What happened to Cleveland Williams after his loss to Muhammed Ali?

They say "he worked as a truck driver, lifting and hauling pipes from the Port of Houston to destinations around Texas.".

 

I kinda admire the descriptions given out about his getting shot -

"I've never seen a man with such a constitution," Dr. D.L. Bricker said after the surgery. "He lost enough blood to kill a half-dozen men."

"Doctors told me they had never seen such muscles on a human being," said Hugh Benbow. "Anyone else, they said, would have been killed by the shot."

"It is a miracle that he is not in braces," his surgeon, Dr. Don Quast, said two years later.

Fair to say he was one tough mofo.

 

The last work I've heard of him doing of any kind involved with boxing was as a sparring partner for Joe Bugner before the Ali fight in 1973. James Tuite of the New York Times remarked that he "could not dispel the feeling that Big Cat could have made goulash of the Hungarian refugee if he so wanted." Admittedly, probably a bit of an exaggeration.

 

I just found this


“Williams retired, couldn't keep up the payments on his house and forfeited it, saw his marriage fail and took a job on a building site. The need for money also forced him to return to boxing until 1972, when he was 39 years old. The last of his 92 fights was one of his 78 wins, over a journeyman named Roberto Davila in Denver.

In his sixties his kidneys failed and he needed regular dialysis. However, the end was premature, the last tragic moment when he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. As he was crossing the road after a visit to hospital, he was knocked over by a car and died from his injuries. -Bob Mee”

 

The January 1980 issue of Ring, with Howard Cosell on the cover, had an article called "Tracking the Big Cat" about Williams' life at that time. I no longer own that issue, but it might be worth tracking down for those who are interested.

 

Cleveland Big Cat Williams received a title shot too late. He was on the verge of meeting Ernie Terrell for the vacant WBA title on March 5 1965, but as fate had it, he was shot by a Texas State Trooper on Nov 30 1964. imagine what that third meeting with Terrell would have looked like what. Imagine fighting Muhammad Ali in 1963 before Ali beat Liston? Williams did not have any business fighting Ali in 1966, but his greedy manager wanted the large purse, so Cleve went out there, and got embarrassed into being Ali's best performance.

 

How would one go about tracking old ring magazine issues?

 

I would take a look at E bay.

 

Agreed. eBay has been my source for the last several years. People will sell them in lots or individually.

 

Held back in his prime by politics/prejudice, then shot, demolished by Ali, foreclosed, divorced, then working construction after what should have been retirement, kidney failure at a young age and you top it off getting hit by a car.

I can't imagine what he did in a past life to deserve that.

 

He did attack a woman with a meat Cleaver.

 

Well there you go, that must have done it!