Freddie Steele was a boxer and film actor born Frederick Earle Burgett in Seattle, Washington

Seattle, Washington

Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...

. He was recognized as middleweight champion of the world between 1936 and 1938. Steele was nicknamed "The Tacoma Assassin" and was trained by Jack Connor, Johnny Babnick, and Ray Arcel

Ray Arcel

Ray Arcel was a boxing trainer who was active from the 1920s through the 1980s. He trained eighteen world champions....

, while in New York. He also appeared as an actor in a number of Hollywood films in the 1940s, including Preston Sturges's

Preston Sturges

Preston Sturges , originally Edmund Preston Biden, was a celebrated playwright, screenwriter and film director born in Chicago, Illinois...

 Hail the Conquering Hero

Hail the Conquering Hero

Hail the Conquering Hero is a satirical comedy/drama written and directed by Preston Sturges, starring Eddie Bracken, Ella Raines and William Demarest, and featuring Raymond Walburn, Franklin Pangborn, Elizabeth Patterson and Bill Edwards....

.
A good boxer and a hard hitter, Steele lost only two fights during his first ten years in the ring.