I remember it like yesterday. On March 14, 1980, the U.S. Boxing Team perished, except Jimmy Clark who missed his flight from JFK Airport in New York City.

Then, amateur boxing was much bigger than it is now. Howard Cosell calling their fights live on network TV was common. That's where I first saw 139-pound Lemuel Steeples of St. Louis, Missouri.

I didn't know much about him other than he was good — back then you read names in print, heard them mentioned here and there but you didn't necessarily see them because we only had local ABC, NBC and CBS channels — but his name resonated with me for some reason.

Little did I know that the plane crashed in Warsaw, Poland, just short of the runway. Or that former welterweight champion Carlos Palomino's younger brother, Paul, was among the victims. Or that future light heavyweight champion Bobby Czyz didn't make the trip because of an injury. Or that there's a memorial statue of a boxer on his backside, wearing headgear, trying to rise from a knockdown with the inscription: "Down but not Out ... Lost but not Forgotten."

It's a powerful image that I'm learning about 45 years later. Even Clark didn't know about it. Nigel Collins paints a wonderful picture. If you're too young to know about this story, it's a good time to learn.

Clark, 70, remembers it all too well. He'd rather forget. He can't. I can't, either.