Henry Armstrong
Armstrong in 1937 | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
Nicknames |
|
| Born | Henry Melody Jackson Jr. December 12, 1912 Columbus, Mississippi, U.S. |
| Died | October 22, 1988 (aged 75) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Height | 5 ft 5+1⁄2 in (166 cm) |
| Weight | |
| Boxing career | |
| Reach | 67 in (170 cm) |
| Stance | Orthodox |
| Boxing record | |
| Total fights | 183 |
| Wins | 151 |
| Win by KO | 100 |
| Losses | 22 |
| Draws | 10 |
Henry Jackson Jr. (December 12, 1912 – October 22, 1988) was an American professional boxer and a world boxing champion who fought under the name Henry Armstrong. He is the only fighter to ever hold world championships in three divisions (featherweight, lightweight and welterweight) simultaneously.
Armstrong and Terence Crawford are the only boxers in history to hold the undisputed championship in three different weight classes. He defended his welterweight title a total of 19 times.
The Ring magazine named him Fighter of the Year in 1937. The Boxing Writers Association of America (BWAA) named him Fighter of the Year in 1940. The Sporting News recognized him as the Fighter of the Decade for the 1930s. He is currently ranked by BoxRec as the 12th-greatest pound-for-pound fighter of all time. In 2007, The Ring ranked Armstrong as the second-greatest fighter of the last 80 years. Boxing coach and commentator Teddy Atlas considers Armstrong to be the greatest of all time. Historian Bert Sugar also ranked Armstrong as the second-greatest fighter of all time. ESPN ranked Armstrong as number 3 on their list of the 50 greatest boxers of all time. He was posthumously inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in the inaugural class of 1990. In 2019, the International Boxing Research Organization (IBRO) ranked him as the second best boxer of all time, pound for pound, as well as the second-best featherweight, third-best welterweight, and fifth-best lightweight of all time.