The biographer of a Welsh lightweight champion who knew F. Scott Fitzgerald says he believes the title character in "The Great Gatsby" was based on the boxer.

Andrew Gallimore, author of "Occupation Prizefighter: The Freddie Welsh Story," has found an odd link between Welsh and Jay Gatsby, The Times of London reported. Not long before Fitzgerald submitted the manuscript to his publisher, Welsh was involved in a car crash in New Jersey, injuring a woman named Myrtle Wilson.

In the novel, Gatsby's old flame Daisy Buchanan is driving his car when she hits and kills a woman named Myrtle Wilson.

Welsh and Gatsby were both self-made men who changed their names.