in England through 1895. In December 1896, returning to New York City to fight Mike Donovan in a brief exhibition, he was acclaimed by world heavyweight champion James J. Corbett as "the man to whom we owe the changes that have elevated the sport". Mace continued his career exclusively as an exhibition boxer and his last recorded entry into the ring was in 1909 when he was 78 years of age. On 8 March 1897, he performed a four-round exhibition with former world welterweight champion Tommy Ryan in Syracuse, New York, before returning to England that Summer. He continued to fight exhibitions in 1897, and in 1898 opened a boxing academy in Cape Town, South Africa. He performed exhibitions with Jack Valentine in Cape Town in 1903 and 1904. Other pursuits and death Mace was a skillful violinist who originally aspired to a career in music and continued with the art through his career as a boxer. Some believe the destruction of his violin in his early life by three thugs in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, and his subsequent anger and retaliation led him to a life in the ring. In 1856, he was credited with playing "The Cuckoo Song", and "Black Jack Davey" on his violin at the Strand, a supper club in London, while afterwards posing shirtless. In 1862 Mace began his own circus, appearing throughout England including Canterbury, Brighton, Ipswich, and Norwich through December of the year. Earlier in 1862, he had learned the trade and been well paid sparring in safe exhibitions with Tom King at Ginett's Circus, in Oxford, Portsmouth, and Exeter. In 1870, Mace had a small role in the Shakespearean production of "As You Like It", on Broadway's Niblo Theatre in New York City and played several shows to crowded houses. Though he acted as a wrestler and spoke only a few lines of the script, the rougher patrons from New York's "Bowery" enjoyed his realistic portrayal of a wrestler and knew him as a famous heavyweight boxer. Hotels and saloons owned In 1866, Mace became the proprietor of the Strawberry Gardens pleasure grounds at West Derby, Lancashire, near Liverpool a beautifully landscaped park which featured the sports of running, bowling, jumping, wrestling and boxing. Mace himself would often be featured in the boxing displays. At various times, he was also a professional runner, bar owner and keeper, circus proprietor and racehorse owner. The