Born in New York City,
William Cayton earned a degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of
Maryland in 1937, and began a career as a technical writer for DuPont.
By 1945, he was running his own
advertising agency, Cayton, Inc.
Cayton got involved in boxing
four years later when a client, Chesebrough Manufacturing Co., asked for his help in
promoting Vaseline Brand Hair Tonic for Men. He decided to use television advertising on
sports events, recommending boxing because other larger team sports were not yet suitable
for small-screen viewing.
In 1957, working with director
and
writer, Fred Ladd, Cayton produced short
animated feature films entitled "The Space Explorers" followed
shortly thereafter by "The New Adventures of the Space Explorers."
Cayton's cartoons were marketed under the name Cartoon
Classics. Bill Cayton also had a series of cartoons called
Animatoons™. There was also a film series called Jungle.
These were all marketed by Radio & Television Packagers, Inc., which owns the
copyrights as well as the trademark Animatoons™.
Later, Cayton began managing
fighters in the mid-1970s along with his friend Jimmy Jacobs. After
Jacobs died in March 1988, he managed Tommy Morrison, Jeremy Williams, Vinny Pazienza, and
Michael Grant. A surprising anecdote about Jacobs was that he dominated the sport of
Four-Wall Handball from l955 to l969, winning every match he played during that 15-year
span.
Energetic and well-liked,
Cayton was a fixture in the fight business for decades, managing world champions including
"Iron Mike" Tyson, Wilfred Benitez and Edwin Rosario. But he was best known for
co-managing Tyson with Jim Jacobs when the young heavyweight turned pro in 1984.
Big Fights Inc. was the
brainchild of the late Bill Cayton and the late Jimmy Jacobs. In 1961 Jacobs merged his
collection with Cayton's, who owned the "Greatest Fights of the Century". At the
time, Cayton was a network television producer giving him access to many network fight
telecasts. Together they formed a corporation called "The Big Fights Inc." to
restore and preserve fight films. Big Fights Inc. produced over one thousand boxing
features and documentaries. They were nominated for three Academy Awards, for
"Legendary Champions," "The Heavyweight Champions," and "Jack
Johnson." They also produced "The Fighters" which is a documentary of the
first Ali-Frazier fight. Big Fights Inc. had the largest library of boxing films in
the world, with an estimated 16,000 films.
Jacobs died a few years later,
and Tyson sued Cayton to sever their ties around the time Tyson knocked out Michael Spinks
in 1988. Fight promoter Don King took over as Tyson's promoter and boxing
manager, and it was strongly suspected that King was behind the suit. Cayton's
partner, Jim Jacobs, became seriously ill with leukemia. He died a couple of days after
Tyson, with new wife Robin Givens at ringside, had beaten challenger Tony Tubbs in Tokyo.
Tyson had recently signed a new contract with his Cayton and Jacobs and in the event of
Jacobs' death, Cayton would become sole manager. Jacobs' widow would continue to
receive her husband's portion of revenue earned. Givens, began to take a strong interest
in Tyson's finances, telling him that not enough of his earnings were coming back to him.
She alleged that Tyson had signed the contract with Cayton and Jacobs not knowing about
Jacobs' condition. Meanwhile Don King, opportunistically attended Jacobs' funeral and
began "wooing" the Tyson family supposedly with the intent to taking over
Tyson's business affairs (to the benefit of himself).
Besides managing "Iron Mike” and others, Cayton had a large collection of fight
films he began collecting in the 1940s, featuring legendary fighters such as Jack Dempsey,
Jack Johnson and Gene Tunney. His collection
included the famous 1936 fight between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling at Yankee Stadium. Mr.
Cayton sold his film and tape library in 1998 to Disney Corp., which features some (not
all) of the titles on its ESPN Classic Sports network.
"He loved his work. He
loved making deals," daughter Trish Cayton said. "Even as sick as he was, he was
still working a day before he died."
"I love boxing. It's
the most elemental of all sports, and the most exciting," Cayton said in a 1996
interview.
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