Ali Arrives in Maine

May 23, 1965 - Muhammad Ali arrived at the gentle, rolling banks of the Androscoggin River in Maine today and declared: “Every city in America looks the same to me. I don’t know nothing about Maine.”

On Tuesday night, he will defend his title against Sonny Liston in Lewiston.

Ali’s entourage, which included two detectives of the New York City police homicide squad, arrived at 3:15 p.m. after breaking camp at Chicopee, Mass., 217 miles away.

The champion was somewhat cranky at a brief news conference in the Holiday Inn at Auburn. He scoffed at reports that carloads of New York gunmen were en route to do him damage.

“Only two men I’m afraid of is…” he said, pausing as he fumbled in his wallet. Then, pulling out two photographs, he said, “…God and his messenger — Allah and Elijah Muhammad. Can’t scare me with no pistols.”

Elijah is the head of the Black Muslim movement, of which Ali is the most famous member. The report of possible danger to Ali is based on the information that some of the former followers of the late Malcolm X are “missing from their usual haunts.”

Detective William Confrey of Manhattan Homicide North and his partner, Detective John Keeley, had come just “to cooperate with the local police” because “we know what these fellows look like.” Both men have been working on the Malcolm murder case.

Ali said the report was part of a plot to scare him, which was really “going to scare Sonny.” He went on to say that those who started the story knew that, historically, the American Negro has always lived in fear. But Muslims are not afraid, he said.

“And if a carload of men are coming after me, go stop them, put up roadblocks, go out on the highway,” he said. “If you heard they was comin’ after President Lyndon Johnson, you’d get those guys.”

There are some who believe the report has been part of a promotional campaign to sell more closed-circuit television seats.

“If I could assure the people an assassination, I could sell a million tickets,” said Fred Brooks, president of Sports-Vision, Inc., only half-jokingly.

There seems little likelihood of a sellout at the Central Maine Youth Center unless prices are cut at the last moment. There will be 5,900 seats around the ring in the mill city’s hockey arena.

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