Liston was beholdin' to the mob and everybody knew it. Liston relocated to Denver with his wife Geraldine and friend/sparring partner Foneda Cox and underwent extensive counseling with Father Murphy. He became a professional fighter on September 2, 1953, when he knocked out Don Smith in a single round in St. Louis. After having his license revoked, Liston made a smart decision, as he had when he bought out Barone. (Which isn't to say that Liston took advantage of Father Murphy, or that he had a disregard for what Father Murphy had to say. Sonny Liston prefers not to tell the details of marital status & divorce. The rematch in Las Vegas on July 22, 1963, was another first-round knockout. Sonny Liston, hard-luck son of Arkansas sharecroppers, was champion of the world. Clay later changed his name to Muhammad Ali. At the age of 16, Listonmore than 6 feet tall and weighing 200 poundsbecame a menacing presence in his neighborhood, occasionally working as a strike-breaking labor goon. Sonny Liston was featured in a novel "Girl Fighter" with a brief reference to his early life, his rise to WBC heavyweight champion and his eventual losses to Clay/Ali. Geneastars | Facebook. Sonny Liston: His Life, Strife, and the Phantom Punch. That hurt him deeply, though he instinctively hid the scars behind a scowl. Sonny Liston was officially born on May 8th 1932, even if no one knows exactly when he was born, that is the date that he set up for all the official records. The reader can form his own conclusion based on the reports of those involved. Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. Site contains certain content that is owned A&E Television Networks, LLC. Charles Sonny Liston was a noted boxer who briefly reigned as Heavyweight Champion after a first-round knockout against Floyd Patterson. Liston was raised on heavy farm work, many beatings, and with virtually no schooling. He was caught and charged with first-degree robbery and larceny, and was sentenced in 1950 to 5 years in the Missouri State Penitentiary. Liston had a short and successful amateur career, following which he turned pro. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 2000. {{ media.date_translated }}, {{ asCtrl.bannerRights.content|translate }}, The Geneanet family trees are powered by Geneweb 7.0. Owing to his bold physique and strict upbringing, Liston loved training. Liston and Geraldine had no children, but Liston loved kids and enjoyed being in their company. No one knows how Sonny Liston died. WebParents and Siblings Charles L. "Sonny" Liston 19321970 Geraldine Chamber 19252005 Spouse and Children Charles L. "Sonny" Liston Male19321970 Male His mother believed he was born in January, 1928, but Liston would later claim his birth date to be May 8, 1932. In 1950, he was convicted of two counts of larceny and two counts of first-degree robbery and spent more than two years in the Missouri State Penitentiary in Jefferson City. 4 among heavyweights, on Dec. 4, 1961. (LogOut/ He was sired by Lawman out of the Galileo mare Stars In Your Eyes. View agent, publicist, legal and company contact details on IMDbPro. He put himself under the care of still another Catholic priest, Father Edward P. Murphy, a kindly Jesuit who was the pastor of a predominantly black church in Denver. He quickly destroyed all the leading heavyweight contenders--Roy Harris, Zora Folley, Cleveland Williams--to earn a title shot against Floyd Patterson. The rematch, in Lewiston, Maine, on May 25, 1965, was even more controversial. The map below shows the places where the ancestors of the famous person lived. Tosches is admirably objective in his presentation of Liston. Liston won 26 consecutive bouts, moving inexorably toward the heavyweight championship. For a while, he even lost his license to box in the United States. Later, films of the fight showed the bout ended at the 1:25 mark. Nine years of steady fighting later, and following additional scrapes with the law (fourteen arrests between 1953 and 1958 and a conviction in 1956 for assaulting a police officer), Liston finally fought Floyd Patterson for the Heavyweight Championship. aged 38years old. His final record as a professional was fifty wins, thirty-nine by knockout, and four losses. He became a professional fighter in 1953. When Liston became the top challenger to champion Floyd Patterson by 1960, it was a It was there in Sand Slough that Charles L. Liston was born, on the 50 acres that Tobe rented from the Man.". In the same interval, he had gotten married (in 1957 to Geraldine Clark), moved from St. Louis to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1958, and been questioned by a congressional committee about the takeover of his management by mob elements in 1960. Charles "Sonny" Liston was born into a sharecropping family who farmed the poor land of Morledge Plantation near Johnson Township, St. Francis County, Arkansas. The official cause of death was lung congestion and heart failure, although Liston had fresh needle marks on his arm and police discovered heroin and a syringe in the house. Again rumors were rife that the match was fixed by the criminal underworld. His trademark shirt during his illegal raids was yellow. The subsequent rematch with Clay on May 25, 1965, included the infamous phantom punch. Though it appeared that Liston had barely been grazed by Clays right fist, the boxer went down just one minute and 45 seconds into the first round. His alcoholic and violent father was thirty years older than Sonnys mother. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ). His ring style was the essence of simplicity; he displayed little finesse but much raw power, especially in his left hand. Charles L. Sonny Liston was born in St. Francis County, Arkansas, to Tobe Liston and Helen Baskin. His father was 30 years older than his mother. Official Sites. Liston's formative years were spent growing up as a physically and mentally abused child living in a forsaken patch of land known as Sand Slough, Ark. The CALS Foundation is a 501(c)(3) organization. At the age of 14, he was almost 6 feet tall. Assael, Shaun. William Friedkin was intended to direct his biopic "Night Train" with Ving Rhames as Sonny Liston. Because of his arrest and prison term, Liston didn't have a fight between March of 1956, when he decisioned Marty Marshall in Pittsburgh, to January of 1958, when he knocked out Bill Hunter in two rounds in Chicago. The continual conflicts with the police. Sonny Liston turned professional in September 1953. Change). Liston, who posted a career record of 50 wins and 4 losses with 39 knockouts, reveled in this role of the fighter America loved to hate. He won in the first round against Don Smith. The first time you log in to our catalog you will need to create an account. WebHalf-siblings. Clay was no debtor to the mob. With Cus DAmato as his coach, Liston reigned as champion for seventeen months. In 1996 when Mike Tyson KO'd Bruce Seldon in one round for the WBA Heavyweight Championship, Tyson had won the WBC Heavyweight Championship six months earlier and was seeking to unify the title. Along with his many siblings, Liston grew up He was one of many He started boxing in prison and was likely over 30 then. Owing to his many siblings and a brutal, hardscrabble Arkansas childhood with an abusive father (excruciatingly detailed in the movie and book), Liston had an affinity for needy children. Liston started boxing at the age of 14 because there were no sports available in Florida at the time. Liston continued fighting following the loss of his title, mainly because it was the only legal way he knew how to make a buck. (LogOut/ After winning most of his matches by knockout, he turned pro in 1951. Liston's purpose was to show the Pennylvania State Athletic Commission, and the world, that he was turning a new leaf. Hungry fighters eager to break free from the shackles of their own environment bring an element of savage desperation into their ring encounters. The cover was one of the most famous images of the early 1960s, as Liston embodied the fears of White America during the days when Southern police officials had attacked the burgeoning civil rights movement with violence, a violence white Americans feared might be returned onto them. The official date of Charles L. Liston is given as May 8, 1932. | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Contact Us. His father physically molested him. His mother separated from his father and went to St. Louis in Missouri. Tobe was mean to his children, and especially to Sonny. His alcoholic and violent father was thirty years older than Sonnys The place had a name, but it was not to be found on any map. After a little while, Liston followed his mother and was reunited with his other siblings. Nevertheless, he had a soft spot for children. Liston was the second last in a family of twenty-five siblings. He was one of many children one account lists 22 siblings and half-siblings. He had his first competitive match in prison. Boxer Charles L. "Sonny" Liston was born in St. Francis County, Arkansas on May 8, 1932. Basically, for a guy like Liston, it meant that you either dealt with them, or you didn't deal at all. His death certificate states his death as December 30, 1970, based on milk deliveries at his doorstep. Liston's career was interrupted for nine months beginning in December 1956, when he was sent to the St. Louis workhouse for assaulting a policeman and stealing the officer's gun. By all accounts, Liston had a woeful childhood. She was working in a shoe factory when her son Charles unexpectedly came to the city and looked her up. He was arrested twice in a period of months in Philadelphia in the summer of 1961. When a tribute gift is given the honoree will receive a letter acknowledging your generosity and a bookplate will be placed in a book. He cleared out his opponents to become the topmost contender. Some believed that the fight was fixed as reported in later biographical works like The Devil and Sonny Liston (2000) by Nick Tosches. Liston had a rough and violent childhood. Deceased persons are not concerned by this provision. He only served six. Sonny Liston was introduced to boxing while serving time in a Missouri State Penitentiary. From the time he was old enough to be useful in the fields, Sonny was a laborer for his tenant farmer father. Donations made to the CALS Foundation are tax-deductible for United States federal income tax purposes. The son of tenant farmer Tobey Liston and his second wife, Helen, Liston was the 24th of his fathers 25 children. He served brief prison terms and on one occasion was introduced to boxing by a prison chaplain. His final record as a professional was 50 wins, 39 by knockout, and four losses. Early Life. There, he committed various muggings and robberies. On this date in 1964, a heavily favored Liston lost his title to upstart Cassius Clay, soon to be Muhammad Ali. Additional support provided by the Arkansas General Assembly. Made a comeback in 1968-1969 and won 14 straight before losing to Leotis Martin. His epitaph reads: "A Man.". In prison, encouraged by Catholic chaplains, Liston took up boxing, where he was an immediate and spectacular success. Charles "Sonny" Liston's life and death began and ended in the same manner: as a mystery. Perhaps no keener insight can be gained from those early years, though, than from what Sonny himself was quoted as saying: "The only thing my old man ever gave me was a whipping.". Please try again. Honor or memorial gifts are an everlasting way to pay tribute to someone who has touched your life. Change), You are commenting using your Twitter account. Jack Dempsey and Roberto Duran are two cases in point. He compiled a career record of Liston was arrested more than 20 times. However, his career was marred by criminal activity and, later, accusations of mob connections and throwing fights. The title fight was in Chicago, Illinois, on September 25, 1962, with a wide public pulling for the champ (including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and authors James Baldwin and Norman Mailer). Survived by his wife Geraldine and a step-daughter. There were also times when he showed surprising compassion for the less fortunate. He won 11 consecutive fights by knockout in 1968 and added three more wins in 1969 before losing a brutal bout to Leotis Martin. Nine years of steady fighting later, and following additional scrapes with the law, Liston fought Floyd Patterson for the Heavyweight Championship. Creating an account gives you access to all these features. WebTogether with his 24 siblings and half siblings, Sonny grew up in the local cotton fields. Sonny Liston was born on May 8, probably 1932, to Tobe and Helen (Baskin) Liston, African-American sharecroppers in rural St. Francis County. General Melvin Krulewitch, chairman of the New York Boxing Commission in the 1950s, refused to issue Liston a license to fight in New York because he was guilty of associating with "questionable" characters. Pre-European Exploration, Prehistory through 1540, European Exploration and Settlement, 1541 through 1802, Louisiana Purchase through Early Statehood, 1803 through 1860, Civil War through Reconstruction, 1861 through 1874, Post-Reconstruction through the Gilded Age, 1875 through 1900, Early Twentieth Century, 1901 through 1940, World War II through the Faubus Era, 1941 through 1967, Divergent Prosperity and the Arc of Reform, 19682022, World War II through the Faubus Era (1941 - 1967). Served time in prison for robbery and later for assaulting a police officer. They called it Sand Slough. Sonny Liston was born on May 8, probably 1932, to Tobe and Helen (Baskin) Liston, African-American sharecroppersin rural St. Francis County. (LogOut/ Inducted into the World Boxing Hall of Fame, 1990. Check back often as we will continue to update this page with new relationship details. Sonny, who was known by his proper name Charles while growing up, rarely attended school and never learned to read or write, a fact that haunted him as an adult and fed a lifelong problem with insecurity. He is from AR. Liston was raised on heavy farm work, many beatings and with virtually no schooling. Encyclopedia of Arkansas He managed to turn his cruel past to his advantage. 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Those dark forces were also at work when Liston willingly placed himself in the hands of the mob that ran the fight game during the time of Liston's ascendancy to the crown. Major funding provided by the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation. It has been rumored that the crime boss John Vitale arranged for his early release. Known for his powerful punch, the majority of his victories were knockouts. He was one of many childrenone account lists twenty-two siblings and half-siblings. His heavyweight title-winning victory on September 25, 1962, was indicative of his powerful style: After a mere two minutes, he knocked out Floyd Patterson, which marked the first time in history that a reigning heavyweight champion was counted out in the first round. in rural St. Francis County. He went on to win several amateur matches. In a short amount of time, those felonious deeds cost Sonny Liston his freedom. Former World Heavyweight Champion who learned to fight while in jail. In Michael Mann's Ali, Liston was portrayed by famous boxer Michael Bentt, with whom he shares a strong resemblance. In September of 1953, he knocked out Don "Toro" Smith in two rounds in St. Louis, setting in motion a career which would span 17 years and bring Sonny to the pinnacle of success in his sport. New York: Skyhorse, 2011. Copyright 2020 ARKANSAS SOUL MEDIA, All rights Reserved. Thus, cloaking the heavyweight champion of the world--the epitome of masculinity and male supremacy--in a Santa Claus hat was the height of irony at the time.