Bob Rennie
Ross Milne
Nicole Phillips
Calen Knauf
The Astoria Boxing Club
A few days ago we shared this Grant Harder image, “Astoria Boxing Trophies“, with you as the Daily Flickr Pickr. Completely ignorant to the history of the Astoria and it’s connection to boxing, I asked what the deal was, and Dan Nickel answered…
“The Astoria Boxing Club was founded in 1977. Its home was in the basement of the historic Astoria Hotel at 769 East Hastings Street, when the pub owner, Louis Valente Sr., allowed the club to use the basement space as a gym.
Boxers from the Northwest Eagles Boxing Club joined the gym shortly after it began, with top-level amateurs, such as the Angelomatis brothers and the English champ Kevin Howard, leading the way. George Angelomatis and Jack Duke managed the gym. Duke, a probation officer, recruited troubled and underprivileged youth to join the club, some from the nearby Raymur Housing Projects, which were only two blocks from the gym. Many young men from the projects came eager to box, and from the very beginning the gym had several national champions.
Longtime club members, such as the Mitchell brothers, the Galler brothers (Randy Galler won the Championship in his first year at Nationals), Dale Walters, Manny Sobral, Jimmy Warral, and Geronimo Bie kept the gym in the spotlight for many years. Bie was a silver medalist in the Commonwealth Games, and during one year, the club had five National Champions at the same time.
In 1998, the club left the Hastings Street location and moved to the North Burnaby Inn, where it stayed until 2002, when renovations to the Inn forced a move. From there, the famous club moved to its current location at the Fraser Arms Hotel. To this day, a core group of young, hungry, and talented boxers are joined by George Angelomatis, Mike Vukelic, and Jason Noel, who together are building on the illustrious legacy of the Astoria Boxing Club.
taken from http://www.astoriaboxing.ca/history.html” – Dan
March 18th, 2010 at 12:41 pm
The Boxing gym is still under the Astoria, and regularly used. Cool stuff.
March 25th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
The Astoria Boxing Club was founded By Walter Boyce several years early and the road for fighters such as the Mitchell brothers, Gallers, Sobral, Bie and Warral was pved by The Boyce brothers, Wayne and Tommy who held and still hold records for KO’S and Golden gloves won in a year.
May 10th, 2010 at 7:34 am
Nice to see that someone around town remembers some of the history of this great boxing club i cant speak for prior to 1977 but i do remember Kevin Howard who went on to win 2 Canadian championships and was the first National champion from the Astoria after it moved to its new digs on Hastings.
September 7th, 2010 at 2:23 am
The ASTORIA BOXING CLUB is anteresting boxing story comprised of a number of parts, The first part begins in the Sixties when the BOYCE family split from the Hastings Boys Club boxing club
and set-up shop at the Astoria Hotel. tHe coaching was led by WALTER BOYCE, but in the early Seventies the coach was WAYNE BOYCE.
After the BOYCE involvement, came the renewed club with the North West Eagles connection
until George and Jack began a new run in 1977.
Like many others some of the boxers crossed over from other clubs. MANNY SOBRAL was a member of the SHAMROCK BOXING CLUB with coach BOB DECKER.
Some the fighters in the Sixties were Wayne Boyce, Glen Magee, Rick Fleck, Billy Taylor,
Clint Page and John Amos. Amos, Taylor and Boyce
were three of the 19 BC boxers that participated
in the 1968 Seattle Golden Gloves.