In one of my previous posts I mentioned a pro wrestling match between American wrestler of German descent called E. Roeber and Olsen 'The Big Dane' for the 'Worlds Greco-Roman Heavyweight Championship' which happened in NYC in March 1900. Yes, that match was officially sanctioned by the National Police Gazette of NYC, and the winner was recognized by that pro sports promoting newspaper the world champion wrestler. I am glad to share with everyone couple of match reports which appeared in local American newspapers. That match remained somewhat 'controversial' in opinion of many fans and journalists for its 'unprecedented finish' the victory was awarded not a clean back fall but based on the unable to continue conditions of one of the two wrestlers. And some newspapers even 'dramatized' the actual finish of the match, tried to make it appear as 'deliberately brutal', and made the Danish pro wrestler look like a complete "villain" not a sportsman at all, who enjoyed 'intentionally hurting and choking his opponent to death', and made Roeber an "innocent victim" of the dirty techniques of the barbarian Viking. All these sounds very familiar, is not it? There are plenty of such "rhetoric" reports available online and on various digitized newspaper archives. I tried to find some another kind of reports though, I would call them "less emotional" and more "down to earth", which describe an actual match without "fantasizing about it" and what and how it all has happened.
Enjoy the read my friends.
Wow, would LOVE TO WATCH THIS!!!
Rather confusingly the article tells us Olsen is from Copenhagen but refers to him as"the Swede"
Notably, another match on the same card featured famous George Bothner, who was considered the most scientific catch wrestler, and overall the best pound for pound catch wrestler of his generation in the United States.
What I personally find very interesting, is that on the same day, on the same card with the main event in which the world Greco title was at stake, they also had some antique vintage for the 1900s pro wrestling event - the collar and elbow wrestling match! This ancient pro wrestling sport started losing its popularity in the late 1880s and in the 1890s was replaced by Greco and Catch as the main pro wrestling styles in the United States.