O n a recent summer afternoon, Jimmy Clark sat on the couch in the family home, deep in Pennsylvania’s corn country. His son, James Jr., sat next to him, James’s sister, Shakia, nearby. Clark is 70 years old now, still tall and slim, his face virtually unmarked. His close-crop stubble is mostly gray, his eyes mischievous. Jimmy had an admirable amateur and professional boxing career but is destined to be remembered for a day he would rather forget. It was March 14, 1980, and it was snowing across the Eastern Seaboard as Clark, already running late, rushed to catch a plane that had already left without him. “I was late like always, but that time it saved my life,” said Clark. Was it luck or just a simple twist of fate? Jimmy smiled and said, “I’m blessed.” Clark, a heavyweight, was supposed to be the 15th member of the U.S. amateur boxing team flying to Europe for a series of exhibitions. President Jimmy Carter had boycotted the Moscow Olympics in response to the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan. The Euro trip was sort of a consolation prize, giving the boxers an opportunity to show off their skills and unleash some of the energy built up while training for the Olympics. Due to the heavy snowstorm, Flight 007 was postponed two hours before taking off from New York’s Kennedy International for the journey to Warsaw- Okecie Airport in Poland. The plane was a Soviet Ilyushin Il-62 jetliner with four rear-mounted engines, piloted by Captain Pawel Lipowczan, who had clocked nearly 9,000 flight hours. There had been no problems during the nine-hour fight until the plane made its final approach. Suddenly it went into a deep dive and crashed into the ice- covered moat of a 19th-century military fortress. The plane was traveling at 240 miles per hour upon impact, and all 87 people aboard were killed. There were unsubstantiated reports that some of the boxers survived the crash and drowned in the moat. After an investigation, it was determined the reason for the crash was
THE SURVIVOR
a faulty turbine shaft. Fourteen young boxers had their lives snuffed out that day, innocent victims of a disaster. Jimmy stared at a piece of paper with a list of the boxers who perished that day and was asked if he recognized any of the names. “Kelvin Anderson, I knew him. Lonnie Young. I’ve heard that name,” said Clark. “These were all wonderful guys. They deserve to be here, like I’m here. These are bad memories. I still don’t like to talk about it much.” Jimmy’s mindset was perfectly understandable, but out of respect for the boxers who died, here are their names, hometowns, and weight divisions in which they boxed: Kelvin Anderson, Hartford, Conn. (heavyweight); Elliott Chavis, U.S. Army, Fort Bragg, N.C. (light heavy); Walter Harris, San Francisco, Calif., (light heavy); Andrea McCoy, New Bedford, Mass., (light middle); Byron Payton, Troup, Texas (light middle); Chuck Robinson, Port Townsend, Wash. (light middle); Paul Palomino, Westminster, Calif. (welter); Lemuel Steeples, St. Louis, Mo. (light welter); Byron Lindsay, San Diego, Calif., (light welter); Gary Tyrone Clayton, Philadelphia, Pa. (light); Jerome Stewart, U.S. Navy, Norfolk, Va. (bantam); George Pimentel, Elmhurst, N.Y. (fly); Lonnie Young, Philadelphia, Pa. (fly); David Rodriguez, Pomona, Calif. (light fly). Clark was not the only boxer who was scheduled to fly to Poland on Flight 007 but stayed at home. Heavyweight Tony Tucker had suffered a shoulder injury; Bobby Czyz broke his nose in a car accident; Marvis Frazier did not go because his father, Joe, “had a nightmare in which his family was engulfed in flame in an air crash. He refused to let Marvis go on that trip,” said Frazier family spokesperson Sharon Hatch. The boxers were not the only representatives of Team USA who lost their lives when Flight 007 plummeted out of the sky. Accompanying the boxers were eight noncombatants. They
were: Joseph F. Bland, team manager; Col. Bernard Callahan, referee/judge; Thomas “Sarge” Johnson, head coach; John Radison, referee/judge; Junior Robles, assistant trainer; Steve Smigiel, interpreter; Ann Delores Gill Wesson; team assistant; and Dr. Ray Wesson, team physician. I asked our little gathering about the sculpture that now stands in memorial to the ill-fated U.S. Team. Clark and his family were astounded to learn about the statue and had no idea it existed until that moment. Actually, there are two identical statues, one at the Warsaw Olympic Center and the other in the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. There is a high triangular plinth with a figure of a boxer struggling to get up on top. The sculptor is A. Thomas Schomberg. “That’s a wonderful thing,” said Clark. Not long after the boycott was announced, Clark received a handwritten letter from President Carter on Oval Office stationery explaining his reason for boycotting the Summer Games. There’s a framed photo of the letter on the mantel, and the injection of politics into the conversation lightened the mood. Jimmy’s shoutouts created a call-and- response that had everybody giggling. “Didn’t Carter have a brother who was an alcoholic?” said Jimmy. “That was Billy Carter. He drank a lot of beer, but people liked him.” “What happened to Billy?” “He’s dead.”
the distance in two. “Stevenson was a good fighter with a strong right hand,” said Clark. “Most of the guys he fought got knocked out. All I had to do was keep my hands up and put my left hand in his face. I moved around, jab, jab, jab.” Less than three months after missing the fatal flight to Poland, Clark ended his amateur career with a points win over Anders Eklund on April 5, 1980. Clark turned pro on January 15, 1981, at the Conrad Hilton Hotel in Chicago, tallying a first-round TKO of fellow debutant Steve Sandborne.
A memorial sculpture titled “Down but not Out ... Lost but not Forgotten.”
said James Jr., an affable dig at his dad’s dietary habits. The ambidextrous conundrum harkens back to a time when southpaws were considered poison due to their unconventional style and difficulty getting fights. When Jimmy began boxing in 1971, there were still trainers saying southpaws should be drowned at birth. Clark is naturally left-handed but was “turned around” by a trainer, a common practice back then that has fallen out of favor these days. Clark was more comfortable talking about his own boxing career than the horror of Flight 007. A resident of Coatesville, Pennsylvania, he moved closer to Philly to train at a hardcore sweatshop that has developed many of the city’s best fighters. “I had a lawyer by the name of David Berker who involved me with Angelo Dundee and started me boxing at the 23rd PAL with Duke Dugent. My first trainer was Bob Brown,” said Clark. “It was like a family down there. I sparred with a lot of those guys such as ‘Cyclone’ Hart and Willie Monroe. Quenzell McCall was there training Bennie Briscoe. Bennie had a hard left jab that could knock your head off. “After a while, I got on the USA National Boxing Team and started to
Jimmy won six more times that year and three more in ’82. Most of the competition was far from daunting. Then came Bermudian Clarence Hill, who had his island swagger and was the first to extend Clark 10 rounds. It was a competitive match with the split decision going to Jimmy. Three fights later, the boxer who missed the plane lost his first pro fight when Reggie Gross stopped him in the ninth round on March 8, 1985. Had the bubble burst? Was Clark just another golden boy turned to pyrite? The truth is we will never know for sure, because Jimmy had three more fights – one in 1986, one in 1987 and a third that was switched to a “no contest” – then he retired. With just one loss in 19 pro fights (16 KOs), you would expect Clark to regroup and continue his career. Maybe switch trainers, a common practice when a prospect suffers his first loss. But Jimmy had an ace in the hole, a career where you’re less likely to get punched in the face. “I had a law degree from West Chester State University,” said Clark, who worked as a paralegal. “I majored in criminal justice, so I had to be in court some of the time. I really like boxing, but my love is the law. “In civil court, you fight for money.
travel, first around the country and then overseas. I boxed in Germany, Kazakhstan, Cuba and Hawaii,” said Clark. Clark’s final amateur record is difficult to pin down, but he was clearly among the best. After all, he won the 1977 U.S. National Golden Gloves heavyweight championship by outpointing future pro titleholders Greg Page and Tony Tubbs on the same day. His finest amateur performance was the TKO victory over Igor Vysotsky at Madison Square Garden on December 14, 1975. The Russian had beaten Cuban superstar Teofilo Stevenson twice, the first time by split decision and the second by TKO. “Vysotsky was better than Stevenson,” said Clark. The Clark family celebrated Jimmy’s triumph by framing the newspaper clippings from the Vysotsky fight, now on display for all to see on the same mantelpiece as the letter from President Carter. A little over a month before Flight 007 plunged into the moat, Clark had the third and final bout in his trilogy with Stevenson. Clark lost all three but went
“He drank too much.” Jimmy was on a roll.
“What was the name of the governor who didn’t like Black people?” said Jimmy. “That was George Wallace, governor of Alabama.” “He drank too much.” Although he boxed out of an orthodox stance, Jimmy started another humorous discussion by claiming to be ambidextrous. “I could use both hands,” said Clark. “He sure can eat with his left hand,”
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