Julius La Rosa (born January 2, 1930) is an American pop singer, whose reputation as a respectful and crafty interpreter of traditional pop music is still overshadowed by his controversial on-the-air firing from Arthur Godfrey's radio show in 1953. La Rosa was born in Brooklyn, New York. He joined the United States Navy after finishing high school, becoming a radioman who sang informally. The young sailor's Navy buddies managed to promote him to Godfrey---at the time one of America's leading radio and television personalities, and himself a Naval Reserve officer, whom the Navy often accommodated as a nod to the good publicity he gave the service. Godfrey, for his part, was impressed by La Rosa's singing and had him flown to New York to appear on his television show, with Godfrey ending the spot by saying, "When Julie gets out of the Navy he'll come back to see us." It was, as La Rosa discovered soon enough, a bona-fide job offer.