Between us hardened Heritage Members, we've all been to thousands of live wrestling presentations.
Most casual fans' experiences were wholly restricted to what they saw in the squared circle on the small screen.
So my question is: what were the very special aspects of attending a live show that were in no way conveyed on tv?
My own memories of Masambula or Nagasaki appearing from the dressing rooms and parading between the fans in all their regalia still excite me today. McManus bounced, all focus. Kellett swayed and swaggered as if on a Sunday afternoon stroll after a wholesome lunch. Alan Garfield took an eternity, exchanging witty insults with the spectators. Tibor, shyly, seemed to loathe every step to the ring. Torontos waved to acknowledge plaudits ... that nobody was giving him.
I have limited myself to ringwalks.
What are your special memories of live wrestling, as opposed to tv?
Another aspect of live events is that because it requires an effort and because you are paying to attend it tends to be more memorable
The grannies with their handbags that were full of weapons.......and the deadly hat pin..........
What did you like about the smaller venues, Peter?
Then as now live is better in a smaller venue.The large venues are fine if you are near the ring but at the Royal Albert Hall you sometimes need binoculars.
It was all about the whole sensory experience, taking everything in and not just the narrowly focused bit you saw on tv. It was about waiting for the ring light to be switched on, looking around the hall, seeing what other fans were up to, the sometimes unexpected antics of a wrestler as he came towards the rings, and for the baddies their encounters with the fans enroute, the interaction of wrestlers with individuals in the audience, the brightness of the ring lights, the sometimes overly long wait for the wrestlers to appear, a 360 degree experience. The noise, the comments from the fans, the occasional quiet moment followed by a crescendo, going home hoarse ....
Very much like being at a live football match as opposed to watching the game at home or in the pub on TV; you were in among the crowd who were generally feeling the same way as you and cheering the same wrestler of tag-team and your emotions would frequently get the better of you. Once that you sampled the live experience televised wrestling was secondary.
For me I remember the lighting , it made such an effect of stardom. Also the intensity of the crowd as the wrestlers drew heat. After seeing wrestlers on Tv , when I got to see them in the flesh it was almost as though I knew them. The really small ones were very small , McManus , Pallo , did not quite notice it with Dennison or Heath though and they were small. A lot of the lightweights were small. As soon as you got a bit bigger they seemed really big men. People like Logan and Ginsberg , Joynson , Arras and yet wrestlers like Rocky Wall , Gwyn Davies , were real big men. You could gauge them so much better than on TV.. Wrestling had a bad habit of miss matching weights. But of course there was no weigh in. The show was well presented , very professional entertainment and a good night . As a loyal fan I was a hard task master , if I did not like the bill , I would not go. To this day I refuse to say who I did not like as I know now that they were all craftsmen and deserve to be remembered. I never took a blind bit of notice about quality of seating. If the show was good , I did not care. The biggest pain was pillars when the halls were full. Early Belle Vue was bad on this then the crowds dropped off. Also suffered this at Buxton. Strange that I should always remember Jim Moran's Gargantua and Don Vines dirty tactics. Streiger yes , but these two also left their mark.
I remember watching live wrestling with my Dad, at the local hall. The whole experience was completely different to the action on tv. It was great seeing the ring, the anticipation of the different bouts and wrestlers. The atmosphere from the fans, And just seeing live wrestling was fantastic.
Early days Mal Kirk, pre-shaven head, was frightening as he walked past you. Adrian Street stood in his corner, robe still on, staring out into the crowd, and the longer he did it, the louder the cat-calls got. The noise was something hard to replicate on TV.
The "violence" for want of a better word, when the villain tried to get past the ref and kick a downed opponent, seemed quite shocking when you were sat close to the ring.
Silly things, like between rounds, when he was one fall down, due to nefarious, villainous tactics of his opponent, Johnny Kwango would grab his towel, from the corner man, hold each end, stretch it out, and then start rubbing it across his forehead, as if it to signal he was getting the head-butt ready. All the young kids in the audience, and probably a lot of adults, would shout, "yes!" and start cheering. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, just writing it, now.
The heartache (again, as a young lad) when you were so caught up in a match, that you thought the good guy really was going to beat McManus, only to have your hopes crushed, when the inevitable happened. Followed usually by a clean fought contest, with Mick McMichael, or someone like that, with lots of handshaking after every escape and counter, to send us out for the late bus, with a sense of calm.
So Many of these Type of Memories ANGLO!!
Right Away Springs to Mind- the Ring Entrance of QUASIMODO-The Hunch Neck of
NOTRE DAME!-To This Day I Can STILL Hear That Hideous Ringing of His Hand-Held
Cloches!!-Eerie and Chilling!!
I Always had a Chair in The Stage Chute at KING GEORGE'S HALL- BLACKBURN-and I
Immediately Recall My Neck Hairs Bristling as a Very Menacing Early MAL KIRK Walked
Inches By My Chair Looking Highly Menacing!!
Then There's The Swagger and Arrogant Walk to The Ring Of The Fabulous HELLS
ANGELS at The Closely Packed PARR HALL in WARRINGTON-You Could SMELL Their
Deodorant!!
The Cacophany of Stamping Feet On The Wooden Floors of My Beloved KINGS HALL-
BELLE VUE When The Crowd Were More Than 'Displeased'!!
The 'Tradition' of Wrestlers at WRYTON STADIUM-BOLTON- of Watching The Bouts
They were not in Themselves from The Dressing Room Door or Around the Walls of
This Former Cinema!!-I Remember Standing Next to TERRY O'NEILL there Back in
The 1960's and We were So Engrossed in The Bout-I Forgot to get his Autograph!!
He WASN'T On The Bill!!
And of course COUNT BARTELLI After Another Loss Grabbing The MIke and Demanding
A 'Fight to The Finish' against a 'Slowly' Returning to The Dressing Room KENDO
NAGASAKI!!
And Not Forgetting The Strong Pungent Smell of Blood and Sweat ALWAYS Pervading
the Air at LIVERPOOL STADIUM- A Proper Fighting Arena!!
MAIN MASK
At St James I never really took notice of the ringwalks, it was the stepping into the ring under the lights. Wrestling took on a new excitement miles away from the grey flickering spectacle we watched on TV. We had colour not only on the trunks and robes, slaps, chops etc left their marks which showed up under the lights.
The City Hall I preferred to sit on the stage which you accessed via stage doors to each side of the stage, these were the same doors that the wrestlers used to enter the hall. Coming back from the gents between bouts you occasionally bumped into a wrestler heading to the ring, I ended up face to face with Kendo and Steve Logan returning to my seat on different occasions. Although the atmosphere wasn't the same as St James they still drew respectable crowds of around 2000 and the crowd especially where we sat could be very vocal and animated and that along with the banter definitely added to the enjoyment. Those things were not attainable on TV either in grainy black and white or colour.