Welcome to part two of my Lehigh Valley Mount Rushmore of Lehigh Valley sports. Part one was last week and discussed several worthies who did not make the list. These are my four who did make it, and they were selected with the help of two Allentownians who are familiar with the sports scene, Charlie Marcon and Ted Lyons. And remember, this my list. Don’t blame Charlie and Ted if you have problems with it, and I’m sure you will.
Before we get into, we have to establish what makes a Lehigh Valley Mount Rushmore. Athletic accomplishment matters primarily, of course, but the four Rushmores must absolutely scream Lehigh Valley. They had to make their rep here, they had to settle here. They are and always will be quintessentially Lehigh Valley.
The first and easiest pick is Larry Holmes. I covered some of Larry’s early fights while at the Bethlehem Globe Times and I can tell you, he did not have an easy climb to the top. He dropped out of school in the seventh grade, he took all kinds of odd jobs, he was not an incredibly highly ranked amateur boxer. He worked his way up, partly by being a sparring partner for Muhammad Ali and Joe Frasier, and he boxed in those bucket-of-blood arenas like the Scranton YMCA. He finally won the WC World Championship in 1978, and in typical Holmes fashion, needed the fifteenth round to beat Ken Norton to win it…