On this day, Feb 11 1962, Ali vs Banks

Banks was killed by Leotis Martin!
Yes Liston was old!
But guy killed Banks and knocked Liston with monster overhand!
Banks was nice fighter but...

 

They say that someone had put concrete to patch up the ring and Banks was dropped by Martin and hit his head on it. Banks seemed to be ok at the moment but died a few days later.

 

Interesting. I never read this. You happen to have a source?

 

This page references some local news accounts that mention the condition of the ring.

https://ringsideboxingshow.com/SheltonBLOGsonnybanks.html

 

Great find. Never read about this, only speculation.

 

Neither have I. Thanks for showing me. I did find an account of his final days fighting for his life a while back. Will try to find it for you guys.

 

https://broganrogantrevinoandhogan.wordpress.com/2012/10/08/the-tale-of-lucien-banks/

 

I would guess that the ring surface in the 1960s was canvas, over either boards or plywood. According to the story, "concrete" was used to fix the ring surface? Using concrete doesn't seem likely, but it would be interesting to hear from some people who might have been around in the 1960s to find out if the story could be true. There were probably some epoxies in the 1960s that could have been used to fix canvas, those combined with sewing would make more sense than using "concrete."

I've put up rings and have talked to a lot of people who were around boxing in the 50s-60s and have never heard of concrete being used to repair a ring. I can't think of any advantage to using concrete, it would take a long time to set up, it probably wouldn't bond with canvas and would easily come apart? Maybe canvas was expensive in the 60s, but sewing and some type of epoxy would fix a tear better than concrete.