Sugar Ray Robinson

Born Walker Smith Jr. on May 3, 1921, Robinson was the son of Leila (Hurst) and Walker Smith Sr. The Smiths had moved from Dublin, Georgia, to Detroit, Michigan, along with their two daughters, Marie and Evelyn, just weeks before Robinson's birth. In Detroit, Robinson's father worked as a ditch-digger and moonlighted laying sewers. Leila Smith, who found work as a chambermaid at Detroit's Sheraton Hotel, later supported her family by working as a seamstress. Robinson attended Balch Elementary School where during his early years he was known by all as Junior.

When his parents separated in 1927, Robinson's mother took him and his sisters to stay with their grandmother in Greenwood, Georgia, then returned to Michigan to handle the divorce. She returned after one year and brought the children back to Detroit where the four of them lived on Palmer Street, pending finalization of the divorce. In Detroit, Robinson spent his free time at the Brewster Recreation Center, where he met and idolized the young Joe Louis, still an unknown at that time.

With the divorce papers finalized, in November of 1932 Robinson's mother brought her children to live with her in New York City. There the family rented an apartment near Times Square, at 419 W. 53rd Street. The neighborhood, an ethnic ghetto, was known during the Great Depression as Hell's Kitchen. To stay busy after school Robinson and his sisters went to the Ray Scott Studio for tap dancing lessons. After a year the family moved to Harlem, where Robinson attended Cooper Junior High School; he earned spending money by working at a fruit stand.