Jersey Joe Walcott

Ezzard Charles won the National Boxing Association heavyweight crown in a fifteen-round decision over Jersey Joe Walcott on June 22, 1949. But two years later, on July 18, 1951, Walcott turned the tables on Charles, knocking him out to take the heavyweight title for himself. The following year, Charles failed in an attempt to recapture the title from Walcott, who lost it barely three months later to Rocky Marciano.

He was born Ezzard Mack Charles on July 7, 1921, in Lawrenceville, Georgia. After a brilliant amateur boxing career, Charles turned pro in 1940 and went on to win twenty consecutive fights in the first eighteen months of the decade. He temporarily left boxing in 1943 to enlist in the U.S. Army. Charles eventually moved up in weight class and became the heavyweight champion from 1949 until 1951. His attempts to recapture the title, first from Walcott and later from Marciano, all ended in failure.

Charles retired from boxing in the late 1950s. In 1966 he was stricken with Lou Gehrig's disease that before long confined him to a wheelchair. Charles died on May 28, 1975.