Ed Franco Edmondo Guido Armando Franco or Ed Franco ( April 24 , 1915 - November 18 , 1992 ) was a professional American football player . He earned fame as one of the legendary Seven Blocks of Granite and played professionally for the Boston Yanks . He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1980 . Early life . Ed Franco was the youngest of nine children born to Italian immigrants , Nicola and Filomena Franco , on Christopher Street , in New York City . The family later moved to Jersey City , New Jersey , where Franco began to display his extraordinary athletic ability . He earned All - State honors at William L . Dickinson High School as both guard for the football team and catcher for baseball . Seven Blocks of Granite college football fame . After high school , Ed " Devil Doll " Franco attended Fordham University where he was elected president of his freshman class . He played guard and tackle for the legendary " Seven Blocks of Granite , " coached by the " Sleepy " Jim Crowley , one of the famed Four Horsemen of Notre Dame . The , Franco was voted as a consensus All - American for both positions following the 1937 and 1938 seasons , only one of two Fordham players ever named consensus All - American . He played alongside the famous Vince Lombardi , the right guard for the Blocks of Granite . In 1935 the Rams posted a 6 - 1 - 2 record with five shutouts . The 1936 squad lost only one game , the season finale to New York University . The Blocks saw their peak in 1937 with 8 wins , no losses , and no ties . Franco served as captain of the East team in the 1938 East - West Shrine Game . Professional football career and after . Franco had a brief professional career : He was a 5th round selection ( 31st overall ) of the Cleveland Rams in the 1938 NFL Draft , but didn ' t stay with the team . On December 9 , 1939 , Franco married his sweetheart Anna May McGinley , a nursing student at Bayonne Nursing School . Franco decided not to continue his professional career , however , since at that time football paid little . Franco returned to Fordham as a line coach for six years , where he helped the Rams gain a Cotton Bowl Classic bid in 1941 and a Sugar Bowl bid in 1942 . In 1944 Franco returned to the NFL and won the starting tackle job in his first game as a member of the Boston Yanks . He coached a the American Association Jersey City Giants . Franco worked as the eastern scout for the Green Bay Packers and the Washington Redskins along with coach and close friend Lombardi . Franco later owned several successful businesses in Jersey City and Secaucus and worked for the Meadowlands Racetrack . He died on November 18 , 1992 at the age of 77 . He was survived by his three children , Margaret , Ned , and Rosemary , six grandchildren , and seven great - grandchildren . Honors . In 1980 , Ed Franco was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame . That same year , Franco a Jersey City baseball park was dedicated in his name ; the park is still in use today . On October 24 , 2008 , Fordham University honored the memory of its legendary defensive line by dedicating a monument on its Rose Hill campus . The monumentmade of seven blocks of granite stonestands by the entrance to Jack Coffey Field .