1. Guglielmo Papaleo was an American professional boxer, better known as Willie Pep, who held the World Featherweight championship twice between the years of 1942 and 1950.
47 Facts About Willie Pep
1. 2.
Willie Pep was voted as the No 1 featherweight of the 20th century by the Associated Press and ranked the No 1 featherweight of all time by the International Boxing Research Organization in 2005.
3.
Willie Pep is currently ranked by BoxRec as the 28th greatest pound-for-pound fighter of all time.
4.
Willie Pep worked as a shoeshine boy in downtown Hartford alongside Johnny Duke.
5.
Willie Pep was earning more in one night of fighting each week.
6.
In 1938 Willie Pep fought Sugar Ray Robinson in the attic of a feed store in Norwich, Connecticut.
7.
Willie Pep started boxing professionally on July 10,1940, beating James McGovern by a decision in four rounds in Hartford, Connecticut.
8.
Willie Pep was undefeated during that span and for fight number 26, he finally headed west, beating Eddie Flores by a knockout in the first round at Thompsonville, Michigan.
9.
Willie Pep beat Archibald by a decision in ten rounds and, in his next bout, challenged Abe Denner for the New England-area featherweight title.
10.
Willie Pep won the fight by a decision in 12, and his status among the world's top featherweights continued to climb.
11.
Willie Pep became the World Featherweight Champion by outpointing the defending world champ Chalky Wright over the 15 round distance.
12.
Willie Pep fought twice more to finish the year, winning both by knockout.
13.
Ten days later, Willie Pep was back in the ring, beating Bobby McIntyre by a decision.
14.
Willie Pep closed 1943 winning five fights in a row, including two over future world champion Sal Bartolo and one over Jackie Wilson.
15.
Willie Pep won all 16 of his bouts that year, including wins over bantamweight champions Willie Joyce and Manuel Ortiz.
16.
Willie Pep fought and beat Wright two more times, with Pep's featherweight title on the line once.
17.
Willie Pep made his first fight abroad, beating fringe contender Jackie Lemus in Canada.
18.
Willie Pep had eight fights in 1945, winning seven and drawing one.
19.
Willie Pep beat former world champion Phil Terranova to retain the title, and had a ten-round draw with Jimmy McAllister.
20.
In 1946, Willie Pep had 18 fights, and won all of them, including a 12-round knockout of Bartolo and a three-round knockout of Wright.
21.
Willie Pep had a six-fight knockout win streak during a span that year.
22.
Willie Pep defended the world featherweight belt once that year, knocking out Jock Leslie in twelve rounds at Flint, Michigan.
23.
Willie Pep retained the title by beating Humberto Sierra by a knockout in 10 and he beat former world champion Paddy DeMarco, in ten, but by decision.
24.
Willie Pep finished that year beating former bantamweight champion Harold Dade by a decision in ten at St Louis.
25.
Willie Pep lost his World Featherweight Championship to Saddler, being unable to come out for the eighth round due to a separated shoulder suffered at the end of the seventh round.
26.
Willie Pep won eight bouts in a row to start the year, but his ninth bout, the last chapter of the rivalry with Saddler, was his most important bout that year.
27.
Willie Pep quit because blood from his right eye was bothering him.
28.
Willie Pep wouldn't make a fight of it and Sandy couldn't.
29.
Willie Pep was knocked out in six by Tommy Collins, but held two wins over Billy Lima that year.
30.
Willie Pep won all 11 fights in 1953, and entered 1954 on a 17-fight winning streak.
31.
Willie Pep ended up winning three more bouts before the end of the year.
32.
Willie Pep went on boxing for five more years, retiring in 1960, and then he came back in 1964 and boxed for two more years.
33.
Willie Pep boxed in Caracas, Venezuela, losing to Sonny Leon by a decision in 10, and in his last fight, in 1966, he lost to Calvin Woodland by a decision in six.
34.
Willie Pep had a record of 229 wins, 11 losses and one draw, with 65 wins by knockout.
35.
Willie Pep lost the lawsuit, the jury deliberating just 15 minutes.
36.
Willie Pep remained active in boxing after hanging up the gloves, serving as an inspector and referee.
37.
In 1977, Willie Pep was elected to the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame.
38.
In March 2006, Willie Pep resided at a nursing home in Connecticut, diagnosed with dementia pugilistica, before his death on November 23,2006.
39.
In 1945, Willie Pep was voted Fighter of the Year by The Ring magazine.
40.
Willie Pep was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in its inaugural year of 1990.
41.
Willie Pep was ranked sixth on Ring Magazine's list of the 80 Best Fighters of the Last 80 Years in 2002.
42.
Willie Pep was named the third greatest fighter of all time by Bert Sugar.
43.
Willie Pep was ranked 5th on ESPN's 50 Greatest Boxers Of All Time list in 2007.
44.
Willie Pep was voted as the Greatest Featherweight Ever by the Houston Boxing Hall Of Fame in 2014.
45.
In 2011, the city of Middletown, Connecticut constructed the Willie Pep Skatepark named in honor of Pep.
46.
In 2023, The Featherweight, a feature film based on Willie Pep's life, premiered at the 80th Venice International Film Festival.
47.
The "no-punch" winning round is disputed; several contemporary newspaper articles make no mention of it, and an account in The Minneapolis Star describes the third round as "toe to toe slugging with Willie Pep inflicting his best punishment with a right to the body".