Joe Frazier, Cloverlay and Joe Hand Remembered

In my early days as a builder I had a number of interesting projects, one of which was to build the Joe Frazier Gym on North Broad Street in Philadelphia.

A young architect that I knew came into my office one day and excitedly said that Cloverlay had asked him to put the details together to build a gym for Joe Frazier. I knew that Cloverlay was a group of Philadelphians of some stature that had financed and managed the career of Smokin Joe Frazier the heavy weight champion of the world.

I was enlisted to put the deal together and renovate a vacant building to provide a gym for Joe to train Philadelphia boxers.

Cloverlay was very tight with their budget but the enthusiasm of my team of sub-contractors found the way to build the gym for a lot less money than it deserved.
The gym and Cloverlay turned out to be the least interesting part of project for me.

I got to know Joe Frazier pretty well during that period and also worked with a police detective named Joe Hand who handled various details for Cloverlay when he was off duty as a cop.

Joe Frazier was a great fighter but I got to know him as a really great guy. Joe did not have a strong education but he was obviously the product of a strong family in his early days in Beaufort South Carolina. During those days Joe had people around him that were more than hangers on. The people around Joe were interested in Frazier’s welfare.

Yank Durham trained Joe and gave him every bit of his experience as a fight trainer and a father figure.. Durham gave Joe the Smokin Joe nickname. He would tell Joe when he was training that he wanted to “see those gloves smoke.” When Yank died at a too early age Eddie Futch took over the handling of Frazier fight preparations.

It was Futch who was in the corner when Joe and Ali fought in Manila (The Thrilla in Manila) This fight was recognized as the most brutal display of courage between two boxers that ever took place After round 14 Frazier’s eyes were closed and battered. He could not see but insisted on going out for round 15.
The experienced Futch knew that Frazier faced serious permanent damage and threw in the towel despite Joe’s protest. Joe was angry at Futch for years but Eddie knew that he did what was best for Joe.

Joe Hand was one of those people that truly worked to see that Frazier interests were being addressed. Hand was a boxing fan and when Cloverlay was being formed he went to the offices of the prominent Philly businessman heading it’s formation and asked if they would take a small investment of $250 since he was simply a cop and fight fan wanting to participate in the program for Joe Frazier.

They took Hand’s $250 and got more that the money. Hand brought personality and street smarts to the organization. He quickly recognized the value of closed circuit broadcasting of fights and other sporting events. He handled the TV deals for Cloverlay and this eventually led to the formation of Joe Hand Productions which today is the premier promoter pf closed circuit pay for view events. They do boxing, wrestling, martial arts and numerous other events. If you are paying for the event on TV Hand is probably the promoter.

Those early glory days for Frazier evidently faded with the passage of time as he made financial decisions without the tight fisted Cloverlay group counting the money.
Joe still had the great smile and generous attitude even though the money was gone
In my career and travels I’ve met many people that have had fame and glory. Joe is in the top tier of those, not because of his great career, but because he was simply a fine human being.