Bucking the Tiger

Bucking the Tiger: The Life and Times of John Alexander, The Black Prince of Gambling.

For some three decades, John Alexander was arguably the best known African American sporting man in the United States. Wherever he went, he was hailed as The Black Prince or even Alexander the Great.

A longtime resident of Columbus, Ohio, John was born on the estate of General William Henry Harrison in North Bend, Ohio. After the death of his parents, however, he was raised by a white family until he went to work on a steamboat as a teenager.

Quickly rising to the position of steward, John was doing well for a young African American man in the Antebellum South—that is until he was charged with being a fugitive slave and confined in a parish prison in New Orleans. He finally regained his freedom following the intervention of his white friends in Ohio and the devoted young woman he would marry.

After abandoning his budding career on the river, John decided to make his living as a gambler, having learned from watching some of the best riverboat gamblers in the United States who sometimes bet their slaveholdings on the turn of a card.

Renowned for being “on the square,” John prided himself on never cheating a man, never running a crooked game, and never allowing a drunk to play at his tables. He also declined to take money from a customer if he knew the man’s helpless dependents would suffer.

A respected citizen and philanthropist in his hometown, John harbored a deep secret which he never divulged to anyone if, in fact, he knew it at all. For like his childhood playmate, future president Benjamin Harrison, he was also the grandson of President William Henry Harrison!

Bucking the Tiger is the incredible story of a Black man from Ohio who became a national celebrity in the Post Civil War Era. It is a tale of fortunes won and lost, character and resilience in the face of adversity, and an indestructible marriage between a gambler and a devout church woman.