The boxer Lionel Rose, who has passed at the age of 62 after a long ailment, was the primary Aboriginal Australian to win a world title. He always remembered the appreciation he got when he came back to Melbourne in the wake of overcoming the Japanese champion Fighting Harada in Tokyo to win the undisputed world bantamweight title in February 1968. An unexpected 250,000 individuals covered the entry lanes to respect their new 19-year-old champion.
Raised in Jacksons track, Lionel experienced youth in hardship and was taught to box from his father, Roy as a means for self-defence. Later on at 10 years of age Lionel was given a pair of boxing gloves from his classroom teacher as he had been watching him shadow boxing at school. At