On February 25, 1964 brash and young Cassius Clay of Louisville,
Kentucky challenged World Heavyweight Champion Sonny Liston for his
title in a scheduled 15 round event in Miami Beach. Clay came into
the fight a heavy underdog despite winning a gold medal in the 1960
Olympics and posting victories over Henry Cooper, Doug Jones and
Archie Moore. Liston was seen as a menacing, powerful figure and was
coming off consecutive one round knockout victories over prior
champion Floyd Patterson. Clay seemed unnerved at the weigh-in
further reinforcing the theory that Liston would destroy him. Once
the fight began, however, Clay exposed Liston as a slow, plodding and
aging star and peppered him with his signature left jabs and straight
right hands. Liston retired after the sixth round claiming he had
injured his shoulder, but by this time he was a beaten fighter. The
world had a new champion and his name was Cassius Clay, although he
would immediately change that following the fight to his new name,
Muhammad Ali, a name that will live on not only in boxing history,
but as part of our culture as well.
Presented here is a very scarce on site poster to this event. The
poster is cardboard and pictures both fighters. The poster has been
restored to repair the small tack holes that held it in place. There
is no restoration to the images and only a small amount at the tack
holes. The poster has bold color, no creasing and is complete. 14” x
22.” Very few of these posters survived and this is a fine example.