National Football Foundation

Earl Galdeira began his long athletic career as a multiple-sport letterman at Kamehameha in Hawaii, where he graduated from in 1945. He then joined the Army and played service ball. Galdeira was a supervisor at Hawaiian Telephone, where he worked for 42 years before retirement. The passion of the former Kamehameha running back was football officiating. Galdeira worked high school, college and World Football League games, and used to say that referees had to be rulebook lawyers in split-second situations.

One of his career moments came in 1976 when the Big Eight Conference called him to work with a crew on the Hawaii-Nebraska game. Galdeira was the first local official to work a Mainland postseason game, the East-West Shrine Game, and the Japan Bowl.

Earl Galdeira refereed hundreds of football games, including 28 consecutive Hula Bowls and college games on the mainland and in Japan. The Hula Bowl held a place in his heart, as Galdeira worked his way up from a locker room attendant in the early 1950s to a game official. Later Galdeira became the bowl's player relations director and ambassador. He died in 2006 at the age of 79.