Calling, Hack, Anglo, Ron, Gernot, Ost, Adrian, Saxon.

Hi Hack. I think we can all be given a pass for believing in 'it' at an early age. The war was far from a distant memory and from a young age what would you see on the television or at the cinema? Charlie Chaplin and Norman Wisdom yes, but more likely it would be war films and cowboy films and a whole lot of cowboy t.v. We knew that John Wayne, Gary Cooper and Randolph Scott were actors, but we also knew that the Wild West had existed (albeit briefly) and stories about the war were as far away as asking your parents or uncles or aunts about their experiences between '39 and '45. Boxing, both amateur and professional were constantly be screened on t.v. and most youngsters would be aware of a boxing, wrestling or judo club in their area. Often on t.v. a local club would be visited and we youngsters were exposed to guys fighting each other, so when we happened across an I.T.V. wrestling broadcast, which was presented in a serious manner, with a well dressed M.C., a referee and seconds, we naturally thought we were watching a legitimate sport. The T.V. times didn't have 'watch this afternoons professional wrestlers go through their paces, as they act out a series of confrontations' Unless an adult, one we thought could be believed, then 'it' was a competitive sport, just like The Harlem Globetrotters were a legitimate basketball team!

When we were older and wiser, to still follow it, to admit to your peers that you enjoyed it, to maybe feel a little embarrassed when buying a wrestling magazine, to tell work colleagues that you attended last nights show, well that was a different matter!

My Dad didn't mind me watching the wrestling and he took me to the shows when I was young. By the time I was 12 or 13, most of my pals had stopped watching and then it became a bit of a joke as to why I continued.

I did the usual thing of saying "well the title matches are real, no one would lose a title match on purpose", but deep down I knew it was all a con.

When my kids were young, they watched WWF (as it was at the time) and I watched with them, but my better half would just shake her head, she hated it, because she couldn't see past the fact that it was fake.

I only really watch the odd old match on Youtube these days and find the "behind the scenes" stuff, in the books and autobiographies much more interesting, same as Anglo was saying.

The "industry" or the "business", is of great interest. How you got into it, who invited you in, where you learned your craft, the funny stories, how it changed your life, making celebrities of some, and opening other doors.

Just why some good topics/questions disappear without much attention is a bit of a mystery John. Often I think it's a question of timing as some topics can quickly disappear and enter the graveyard of page 2.

Like many I found little shared enthusiasm for my interest in wrestling, other than Aunt Ella. She was mad keen, but then I have to admit that even as a twelve year old I found at Aunt Ella a little eccentric.

Mum humoured my interest and was happy to let me get on with it. Other family members would keenly share their inside knowledge of the business, not that any had any inside knowledge, or even outside knowledge. Dad did take me to the wrestling (and so did mum when dad went out one day and didn't come back). He seemed happy enough to go and enjoyed himself, especially when he continuously told me it wasn't as good as it used to be, when he went to Belle Vue after the war and in the 1950s. Uncle George knew everything about wrestling (and none of it was good) but then Uncle George knew everything about everything. My brother, sixteen years my elder, was very dismissive, and is still bemused at my continued interest over fifty years later. Miss Buck, the headmistress at junior school, who must have been nearing 100, was another who seemed to delight in telling me it wasn't real when I enthusiastically reported my nights at the wrestling. But then she didn't watch Coronation Street - in fact she even had an old television without a tuner so she only had BBC tv and not the new ITV.

When I started watching wrestling in the 80s my parents would laugh, and say, "this is all rubbish, not like the wrestling we saw in the 60s & 70s, that was real wrestling"

But if we were also watching with my grandparents, they would laugh and say, "no that stuff in the 60s & 70s was rubbish too, not like the wrestling we saw in the 30s, that was real wrestling".

For me, Ron encapsulated what many people would have said.

I was the same.

I agree with Dave that a lot of the attraction was the atmosphere.

Also that this appeared hi-risk and, even if a work, anything could go wrong or flare up at a live show.

But the question is not about my interest.

Most non-fans and knockers are very short-sighted and cannot get past the "it's-all-fixed" stage. It is a beautiful and spontaneous art form to discuss amongst wiser heads on here.

It was very difficult being a wrestling fan amongst these all-knowing non-fans. People who take themselves so very seriously in many cases. Quick to identify the wrestling fan as a crackpot.

Yet the same people, on a Monday morning, were often bubbling with wide-eyed excitement at what they had seen on WoS two days before.

Like most of us here I had realised early on that all was not what it seemed. You only needed to watch live twenty bouts or the same wrestler (McManus, Kwango, Syd in my case) three of four times and the routines jumped out at you. The fascination for me from an early age was not any competitive element - that's why I am the poorest contributor to results listings of shows I attended. I drove poor Ray nuts with my vagueness. No, my interest was and remains strongly to this day, just how they did it. How it was managed nationally, how the logistics worked (always fascinated to see who arrived together), and how the in-ring performances were co-ordinated.

From these points of view I suppose I became a bit of a boorish Knower. I watched ringside seaters taking it all so seriously, sometimes going to the apron to get involved. I suppose I thought they were the crackpots but realised they added enormous input to the atmosphere.

But I would see the same much older fans, after the bout or in the bar later on, smiling and laughing about the very bouts that had enraged them, and this made me realise they too were just getting involved pantomime-style in a way I was too inhibited to emulate.

This goes some way, John, to try to explain a few of the many levels of interest that went through my mind. There were more. The complexities of it all were far too sophisticated for me ever really to have a witty one-off rebuttal to those who kindly informed me that it was all fixed.

Yes, I felt uncomfortable at times. Certainly outnumbered. But I just avoided the flak or any great discussion with the heathens and got on purposefully with my interest. I looked down on them as too limited to understand what was really going on.

At other times, not often, I also questioned my own sanity.

There were reassurances of wrestling's validity as long as large crowds attended, it remained on tv, and imposing MCs wore bow ties and black suits to make it all so important.

However, when the Big Daddy show started I grew a pair of donkey ears like Pinocchio did and tried to remain graceful in pulling stumps and moving on to other interests.

but back in the day when they thought in the arenas with crowds calling for blood and nearly always ended in death.... many offs old types miss the atmosphere of those day and smell of blood after good afternoon.

used to be great fun when the Virgins of Gaul came out and did their dancing. the lads and I used to wager which one was not a virgin

Hi John , Most people said to me " You know it's all fixed"

A few would then say "How can you watch it knowing it's fixed"

Or "You can see it was not a real punch or drop kick"

I always argued that some of it was real and I chose my shows to attend based on what I thought was the right bill.

I fell for it . It was all a work. But today it makes no difference.

It was a hard game played by the hardest of men and I admired the hard knocks that they took. The inner workings of the industry are fascinating. That's enough for me. Always was.