Joe E. Martin
Joe Elsby Martin, Sr., (February 1, 1916 - September 14, 1996) was an American boxing coach who trained two world heavyweight champions, Muhammad Ali and Jimmy Ellis, as well as several national Golden Gloves champions.
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Early life
Joe Martin was born February 1, 1916, in Colorado. He was orphaned before he reached a year old and was raised by an aunt in Phoenix, Arizona. He married Christine Fentress on March 4, 1941, and had one child, Joe Jr., who himself became a national Golden Gloves champion.
Boxing coach and police officer
He came to Louisville, Kentucky, in 1937 and joined the Louisville Police Department, serving until his retirement in 1974. In 1938 he became a boxing coach at the Columbia Gym in Louisville (now the student center of Spalding University),[1] where, in 1954, he began coaching three-time world heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali, who was then known as Cassius Clay. During this time, he also trained Jimmy Ellis as well as eleven National Golden Gloves champions.
Martin was an early leader in Louisville's civil rights movement. At the time the future Muhammad Ali began training there, Columbia Gym was racially integrated, unlike other Louisville boxing gyms of that period.[1]
Muhammad Ali's first coach
In 1954, a twelve-year-old then known as Cassius Clay approached Martin to report that his bicycle had been stolen and told Martin that he wanted to "whup" the thief. Martin offered to teach him how to box and guided his career for the next six years. As a 1960 Olympic coach, Martin accompanied the champion to the Olympic Games in Rome, Italy, when Ali won a gold medal. In the 1950s Martin helped produce a weekly television show on WAVE-TV called Tomorrow's Champions, which was broadcast for twelve years. After winning the gold medal, Ali began his professional career but maintained contact with Martin until his death. In 1977, Martin was inducted into the Amateur Boxing Hall of Fame.
Retirement and death
After retirement, Martin started a business as an auctioneer and twice ran unsuccessfully for Sheriff of Jefferson County, Kentucky. He fell ill in the late summer of 1996 and died in Louisville on September 14. He was buried in Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Leitchfield, Kentucky.
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