Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
Pa. camp where Ali trained now open to public
Facility becomes shrine for iconic heavyweight
DEER LAKE, Pa. — The rustic Pennsylvania training camp where Muhammad Ali prepared for some of his most famous fights has undergone an elaborate restoration, opening to the public Saturday as a shrine to the heavyweight icon’s life and career.
The famed Deer Lake camp was in disrepair when California real estate investor Mike Madden bought it shortly after Ali died in June 2016 at age 74.
Madden, son of retired broadcaster and NFL Hall of Fame coach John Madden, said his aim was to preserve an important part of Ali’s legacy.
“It will always be a monument to the guy who created it,” said Madden. “It’s about preserving a piece of sports history, American history and probably world history.”
Ali bought the wooded, out-of-theway property about 90 miles from Philadelphia in 1972 and installed 18 primarily log buildings, including a gym, dining hall, small mosque, visitors’ cabins and a horse barn. It was at Deer Lake where Ali prepared for his epic bouts against George Foreman and Joe Frazier, attracting crowds who watched him work. Ali once proclaimed he was “more at home with my log cabins than I am in my house in Cherry Hill,” New Jersey.
He trained at the camp until his last fight in 1981.
“Ali loved it up there,” said his longtime business manager, Gene Kilroy, an area native who brought Ali to Deer Lake. “He built it the way he wanted to build it, and he credited that camp with helping him win his biggest fights.”
Ty Benner, whose father brought him to see Ali train every time he was at Deer Lake, returned Saturday for the first time in nearly 40 years, donating a T-shirt he got at the camp as a kid.
“My dad was a big Ali fan,” said Benner, 48, of Beaver Springs, which is about two hours away. “I pretty much grew up here.”
He said Madden had done an “amazing” job restoring it.
Visiting from the Philadelphia area, Karen Hauck was also impressed.
“I love this,” she said while her kids and their friend, 11-year-old Benny Quiles-Rosa, took turns at the heavy bag. Benny, an aspiring boxer, gave it quite a beating.
“I can’t wait till I’m allowed to spar,” he said. Seeing where Ali trained, he said, “is a really big deal for me.”
By the time Madden bought the camp, the exteriors of the log buildings were deteriorating and needed extensive repair.
Inside, the gym has a new ring and sleek display of blown-up photos that show Ali living and working at the camp, slugging it out with opponents inside the ring and clowning around with other famous faces, such as The Beatles.
A video retrospective of Ali’s career, narrated by Howard Cosell, plays on a flat screen.
The hilltop camp, dubbed “Fighter’s Heaven,” is open to the public on weekends. Admission is free, though visitors may donate to charities designated by the camp.