In the Louisville of Muhammad Ali, of Cassius Clay, the greatest boxer in history

Cassius Clay aka Muhammad Ali, the greatest boxer of all time, would be 80 today if Parkinson hadn’t taken him away in 2016. He won gold at the 1960 Rome Olympics, faced Joe Frazier at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan in 1971 and 1974 in two of the legendary matches, he fought in Kinshasa in Congo and Manila in the Philippines, but his life always revolved around Louisville, the city in Kentucky where he was born, study, he began to boxing by chance encouraged by an Irish policeman, where he became a militant against racial discrimination, stepped into the ring one last time and chose to be buried.

Cassius Marcellus Clay Junior was born on January 17, 1942. The pink log cabin where he spent his childhood is located at 3302 Grand Avenue in Louisville’s West End, after his death it was opened to the public with photos and videos of his extraordinary sporting history and human. In 1954, at the age of 12, he approached boxing at Columbia Gym now part of the student center of the Spalding University.

Louisville, Cassius Clay’s home on Grand Avenue

In 1960, at the age of 18, he won gold in Rome and debuted in the first professional meeting at the Freedom Home of the Kentucky Expo Center in Louisville and won. Success came and the famous hot pink Cadillac convertible – like that of the great boxer Sugar Ray Robinson, his idol – with which Cassius roamed the city. Like Sugar Ray, Cassius decided that his life would be public, open to all, he would never refuse to sign an autograph or run away from his fans. He buys a house in the city center, on Walnut Street: in 1978, the street was renamed Muhammad Ali Boulevard. Because in the meantime Cassius, a follower of Malcolm X and committed against racial segregation, converted to Islam taking the name of the prophet and served five years in prison for refusing, as a conscientious objector, to fight in Vietnam.


Belle of Louisville, paddle steamer on the Ohio River

Leaning between a bend in the Ohio River on the border with Indiana, Louisville is the main city of Kentucky, where the famous fast food Kentucky Fried Chicken was born, tourists who visit it plow the river – which in 1579 km of length divides the Southern states from those of the American Midwest – aboard replicas of the steamships that once sailed as far as the Mississippi Delta, all the way to New Orleans. But Louisville is most famous as the city of Muhammad Ali, to whom theAli Center an educational, exhibition and event center based on the six principles of the boxer who in the course of his life was also an icon for civil rights, actor and writer. His principles are trust, conviction, dedication, giving, respect and spirituality. The location of the Alì Center is not accidental because, after suffering an episode of racism, in protest the young boxer threw his Olympic gold into the waters of the Ohio River.

His last appearance was at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, when Muhammad Ali lit the Olympic flame that inaugurated the games and moved the world with the obvious tremors due to the disease. He died in a hospital in Phoenix, Arizona, on June 3, 2016. His funeral, as public as his entire life, was held in Louisville amidst a crowd: 35,000 tickets were distributed to organize it and avoid riots. President Obama sent an official message, but the eulogy was read by former President Bill Clinton. Turkish President Erdogan and King Jordan Abd Allah II attended the ceremony. Representing Italy was the boxer Nino Benvenuti.


Louisville, the boxing glove memorial plaque in front of Cassius Clay’s house on Grand Avenue

Muhammad Ali’s coffin was carried by former world heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis and actor Will Smith who in 2001 had played the role of boxing champion in the biopic Ali directed by Michael Mann. The gigantic funeral procession, which started from the Kfc Yum Center, crossed the whole city for hours, stopping in the symbolic places of his life. He finished at Cave Hill Cemetery, where his grave became such a popular pilgrimage site that the direction of the holy field had to install signs to reach his grave and avoid the chaos created by the many visitors wandering around the headstones. The public funeral was followed by a private function with a Muslim rite.

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In the Louisville of Muhammad Ali, of Cassius Clay, the greatest boxer in history