Muhammad Ali died on June 3, sparking worldwide mourning and stirring up memories among those who knew him, met him, or saw his prize fights. But few realize that Ali made several trips to Hudson County.
The most famous trip came in June 1979, when he did a charity boxing match at the Jersey City Armory on Montgomery Street against then-Jersey City Mayor Thomas Smith and Gov. Brendan Byrne.
Ali has been called the greatest boxer in history. But he was also a remarkable personality and political activist. He lost his heavyweight title when he refused to be drafted, a pacifist protest against the Vietnam War based on his Muslim faith.
He was stripped of his title, but eventually won his case in the U.S. Supreme Court. This allowed him to return to the ring, and after a series of fights in the early 1970s, he was once again the heavyweight champion of the world.
Ali returned to Hudson County in the early 1990s where he was honored by then-Hudson County Executive Robert Janiszewski
“Muhammad Ali swooped down, diagonally, near my cheek. In the photo, it looks like he kissed me, though the champion did not.” – Michele Dupey
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Dupey kept the photograph of the moment, but recalled that it was a struggle to take.
“Even the photograph was a special undertaking, as I was told to position myself in a certain way. Muhammad Ali swooped down, diagonally, near my cheek. In the photo, it looks like he kissed me, though the champion did not. He never touched me! I’m sure that protected him from any illness, since he came in contact with so many people, and took photos with them,” she said.
One legend recalls another
Years later, Dupey married Ray Robinson II, the second son of another great champion boxer, Sugar Ray Robinson. He has his own recollections of Ali.
“When Muhammad Ali (then known as Cassius Clay) first came to New York after his performance in the 1960 Olympics, the first person he came to see was my father, Sugar Ray Robinson. I was 10 years old at the time. That’s where I met him – at my father’s business in Harlem – Ray Robinson Enterprises,” Robinson said. “I was struck that Ali was very big, and yet, very gentle. One thing I know… Muhammad Ali revered my father, and in 1975 was quoted in the book, ‘African-American Sports Greats,’ ‘I believe I am the greatest heavyweight of all time, but Ray Robinson was the greatest fighter of all time.’”
Friends who knew or boxed with him
Ali had a number of admirers, and many previously untold stories about him have surfaced, including his attempt in 1977 to bring the Beatles back together to raise money for charity.
Bruce Dillin of Bayonne, a personal friend of Bayonne-born fighter Chuck Wepner, admired Ali.
“I’ve just always hated the fact that a couple of generations of people only know Ali through video and old films of him in his heyday,” Dillin said. “Worse, they saw him as an almost silent, shaking and infirm former icon. They will never realize what an impact he had on society, race relations, and, of course, boxing. When Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali copped the heavyweight title, it was like that moment in ‘The Wizard of Oz’, when the film turns from black and white to gorgeous color: he took us down a marvelous yellow brick road that transformed the sport of boxing. There truly will never be another like him.”
Wepner, who became the model for Sylvester Stallone’s character Rocky Balboa, inspired the films after meeting Ali in the ring, and later became Ali’s friend. He talked to The Hudson Reporter several times about his experiences.
Known as “The Bayonne Bleeder,” Wepner became a boxing legend when he was granted a title fight against Ali, when most people believed Wepner’s career was over.
While he had already earned a reputation in the ring for not being knocked out in 41 prior professional fights and for his tendency to bleed profusely, the match against Ali gave him a crown that few other fighters could achieve: he went 15 rounds toe to toe with Ali, and managed to knock Ali down.
Now, more than 30 years after that bout, Wepner lives on immortalized in the “Rocky” movies.
Fight promoter Don King had heard about Wepner and set up the championship match.
Ali was apparently looking for an easy bout as a warm up for his next major challenger and agreed.
When asked prior to the fight, Wepner replied, “I’ve been a survivor my whole life, and if I survived the Marines, I can survive Ali.”
The fight went 15 rounds. As in the movie, Ali didn’t initially take Wepner seriously, taunting him, and hoping Wepner would wear down. But halfway through the fight, Ali got angry and began to battle hard. Wepner, who had never been knocked off his feet in any prior fight, would not fall. Then in the 15th round, Ali managed to knock Wepner into the ropes, and though Wepner climbed to his feet by the count of nine, he was ruled the loser by a technical knockout.
“There’s not another human being in the world that can go 15 rounds like that,” the admiring Ali was later quoted as saying.
“He was fighting Muhammad Ali, who was like, you know, the perfect fighter and he [Wepner] knocked him down,” Stallone said on the TV program “Inside the Actor’s Studio.”
“And that validated his entire life. He didn’t expect to win. He knocked him down. You can never take that away from him.”
“Sly [Stallone] called me about two weeks after the Ali fight and told me he was gonna make da’ movie,” Wepner said on his official Web site.
Al Sullivan may be reached at asullivan@hudsonreporter.com.