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Edited: Oct 31

Nooks and Crannies.........Lewes.................... Winshaw Promotions

I stopped and thought about this one. Is Lewes a Nook and Crannie.

Well for one it is not on the coast and Dale Martins had a huge number of Sussex Seaside towns in their charge.

And also thus far , I have not found Dales operating in Lewes.

When I covered Bexhill on Sea I presented some Winshaw Promotions bills and for sure many of the wrestlers were unknowns.

It was pretty much established that they were a Lewes based promotion and the only other town they seemed to be at was Seaford.

Lewes though , is the epicentre because the Winter family were living there and had a wrestling gym there. It was their venture. Johnny Winter and his younger brother Ricky are credited with being the Promoters , born 1940 and 1943 in Lewes and there were a few sisters too. But Dad John Eric Winter also a Lewes born man 1918 was the secretary , so who knows how many people were involved here. But that local gym no doubt brought through some more wrestlers , some who never made the jump to Joint Promotions.

A lot of these guys had jobs and wrestled as a side line , so fair to assume there was no pressure to wrestle every night.

I can't show all the bills so it's just a taste here. Click for larger image.

It's doubtful that with a ring as well, 350 people could cram into Lewes Town Hall , but for a period of maybe 1964 , Certainly 1965 to 1972 the venture worked. I know from the papers , in the end at the end of 1972 the gate was falling below 200 and that brought the finish.

But today Jason Winter is promoting wrestling at the very same place with a Winshaw Trophy. You will find him on the web.

So Lewes is a very special Nook and Crannie with this unique alternative wrestling with colourful characters in swathes.

The April 1965 bill might have been the first one to really target the public , they had done a show in a school prior to this. Its quite a collection of names to look at in depth. Maybe not to be taken too seriously. I mean "The Mysterons" , can you believe it. The Masked Bear. A Ghoul , and they liked tag wrestling as well.

I have gone through the bills 1965 to 1970 and listed the wrestlers. We get many people coming to Heritage with "My relative was a wrestler" , some times we have not heard of them.

This list might just help. Many of these not in the A-Z.

Part two will present these wrestlers , showing quite a big promotional effort with a few well known names thrown in.

8 comments

8 Comments

The Ost

Nov 06

This is not Lewes, or anywhere near it, but it is interesting to see Pallo use a few of the Winshaw guys in his promotion:

RON HISTORYO....Time Cop,

Nov 06

Replying to

Yes Ray Luxford for sure made it with Pallo and you would expect a few of them to master the trade as Wrestling in Lewes went on for a good many years. It was either Ray or a friend on his behalf that dropped me a line a few years back wanting copies of anything I had with Ray on.

If you were not an absolute top man it must be great to have bills where you are in the company of many of the best ever.

I say that with the cameo of , in my opinion , anyone who wrestled was a top man for even being out there in front of an audience. What an experience it must have been.

Hack

Nov 15

Replying to

Pallo put on some good shows. On paper at least (Anglo Italians experience is that reality was often different). But this is poorer than any Dale Martin bill. For them to have had either of the Borg twins in a main event would have had us crying out. He says this is a show you cannot see on TV. Never a truer word, thank goodness.

The Ost

Nov 06

Really neat stuff Ron. I have 3 handbills from the promotion:

RON HISTORYO....Time Cop,

Nov 06

Replying to

If you need the Lewes "set" drop me a line Steve and I can let you have it for the index that you look after and continue to build.

The Ost

Nov 06

Replying to

thanks Ron will email you

Anglo Italian

Oct 31

Painstakingly compiled list below, thanks Ron.

Don Cockle continues to fascinate me - was it Him?

Kinky and Killer in there too, and a very rare sighting of Iron Jaw.

Of the other names, haven't you got to love Roger Careless? Can you imaging the things the crowd shouted!

And I just wonder whether the 18-stone Spaniard El Toro was our good friend Jules Kiki?

Edited

RON HISTORYO....Time Cop,

Oct 31

WINSHAW PROMOTIONS

Con Aherne..... Cork

Ricky Allen..... Stepney

Jack Arkwright

Batmen

Al Bowley.... Lewes

Bertin Wulf..... Norway

Black Panther

Black Angels

Ronnie Boswell

Blewden Brothers .....North London..... George Blewden Islington

Barry Bridges ...Tonbridge

Micky Bourne ...Croydon

Dynamic Blues... Gravesend

Roy Barker

Doug Burgess ...Lewes

Allan del Blanco ...Canada

Tiger Bright

Don Cockle... Elephant and Castle

Jim Christian ...Liverpool

Roger Careless

Ron Coggins

Christoffi Bros

Bob Courage

Cheyenne... USA

Brian Carpenter

Duke Cordell .....Camberwell ....Nev Cordell Mayfair

Duke ....Brighton

Al Deblanco.... Canada

Johnny Dines ....Plumstead

Blue Diamonds.... Eastbourne

Diamond Hegarty ....(deaf and dumb)

Barry Delmont

Mike Didcote.... Woodgreen

Buck Davies ...Lewes

Dave Elphick.... Tonbridge

El Toro ....Spain

Johnny Falcon

Dave Gibson ....Bethnal green

King of Gorillas ....19stones

Dave Garnett

Ghoul

Dave Garnett ....Tonbridge

Little Garth

Tony Grant

Roy Howard

Tony Howard ....Gravesend

Ralph Henry.... Chatham + Tonbridge

Dave Hines

Paddy Hurley ....Cork

Bobby Isles.... Havant

Mel James ....Cardiff

Bob James ....Sittingbourne

Johnny Kincade

The Kid

Karl Kruger ....Lubeck Germany

Charlie Knight.... Devon

Colin Knight.... Redhill

Dave Kennedy

Killer Johnny Kowalski .....USA

Max King ....Havant

Sammy King ....Barbados

Roy L'vant ....Canada

Ray Luxford ....Brighton

Bobby Lawrence

Arne Levene

Francis La Goss

Danny Ladd

Ricky Lane

Frank Musako ....Poland

Rory McDowell

Butch Mason

Dave Mitchell ....Bethnal Green (real name Cyril Millham)

Mysterons

Jock McGilvery.... Dunfirmline

Masked Bear

Joe Murphy (iron Jaw)

Butch Mason

Mustapha Nasser.... Egypt

Brad Newby....Birmingham

Paul Nelson

Sean O'Jeary ....Galway

Mike Peters ....Aberystwyth

Danny Quinn ....Ireland

George Ruckman ....Brighton

Billy Ruck,.... Brighton

Vince Randell

Josef Szarbo ....Hungary

Roy Stewart ....Eastbourne (real name Roy Milnes)

Jeff Shirley ....Chatham + Eastbourne (real name Geoff Robinson)

Bob Steel ....Liverpool

Rod Steel ...Birmingham

Renato Sperrantio... Italy

Johnny Stilletto

Ed Seager... Halifax

Ski Hi Lee

Mike Sullivan

Spider

Tony Scarlo

Norman Taggart ....Reading + Sussex Farmer

Keith Urry.... Lewes +Southend

John Winter ....Lewes

Ricky Winter ....Lewes

Dennis Williams.... Uckfield

Keith Williams

Biff Watson ....Portsmouth

Reg Watson ....Burgess Hill

Graham Wallis ....Wigan

Wallis Bros ...Staines

Jay Walker... Australia

Nelson Ward... Bognor

Mo Yasdi ....Persia

Edited