He was still fit and strong, with small, bright eyes under a low brow and an upper body that would shame men half his age. Fighting to prove his innocence against a minimum sentence of 25 years, Lenny never gave up, and went on to be found not guilty.

Minuses come from not mentioning any of his losses (he was far from unbeaten) and from the feeling that he was quite a bully. A poor condition book can still make a good reading copy but is generally not collectible unless the item is very scarce. In his autobiography, McLean recounts that various film studios had expressed an interest in making a film based on his life and career in unlicensed boxing. McLean's first unlicensed boxing match came about as a result of a chance meeting while in his late teens.Many more followed, and they adopted Blake’s visual language for their covers: black background, glowering headshot, menacing quote ( The Guv’nor’s was ‘I look what I am – a hard bastard’). The majority of the book was overshadowed by his underlying issues with his stepfather and the loss of his father.

As a respected and feared figure, he often associated with infamous criminals such as the Kray twins, Ronnie Biggs and Charles Bronson.

He gave me directions, and even offered to stand in his garden until I drove past so I wouldn’t miss the turning. Lenny McLean inspired fear in many, but respect from all, as he became a bare-knuckle fighting legend. These are touching tributes from the men and women that Lenny encountered on his journey through life. This gives a colourful and very much one-sided hagiography of the man and his relatively short life. We have as yet still not come to terms with our loss but are heartened that now in Feb,1999 the book has spent five months in the Times top ten chart.

Title Page A page at the front of a book which may contain the title of the book, any subtitles, the authors, contributors, editors, the. In October 2017, The Guv'nor Revealed – The Untold Story of Lenny McLean by Thomas and Lee Wortley was released.Roy had mentioned that Lenny had in fact been beaten several times in the unlicensed, once by himself, but also twice by Johnny Waldron and twice by Cliff Field. He was a man in possession of an arcane and almost impenetrable moral code, applied utterly inflexibly with his fists.