Eddie Giosa, 83, ex-pro boxer

WHEN HE WAS about 14, Eddie Giosa started playing hooky from school.

He wasn't out running the streets or playing in the park. He was training to be a boxer.

He would slip out of his house in South Philadelphia and head for the gym at 8th and Latona streets. If he didn't get through the window before his mother came to wake him, he'd hide under the bed, usually with boxing gloves on, until the coast was clear.

Maybe his academic career suffered, but his boxing skills were well-honed by the time he entered the local Golden Gloves tournaments, which he won from age 16 through 19.

He was 16 when he won the Daily News Diamond Belt championship.

Eddie went on to a 12-year career as a professional boxer in the lightweight division, winning 67 of his 105 professional bouts, 10 by knockouts, and losing 29, with nine draws. He fought six world champions, but never won a championship. He retired from the ring in 1954.

He died Sunday of complications of Alzheimer's disease. He was 83 and lived in Sicklerville, N.J., but had lived most of his life in South Philadelphia.

Eddie worked for RCA in Camden until the early '70s, and as a mailer for the Inquirer and Daily News for 25 years. He retired in the mid-'90s.

He was born Armando Giosa to Frank Giosa and Theresa Martinelli, Italian immigrants.

When he started school, teachers thought Armando was Italian for Edmund, so he became Eddie. He attended Bok Vocational High School.

Eddie served briefly in the Army during World War II, until it was found that he had flat feet. He could dance around a boxing ring, but apparently the Army didn't think he could march.

At RCA, Eddie made parts for communications systems in warplanes.

Fellow workers put up a punching bag and a bell and gave him a silk robe with the RCA logo on the back. Every time a shipment went out to help the war effort, Eddie would come out with the robe, hit the fast bag for luck and ring the bell.

He was only 15 when he started dating Asunta Gentile. They were married in 1946.

In the ring, Eddie was a boxer rather than a puncher, but he dazzled opponents with double and triple left hooks.

Eddie was said to be the first boxer to appear on television. It was a fight against LuLu Costantino in November 1946. Eddie won a 10-round decision.

In a fight with the great Willie Pep (230-12) in Boston on Nov. 26, 1945, Eddie connected with his patented double left hook, staggering Pep.

Clinching against the ropes, Willie said to him, "Don't get fresh, kid, and you won't get hurt." Eddie lost on points.

One of Eddie's great fans was his son, Frank.

"When I was 2 years old on my birthday, April 12, 1951, my father took me to Syracuse to watch him fight Carmen Basilio." His father lost a 10-round decision to the two-division champ.

"I was at ringside for the last four fights of his career in Philadelphia," Frank said. "He won all four."

In his last fight on Feb. 25, 1954, he outpointed Jimmy Champagne.

It was the end of a long haul since his first pro fight on March 16, 1943, when he knocked out Al White. Over the years, other well-known opponents included Bob Montgomery, Beau Jack, Sandy Sadler and Ike Williams.

How did Frank feel watching his father in the ring?

"He was amazing," he said. "But I was scared."

Eddie was inducted into the Pennsylvania Boxing Hall of Fame and the Italian-American Sports Hall of Fame.

Besides his wife and son, he is survived by another son, Ed Giosa Jr.; two daughters, Jerri Seitchik and Rita Marie Taylor; a sister and two brothers; 11 grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.

Services: Funeral Mass 9:30 a.m. tomorrow at Epiphany of Our Lord Church, 11th and Jackson streets. Friends may call at 7 tonight at the Vincent Gangemi Funeral Home, Broad and Wolf streets. *