Produced by Bunnie Lee, this is one of many records to feature boxers, or a boxing theme, often in the form of a tribute like the Terry Nelson recording on Halagala from 1966 (see below) . Around the time of a particular fight many records would be issued favoring one or other of the contestants. It's hard to know whether the 'Classius' in the title is a pun or just another spelling mistake.

 Cassius Clay fought Sonny Liston in 1964 for the heavyweight title and forced Liston to retire after the sixth round. After the fight Clay announced that he accepted the teachings of Islam and changed his name to Muhammad Ali. It is interesting to note in changing his name Ali was thinking of something more fitting if he was to become a representative for his people; that, Cassius Marcellus Clay (1810-1903) was an emancipationist who lived in the slave-holding South.

 Controversial from the beginning, he became very vocal in speeches for the emancipation of slaves, Clay was an emancipationist, not an abolitionist. Emancipationists sought to eliminate slavery by gradual, legal means, while abolitionists wanted slavery to end by any means possible. After delivering a speech against slavery, Cyrus Turner, the son of a pro-slavery candidate, called him a liar and struck him. Clay drew his knife but was surrounded by a crowd, who disarmed him and began clubbing him. Clay was stabbed in the lung, and his breastbone was severed. Wounded deeply, Clay grasped his knife and wrested it away from an attacker, cutting his own fingers to the bone, he then found Turner in the crowd and stabbed him. Another Turner tried to shoot Clay in the head, but the gun misfired, Clay's14-year-old son, handed him a pistol, but by then Cassius was beginning to lose consciousness from loss of blood.

CASSIUS CLAY (THE GREATEST) * TERRY NELSON * HALAGALA 8 * UK

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