, McAuliffe retired. There is no record that McAuliffe ever lost a fight. He died in 1937. Referee Billy Roach, despite the environment that surrounded the rough kid from Bangor, called Jack McAuliffe “the Dapper Dan of boxing.” In his prime, McAuliffe was seldom shabbily attired or poorly-groomed, according to Roach.

“He would walk across the ring with a lordly air,” wrote Roach, “and there was something royal in his gesture as he threw off his robe and acknowledged the plaudits of the crowd.”

The schoolboy who beat up his teacher will ever be remembered as the immortal Jack McAuliffe, the Napoleon of the prize ring.

Prizefighters are a singular tribe. Jack McAuliffe was that and more.