One Minnesota Woman's Connection To Muhammad Ali

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- As the world mourns the death of Muhammad Ali, we're learning more about his connections to Minnesota.

It was the late 1960s, the height of the civil rights movement and a freshman at the University of Minnesota caught the attention of the great Muhammad Ali. Hattie Webb has a plaque with a photo to mark the days that mark her life.

"We conducted a sit-in and we literally shut Morrill Hall down which shuts down the University of Minnesota," Webb said.

It was 1969. Webb says they were trying to tell the president about discrimination on campus. They didn't get the meeting, they did get attention.

"Of course that made national news. There wasn't many black people here to begin with and here these 20-something students are shutting down the University of Minnesota," Webb said.

And that, she says, sparked the attention of Ali. His boxing privileges were revoked after he refused to go to Vietnam, the war her only brother was fighting.

"He asked if he could come here and talk to us and we were so excited."  Webb says. "It was a very powerful speech. It was about civil rights."

Serious but humorous, she said, humor he'd shown in other speeches.

After his speech at the U, he had more to say to Hattie.

"He walked over to me and said, 'Can I take you to dinner?'" She accepted. "I told him about my brother being in Vietnam and we talked for hours."

She says it wasn't romantic, just conversation with a lot of heart.  She says his visit to the U helped grow the minority enrollment.

"It made people of all colors, not just black people, take more notice about  the inequities and the problems, things that were going on in that time," Webb said. "He will always be the greatest in so many ways."

About three months after Hattie met Ali, her brother was killed in Vietnam.  Ali sent her family a telegram, offering his sympathy.