Archie Moore

Light Heavyweight Boxer

• Born: December 13, 1913 (or 1916)
• Birthplace: Benoit, Mississippi
• Died: December 9, 1998
• Place of death: San Diego, California

Boxer, actor, and activist

During a career that spanned four decades, Moore became one of the most prolific and successful boxers in the history of the sport. His success in the ring and subsequent work as a coach, actor, and activist established Moore as one of the most recognized and respected African American athletes of the twentieth century.

Areas of achievement: Civil rights; Film: acting; Social issues; Sports: boxing

Early Life

Archibald Lee Moore was born in the Mississippi Delta town of Benoit. His parents, Lorena and Thomas Wright, separated soon after he was born, and Moore and his sister were sent to live with an aunt, Willie Pearl Moore, in St. Louis, Missouri. Archie took the surname of his aunt and her husband, Cleveland Moore, and spent his boyhood in St. Louis. Following the death of his uncle and sister, the teenaged Archie Moore began to struggle academically and was arrested repeatedly for stealing, leading to a stint in a reformatory that Moore later cited as a turning point in his life. While at the reformatory, Moore began training as a boxer, showing early promise with several knockout victories in the facility’s intramural boxing program.

Moore began an amateur boxing career as a middleweight in 1935 but soon began clandestinely accepting money for matches. Recognizing boxing as one of the few potentially lucrative careers open to African American men, he soon began a legitimate professional career. The exact time and place of his formal professional debut has been the source of much debate. According to Moore, his first professional match, a second-round knockout of a fighter known as “Piano Mover” Jones, took place sometime in the autumn of 1935.

Life’s Work

Moore spent the early years of his professional career in obscurity. Fighting as a middleweight, he scored a number of victories—most of them knockouts—during the late 1930’s and early 1940’s, suffering only occasional losses. In the late 1930’s, he moved to San Diego, California, where he would spend the reminder of his life. There, Moore began fighting more prestigious opponents and receiving larger purses for his frequent victories. He soon became known as a superb defensive boxer, earning the nickname “The Old Mongoose” for his skill in evading the punches of his opponents. Stints in Australia and Argentina brought international recognition and larger purses but failed to gain him recognition as a title contender. In 1943, after winning the California middleweight title, Moore graduated to the light heavyweight class, where he would compete for the remainder of his career.

Despite recording numerous victories over formidable opponents, Moore was not granted the opportunity to fight for the world light heavyweight title until 1952, when—at age thirty-nine—he defeated then-champion Joey Maxim. Moore successfully defended this title through the 1950’s, defeating several younger fighters. He contended for the world heavyweight title several times during this period, most notably against Rocky Marciano in 1955 and Floyd Patterson in 1956, but failed to defeat any of his heavyweight opponents. Nevertheless, Moore’s fame and reputation continued to grow during the 1950’s, and he became one of the most recognized African American athletes of the decade.

Part of Moore’s growing reputation stemmed from his rigorous training regimen and unorthodox diet, which entailed thoroughly chewing portions of meat to extract the juices and then spitting them out before swallowing. Moore invested some of his formidable earnings from this period into the construction of his own training camp near San Diego. Dubbed the Salt Mine, this camp hosted a number of promising young African American boxers, including Olympian Cassius Clay (later Muhammad Ali), and earned Moore an additional reputation as a trainer.

As his boxing career waned, Moore devoted increasing amounts of time to other pursuits, such as training other boxers and acting. Moore defended his light heavyweight title only sporadically during the early 1960’s, prompting boxing authorities to strip him of the title for inactivity in 1962. That year, Moore, at age forty-nine, was able to secure one last fight for the heavyweight title against former protégé Ali, but lost to the much-younger fighter in four rounds. After one last fight, a third-round knockout victory in 1963, Moore announced his retirement from boxing in 1964. His official record of 184 wins (130 by knockout), 24 losses, 10 draws, and 1 no-contest stood as one of the most formidable in the history of the sport.

After his retirement, Moore became increasingly active in the Civil Rights movement as a speaker and philanthropist. In the nonviolent tradition of Martin Luther King, Jr., the former pugilist often publicly played the role of peacemaker, denouncing urban rioting and more militant strains of activism. In 1967, Moore founded the Any Boy Can (ABC) program, designed to deter inner-city youths from delinquent behavior through athletics and character education. The name of the program later was changed to Any Body Can, and it remained active in the San Diego area into the 1980’s.

Moore continued to train other fighters into the 1970’s. In 1974, he trained George Foreman for his “Rumble in the Jungle” fight with Ali in Zaire. Moore also served as assistant coach of the Nigerian boxing team at the 1976 Olympic Games. Meanwhile, the boxing community continued to recognize Moore for his achievements. He was inducted into the U.S. Boxing Hall of Fame in 1966, the St. Louis Boxing Hall of Fame in 1985, and the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1990. In 1987, he received the Rocky Marciano Award for lifetime achievement. Moore’s health declined throughout the 1980’s and 1990’s, and he died of heart failure in a San Diego hospice facility on December 9, 1998.

Significance

During a lengthy career that included bouts against such great African American boxers as Ezzard Charles, Floyd Patterson, and Muhammad Ali, Moore joined these men as one of the most widely recognized black athletes of the twentieth century. He was one of the first African American sports figures to gain fame as both an athlete and an actor capable of playing serious roles. Although not as active or outspoken as many of his contemporaries in the Civil Rights movement, Moore proved willing and able to utilize his position as an elder statesman respected by both African Americans and whites as a means of drawing attention to the movement and advancing its goals. His efforts to improve the prospects of inner-city youths achieved a measure of success, earning him the recognition of President Ronald Reagan in the early 1980’s and providing a blueprint for similar programs. In activism as well as athletics, Moore led by example, and at the outset of the twenty-first century he still was widely recognized for his contributions to boxing and the African American community.

Bibliography

Douroux, Marilyn G. Archie Moore, the Ole Mongoose: The Authorized Biography of Archie Moore. Wellesley, Mass.: Branden Books, 1991. This biography focuses upon Moore’s personal life, including detailed discussions of his acting career and involvement with the ABC program.

Fitzgerald, Mike. The Ageless Warrior: The Life of Boxing Legend Archie Moore. Champaign, Ill.: Sports Publishing, 2004. This balanced biography of Moore includes detailed discussion of his boxing career and life as a trainer, actor, and activist.

Kindred, Dave. “A Celebration of Life.” The Sporting News (December 21, 1998): 62. This obituary provides a synopsis of Moore’s career and places his life and work in a social and cultural context.

Moore, Archie, and Leonard B. Pearl. Any Boy Can: The Archie Moore Story. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1971. Autobiographical work published to promote Moore’s ABC program for at-risk youth.

Remnick, David. King of the World: Muhammad Ali and the Rise of an American Hero. New York: Vintage Books, 1999. This biography of Ali contains accounts of his training sessions and bout with Moore as well as discussion of Moore’s influence on Ali.