R.I.P. ALI – Root Doctor of The Ring!

Strange as it is, but several years ago I found the home of a witch doctor family in South Carolina. Straight up vodun and creepy ritual rooms. Multi-generational group of them too. I salvaged hundreds of photographs that 140 degree heat beating through the ceiling was about to destroy. Among them? Candid 1974 Polaroids of Ali and his mistress Veronica Porsche in Zaire for “Rumble In The Jungle.” How uncanny to end up nearly destroyed on the floor of a witch doctor’s house in South Carolina who’d seen him rumbling in Africa…life is amazing. He was everyman’s hero really and his mojo had no rival. The photo below is just one of a few and has never been published. And yes, snapped by a root doctor.

“He was a sorcerer of the ring, witch doctor of the mat, and when he conjuh’d demons with his fists, his opponents went flat!” — S. Scott

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About Shannon Scott

Shannon Scott, aka, "The Bard of Bonaventure," or "The Storyist," is a 30 year resident of Savannah, Georgia and easily Savannah's best known storyteller at this point in his career. Scott has worked for national TV shows like, "Scariest Places On Earth," "Ghost Hunters," and produced his own documentary, "America's Most Haunted City" about Savannah, Georgia. As a vehicle, Shannon utilizes the story of cemeteries like Bonaventure, to commentate on symbolic language, art, burial traditions, secret societies, politics, romance, ritual traditions of many cultures and really the greater connections to the history of the world and present-day life.