Emanuel Steward, the famous boxing trainer and owner of the Kronk Gym died at a Chicago hospital Thursday. He was 68 years old. He had been undergoing surgery for diverticulitis.
Steward was also a commentator for HBO Boxing. Throughout his career, he trained as many as 41 world champion fighters like Lennox Lewis, Thomas Hearns, Oscar De La Hoya, Tony Tucker and Wladimir Klitschko.
Klitschko said about Steward: "It is not often that a person in any line of work gets a chance to work with a legend, well I was privileged enough to work with one for almost a decade. I will miss our time together. The long talks about boxing, the world, and life itself. Most of all I will miss our friendship."
Steward took to boxing at a very early age, when he received a pair of boxing gloves as a Christmas gift when he was 8. He moved to Detroit as a teenager and began training as an amateur boxer. He won the Golden Gloves tournament at the age of 18.
In 1971 he started working as head coach at the Kronk Recreation Center. Hilmer Kenty was the Kronk's first boxing champion. It was Harns however, who made Kronk popular winning titles in four divisions.
Hearns once said of Steward: "He brought the very, very best out of me."
Steward has trained several great boxers in the past 40 years out of Kronk. "Lennox used to say when fighting as an amateur that everyone was afraid of the Kronk guys. He saw the respect when they saw the colors," he had said.
Detroit mayor Dave Bing expressed his grief over Steward's death. "With the loss of Emanuel Steward, we have lost a true Detroit icon. Emanuel Steward embodied our city's toughness, our competitive spirit, and our determination to always answer the bell. We are grateful for Emanuel Steward's many contributions to our city and his impact on generations of young people."
Steward was an inductee of the International Boxing Hall Of Fame and the World Boxing Hall of Fame. He was also known for his charity work in the Motor City helping endangered youths to attain an education.
De La Hoya, the retired American professional boxer said: "It brings me great grief and sadness to hear of the passing of one of the best and most respected trainers of this era. I learned a lot from him during our professional relationship and I will be forever grateful for his help during that time. We were also friends and I know I am going to miss him as so many others will, too. He was an important part of our boxing community."
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