These days some promotions have male versus female matches.Did this ever happen in the "Golden Era" ?
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Talk Wrestling
Share your memories of British wrestling 1930 - 1988
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Interesting that in 1938 Pro Wrestling was considered significant enough to warrant questions in Parliament
Also interesting that "Soapy Sam" Sir Samuel Hoare described the proposed match as an exhibition!
That's right James, in the Coventry Evening Telegraph. Didn't stop him having a lady second though.
Prince Barnu who was also a coulmnist for a Midland Evening Paper used to rail in the paper against mixed bouts.
On 3rd November, 1938, the Conservative Member of Parliament for Devon East, Gordon Hall-Paine told Parliament a match between a man and a woman had taken place in the London area on 25th October. He asked the Home Secretary, Samuel Hoare, if he planned to take any steps to prevent future occurrences of such events.
The Home Secretary reported that the exhibition had been cancelled as London County Council obtained in their General Powers Act of this Session a provision giving them powers of control over public wrestling. Furthermore, from 1st January, 1939, the powers to impose restrictions on wrestling would become permanent.
I remember Jane Porter (Klondyke Kate) as being a very friendly girl; quite the opposite of the character which she portrayed in the ring. She was a genuine fan attending each week at Hanley's Victoria Hall and it was Bobby Barron who introduced me to her and suggested her for some bouts. At the time Jack Cassidy's oldest daughter, Chris, was working as Klondyke Kate (later to become Hellcat Haggetty) and I recall Dave (Bobby) suggesting I bill her as either Big Bertha or Klondyke Jane. Basically she was a safe opponent for his wife Rita who was wrestling as Gypsy Sarah (and later became a Cherokee Indian). Without going into too much detail, I do recall that she possessed an interesting collection of magazines which she picked up in Germany.
There was also a secret intergender match on an Orig Williams show where Klondyke Kate worked under a mask to replace a male wrestler who hadn't shown up. As she recalled it, the crowd were none the wiser until they had to go to the finish early because the athletic tape they'd used for... architectural reasons... started to come loose.
In defence of "the People" in 1966 Pro Wrestling was still taken seriously enough to be regarded as a legit sport on a level with Pro Boxing.On this basis a man fighting a woman would seem quite degenerate(it does not happen in Pro Boxing).
In 2025 no newspaper would regard it as controversial because it is accepted as a pre determined exhibition were both competitors look after each other and in any case the woman usually wins
No better person to prove me wrong than Ron. I should have known though, because in our Nola Goldsmith tribute we reveal that Nola wrestled mixed sex matches even earlier than this,
"In December 1966 Nola hit the national press when that guardian of public morality, “The People” described her mixed sex match against the so-called African witch-doctor Nawamba as a sickening spectacle that pandered to the lowest instincts."
Mixed tag started in 1966 with Jack Taylor promoting. Here is a singles match from 1967
I have contributed previously about it happening surreptitiously on Brian Dixon's shows when he would promote Mitzi Mueller versus The Black Widow ("Romeo" Joe Critchley).
It certainly did Peter. Maybe not in the 1960s, though I might be wrong, as it was a struggle to find councils that allowed any female wrestling, but into the 1970s promoters including Jack Taylor and Ron Farrar would include male v female matches.