Details

“No matter how big they got, they started out small.”

Long before he was Muhammad Ali, 12-year-old Cassius Clay knew he would be a hero someday, no matter what anyone else had to say. In the nation’s dark time of Jim Crow racism and violence, Cassius— with the support of his family, training from Officer Joe Martin, and his own hard work—fought his way onto the gold-medal stand and into the history books.