Shelby's Impossible Fight: Dempsey vs. Gibbons, nineteen twenty-three

In nineteen twenty-two, oil was discovered near Shelby and the town of five hundred and thirty-seven decided to think big. Local promoters offered Jack Dempsey, the heavyweight champion, three hundred thousand dollars to defend his title here on the Fourth of July, nineteen twenty-three. Workers built a forty-thousand-seat wooden octagon on a hill outside town.

Only about seven thousand people paid to get in, though thousands more slipped in for free once the fences came down, pushing the total crowd past twenty thousand. Dempsey beat Tommy Gibbons on points over fifteen rounds, the only time in his career he had to go the distance. The gate receipts barely covered the champion's first installment.

Four Shelby banks collapsed in the aftermath. The arena was torn down for lumber. The town survived, barely, and today it wears the story like a badge.