How to get tickets to Ali memorial services
UPDATE: All tickets to the Friday service have been distributed. Tickets remain available for the Thursday service.
Ahead of boxing giant Muhammad Ali's funeral and memorial services in Louisville – certain to be watched globally – the Ali family announced that 29,000 free tickets would be available starting Tuesday morning for a Thursday Muslim funeral service at Freedom Hall and starting Wednesday morning for a Friday memorial at the KFC Yum! Center.
On Friday, King Abdullah II of Jordan and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will be among the dignitaries at the 2 p.m. memorial, where eulogists will include former President Bill Clinton, actor Billy Crystal and broadcaster Bryant Gumbel and wife Lonnie Ali.
There has been no official word from the White House about participation, but on Monday family spokesman Bob Gunnell announced that pallbearers would include actor Will Smith, a family friend who portrayed Ali in a film, former heavyweight boxing champion Lennox Lewis and others.
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Mayor Greg Fischer said that with the world's attention turned to Ali's beloved hometown during a historic week. "Our job now, as a city, is to send him off with the class and dignity and respect that he deserves."
Below are details on how to get tickets to each service, which won't be offered online.
Thursday's Jenazah funeral service:
Tickets for the noon Jenazah Islamic funeral prayer service will be available on a first come first serve basis at the Freedom Hall box office window starting at 10 a.m. Tuesday. There is a maximum of four tickets per request. There are 14,000 tickets available, Gunnell said. Free parking will be available.
On Thursday, doors will open at 9 a.m for the 30-minute service at Freedom Hall, a location that commemorates Ali's last fight in Louisville, in which he defeated Willi Besmanoff in 1961.
Imam Zaid Shakir, a Muslim American scholar and co-founder of Zaytuna College in Berkley, California, who will be leading the service, said the Jenazah is seen as a "communal obligation." Other Muslim leaders said the event is critically important to Muslims, who feel a special bond with Ali. Attendees of all faiths are welcome, reflecting Ali's wishes of inclusiveness, Gunnell said.
“To be properly prepared for burial, prayed over and then buried is a right owed to every single Muslim," Shakir said.
Friday's memorial service at KFC Yum! Center:
The Yum! Center memorial service will be open to the general public with limited seating. Tickets will be available at the KFC Yum! Center box office beginning at 10 a.m. Wednesday, and guests can begin lining up at 6 a.m. Tickets are on a first come first serve basis and are limited to four per person. Based on availability, remaining tickets may be available Thursday. There are about 15,000 tickets available, Gunnell said.
Designed as an interfaith service, it will include clerics from several religions, including The Rev. Kevin Cosby of Louisville, Rabbis Michael Lerner and Joe Rapport of Louisville, a representative of the Buddhist religion and U.S.Senator Orrin Hatch representing Mormons.
There will be a poetry reading by Ambassador Attalah Shabazz, the eldest daughter of Malcolm X.
For those unable to attend, it will be streamed live from www.alicenter.org, and also shown on large screens just outside the Yum! Center.
Afterward, a private reception will be held at the Ali Center for friends and guests. The family has asked that, instead of cards or flowers, donations be made to the Ali Center.
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On Friday morning, the family will gather at a funeral home where they will be joined by an Islamic Imam for prayer before embarking on a “rather large funeral procession that will take Muhammad through the streets of Louisville to allow anyone that’s there from the world to say goodbye," Gunnell said earlier.
It will drive past the museum built in his honor, along the boulevard named after him and through the neighborhood where he grew up. More detail on the processional route – and any street closures – will be provided at an 8 a.m. briefing Tuesday, led by Mayor Greg Fischer.
But officials have said it will start at 9 a.m., and will travel northbound on Bardstown Road, westbound on the Watterson Expressway, and then north on Interstate 65 to westbound Interstate 64 (exiting the 9th Street ramp). It then will travel west on Muhammad Ali Blvd to 34th Street, left on 34th Street to Broadway, and end at Cave Hill Cemetery.
"Right now we're going to suggest people get there early," Gunnell said.
Ali will be buried in a private, family-only ceremony at Cave Hill, a national historic cemetery home to many prominent citizens including Colonel Harland Sanders, the founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken. Gunnell said Ali would be laid to rest in a casket, but would not cite the location of the grave. More detail may be provided about the burial on Wednesday, Gunnell said.
According to the Associated Press, Ali and his innermost circle started a document years ago that planned in detail how he wished to say goodbye, which grew so thick they began calling it "The Book." The final revisions were made days before Ali died Friday at an Arizona hospital, his family by his side.
"The message that we'll be sending out is not our message - this was really designed by the champ himself," said Timothy Gianotti, as Islamic studies scholar who helped for years to plan the services. "The love and the reverence and the inclusivity that we're going to experience over the coming days is really a reflection of his message to the people of planet earth."
Reporter Chris Kenning can be reached at ckenning@courier-journal.com or 502-582-4697.