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Ronnie's friends and family continued to fill his life, but the year he turned fourteen, somehow, almost imperceptibly, things started to go wrong.
Maybe because he was an all-around athlete and bigger than the other boys his age, Ronnie became a kind of guardian for his buddies. “I wasn't tougher, though,” he insists. “We were all tough.” When the brothers started going into neighborhood houses to swipe “nickel-and-dime stuff,” Ronnie was almost always there. They didn't consider what they were doing break-ins until the cops called it that the first time they were caught and released to their parents.
Ronnie continued to struggle in school, especially with reading. Most of his grades during his freshman year at Manual High School were failing, and in the spring, he finally made the fateful decision to drop out, along with Roy and Sonny Boy Tyler. The delinquency continued, break-ins turned into burglaries, and before the summer was over, Ronnie had been arrested for stealing a pocketful of bubble gum and was held for a couple of months in juvenile hall.
Ron's own eyes fill with tears when he remembers his mother crying in court and again when he was released. “She always told us that she had to ‘raise up the child in the way he should go, and when he's older, he won't depart.’ For a long time, it didn't work out that way with me, and I've always been sorry at what I put her through. But in the end, she knows I won't depart.”
It has been reported that Ronnie rebelled against his strict religious upbringing, but he doesn't remember it that way. “I always respected my parents and I feared God. I was just like a lot of other kids, caught up in the excitement.” He adds, “Sometimes you have to stray to find your way.”
Asked in 2001 by newscaster Peter Boyles to name his greatest opponent, Ron responded without pausing, “The toughest guy I ever fought was my father, and I never got to throw a punch.”
Later, he describes his mixed feelings about his father. “Kids always resent their parents, but for me, the resentment was with respect. You know what I mean? My father had all the power, and I wanted to take control of my own life. But both my parents knew me. They always knew me. They knew I didn't want to hurt anyone.”
That fall Ronnie and Roy, along with Conner Hill and Phillip Dawson, learned how to “hop a freight” and took the first of three trips to parts unknown. The next year, they went to Gary, Indiana, and the following year to Chicago, where they were rescued by Ronnie's Aunt Bertie. That first time, though, the train happened to be headed toward Great Falls, Montana.
“A hobo down by the train yards” had taught them the basics. Ron remembers, “He showed us how to spike the doors of the freight cars. He said we should always set up more than one car, in case we saw some bad guys already settled in when the train started to move.”
By the time they arrived in Great Falls two days later, they were not only hungry, having devoured their bag of sandwiches the day before, they had started to feel the cold of the spitting wet snow outside. Ronnie had lost a shoe jumping onto the moving car back in Denver, and the second he stepped on the ground, he felt the cold all the way into his teeth. The boys lasted barely two days before the police picked them up and called their parents in Denver. William told the cop who called to hold Ronnie overnight, just to teach him a lesson, but the message backfired when he reacted with a “Thank you, Jesus,” for the warm cell and hot food.
Back in Denver, Bill was spending more time out “evangelizing” with his father, and when Ronnie returned, Nellie began to lean more heavily on him, not only with housekeeping chores but as the primary caregiver in the family. Whether or not this new arrangement was part of the effort to get him back on track, Ronnie and his mother grew closer, and he tried hard to instill the same sense of responsibility and love of God into his siblings that his mother had encouraged in him.
But the misdemeanors continued. The boys started “going jackin”—one distracting a store clerk while the others snatched small items they could stuff in their jeans. Twice more Ronnie was brought before a judge and twice more he was sentenced to juvenile hall. Shortly after he was released the last time, he was caught red-handed, along with Roy Tyler, snatching a purse.
Finally, William and Nellie threw in the towel. When the judge told them he needed to get Ronnie's attention and didn't know how to do that without incarceration, they agreed. William said, “I can't keep my foot on his neck all the time,” and Nellie nodded her affirmation. The judge expressed regret at sending sixteen-year-old Ronnie Lyle away from “a good home,” but sentenced Roy Tyler and him both to eighteen months in the Buena Vista Correctional Facility.
As the only Colorado state reform school, Buena Vista had a reputation in those days for “punishment, not coddling,” and Ron got his first taste of incarceration. He still remembers his prisoner number was 14948 and Roy's was 14949. The two friends had watched each other's backs since they were eight years old, and in 1957, they were doing it behind bars.
William and Nellie had tried to keep Ronnie on the right path, along with all their other children, and as it turned out, not one of his brothers or sisters was ever arrested. Only Ronnie. His parents were confounded by his behavior, but neither ever gave up on him. Nellie, especially, continued to express her confidence in her second oldest and did everything she could to support him, visiting constantly and bringing him little gifts, but mostly praying.
Ron still idolizes his mother and regrets causing her so much pain. He can only explain his behavior as, “The problem was I got out of the backyard and into the alley. Once I'd seen the alley, they couldn't get me back into the yard.”
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In Buena Vista, Ronnie learned some basic, unofficial rules of confinement. “Mind your own business” served him especially well later when he did hard time. Even in reform school, he had a daunting reputation as a tough guy, probably because of his size and stature. But he also began to apply a personal code of defense, later confirmed and solidified in the ring: “If you get hit, it's your own fault.”
Buena Vista operated similarly to most juvenile correctional facilities in those days, as a toned-down model of adult prisons. The boys were locked in at night, and activities were tightly controlled and guarded. Teachers were available, but classes were not designed to accommodate students with learning disabilities, a fairly new educational concept in the late 1960s. Ronnie probably had some form of dyslexia, as reading had been difficult for him throughout his life, though he always demonstrated the ability to comprehend and explore complex ideas. At Buena Vista, he had the choice of going to school or working, and most of the time he worked—as the fireman in the boiler house shoveling coal into the furnace whenever the fire got low.
Most of the kids in reform school were black or Chicano, just like his neighborhood, and Ronnie treated his fellow prisoners with respect, “as long as they deserved it.” He doesn't remember his time there as too bad, probably because for the first time, an adult recognized his athletic ability.
Mr. Kelly was the athletic director at Buena Vista, and unlike high school coaches who had to turn Ronnie away from teams because of his failing grades, Mr. Kelly recognized his prowess, especially on the basketball court. For the first time, Ronnie felt he could be an outstanding athlete. He felt it in his speed and quickness and, most of all, in his dedication to practice.
Looking back, Ron knows that in reform school, he accomplished more than just doing his time. “In Buena Vista, I started to learn self-discipline,” he says.
Released in 1959 at age seventeen, he went back to his life at home and on the streets. His brother Bill had already graduated and was headed to college. Two more brothers had come along, with the youngest girl, Karen, yet to be born. Life was moving on, but Ronnie didn't know how to move with it. He loved and admired Bill, but he couldn't begin