Boxing legend Steward dies

Associated Press

Detroit

Emanuel Steward, the owner of the legendary Kronk Gym and a standout trainer for boxers including Thomas Hearns, Evander Holyfield and Oscar De La Hoya, died Thursday. He was 68.

Victoria Kirton, Steward’s executive assistant, said Steward died Thursday at a Chicago hospital. She did not disclose the cause of death.

Steward trained, helped train or managed some of the greatest fighters of the past 40 years out of the Kronk, a dingy, overheated basement gym that produced world champions like Hearns, Sugar Ray Leonard and Lennox Lewis.

Steward was born in West Virginia and moved at the age of 12 to Detroit. In 1963, an 18-year old Steward, fighting as a bantamweight, won the national Golden Gloves tournament. It was Hearns who really put Kronk — and Steward — on the map. The Hitman was the first man to win titles in four divisions — he won five overall — and topped his 155-8 amateur record by going 61-5-1 with 48 knockouts as a pro.

“He brought the very, very best out of me,” Hearns once said of Steward.

The gym for years was seen as a way to keep kids out of trouble and off the streets in southwestern Detroit. In 2006, Detroit shut down the recreation center that houses the gym because of a major budget shortfall.