WHY A BRITISH COLUMBIA AMATEUR BOXING HALL OF FAME: By Brian W. Zelley

Background - BC AMATEUR BOXING NEWS (1983 to 1986)

During my term as editor for the BC Amateur Boxing News in the Eighties,
I came to the conclusion that there was very little discussion of past events
or those Golden Memories of past boxing happenings.

The logical step was to add past events in a Flashbacks section or as an introduction to report on various tournaments such as the 1085 Diamond Belt tournament in Victoria, BC there was some flashbacks to 1967, 1968 and 1980.

In a buil-up to the Vancouver Island Amateur Boxing Championships
in 1984, a summary of the highlights of amateur boxing from 1954 to the Seventies was produced.

However, it appears in 2009 and 2010, that many folks now involved ii in amateur boxing are lost when it comes to the past as they were in the Eighties.
One example was the case of the early history of the Nanaimo Boxing Club
which was started in 1971 by Dan Wright and Brian Zelley. Active boxers in Nanaimo did not know much of the history and were unaware of who started the club and the connection to the old Newcastle Boxing Club of the Sixties.

Another recent concern was at least two former boxers from a club in Greater Vancouver did not understand the history and one disputed that Dan Wright
was a founder.

A Tarnished Golden Gloves Program

In the 2010 BC Golden Gloves program, the only significant reference
was a list of past Golden Boys from 1939 to 2009. It was a nice list but
the Golden Boys for 1968 and 1969 were incorrect. The 1968 BC Golden Boy
was Portland boxer RAY LAMPKIN and the 1969 Golden Boy was Seattle boxer
NEIL KNIGHT.

HALLS OF FAME IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

There is a BC Sports Hall of Fame, but amateur boxing has not been high on the inductee list with only seven names. Since the beginning of the Golden Gloves
in 1939, that works out to slightly less than one individual per decade not to mention the total history of the sport in BC.

MUNICIPAL SPORTS halls of fame - very few of the towns have many boxing folk inducted, but at least Prince George has seven as of 2010.

THE BC AMATEUR BOXING HALL OF FAME

Began recently with a call for names, and it did not take long to gather 50 names to start the selection and elimination rounds. aS of July 30, 2010 there are now 24 names of folks that are still in the competition, and at the end of August it is expected the list will be reduced to about 12 names, but of the 50 that are eliminated along the way, they wiill be remembered for future years along with others.