Top: Muhammad Ali & Zbigniew Pietrzykowski of Poland after Ali won their bout in the 1960 Olympic finals in Rome in the light heavyweight division.

Bottom: The two are collecting their medals along with Giulio Saraudi (Italy) and Anthony Madigan (Australia) who both came joint third.


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Joe Frazier knocking down Muhammad Ali in the 15th round of their 1971 encounter at Madison Square Gardens. Frazier went on to win the fight on a points decision becoming the first man to defeat Ali in the ring. 

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This photograph taken in 1981 shows the dramatic moment Muhammad Ali saved a suicidal Veteran of the Vietnam war. The former Heavyweight Champion shouted to the man; “I’m your brother, I want to help you” after which the man allowed Ali to approach and eventually came off the ledge.

Source: dailymail.co.uk
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Don King posing with two of the best fighters he ever worked with, former heavyweight champions Mike Tyson and Muhammad Ali. The picture was taken in Las Vegas before a WBA-WBC lightweight championship fight on October 29, 1988.

Source: beatsboxingmayhem.com
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Cassius Clay aged 18 fighting Tony Madigan of Australia during the light heavyweight boxing semifinals at the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome.

Source: telegraph.co.uk
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A couple of young boys practising boxing.

Source: Tumblr
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Mugshot of boxing’s most notorious promoter Don King after he killed a man who owed him money (1954).

Source: boxinginsider.com
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Robert De Niro in Raging Bull (1980)

Source: aostolazafilmhistory
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Benny the Ghetto Wizard Leonard, widely considered one of the best lightweights of all time, was champion from 1917 to 1925 defending his title seven times. His record stands at;

Total fights 219
Wins 183
Wins by KO 70
Losses 24
Draws 8
No contests 4

Source: wikipedia.org
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Muhammad Ali, who was famously banned from boxing for being a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War, points to a newspaper reporting in 1966 on a 30,000 strong protest march that had recently taken place against the conflict.

Source: dailymail.co.uk
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A 1964 photo of middleweight challenger Rubin Carter.

Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter, who died in April 2015 aged 76 could, according to some commentators, have become the World Champion and was one of the best middleweights of his day. However on June 17th, 1966 Carter was out on the town with a friend, John Artis and their lives would change forever when they found themselves getting arrested for the murder of a bartender and two customers of the Lafayette Bar and Grill.


Rubin Carter knocking Flore...
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A photograph of unidentified German girls boxing in shallow waters, taken by Bernard Kobel in the 1950s.

Source: etsy.com
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Muhammad Ali looking dejected after losing his final fight to Trevor Berbick in 1981.

Source: dailymail.co.uk
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A young Nelson Mandela doing some boxing training. He wrote in his autobiography Long Walk to Freedom;

"I did not enjoy the violence of boxing so much as the science of it. I was intrigued by how one moved one's body to protect oneself, how one used a strategy both to attack and retreat, how one paced oneself over a match.....Boxing is egalitarian. In the ring, rank, age, colour and wealth are irrelevant.....I never did any real fighting after I entered politics. My main interest was in train...

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American boxer Joe Rivers sparring with the women's lightweight
world champion, Louise Adler in 1926 while helping her train for an
upcoming title defence.

fscclub.com
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Muhammad Ali meeting Saddam Hussein in 1990 when the former heavyweight champion was enlisted to help negotiate the release of 15 American hostages. The ‘guests’ were held in Iraq following Saddam's invasion of Kuwait with the threat that they would be used as human shields should US forces attack strategically areas in the country. After tense negotiations, all 15 men were released without being harmed but when praised for his actions, Ali insisted all credit be given to Allah.

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Muhammad Ali and actor James Earl Jones, who at the time was starring in the Broadway production of the Great White Hope. The play told the life story of boxing legend Jack Johnson and after watching it, Ali told Jones that if you replace the problems caused by Johnson's love for white women with Ali's religious preferences, the two great boxers had virtually the same life story.

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Jack Johnson (right) knocking out James J. Jeffries in their 1910 title fight. Jeffries was the first of the so called Great White Hopes backed to take the title from Johnson, who had become the first black heavyweight champion two years earlier. After the fight, there were race riots across America which lead to 25 deaths and several lynching attempts.
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Muhammad Ali (1966) training in former World Bantamweight champion Jimmy Coulon's
gym in Chicago. Photographed by Thomas Hoepker
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Picture taken on October 26, 1951, of the fight between the aging former champ, Joe Louis and a much younger up-and-coming fighter, Rocky Marciano. Louis had returned to the ring after retiring to clear his considerable debt to the IRS so when offered $300,000 to fight one of the hardest hitters around, it was too good to refuse.

Marciano, who grew up idolising Louis, demolished the former champion, knocking him to the floor in the eighth round before hitting him clean out of the ring, causin...
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Photograph of Jack Johnson vs. Tommy Burns taken on December 26 1908 in Sydney, Australia. Johnson won the fight in the 14th round and became the first African American to be the World Heavyweight Champion, sparking the original hunt for the so called ‘Great White Hope’.
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This poster depicts Heavy Weight boxer Joe Louis and was aimed at getting new recruits to join the American army during World War Two. It was produced around 1942 during the ‘Brown Bomber’s' reign, which stretched from 1937 – 1949.
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