Murray Sleep was a gentle soul who found himself attracted to a violent sport. His years as a supervisor of championship fights for the World Boxing Association (WBA) brought opportunities, recognition and fame to many Nova Scotians. It also opened a new world for Murray and his lifelong friend Buddy Daye. Together, they travelled the world attending the major championship events of the last 30 years and promoting the careers of many Nova Scotians including Clyde Gray, Trevor Berbick, Art Hafey, Razor Ruddock, Kirk Johnson and referee Hubert Earle. Murray was a member of the Halifax Boxing Commission in the 1960s, joined the Nova Scotia Boxing task force, served as president of the Canadian Boxing Federation from 1979 to 1983, became a vice-president of the WBA in 1981 and was appointed vice-chairman for Championship Ratings of the WBA in 1987, serving through 1993. He was asked to run for WBA president, but declined. Wherever he went, he was considered a man of integrity, dedication and hard work.

Along the way, Murray and Buddy met and befriended the elite of the boxing world. The Alis, Fraziers, Holyfields and Foremans became accustomed to seeing “salt and pepper,” as Sleep and Daye came to be known, at ring sides from North Dakota to the Philippines. They had struck up a friendship as merchant seamen in the 1940s. The quiet, unassuming Sleep, elected to the Canadian Boxing Hall of Fame in 1985, and the outgoing Daye struck many of their acquaintances as the archetypical odd couple. Their pranks on the road became legendary. Like the time they attended a WBA convention in Philadelphia.

As they entered an elevator in their hotel, Buddy, always looking for an opportunity to gently nudge his friend to the brink of embarrassment, allowed Murray to go ahead. As the elevator doors were closing, Buddy stepped back and exclaimed: “who’re you calling a N …..? ” The doors closed on Murray, alone in the elevator with the towering Muhammad Ali and Larry Holmes. As they stared down at him, Murray admitted to wetting himself in fear.

On another occasion, shortly after Canada’s then ambassador to Iran, Ken Taylor, sheltered several Americans in the Canadian embassy in Tehran during the Islamic revolution, Buddy and Murray were attending meetings in Washington. They wandered into a nearby shopping centre and while Murray sat down to rest, Buddy told shoppers that Murray was the popular Canadian ambassador. Then he stood back and watched as a crowd gathered around the bewildered Sleep. Years later, Buddy still chuckled at Murray’s predicament. Murray’s modesty meant that few knew about his influence in the inner circles of international boxing. Hubert Earle of Lower Sackville became an internationally recognized referee, handling more than 30 major fights around the world, after Murray went to the WBA and urged that they put him on their roster. “Murray staked his reputation on me,” recalls Earle. “How many people would do that?” Buddy Daye’s passing was a blow to Murray. Age and his own illness kept him closer to home as time went by. He died, at 80, in 2003. “He was lost,” says his widow Nora. She never liked the sport and couldn’t understand her husband’s attachment to it. She considered it barbaric. They seldom discussed it and, “with five daughters he was outnumbered.” John Soosaar is a long-time boxing observer who worked in media for many years and is now a provincial government information officer.

Bio Courtesy of John Soosaar