Biography for
Tommy Morrison More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

2 January 1969, Jay, Oklahoma, USA

Birth Name

Tommy David Morrison

Nickname

The Duke

Height

6' 2" (1.88 m)

Mini Biography

He's a heavyweight professional boxer from Jay, Oklahoma, who made national news Thursday, Feb. 15, 1996, when he announced that he is HIV positive. He was suspended from worldwide boxing when he tested positive prior to a boxing match against Arthur Weathers in Las Vegas. He said he plans to pursue AIDS awareness activities.

IMDb Mini Biography By: Anonymous

Spouse

Dawn Gilbert	(17 September 2001 - November 2007) (divorced) 1 child
Dawn Gilbert	(17 September 1996 - November 1998) (annulled) 1 child
Dawn Freeman	(18 May 1996 - September 2000) (divorced)

Trivia

He is the great-nephew of John Wayne.

He won the WBO Boxing Championship from George Foreman in 1993. He lost the championship to Michael Bentt in 1994.

In 1989, Morrison had 19 wins, 15 by knockout. Among the fighters beaten were former Mike Tyson opponents Lorenzo Boyd, Dave Jaco and Lorenzo Canady, as well as former George Foreman opponents Steve Zouski and Ken Lakusta.

He won three fights in 1995 before meeting Razor Ruddock for the IBC Heavyweight Championship.

A huge Elvis fan.

In 1988, his senior year, he won the Kansas City Golden Gloves. In the Olympic trials, he advanced to the finals and lost to Army Sergeant Ray Mercer, eight years his senior.

In the Olympic trials, he got to the finals and lost to Army Sergeant Ray Mercer. Mercer was eight years older.

Now that he has retired from boxing, he is now working his way toward acting professionally.

Seeing the Stallone classic "Rocky" was what really inspired him to go pro with his boxing.

In 1988 he won the Kansas City, Mo., Golden Gloves, advanced to the National Gloves in Omaha and got invited to the western Olympic trials. He came up short in Concord, Calif., where he lost a split decision to heavyweight Ray Mercer, who went on to win a gold medal in Seoul.

Originally aspired to be an actor like his grand-uncle, but with all the boxers in his family going on at that time, his mother pressured him to try out for Golden Gloves. He won. He was 25-0 before he realized that boxing was something he wanted to do full-time.

Always wanted to act, but fell into boxing because of his mother's wishes. There was so much success in the family with boxing that she encouraged him to compete.

Made an extremely brief cameo in the film They Live in 1988.

After a decade of being barred from boxing due to his HIV status, he found that the original test showed a "false positive", meaning he is free of the HIV virus. He is now planning a comeback!.

From the age of 13 to 19 Tommy entered every tough man contest he could. Winning 49 fights out of the 50 he participated in. During this time starting in December of 1976 he also was fighting amateur boxing matches. In 1980 he also won the Jr. Olympics. He continued this until 1988 where his total of amateur fights was 242 with an impressive amount of wins which was 222 with only 20 losses.

Father of 4 sons.

Personal Quotes

(On boxing): "It was a life changing experience. Very interesting and something I look forward to doing again. Acting is a different challenge."

(On how he sexually-contracted HIV): "Wilt Chamberlain had nothing on me. Infidelity was one of my biggest battles in life. I couldn't overcome it. It probably helped my first marriage crumble."

Where Are They Now

(May 2006) Currently lives in Sparta, Tennessee, where he is writing his autobiography.

(February 2007) Making a boxing comeback.

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