Now when it comes to the all-time greats, a few names probably come to mind.

Jordan Gretzky, the babe who was a guy, but maybe none are more revered or have been

more mortalized than Muhammad Ali.

Now the photo taken from this fight by John Rooney is arguably the most famous sports photograph

of all time.

Muhammad Ali is one of those sports figures who, well not even just a sport, he transcends

the world of sports.

He left the legacy permanently etched into really American culture at large.

But what if the legacy that you know or that you think you know is wrong?

So go with me here for a second.

Some of you are going to be upset by the first half of this presentation.

And then some of you are going to be upset by the second half.

So depending in which group you find yourself, I ask you to either fast forward or rewind

to the portion that you find acceptable as this is usually how we process complex historical

figures in order to make them more palatable to our modern echo chamber sensibilities.

Just do that.

Before Ali was the Ali you know, he was known as Cassius Clay.

Then in 1964, Cassius Clay ditched his slave name and joined the nation of Islam.

Now please note, the nation of Islam is important here.

It's not the same as Islam and not representative of all Muslims.

We'll come back to that later.

So Ali converted, actually, after he was handed a newspaper cartoon outside of a skating

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