Stories From Texas

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Document Type

Article

Publication Date

11-19-2025

Abstract

George Edward Foreman was born in 1949 in Marshall, Texas, the fifth of seven children. Life was hard. George grew up hungry, angry and restless. By his own account, he was headed for the streets and headed for trouble.

In his mid-teens, he dropped out of school. He was big and strong, but he wasn’t strong in spirit. He fought, he stole, he drifted. His mother prayed he’d find another path.

Then came the Job Corps, a government program that gave poor kids work training. George signed up, thinking it was a way out of Houston’s Fifth Ward. It was there that a supervisor put a pair of boxing gloves on him. They fit like destiny.

George hated losing. He hated being laughed at. That hate became fuel.

In just a few years, he went from angry dropout to Olympic boxer. In 1968, in Mexico City, George Foreman shocked the world by winning the heavyweight gold medal.

He turned professional. In 1973, he fought Joe Frazier, “Smokin’ Joe,” and knocked him down six times in two rounds. Foreman became the heavyweight champion of the world. They said he was unbeatable.

But then came Zaire, 1974: the “Rumble in the Jungle.” Muhammad Ali rope-a-doped him — leaned against the ropes, let Foreman punch himself out, and beat him in the eighth round. The giant fell.

Foreman spiraled. He was lost. He retired, nearly died from exhaustion in a Houston locker room, and turned to preaching. Folks thought the fighter was finished.

But in 1987, 10 years after hanging up his gloves, Foreman made the most unlikely comeback in sports. He was older, heavier, slower — but calmer, wiser, stronger in spirit. People laughed when they saw him because he looked like a preacher in boxing trunks.

And yet, he kept winning. On a November night in 1994, at the age of 45, George Foreman knocked out Michael Moorer to become the oldest heavyweight champion in history.

Foreman wasn’t just a two-time heavyweight champ. He was a two-time American success story. That alone would have been enough. But here’s the twist:

Not long after, a company approached him with a funny-looking electric grill. Portable. Tilted. Designed to drain fat. They asked George to put his name on it.

He did more than that. He sold it. He smiled. He told America it was a lean, mean, fat-reducing grilling machine.

The George Foreman Grill went on to sell over 100 million units worldwide. Foreman made more money from grills than he ever did from boxing.

He passed on that winning legacy to his 12 children – including five sons, all named George. He explained that if “one goes up, we all go up. If one goes down, we all go down together.”

Foreman died earlier this year at 76. From the streets of Marshall, to Olympic gold, to world champion, to kitchen counters around the world, he was one of the most inspirational success stories Texas has ever seen.

Format

.MP3, 192 kbps

Length

00:03:54

Language

English

Notes

https://www.texasstandard.org/stories/george-foreman-history-grill-heavyweight-champion/

Comments

© 2025 William F. Strong. Uploaded with permission of copyright holder.

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