Update…

IRONDEQUOIT, N.Y. (AP Nov 12, 2012) – Several hundred people packed a church to say final goodbyes to Carmen Basilio, who won the world
middleweight boxing crown from Sugar Ray Robinson in 1957 before losing a rematch six months later.
     Basilio died Wednesday (nov 7, 2012)  at a Rochester, NY  hospital where he was being treated for pneumonia. He was 85.
     The Hall of Fame boxer was described as a gentle and kind man at
his funeral Monday in his hometown Irondequoit, a Rochester suburb.
     Basilio took the welterweight title from Tony DeMarco in 1955
and added the middleweight belt near the close of a 13-year career.
At 5-foot-61/2, Basilio bored relentlessly into opponents and wore
them down with body blows.
     He’s survived by his wife, four children, eight grandchildren
and 10 great-grandchildren.

 

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) – Carmen Basilio, a genial onion farmer’s son with a malevolent left hook who wrested the world middleweight boxing crown from Sugar Ray Robinson in 1957, has died. He was 85.
     Edward Brophy, executive director of the Boxing Hall of Fame in
upstate New York, says Basilio died early Wednesday morning in a
Rochester hospital where he was being treated for pneumonia.
     Basilio lived in the Rochester suburb of Irondequoit and was
among the first class of hall of fame inductees in 1990, a group
that included Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Rocky Marciano, Joe Louis and
Jake LaMotta.
     His career ended in 1961 with a 56-16-7 record that included 27
knockouts.
     Basilio’s family said he’d been in failing health since heart-bypass surgery in 1992.