Carmen Basilio - Retirement

Retirement

Following his esteemed career as a fighter, Basilio worked for a time at the Genesee Brewery in Rochester, NY. Basilio, who was also a member of the United States Marine Corps at one point of his life, was able to enjoy his retirement. During the 1970s, his nephew Billy Backus became world's welterweight champion after having a shaky start to his own boxing career, and Basilio declared on the day that Backus became champion, that to him, Billy winning the title was better than when he won it himself.

In 1990, Ed Brophy decided to build the International Boxing Hall Of Fame in Canastota, New York to honor the two world champions who were born there: Basilio and his nephew. Although Backus isn't a member of the Hall Of Fame, Basilio is, along with many of the fighters he met inside the ring.

In the late 1990s, Basilio became seriously ill, and he required triple bypass heart surgery. Doctors were able to repair his heart.

Basilio was interviewed for an HBO documentary on Sugar Ray Robinson called "The Dark Side Of A Champion". He mentioned that although he respected Robinson's talents in the ring, he did not like him at all as a person. He called him a "son of a bitch" and said he was the most arrogant, unpleasant person that you would ever want to meet.

In 2010, "Title Town USA, Boxing in Upstate New York" by historian Mark Allen Baker was published by The History Press in 2010 and identifies Canastota as the epicenter of Upstate New York's rich boxing heritage. The book includes chapters on both Carmen Basilio and Billy Backus. The introduction was written by Edward P. Brophy Executive Director of the International Boxing Hall of Fame.