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http://kayfabememories.com/Stories/mickkarch/mk17.htm

When I was a teenager attending the TV studio matches at WTCN in
Minneapolis, one of the more recognizable faces on a weekly basis was
a gentleman not seen in the ring, but rather in the front row. His
name was Nick DeGidio, who lived in Northeast Minneapolis. Friends,
wrestlers, promoters and announcers knew him as "Grandpa Nick."

He was a mainstay, a fixture, at the weekly AWA tapings. For years and
years, Grandpa Nick would sit in the front row, boisterously cheering
for the babyfaces and booing the heels. You always got the sense that
Grandpa Nick knew exactly what the business was all about, but like so
many of our grandparents, he suspended his disbelief for that two
hours every Saturday afternoon.

Announcer Rodger Kent, in his audience warm-up prior to the tapings,
would tell the fans in attendance to take their lead from Grandpa
Nick, who Kent referred to as our "head cheerleader." Grandpa Nick
reveled in the attention and was a show in himself, with a booming
voice that belied his diminutive size. His favorite raspberry for the
heels was "DOWN THE RIVER!!!"

Grandpa Nick was the "holder of the tickets." The tickets for the
studio matches were free, but you had to write the station for them,
and quite often that meant a several week delay. But each and every
Saturday, myself and a friend or two would arrive at the studio a
couple hours prior to the taping and Grandpa Nick would have tickets
in hand for us.

That is, until one fateful afternoon when we rankled him. It was the
day that Ray Stevens faced Red Bastien in a singles match. As the
match neared its conclusion, Bastien was tossed from the ring, where
Nick Bockwinkel, seconding Stevens, ran Bastien into the ringpost.
Those of us in the Bockwinkel Brigade cheered Bock's action. Grandpa
Nick, in that aforementioned suspension of disbelief, was so furious
with us that he cut off our ticket supply for the next month! We
finally made amends and got back in Grandpa's good graces.

One Saturday afternoon, after one match had ended and the TV tapings
were in the midst of a commercial break, I looked over to Grandpa Nick
in the front row, and he was slumped over. A policeman and a first aid
attendant rushed to his side and took him from the studio. He was
taken by ambulance to a local hospital, having suffered an aortic
aneurism, a deadly rupture of one of his heart vessels. We visited him
in the hospital the next day, and it was apparent Grandpa would not
survive. We wished him well for the last time, as he died a day or so
later.

How ironic that old Grandpa Nick started to close down shop in the
same front row where he had been "head cheerleader" for all those many
years.

There will never be another like him, truly a wonderful memory from
those glorious kayfabe years.


--- Internet Rex 2.29