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Tarun Anbarasu  

Dr. Clark

ENGW-1111  

12 March 2023  

George Foreman: Fighter and Entrepreneur  

George Foreman taking a hit from Jimmy Young during their 1977 fight in Puerto Rico, a fight that would
change the trajectory of Foreman’s career forever.

Ding! Ding! Ding! The final bell sounded as an utterly exhausted George Foreman

collapsed to the ground of his locker room. The year is 1977, and amidst a backdrop of Vietnam

protests and the infamous “War on Drugs”, George Foreman decided to try his hand at the
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Heavyweight Championship title by fighting Jimmy Young in the humid atmosphere of Puerto

Rico (Kincade). Nearly 20 years later, George Foreman went on to win the Heavyweight

Championship again, upsetting Michael Moorer. But for the next few decades, Foreman would

build his multi-million-dollar business empire in food supplies, adhering to the unspoken rules

for African American athletes in exploring entrepreneurial ventures out of a historical necessity

due to a lack of solid job security even if they are champions. 

Born in the year 1949, in Marshall, Texas, Foreman grew up in poverty as one of seven

children, Foreman dropped out of high school in the 9th grade, turning to a life of petty crime ad

spending time in a juvenile detention center (Biography.com). Foreman’s life up to this point led

everyone to believe he’d be just one of many other hopeless youths out in the rough, crime-

infested streets of the Fifth Ward neighborhood of Houston. However, Foreman’s life took a

sudden up turn after he was introduced to boxing while working at the Job Corps in California,

where his counselor (ex-boxer Doc Broadus) recognized his talent for the sport and encouraged

him to take it seriously. Soon after this Foreman joined the local gym and made a name for

himself after a successful amateur league run with 22 wins and four losses. His hard work

culminated in him winning gold at the heavyweight division during the 1968 Mexico Summer

Olympics. Foreman eventually left the sport of boxing after a close brush with death during a

fight against Jimmy Young in Mexico, spending the next few years building a business empire

that still stands to this day and focusing on his newfound commitment to his faith. Eventually, he

found he was called to the ring again in order to raise money for a new youth center he wanted to

fund. Foreman’s legacy as both an athlete and entrepreneur culminate in his desire to both escape

poverty as a black man in America and support those around him to do the same. 
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Black entrepreneurship in America has a long and conflicted history. Especially in the

south, Black-owned businesses faced outright horrid acts of racial violence since the conclusion

of the Civil War up till the removal of the Jim Crowe laws (Farnand). A new project known as

Monroe Work Today completed a study by compiling data on all the recorded lynchings that took

place between 1877 and 1950, with the statistics revealing that there were at least 4,000 lynching

victims, and an additional 600 victims of racial mobs in that time (Bliss). This paints a terrifying

image of the environment that many black business owners had to operate in and the world into

which George Foreman was born. A prime example as to the discrimination of black athletes was

the story of Jackie Robinson, the first black athlete allowed to play in the MLB instead of the

designated “Negro League”. Robinson received thousands of death threats via letters, with many

even claiming they would beat his wife and abduct his son (Farnand). Being an athlete in an

environment where the life of your loved ones and yourself were at risk caused this subconscious

need for many black athletes to create multiple revenue streams in order to break the cycle of

poverty and leave a legacy so that their kids could enjoy a more fruitful life.

This context of racial inequality in almost every aspect of American life existed from the

time George Foreman was a child. Despite winning the Championship title, Foreman’s wealth

would never be secure as an African American athlete. After his initial retirement, Foreman took

his nearly $5 million in earnings and made a series of bad investments in oil, gas wells, and

banks that nearly left him almost completely bankrupt and teetering on the edge of homelessness

(Katzowitz). Foreman combined both his determination as a boxer and savvy as a businessman

to sell himself to big corporation in the hopes of getting a series of fights that could land himself

another title and get the wealth once took for granted. This began a series of meetings with fight

promoters and large corporations, with Foreman pitching the idea that he, now a middle-aged
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boxing retiree who had made a series of bad investments, could make them money. Foreman

demonstrated his business skills extremely well, to the point executives on New York City’s

infamous Madison Avenue, the “Mecca” for modern day advertising agencies, wanted him to

sell their products. In an interview with Forbes Magazine, Foreman states “They’re calling me

day and night. I was selling myself so successfully that they said, ‘Let him sell our stuff,’

Foreman said, adding: ‘These people came to me and said they wanted to go in on a joint venture

with me for the grill. I didn’t have any idea it would sell. Next thing you know, I had sold 500.

Then 5,000. Then we sold 5 million of those things. If I told you that I could see that coming, I’d

be lying’” (Katzowitz). Foreman’s ability as a salesmen resulted in him landing the biggest

business opportunity of his career, in the form of his own line of grills which would come to

dominate the food supply industry in the coming decades.

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Foreman’s entire comeback was a culmination of his identity as both an entrepreneur and

a boxer. The ability to convince others of his potential combined the intricate tactics that sales

and marketing professionals have used for centuries in tandem with pure athletic ability in order

to facilitate his return into the spotlight. Having been in the midst of a climate of notorious unrest

in the United States during the tumultuous 1970s – 2000s as society began to peel back the layers

of antiquated thinking and strive for true progress, Foreman made his mark as a prime example

of black entrepreneurship, demonstrating that even from the depths of poverty, even an

individual prone to the biases of past racial transgressions can overcome all odds (twice) and

make their mark on major industries. In the modern era one can see more and more black

athletes creating brands for themselves as a supplementary form of income, a gleaming legacy of

the black athletes of the past who used to do it out of necessity. Icons such as Michael Jordan and

Lebron James revolutionize the sneaker game, while trailblazers such as Serena Williams cement

themselves in marketing campaigns for a plethora of different products. The original need for

entrepreneurship has made way for countless examples for black excellence in the athletic

sphere, and continues to act in a way that allows African American athletes to generate a

secondary source of income that will act as a layer of financial security for these individuals and

their children for generations to come.

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Works Cited

Biography.com Editors. “George Foreman.” Biography.com, A&E Networks Television,

https://www.biography.com/athletes/george-foreman.

Bliss, Laura. “This Map of U.S. Lynchings Spans 1835 to 1964.” Bloomberg.com, Bloomberg,

17 Jan. 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-17/this-map-of-u-s-

lynchings-spans-1835-to-1964.

Farnand, Sarah. “Racism Is All Too Prevalent in Professional Sports.” The McGill Tribune, 6

Sept. 2021, https://www.mcgilltribune.com/sports/racism-is-all-too-prevalent-in-

professional-sports-02162021/.

“George Foreman Jimmy Young Photostream.” Zimbio, 3 Jan. 2018,

https://www.zimbio.com/photos/George+Foreman/Jimmy+Young/5F48KGe5G_o/

Disney+ABC+Television+Group+Archive.

Katzowitz, Josh. “George Foreman on Being a Salesman, His Comeback, and How Much Money

He Made from His Grill.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 19 Nov. 2019,

https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshkatzowitz/2019/11/18/george-foreman-salesman-grill-

earnings/?sh=3288a4b8210e.

Kincade, Kevin. “Lost and Found: Remembering George Foreman vs Jimmy Young.” RingSide

Report, https://ringsidereport.com/?p=62411.
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Kozlowski, Joe. “George Foreman Earned Way More Money from His Famous Grill than He

Did as a Boxer.” Sportscasting, 3 Apr. 2020, https://www.sportscasting.com/george-

foreman-earned-way-more-money-from-his-famous-grill-than-he-did-as-a-boxer/.

Summers, Keyona. “Study: Black Entrepreneurship in the United States.” University of Nevada,

Las Vegas, 10 Feb. 2023, https://www.unlv.edu/news/release/study-black-

entrepreneurship-united-states.