Before: 1960 would be Angie Dickinson's busiest year in boxing terms, and although shaken by the loss to Mitzi Gaynor, she came back quickly with this bout against gritty blonde Honor. The classically trained Blackman could play the kitten, but she despised Hollywood's bottle blondes and was notorious for making other women suffer when finishing opportunities were apparent. Angie was well aware of Honor's reputation going in - even seemingly attracted to it.
"I never wanted to knock someone out so bad in all my life" she was quoted as saying.
Black pushup, pink with white criss-cross pattern hipster bottoms for Angie - Black push up, black panties for Angie - fought in one of the private ballrooms at the Sands.
R1: Blackman with her hunched posture, and curved jab looked to do Angie the way Mitzi had done, but Dickinson countered with the hook and dropped Honor to her butt with the fight's first punch, and the taunting began as a flush faced Brit. got angrily to her feet. As the girls circled, they came together in a series of collisions - Honor trying to step in with the jab, Angie whipping the hook, with the American getting the better of the exchanges and forcing Blackman into retreat. Honor would get the jab going late, finding Angie's left eye with heartless determination, but Dickinson had hammered out the points with her heavy left hand.
R2-3: Honor continued to try to work off her jab, but she was getting smacked sideways by the counter left hook of Angie as the girls continued to come together Mid-ring. Dickinson worked feverishly to the body whenever Honor went to the ropes, and Angie drew warnings for straying low as she twisted her hips into multiple hooks below Honor's elbows. For her part - Honor couldn't hold Angie off, and didn't have the legs to use the ring - toe to toe Dickinson was beating her up, but the Brit. did what she could. Drawing warnings for elbows, and lacing Angie's eyes repeatedly in the clinches - Honor opened a cut over Angie's left eye after 3 which had the American blinking and distracted at the bell.
R4: Honor finally began to pound back Angie's head with the jab, freezing the American's feet, and leaving her susceptible to Blackman's follow up hook on the right eye. Circling patiently left, Honor kept Angie outside and made her fight at range - Dickinson jumping in with the hook, but paying the price as the Brit. began to score with cracking combinations. By the end of the round, Honor was on the board, and Angie's left eye was tragically closed as she wandered to her corner.
R5: Blackman's cruelty was never more apparent than when she went to work on Angie Dickinson's face this round. Stepping around her stabbing jab, Honor bounced hooks and crosses off Angie's eyes and cheeks, constantly getting the American to take and chase, her head snapping back, feet stepping wrong as Blackman's accuracy began to tell. Dickinson gobbled up dazzling combinations as Blackman got off, and stepped away with impunity, and by the final bell, Angie was out over her feet, wobbly butt, and dazed. Blackman wore a haughty smile as she strutted confidently to her corner for the break.
R6: Blackman went right back to work with the jab, and Angie timed her perfectly. Slipping in and to the right, Dickinson got her body behind a left hand to the jaw to open the round, and Honor went out with alarming suddenness, getting swept to the canvas and laying out with a shattering bang on the dusty plywood. Blackman lay completely starched, on her back, fists above her head with the pain of the knockout etched upon her sleeping face as Dickinson lifted her mitts in weary triumph.
Spectacular KO6 Angie Dickinson.
After: A relieved Angie partied on into the night with her 'pack backers, despite heavy swelling about her eyes that many felt shortened this little dynamo's career, especially with Angie fighting so often in the early sixties. Honor's fists had left their mark, but Blackman's aura was forever diminished by this wrenching defeat - a single shot knockout that is still referred to today whenever history's great hooks are discussed.