Philip Kenyon I will start the ball rolling. I have a friend who in our younger days was very keen on having high powered motor bikes. We were always discussing the various manufacturers such as: Triumph BSA Norton etc. One day we came up with name of the Italian manufacturer MV Agusta, I said “John that’s it, instead of my real name of Phil Kenyon, I took the name of Mike Agusta. Some promoters would wrongly print as Mike Augusta. Duncan Phillip, this has endless possibilities. How about the following: Billy British Small Arms-the Reigate Redskin. Rocky Triumph and finally Hook Norton - the Midlands flying machine. I hope this is what you intended! Bernard Hughes Knowing the esteem that Lofty and Chris have for the masked men, it occurs to me that most of those under a bonnet generally took names from 3 different types. First you had the Executioner, Slayer Killer type of name; generally a frightening name. , then it was "The" something..like The Ghoul. Or you had a colour and a following noun e.g. Black Angel. Where in the western films the goodie always wore a white hat and the baddie wore the black one., look at all the Black Somethings and the White Somethings in the masked boys, the colour didn't help. Generally they all stretched the rules. I admit there were 1 or 2 outside this sphere i.e. Kendo -- to make people think that he was Japanese. Dr.Death could have easily have been called just "Death" Just musing, probably doesn't add anything to Phil's original post, but Phil you should know that promoters or printers often got names wrong. Anglo Italian Goldbelt was working as a stevedore in Elesmere Port before he started wrestling. He saw this wealthy Frenchman regularly sail by in his luxury yacht and was mesmerised. The yacht's name? Maxine. My other theory about Ellesmere Port wrestlers hasn't been corroborated (in fact I've been told it's wrong, but that won't stop me, will it, Bernard?) I just thought that Steve Viedor being from Ellesmere Port was just obviously where he got his name from - a stevedore. Doesn't aaaaanyone agree this is a fair theory? Is there a modern day US wrestler hamming up the monocled Brit bit and wrestling as Sir or Lord Dudley, or something with Dudley? Surely this is in recognition of Alan Garfield, real name Dudley? Nice topic Philip. Bill Smith I did read,in his book,that "Count" Bartelli got the Count part of his name from when he wrestled abroad and shouted to the ref to "count" for the pin fall.How he got Bartelli I dunno Beancounter Nice posting Anglo. In which case did the Elesmere Port middleweight Monty take his ring name from a swan paddling by? Your theory on Steve Veidor certainly rings a Bell. Bill Smith Great stuff beancounter.I imagine Bert used to drink down at "The Royal" John I think that some of the names of British wrestlers were taken from American wrestlers. I believe that there was an American wrestler called Black Jack Mulligan and his name started being used by British wrestler Larry Coulton. Giant Haystacks name came from the American wrestler Haystacks Calhoun. I am sure that other users of this site can think of a few more examples. Bill Smith Max Craptree's relative became Greg Valentine........Valentine was a top name American Heavyweight of around 19/20 stone. The British version was a little chap who wore white trunks . Ed Lock Steve Young (the son of Roy Bull Davis) took the name of Canadian wrestler Skull Murphy.The original Skull Murphy had used the name since the early 1950s. He was a star in America and Australia in the 1960s.I believe that Young began wrestling in the early 1980s and adopted the Canadian wrestler's name in that decade. The real Skull Murphy passed away in 1970.I'm sure that my good mate John Shelvey has some great memories of the primary Skull Murphy in Australia. Mad Mac I think we've previously touched on the strange case of Bernie Wright, who returned from Calgary as the mohawked "Bearcat" Wright, the original holder of the name having been a gentleman of colour who weighed in at about 20 stone... Dave Sutherland In an interwiew with "The People" some years ago Bartelli claimed that the name came from his frequent haranguing of the referee to "Count, count aa tell thee" which transformed itsself into his ring name. Anglo Italian We've had lots of topics over the years about wrestlers "borrowing" names from others, and one of mine was Masambula copying Max Bambula. The tragic Jim Wango seems also likely to have influenced Johnny Kwango. Haystacks, Hardboiled Haggetty, and others too seemingly influenced by 1967's Pictorial History of Wrestling. Gotch, too? Even in Dale's book there is a reference to Quasimodo which made me sit up. This Quasi was masked. But I felt Philip was after how wrestlers dreamt up their original names. Pallo was from his mother's side of the family, so a real name. D'Orazio I believe was his wife's name, but since there was a top fifties boxer called the same, that link is still up for debate. Jack Dempsey was another who seemed to take a leaf from the excitement of 1950s US boxing, as wrestling did across the board. Rocky Wall was no doubt influence by Marciano? John Elijah was apparently Elisha, and Elijah was a mistake. I'd love to know how Steve Logan got his name. (The original, of course). The Exorcist may have been influenced by a film. Names were rather restricting, in some cases. You couldn't really imagine Johnny Saint doing a heel turn, could you? Or the Mad Axeman being roared on by adoring fans.... Some of the best names were real: Street, Kincaid, Elrington. And a gold star for whoever dreamt up Leon Fortuna - a name which really was in tune with the sport and caught on immediately and became synonymous with wrestling. Years ago I had also surmised Elrington was a made up Spanglish word meaning "the ton in the ring" - but it transpires it was his real name. Philip Kenyon Another example can be found in the A-Z list, with Bob Bannister wrestling under the name of “Bob Retsinnab” from Hungary. If you hadn’t noticed it was just a trick of spelling his name backwards! Anglo Italian Reminds me then of Blackburn Roberts. His etymology seems too obvious to explain. The Stan Rylands - Bobby Ryan - Wtryton Promotions - Arthur Wright chain could do with unravelling. What about The Outlaw? And indeed all those injuns. Cowboy films were all the rage in the forties and set in the minds of sixties promoters (who hadn't noticed that youngsters were less interested in them). So The Outlaw came from the controversial Jane Russell film. Phil Kenyon Another name (Big Daddy) has just come up in the thread "Rise of the super heavyweights" by David Franklin, "They then changed his name to Big Daddy (a name taken from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, a play by Tennessee Williams, set in the "plantation home of Big Daddy Pollitt (played by Burl Ives), a wealthy cotton tycoon)." Ed Lock Did Ray Steel and Steve Casey intentionally adopt the names of former World Heavyweight Champions? Or perhaps promoters bestowed the familiar names upon Steel and Casey? British Heavyweight Champion Steel used the name (minus an "e") of legendary American wrestler Ray Steele (real name Peter Sauer). Steele (Sauer) was a superstar in the 1930s and 1940s. Steve Casey (real name Steve Hoy) was, of course, the son of wrestler Wild Angus. Casey replicated the name of Irish wrestler Steve "Crusher" Casey, another star of the 1930s and 1940s. Bernard Hughes Just re-reading through this old post. I meant to answer Bill when he put his quip up about Bert drinking at the Royal.(and forgot) I believe that Bert took his name from the royal blue mask that he wore when he first started. JN Lister: Here's a few more: Tony Walsh is his middle name and his mother's maiden name. ('Banger' is from Mark Rocco claiming Midlanders are a bunch of headbangers.) Giant Haystacks was adapted from US wrestler Haystacks Calhoun. Mark Hussey took Rocco from his great grandfather and Rollerball from the film of the same name. Klondyke Kate was both a play on the Klondike brother wrestlers and was also the nickname of a famous early 20th century singer in the Yukon who was the subject of a 1974 Suzi Quatro song. Johnny Kidd's name came from Max Crabtree and he's unsure if it was taken from the Pirates singer or was inspired by George Kidd. Sweet Saraya misheard the name of the band Slayer in a rock club! Steve Green was renamed Grey to avoid confusion with Roger Green, though for a brief period he started as Stanley Grey to avoid confusion with other Steves. Malcolm Clifton dropped his surname and used his middle name to become Mal Stuart, but ring announcers kept calling him Mel Stuart by mistake and it stuck. Darren Matthews took Steve Regal from a US wrestler. He was briefly Roy Regal for Dale Martin and later William Regal for WWE, in both cases under the "too many Steves" rule. On a related note, Mel Stuart told me he'd sign so many autographs with his ring name that he'd find himself accidentally signing legal documents like his mortgage application as Stuart rather than Clifton. He also remembered that he got so used to his dual identity that he didn't think of it as unusual until his young daughter asked why she had a different surname to him! Eddie Rose Harry Green of Crewe became Jack Lang. Jim Hart of Manchester became Terry Downs ; there were already professional wrestlers with those names. Jack Atherton billed me as WAT TYLER without consulting me for about 2 years: it was a history name he liked, but he paid well. He also billed me at different time as Eric Muiller of West Berlin ("Keep your mouth shut in the ring!) and The Mask. Le Masque, Le Diable Rouge (later Les Diables Rouges in tandem with Pete Lindberg and then Ian Wilson). No wonder some wrestlers had split personalities! Don't forget Kennet Earsla alias the Kangeroo Kid from New Mills in Derbyshire! We could go on all night...... Graham Brook I used to get my posters from a printing firm called Bailey's who worked out of a little village called Somercotes. They rarely made spelling errors and would usually print a run of around fifty posters for a show. i remember one of their girls on reception once telling me an amusing story of when they had to throw away a whole print run of posters for Wryton due to a spelling error to which they felt they just couldn't turn a blind eye. This involved Count Bartelli. Incidentally, I do have a poster from a Wryton show at their Bolton stadium printed by Bailey's which boasts the billtopper of Hans Streiger versus Billy Two Rives. mikey370 Reading from an earlier post in this thread, it was mentioned that Steve Young took the name of Skull Murphy. I used to go out with a girl who had in turn courted the said Steve Young but she told me his real name was Peter Northey (not sure how surname is spelt). Also i was often curious how the Royal Brothers were Bert Royal and Vic Faulkner and wasnt there dad called Vic Hessell - please correct me if i am wrong regards their fathers name but i think thats what they used to say he was called. David Mantell Yes, that's the correct spelling. His dad Roy Bull Davies was Charles Northey to the taxman. Murphy became Skull after losing a hair vs hair match, but his new character, like (Giant) Haystacks (Calhoun), was a Brian Dixon W(W)WF tribute - in this case to the original Joseph "Skull" Murphy of Capitol Wrestling/WWWF in the 1960s. I believe the UK version of Skull played the ghost of the American original in a stage play about a decade ago. SaxonWolf Didn't Rocco once claim he was a stuntman in the film, Rollerball, and that is why he picked up the name?

Winners and Losers Another gem almost lost when we closed the old forum. New members can add their opinions whilst the original contributors may like to add more. Andy I have often wondered about whose idea it was to have a wrestler have either 'unbeaten' records or long winning runs. Kendo, for example - would this have been the promoters building him up? Or Kendo refusing to lose? On tv at least he did not lose very often, like Mick McManus. The tv bouts Les Kellett had, or at least the ones I have seen, usually resulted in Kellett wins { i am not knocking him by the way}.Other guys such as Sid Cooper {one of the great workers for me} often lost, especially to the new, younger guys such as Danny Collins. I would love to know of any stories where a wrestler would refuse to lose to certain opponents{ i know about the Pallo/ McManus feud}. Cooper often seemed to lose when I saw him wrestle live. Also, how did certain guys like Brian Maxine hold a title for so long? Again, is this the promoters or the wrestler? Marty Jones traded titles regularly with Rocco and Dave Finlay. I admire all these guys, I am just curious as to how it was all worked out? There were also young title holders such as Dynamite Kid and Danny Collins. How would the seasoned pros have felt about this? Guys such as Peter Kaye who i don't recall ever holding a title{ although i could be wrong} yet he would be one of the regular opponents for these guys to beat. Anglo Italian Nice new topic, at the very heart of pro wrestling.There will be lots of answers and examples but there is no set rule how it all happened as there were so many different circumstances.The aged bill-toppers had to win regularly otherwise they would look over the hill. Masked men had to win, well, not lose, otherwise they unmasked and their run was over. Basically, the decisions were made in accordance with what was best for the business. I think the most striking winning streaks were of precious imported talent in the shape of Ricki Starr and Billy Two Rivers. But yes, Andy, the winners were rather obvious, what about all those losers, Often wrestlers who could actually win. You mention Sid Cooper, he always came across to me as an over-the-top villain, not 100% believable, and a very very light worker, ie didn't hit or hold hard. But when he was on the BBC documentary training with Rip, he was a different kettle of fish and hit very hard. But he always seemed to lose in the years I went wrestling, even to the likes of Bily Torontos.Just goes to show that we fans may still be intrigued by some results but to seasoned pros, these didn't really matter much, it was all about regular and safe paid work with as little travelling to worry about as possible. Finally, I can't help smiling at this new myth that seems to have taken on widespread belief since Timeshift, based on a not quite accurate comment from someone on the show and the visual evidence of a great scrap, that the McManus v Pallo bout or bouts were not pre-arranged. That this idea has gained widespread belief in the last fortnight is just further credit to wrestling as a whole and those two wrestlers in particular. Hack Yabadabadoo! What a question. You do realise, Andy, that if anyone answers your questions Wrestling Heritage would just disappear in a puff of smoke because all of wrestling's great mysteries would have been solved in one go. I think the one thing we can say with some certainty is that unbeaten runs were at the whim of the promoter. Certainly, where Joint Promotions were concerned they had a tight control over every aspect of the business. Wrestlers won or lost at their discretion. If a wrestler didn't comply they didn't work for them - even the likes of Bert Assirati and Billy Robinson were not indispensible.That, of course, does not start to answer the complexity of the question you have posed. Nagasaki, for instance. Evidence suggests Nagasaki was a very skilfull, hard wrestler who deserved the recognition and status he received. But why was he nominated for stardom right from his 1964 debut? A novice youngster given a push from the start. Jim Hussey, Francis Sullivan, Yuri Borienko, Earl Maynard, Bruno Elrington; all going down to him within the first six weeks of his career. Why? Maybe he did display all the signs of a money maker for the promoters right from day 1, and they saw him as a sure fire investment. But then they could have put a mask and an odd costume on someone already proven who they knew they could trust. It was certainly the promoters decision; the mystery is why?Then there is the question of the unbeaten run. Why would hardened, veteran professionals go down to a youngster night after night? Just because they were veteran professionals no doubt. You'll have gathered by now Andy I'm in no position to actually answer your question. McManus we can see as a different kettle of fish (help for those whose English is not their first language). McManus paid his dues over many years, was a dedicated company professional who worked his way up to become a Director of the company. He was the man who made the matches, and the man who decided the result (except where Peter Preston was concerned). Championships were another matter. Until the 1970s champions were credible, and seemingly the best men in the division. Stories that Eric Taylor held his title for so long because he wouldn't let anyone else have it, or Marino because others respected him so much, seem feasible. It does seem a bit more than just believable that following a long period of inactivity Ernie Riley's light heavyweight belt was allowed only around the waist of the previously retired Billy Joyce because that was the only way Riley would bring his belt out of mothballs. As good professionals, of course, Jack Dempsey and Billy Joyce did loan their belts from time to time. I was a fan of Maxine, but how he became a double champion mystified me at the time, and still does. To me his longevity as a champion says more about the standard of challengers, and weakness of 1980s promoters, than the quality of Maxine as a champion. Talking of champions. What about George Kidd? Why was he champion for so long? Skilfull? Definiteley. Unique? Yes. But was he only as good as his opponent allowed? I reckon so. Maybe it would have been professional suicide to have destroyed George's myth. Kellett's an interesting one. A great friend of Norman Morrell. Brought up in northern rings. In later years an adopted southerner of Dale Martin land. And we all know about the animosity between Morrell's and Dales. Another example of how business ruled politics in wrestling. See what you've got started Andy. Andy Thanks guys for your responses. Yes, I see what you mean about wrestlings mysteries! I find it interesting that in the 70s Kendo beat both Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks { how many others can say that in solo matches?} I know Kendo was a strong man in his own right but interesting that both big guys had to go down to him. Sid Cooper was a regular on the bills I saw live in the late 70s and early 80s and although I saw him wrestle other greats such as Steve Grey, John Naylor, Ironfist ...I also saw him lose to then newcomers such as Danny Collins, Ian McGregor and Greg Valentine. So maybe this just shows Sid as a great worker, giving a leg up the ladder to new talent. I have always suspected that some seasoned pros must have hated doing this and maybe even refused, although I have no proof of this. I certainly dont remember Kendo losing to newcomers in this fashion. Slighty off topic, one week at my local venue, the main event was Kendo vs Haystacks. This was billed as the FIRST EVER MEETING!!! Clearly a lie. Anyway, a packed house witnessed Kendo come to the ring accompanied by Blondie Barratt while Haystacks came alone. Kendo had mistakenly thought it was a tag match and refused to face Haystacks alone, so an unknown young wrestler came to partner Haystacks {I think his name was Eddie something} Needless to say, he recieved quite a battering and this was the ONLY time I ever heard the fans cheer for Haystacks { although Kendo didn't stay in the ring with him for long}. Was this a common ploy by the promoters? I didn't see the sense in it as the venue was packed anyway in anticipation of a solo bout between the two, so why change it? Was it maybe just to build their feud at that time? David Mantell "Wrestlers won or lost at their discretion. If a wrestler didn't comply they didn't work for them - even the likes of Bert Assirati and Billy Robinson were not indispensible." Not true - a lot of the Wigan guys as well as others such as George Kidd would flatly refuse to job to anyone who couldn't beat them in a shoot, and in the case of the Wigan crowd would have resorted to cripplingly hooking any non-shooter they were ordered to lay down for. To do otherwise would feel to them like taking a dive. They had a lot of sympathy in the business for this - even Jackie Pallo wrote of George Kidd's refusal to job for inferior legit wrestlers with admiration as a mark of Kidd's integrity. People like this would however sometimes put over a promising kid whom they thought would make the grade in due course - Billy Robinson and Kendo Nagasaki were thus both put over by their respective mentors Billy Joyce and Count Bartelli. Anglo Italian Great topic at the very heart of what fascinates me about professional wrestling. David, are you saying that Bartelli and B Joyce could have prevented Nagasaki's and Robinson's rise in the early days? Hack, I don't agree that "unbeaten runs were at the whim of the promoter." These wre important decisions and the Joint Promotions promoters had to decide upon them at their fornightly meetings. Every unbeaten run entailed an equivalent list of perhaps unwilling or unlikely losers, which I believe is what Andy is getting at. I do think that the various members of JP each had their own individual clout with their own limited power to have absolute control on individual issues. Each had "their own men" who were nominated to have some kind of status throughout the JP network. For example, Bartelli and then Nagasaki were Atherton men and probably fed back to Jack on goings on in the rings of other JP s. Other obvious ones were Ken Joyce for Devereux. Mick McManus for Dale Martin. I think the Maxine thing created a champ in McManus's own image but he was selected primarily for those essential qualities of reliability, willingness to travel, defender of the game's integrity and would do what he was told. But he wasn't an administrator at all. Morrell had quite a team around him. Kellett was obviously a cornerstone until his defection. Just how close Peter Preston was to Morrell remains a a key mystery. Geo. Kidd ran a nice safe show and accommodation when the lads went to Scotland. When these wrestlers then travelled to other JP turf their reputations and unbeatability were defended 100% thanks to the national agreement. David has been on a successful search for Joint Promotions dates. As usual, dates and figures interest me far less than content. It is the fly on the wall records of those meetings which fascinate me and which we try to piece together here with theory and evidence. An extension of this is to visiting talent. I mentioned Two Rivers and Starr and the national approach was 100% visible in terms of their results. The handling of some others is far more intriguing, and the lack of sharing southwards of some such as Los Halcones Dorados still intrigues me now. And how was Devereux allowed not to play the sharing game by hogging, I believe 100%, the Executioner of Bethune on his various tours and about 100 UK bouts? But another shining example of unity was the handling of Jean Ferre on this three tours. In the first tour he won virtually everything, also on tv, and a high-profile Albert Hall debut. But fascinating results, shared a few years ago by Heritage Wryton, revealed that, in his successive visits, he lost most times, meaning that many UK heavweights could and can claim victories over the subsequently immovable André the Giant. Jean Ferre wrestled across the various JP borders and there was a very visible party line on the outcome of his matches. The route this party line took to be communicated and obeyed remains of interest here, and remains unclear. Without a party line, fragmented promotions, also called independants, created results that sometimes lacked logic and harmed wrestling's integrity. Those who want to raise the profile of modern day wrestling should, IMHO, first and foremost create a national structure, regarding results and many other issues. Bernard Hughes Hi Andy. You said " Kendo had mistakenly thought that it was a tag match" etc. I don't know what sort of date that you were talking about but this really is not likely. I think that it would more likely be a ploy by the promoter to build up amimosity for say, a series of matches, and to build up interest for a future event. David. I think that quite a few of us would be interested to know how you could prove a statement like "A lot of the Wigan guys as well as others" .... "would not job" etc. I can't say that it is wrong and it certainly has been repeated quite a few times on this site. Is it all hearsay?. Would anyone on this site who did wrestle give us a hint to just say ,"Yes or No" whether this actually happened. As I understood it, certainly in the earlier days in Morrell promotions the wrestlers would do as they were told or not get to work for him again. I know it all helps the the perceived logic that wrestlers won or lost on their ability, but I believe that isn't true either. I think that it had a lot to do with popularity,drawing power and how the booker and promoter saw the future for a particular wrestler. Obviously a youngster being built up to have a future in the game,would not lose too many and so we have as quoted, perfectly able people like Sid Cooper often losing matches that logic and ability tell you that they should have won. Anglo Italian Reference Wigan, I also don't like the inevitable implication that any wrestler who wasn't Wigan-trained wasn't up to much. David Mantell Pallo talks about this a bit in his book, esp re Assirati and Kidd. I'm sure the masters were perfectly capable of beating the students, but they weren't going to because Naggers and Robinson were respectively Bartelli's & Joyce's prize students and they wanted to give their protegés a break. So Billy J jobbed his Heavyweight double crown to Billy R (in two stages a year apart!), and the Count lost his mask to Kendo, and so two torches were passed. Riley's and Charnock's were the last two hooking/ripping schools left on the face of the Earth by then. SaxonWolf Some interesting stuff here, hopefully Andy is starting to get the information he needs. I think Bernard hits the nail on the head, in the long run, it all came down to "bums on seats", or "drawing power". Let's remember this was a business, with halls and venues booked long in advance, the promoters needed to ensure that the halls were full, so it made sense to have results that ensured the audience would be waiting with baited breath for the re-match or to see a local hero take on a national big name villain. Sid Cooper is mentioned in a few places as a cagey old pro who could actually wrestle, and was often put in the ring with any new wrestler wanting a try out, to see how good they were. The Nagsaki "mystery" as to how he was booked to win against a lot of big names early in his career, not sure, I need to think about that one. In the early days of Joint Promotions, all wrestlers (or nearly all) had to be able to wrestle, they were sent to YMCA's and wrestling clubs, and we know that many of the early promoters had links to legitimate free style wrestling, so would favour real wrestlers. Billy Robinson was a wrestling champion, with proven credentials, apart from his superlative submission skills, so he would be an obvious candidate. At the end of the day, the promoters called the shots, and with the Joint Cartel in operation, you had to toe the line if you wanted to work. David Mantell Well there was definitely a confrontation with Assirati, but with other great rippers/hookers there seems to have been a policy of appeasement - A lot of the Wigan crowd and other important hookers got booked into titles long term. Robinson kept his double crown Brit/Euro Heavyweight titles up until he went off to the US. Two Wigan men Ernie Riley and Billy Joyce had a stranglehold on the British Light Heavyweight title for nearly a quarter of a century, Tommy "Jack Dempsey" Moore became a quadruple crown British/European/Commonwealth/World (unified Euro version) Welterweight champion and kept it all until his untimely 1966 retirement, Bartelli and George Gordienko got long Commonwealth Heavyweight title runs, Eric Taylor held the British HeavyMiddleweight title undefeated until his retirement. Etc Etc (Meanwhile, a cynic might point out, McManus and Pallo got all the main events and the media attention.) A footnote to this - "shooter politics" also existed in the US in earlier eras. Lou Thesz's trainer George Tragos back in the thirties refused to job to anyone who could not out-shoot him and was liable to injure opponents - he once said to Lou "You'll never be a champion unless you make up your mind to hurt these people!". Tragos once injured the arm of a hyped-up young kid he was supposed to job to that the arm had to be amputated. Tragos had the exact same mentality as Assirati or Robinson and would have gotten along like brothers with either one. Yet Tragos was kept as bottom-of-the-card filler (as a sideline to his training work) whereas Assirati and Robinson were champions and stars. That to me illustrates the shooter-orientated character of traditional British Wrestling. SaxonWolf David, I know what you are saying, and in the early days of the Mount-Evans rules, I would imagine it was far safer to put the belt on someone who was respected by all the other wrestlers (reing that back in those days, all wrestlers had to be able to actually wrestle) and also someone who would not get caught out in a double cross situation. Hence legit shooters being weight-class champions. It has often been said that years ago, and probably still today, there was always a chance of some bloke in a bar coming over to pick a fight with a famous wrestler, and the worst thing would be for the wrestler to end up on the front pages of the daily newspaper for losing to some drunken bar room brawler, bad for business, his tough-man credibility would be shot. I think it was Dynamite Kid who said, in his book, that American wrestler Jake Roberts had chickened out of a fight outside a bar, when he was the Stampede Heavyweight Champion, which disgusted Stu Hart, so the belt had to be put on someone else. Non-wrestlers in the US territiories (or non-shooters, to be accurate) who held titles, were usually provided with a body guard, who would be called upon to help him out if a sniff of a double cross arose, they were called "Policemen" and the famous, and respected, Ruffy Silverstein was always a low to mid card wrestler, not charismatic enough, but was always called into action as a Policeman for champs like Buddy Rogers, who could not actually shoot, but were good workers. Harley Race had to go to Japan, as Ric Flairs "manager" and sit at ringside when Flair faced (I think) Inoki. as the NWA feared that Inoki was going to shoot on Flair in a nationally televised bout and send Flair back to the USA minus the belt. The fact that we kept the belts on real wrestlers (for the most part) is one of the things that I like about British wrestling, these were real sportsmen, real athletes, who could and would take on all comers behind closed doors. There are, of course, anomolies, McManus being the obvious one, also Marino and Maxine, holding belts well into middle (or even old) age, no one can convince me that some tough young grappler could not win against an aging Maxine, unless the promoters told them they could not. As for Count Bartelli's belt, I think from memory he "bought" that, or at least suddenly reappeared claiming that he had won it while in Australia. Again, as good as he was, an ageing Count Bartelli would not have beaten all up and coming youngsters. Pro Wrestling is a businiess, more than it is any kind of sport. Eddie Rose Shooters meant men who wanted to fight regardless of opponents, halls, promoters or anything else. Some shooters wanted to fight every time out; others were more unpredictable. A good shooter did not necessarily have to be "Riley Gym" stampmarked although that was a pretty good indicator. Hans Streiger put the fear of God into many opponents and once uppercut Billy Robinson so hard it put Billy on his back. Billy gamely acknowedged it afterwards and said no one had ever hit him so hard in the ring. Skull Murphy was another who easily turned and decided he wanted a bruising encounter, ditto Keith Martinelli, Orig Williams, Jack Martin, Gordon Corbett. Martinelli apart, these were all former boxing booth performers and were well schooled in fisticuffs of all kinds. There is a story that once Skull and Martinelli got into an argument on the Isle of Man ferry that developed into a punch up that lasted for virtually the whole passage. It was described to me by a very relaiable witness as like a John Wayne bar room brawl. And free for the punters. Jackie Pallo is famous for giving Harvey Smith a black eye when their bout got out of control at Blackburn. OK nothing too brilliant about that perhaps, but he meted out the same treatment to a promoter who crossed him. That promoter had been a European Professional boxing champion and was the same age as Pallo. I'm not disparaging Wigan in any way, they were wonderful wrestler (shooters); Riley, Dempsey, Foley, Riss, Joyce, probably the best around at their time but, as one or two other posters have already pointed out there were others on the scene with no Wigan connections. Mad Mac Eddie, I presume the promoter concerned is Peter Keenan? His (Keenan's) autobiography mentions an incident with the Pallos where Junior looked to be about to have a pop and was put on his rear end by Keenan. David Mantell Usually the term "shooter" is used to mean a pro wrestler who is legitimately proficient at Catch Wrestling, (incuding the submissions and the technique which is more sophisticated than Olympic freestyle. It is, in short, the legit sport which worked pro wrestling purports to be. Thus a {straight-}shooter is someone who can genuinely play the sport of wrestling, as opposed to just perform a match.) A "hooker" is a shooter who has mastered all aspects of the most crippling submission holds of Catch Wrestling. A "ripper" is a hooker who goes onto the mat/ring working from a mindset/gameplan of aiming to maul and ultimately seriously injure an opponent. At Riley's gym, wrestlers were trained to be Rippers. Nothing less. grahambrook During the ten years or so that I was involved in promoting I found that the attitudes of the various wrestlers to "winning" or "losing" varied enormously. I had no problems at all with "shooters" and although I used several of the Wigan men (Joe Critchley, Dave Newman and Melvyn Riss immediately come to mind), never was there any attempt to do other than provide an entertainment. Where I knew of enmities between wrestlers, I generally tried to avoid booking them on the same bill. I didn't know of the confrontation between Martinelli and Murphy but I did know that they were both extremely hard men. I was advised to avoid Martinelli so I did and, many years on, now regret it because, as a punter, I certainly enjoyed watching him. I was similarly advised regarding "Skull" Murphy or, in the days I booked him, "Bad Boy" Steve Young. He worked for me by default. A wrestler (I forget who) let me down for a show I was promoting at The Parr Hall, Warrington. I seem to recall that he had been given a week's work by Dixon since accepting my solitary booking against Jim Moser and, as it was his livelihood, felt that he had to take the week. Moser told me that he could fix up an opponent for himself and turned up with Young. In the dressing room I began laying out the bout with them and was stopped politely but firmly by Young who said, "We're used to working together. Just leave it to us lad, we know what we're doing." And indeed they did, producing a great bout. Admittedly, I was in my early twenties at the time and I think that Young regarded me as little more than a punter who had more money than sense. Famous altercations from my time included a particularly nasty fracas between Abe Ginsberg and John Lees (I believe Ginsberg came off better) and Woody Waldo and Frank Cullen. I was refereeing a morning show for Bobby Barron at Tower Beach Holiday Camp, Prestatyn, and Waldo had been booked to face Karl Mc.Grath. Both Waldo and Cullen were lodging in Rhyl at the time working for Orig Williams. Waldo and Cullen had had a genuine backstage fight the previous evening and Waldo arrived the next morning to fight Mc.Grath but barely able to move. Professional to his fingertips, he worked the bout with Mc.Grath (in fact, two bouts, for Pontin's owned two camps in Prestatyn at the time and we would do one in the morning and the second in the afternoon) but it was avery different bout to the one initially envisaged with Waldo going villain which enabled him to move less, spend more time on his feet arguing with the punters and doing blindside punches. Incidentally, it was the first time Waldo had played such a role but he genuinely enjoyed it and I'm sure that this performance out of necessity led the way for his character as an out and out villain for Brian Dixon at Liverpool Stadium a couple of years later. I've got sidetracked on the subject of genuine wrestling feuds but really came on to say what a difference in attitude there was between wrestlers regarding their acceptance or otherwise of the result from workers like Pete Northey (Young) or Bob Bell who would take no instructions saying, "Leave it to us, kid, ", to workers such as Steve Haggetty or would say, "What do you want us to do?" I recall booking Steve Haggetty vs Mike Dallas the Civic Hall, Nantwich, and, following my experience with Steve Young at Warrington, saying, "It's up to you lads. Do whatever you want." Haggetty looked disgusted and said, "Come on, you're supposed to be a promoter. What do you want us to do?" Embarrassed, I murmered, "Six cats," and retreated. Bernard Hughes Great post Graham, giving us the inside knowledge on how bouts were arranged sometimes. I am sorry David, but you cannot believe all that you read in newspapers , magazines or even the internet, as much as we would all like it to be true.. David Mantell One thing that has to be said for shooters/hookers/rippers - if they HAD been succesfully double crossed, they would never have complained or whined about it - they would have had far too much respect for any opponent who could pull off such a thing! It would have taken a very good youngster to beat Bartelli or Marino since knowledge of techniques is crucial to shooting. It's a bit like a poker game really - instead of what cards you have, it's what holds/counters/techniques you know. Strangler Lewis had a public shoot with a mate of Lou Thesz's in the late 30s and it went to a draw after something like 90-120 mins. Lou himself refused to job a title in Nick Gulas's territory until Gulas sorted him out for an unpaid debt - Thesz was safe in the knowledge that no-one else around could beat him (maybe Robinson, but that would be out of the frying pan into the fire for Gulas.) McManus by all accounts was a good amateur rather than a Shooter. Pallo was an OK amateur - notably he only ever had one short interim title reign (British H-Mid for a couple of months in 1969.) A better example to build your case would have been Giant Haystacks's 1979 British Heavyweight title reign. Haystacks was VERY vulnerable to any shooter who meant business. Looking at his old TV solo bouts, a lot of opponents make the point of succesfully legdiving him and having him dangling on the ropes before they let him do his squashing routine. David Mantell An added point about "shooter politics" - one particularly obvious manifestation of it was Dues-Paying - the early period in which apprentice pro wrestlers would be kept out of kayfabe and partake in what they would be led to believe was a shoot (although in practice their more experienced opponent would be carrying them to a decent length of bout- a true competition shoot under these circumstances would end in a few seconds) during the course of which the novice would be thoroughly streched, battered and stiffed by the veteran. A lot has been written by the likes of Fin Martin of Powerslam about how the veterans were being 'nasty evil bullies' by doing this, but one of the main reasons for dues-paying was that a predominantly shooting talent pool would not accept working with a new wrestler until he (or she) had proven that he/she could pose any sort of reasonable challenge as an opponent whatsoever in a legitimate competitive situation. Once a novice has made the league of his/her peer group, then and only then would experienced wrestlers work with him/her, as they would accept someone once they had proven they *did* stand at least a cat in Hell's chance in a real match situation.

andy20066 i picked up a copy of the grapplers souvenir booklet/programme and it features the number one ladies tag team apache princess and cherokee princess. so can anyone tell me how long ladies tag team wrestling was going for and can you name any other female tag teams please Hack No doubt there were female tag teams, but at the time I saw lady wrestlers in the 1960s and first half of the 1970s I didn't see any. At that time I would think that just having female wrestlers on the bill was an attraction in itself. In (I would think late 1970 and 80s) Ron Farrar put on mixed tag matches. HILLARY I think i read a few years ago that ladies tag team wrestling started in the USA in the late 30's. The best female tag teams i have been lucky to see live in Manchester England was The Red Hot Mama's (Pippa L' vinn and Shelby Beach). Hack The first ladies match I can find is June 1964. The Daily Express of 19 November, 1964 reported that no women would be allowed to wrestle on television. In the 1960s there was a lot of council opposition to female wrestling and matches were often cancelled at the insistence of the council. Some councils allowed female matches and they became increasingly accepted towards the end of the decade. Promoter Jack Taylor was one of the pioneers of female wrestling. The first female tag match I can find was on 12th June, 1965, so I think you can fairly safely say the first female tag match was 1965. Duncan I recall seeing Mal Saunders in a mixed tag at the Blackbrook Pavilion, Taunton cicra 1994 on a Southern Promotions bill. Cant remember much more I am afraid! george johnson There were lots of ladies tag matches on Brian Dixon's bills in the 1970's and 80's. One of the most successful teams was Mitzi mueller and Paula Valdez. They were billed as British Tag champions.After Paula went with Fit Finlay as Princess Paula Mitzi teemed up with the likes of Cherokee Princess,Nicky Monroe,Gemma Best and Rusty Blair. The principal heals usually involved Hellcat Haggerty. She had a variety of partners such as Lolita Loren,Lena Blair, Busty Keegan and eventually the formidable Klondyke Kate This pair took the British title from Mitzi and Paula at Southampton in 1979. However because there wern't that many female Wrestlers you also got mitzi partnering the likes of Lena Blair and Busty Keegan against Gemma Best and Rusty Blair who were usually partnered by Klondyke Kate.

paul kaye What became of Rocky Moran (Dave Finlay's tag partner ) and where and against whom did Haystacks make his wrestling debut ? David Mantell Stax tagged with Big Daddy to lose by DQ to the Saints in July '75. Rocky went to Brian Dixon, grew a mullet and jobbed to Fuji Yamada in FY's second ITV appearance. He had a brief stint as British Heavy Middleweght champ in '86, winning from Chic Cullen and losing to Eddie Hammill. Sadly he passed away in 2005 - here his his obit thread from the old 1stop forum: http://www.britishwrestling.co.uk/forums/topic/rocky-moran-r-i-p/ Ron Historyo History had Haystacks debuting in 1967 on the Indy Circuit as Luke Mcmasters. I have no idea where or who he fought and thus far never found a wrestling bill with him on under this guise. Hack I saw Haystacks around 1973 working for Bobby Barron on the Central Pier, Blackpool. I think he was called Giant Haystacks then. Graham Bawden Rocky Moran also tagged with Fit Finlay on a couple of occasions. It was sad to hear of his passing, way too young. He had some excellent clashes with Chic Cullen over the years, that made fine viewing for the grapple fans. nagasakisno1fan This is only from memory now but I think Rocky Moran (Dennis Macmillan) died of cirrhosis of the liver very sadly, an under rated wrestler for sure Ruslan Pashayev Rocky Moran's Heavy Middleweight Title 1986...would highly appreciate any memories of that very short championship reign. Thanks, R

palais fan I was looking through matches and results at The Wimbledon Palais in the 1950s and 60s, and i was struck by how successful Ray Hunter had been against many of the top heavyweights of the day. As I recall, 'Rebel' Ray, was often billed as the British Empire or Commonwealth champion and I recall seeing him on Paul Lincoln's shows at The Granada Tooting, partnered in tags with Al Hayes, as well as on Devereux's shows at the Palais and Dale Martin shows elsewhere in London. I've also seen him in photographs, sharing a ring with Gordienko, Maivia and Cornelius, in Japan, so he clearly got around a bit and must have been respected enough within wrestling to be in the ring with the likes of Gordienko. My memories of him are that he was tall, well built and strong, but not very charasmatic or particularly exciting to watch. I remember him as blue-eye but not one that I would have gone out of my way to see...how do others remember him? And was he the wrestler who least lived up to his nickname? Wrestlefan Ray Hunter was a classic case of the wrestler who looked right, but had a nervous little man lurking within. Saw him up against Johnny Yearsley where he was hammered into two submissions and then against Pat Roach - both of them failed to impress the audience. Bernard Hughes Hi Palais Fan. I read your piece on Rebel Ray Hunter and thought "That's exactly how I would have put it". Absolutely correct.! palais fan Looking at my original post about Rebel Ray, and the responses from Bernard and Wrestlefan, shall I assume that he was so lacking in charisma, and dull to watch, that even Wrestling Heritage fans find him not worth commenting on? Did he have any redeaming features as a wrestler, apart from his physique? Can we put his career down to being a mate of Paul Lincoln? I wonder if any wrestlers from Rebel Ray's era have anything to add? Anglo Italian I didn't have much positive to say, so I shut up. He looked like he didn't want to be there and was doing it all risk-free for the dosh. I don't recall him as well built, tall and tanned yes, but also someone who clearly enjoyed his food. His nickname of Rebel is the most interesting thing about him, and that seems to have been a backroom reference rather than anything the fans could have latched on to at the time. His size made him "credible", but he leaves no lasting legacy. I am quite sure he had some highlights in his career, when the big bucks were down, and probably could mix it, and my memories are admittedly sketchy from long ago, but I don't think he ever wrestled on tv, did he? palais fan Perhaps JNLister will tell us whether he appeared on TV. Re his build, he was certainly muscular when I saw him in the early 60s, perhaps the pies and peas of his native country, or the good life at The Cromwellian club in Soho, caught up with him, later in his career. If Bob Anthony is at the Southern reunion this year, he might be able to comment on Rebel Ray's wrestling ability, as might Joe Cornelius. If he was as 'good' as we remember, it would be interesting to know how he managed to be involved in matches with the best (e.g. Gordienko). djg4jan I am quite surprised at some of the comments on here about Ray Hunter.I was an avid follower of Paul Lincoln promotions in the sixties and saw Ray numerous times.He had great bouts with Dr.Death,Don Steadman,Ski Hi Lee and the numerous foreign villains who came to our shores.Excellent tag matches with Al Hayes.It appeared to go wrong when the promotions merged and he started to lose to in my opinion inferior opponents.He then seemed to drift away presumably to retirement.I prefer to remember him at his peak not at the end of his time. John In answer to Anglo Italian's 13th March query about whether Ray Hunter ever wrestled on TV, yes he did, I have some of his results here. 23/8/1969 drew 1-1 with Tibor Szakacs at Catford 6/9/1969 beat Bruno Elrington by disqualification at Corby 15/10/1969 beat Don Vines by disqualification at Croydon 13/12/1969 lost to Pat Roach by disqualification at Croydon 23/5/1970 lost to Pat Roach 2-1 at Wembley 26/8/1970 lost to Bruno Elrington 2-1 at Catford. He may well have had other bouts on TV, in addition to these, but I have no information on these. Most of his peak years in wrestling though, I understand, were when he was with Paul Lincoln promotions and so none of his bouts from this period would have been shown on TV. Some of the earlier postings seem to have been somewhat critical of Ray Hunter. I cannot comment on his ability as a wrestler because I have never seen him. However, as can be seen from the above results he did mix in very high quality competition and so he must have had something going for him. Anglo Italian Thanks John. The Croydon disqualification against Pay Roach really jumps out, doesn't it? I think one of the consequences of the mergere was that Ray Hunter now found himself with lots of superheavyweight peers like those in the list above, whereas previously he was one of only a couple of such wrestlers within Paul Lincoln Promotions: Mangotitch, Dr Death, the Wild Man, Haggetty and other Lincoln baddies were mostly much smaller. As usual, the final three losses loom like the hallmark of a wrestler who had announced his departure, à la Zebra Kid, and was doing the rounds making those who were staying look good. Good choice of topic Palais Fan, there seems to be controversy and uncertainty here. palais fan Glad you have good memories of Rebel Ray and i agree that the company he wrestled in suggests he must have been better than i remembered him being. I also saw him with Al Hayes, in good tag matches on Paul Lincoln's bills, but seem to recall Judo Al supplying the best moments. Can anyone else comment on his early career in the UK? His earliest appearences at the Wimbledon Palais go back to the early 1950s. Caulkead Once Lincoln merged with Joint, I have no recolection of seeing rebel Ray anywhere. Not on TV, nor at my local hall, which had been a Lincoln venue. And I could say the same about several other Lincoln men. I found Ray's bouts effective, without being outstanding. frank thomas Remember reading about him in James Mortons marvellous book fighters that he worked a lot with mike Marino...they toured with the great Randolph Turpin, who appeared in mixed boxer v wrestler matches,... Ron Historyo I mentioned in My Historic early days that Rebel Ray fought Billy Two Rivers on TV in November 1959. This was the match that brought alive my love of Wrestling and a fascination with Two Rivers. djmask This bout is in the excellent ITV wrestling database, it's just the 'r' is missing from the end of Ray Hunter's name. Geoff Shoots Hello Again I did post this link in the remembering Paul Lincoln thread but some of you thinking back to 'Rebel Ray Hunter' may not have seen that Ray is in a main event tag team match with Dave Larsen Vs Docker Don Steadman and Dennis Dean in this 1962 TV Doc 'The Wrestling Game' (in 2 parts) on the wonderful YOU TUBE! Also of note it is a typical Paul Lincoln bill with Judo Al Hayes Vs Gori Ed Mangotich the 2nd main event. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UB5k4eHi7JY ballymoss I agree that Rebel Ray Hunter,who really was not much of a rebel, only achieved success because of his close association with Paul Lincoln ( Dr Death). I believe they were old school friends in Australia. He was competent but sadly lacking in charisma which really emerged when pitted against such brilliant "heels" as Alan Garfield and Docker Don Stedman. The story goes that he lost his appetite for wrestling and returned to his native Australia. david franklin I was never lucky enough to see any Paul Lincoln shows so the first sight I had of "Rebel" Ray Hunter was when the two promotions merged in the mid 1960's. I'd seen many bills and results from old Paul Lincoln events and was expecting him to be something special. Like many others on this thread I found him a big disappointment. He was dull with no little or no charisma, and he did not seem interested in doing any more than turning up and doing as little as possible. I always suspected that his earlier success was mainly due to his friendship with Paul Lincoln, but perhaps by the time Joint Promotions took over he had simply lost interest. Anyway he hung around intermittently for a few years and then around 1970 he disappeared. I for one was happy to see him go. Ruslan Pashayev Dear Friends, any info on the 1957 all nations tourney won by Hunter would be highly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

An addition to the Lew Roseby topic on the old forum from Heritage member Fred. He would love to hear more memories. fred hi. lew was my god father . can only just remember him, seemed a massive bloke to a tiny 4 or 5 yo lad !! he was my mums brother, from a family of 7, they lived in dulgar st, clayton, manc....close to citys etihad ground now. my mum who died june 2018 used to say they all went to belle vue to cheer him on, tripping his rivals over on the way to the ring ! he died late 60s if i recall, poss early 70s. a gentleman by all accounts. i mostly remember watching him in his b/w referees shirt on WOS sat tea time. i think he was a better ref than fighter !! main haunts were belle vue, new brighton, liverpool i recall. i think theres just my u albert in dorset left of the 7...late 90s and frail. cant give much more info as only just recall him,, he used to say i needed donkey muck in my shoes off blackpool beach if i wanted to grow his size !!

In April 2013 sad news from Colin Joynson, with a latest update in October, 2018, from Bob Steele's daughter colin joynson i have just found out that one of the best wrestlers of the 50 s,60s and the 70s ,a good friend and man i looked up too ,passed away last november.the no 1 middlewiegth Bob steele . bob had been in a care home for the last 8 or 9 years and not in the best of health. it is so sad people drift apart and find things out when it is to late.RIP Joe , my thoughts to go to your family colin joynson Hack Bob Steele was one of the finest middleweights around and another of those unsung heroes who kept the whole business going. Many thanks Colin for letting us know this sad news. Anglo Italian Very sad. I never saw him wrestle in the south but remember he was often matched with Jackie Pallo and other big names. beancounter Bob Steele was one of the finest welter/middleweights of the 1960s. I watched him a number of times at Preston's Queens Hall and should think he was one of the most regularly televised wrestlers of the early part of that decade. May he Rest in Peace. Bill Smith RIP Bob Steele Eddie Rose A truly great wrestler. Had some marvellous bout versus Tommy Mann, Chic Purvey, Cliff Belshaw, Ted Hannon, Jack Dempsey. I had a car from him (he had a place in north Manchester). It was a red Ford Zephyr 6 and it ran like a dream. Its previous owner was Alan Ball, the England footballer. Alf Cadman was a good friend of his - both Salford lads. Bob Steele was one of the perhaps unsung heroes who made wrestling such a great favourite during the Golden age. As Colin Joynson stated: one of the best! Ian McGregor phoned me and said he'd had a conversation the day previously with Monty Swann who rekoned Bob Steele was the best middlweight wrestler in the mid-60s to mid-70s era in UK, colin joynson re bobby steele i am so glad the great wrestler has not bean forgotten.colin joynson beancounter Colin, it is a joy for us old fans to hear from such a fine and admired wrestler as yourself. You were one of the best! Kelly Wray Thank you all for your lovely comments about my Dad (Bob Steele). He wasn't just a great wrestler but the best Dad a girl could ever wish for.

JNLister Had a query from a friend -- not found any trace of the guy myself: A woman who goes to my wife's crochet group has asked me if I could find out anything about her Dad who she says was a wrestler by the name of Barry Greenhill (I believe she said Barry) in the 1960s ish era. She thinks he went by the name of The Great Crescendo and was very very tall (as is she), she claims he was over 7ft. Now whether or not that's true I don't know but she herself is about 6'4 so I'd say his height is likely to be notable. Does that ring a bell for anyone? SaxonWolf I would have thought that at least one of us on here would remember a seven footer, if not us then one of the wrestlers like Dale Storm or Eddie Rose? HackGood grief. Could this be someone I've been searching for over the last forty odd years? Tiny Greenhill was featured on a BBC programme about fairground wrestlers in the late 1960s. Ray Glendenning was also on. I believe he was trained by Jim Hussey Please find out if this is my man. JNListerI've let my friend know and passed on the WH address, Hack. He's going to check with her in the next couple of days. It'll certainly be a nice change to have somebody claim to be or know an old wrestler like this and it be true! Hack I couldn't have imagined the name Tiny Greenhill could I? So he definitely existed, but I know no more than that. Other to say that I was once told it was Roy Bull Davis who trained him, not Jim Hussey as I mistakenly said earlier. sparkys6887Just looking through old post's and wondering what the outcome was??? The Riot Squad Posts: 1495 Eddie Rose wrote in with his memories of Tiny Greenhills which we forwarded but have not yet received a response. Kirsty Cowan Hi my dad was a wrestler called Midge Cowan I've been finding out a bit about him and Barry was a good friend of his he was indeed 7 foot and people called him tiny funnily enough I have a newspaper article about him as he moved to Brixham in Devon and stayed with my dad he was a machanic I think my dad got him into wrestling they worked the fairgrounds for Mickey Kiely's for a bit.I hope this is useful for you.

Anglo Italian Moving on from the discussion Bernard and I were having about wrestlers' weights... Some wrestlers seemed regularly to be billed at wrong weights. Two that stuck out were Klondyke Jake and Roger Wells. Both were regularly billed as 20 stones but seemed not even 16 stones to me. Anyone (dis)agree? Robby Baron was billed as a welterweight throughout his career jet must have been nearly 14 stones in his last few years. Saw him in embarrassingly mismatched contests with Julien Morice. The promoters didn't notice Young Robby grow. Honey Boy Zimba I mentioned today was apparently 15st 7lbs but often featured in light-heavyweight bouts. I have no idea what Masambula weighed - he seemed to wrestle everyone. And Steve Logan featured in all those heavyweight bouts as well as being British Heavy-Middleweight champion. Does anyone else have similar memories? powerlock I certainly think the weight discrepancies got worse in the late 1960s onwards . I know for instance Peter Kaye was supposed to have trimmed down to middleweight but he was a pretty big middleweight as far as I could remember david franklin A match I saw advertised that underlined the lack of credibility as years went by was when Johnny Czeslaw (a mid-heavyweight for all of his career, who often went in against heavyweights) fought Brian Maxine for the British Mioddleweight Title. Everything about British wrestling was nonsensical by then anyway. :( SaxonWolf How accurate were weights anyway? I imagine that when the Mountevans rules first came in, they were properly recorded and stuck to, for a while. But after that? I am sure our weights were more accurate than our US cousins, where everyone has a few inches extra in height added, and about 20 pounds in weight. Ron Historyo I think the trouble is they had long careers and there were books with height and weight statistics and no doubt Kent Walton had some sort of point of reference. With TV it was even more difficult to guess the height. I saw McManus billed from 12-3 to 13-3 (I think) and he no doubt started at under 11 stones. With a thick beefy back he would have some weight at the end but he was so small. Logan must have been 5-8 or a little more when young and topped 14 stones. Not enough to really be in with Rocky Wall but enough for Marino, In that old wrestling footage of Kellet and Dennison going for a run there did not look too much in height and Dennison was small and 13-3 at peak. His partner Ted Heath was apparently 5-4 and looked bigger as he was powerfully built. Kellet was over 14 stones but seemingly not so tall but how tall I am not sure. Andy Robin again went in with the heavies and was strong and somewhere in the 15 stones region but I believe was only about 5-7. A 1970 Kendo was listed as 15-3 and had aspirations of Howes's European Mid heavy Title but Kayfabe could not prove he was European. I would put him at 6-1 but in his Brian Dixon days he must have been over 17 stones. Even without TV with the spotlight on Live I thought they looked big but out of the ring some were not as big as we thought. It's a very difficult judgement but very normal for a wrestler to gain 2 stones in a career , even a small wrestler. Not all of course , Johnny Saint did not change much. SaxonWolf Good answer Ron, and yes of course most people put on the pounds as they get older. Kendo is an interesting one, because he looked a solid build in the late 60's, then when his TV career took off, he became leaner, and in fact looking back on some of his TV bouts in the 70's, he looks positively skinny. His mid-late 80's TV, with Blondie Barratt, he looks like a proper heavyweight. Being up in a ring, made people look taller, and of course the high up angle of the TV camera made them look taller as well. We often talk about Haystacks and how tall he was really, and I think we all agree that he did clap the weight on as he got older, and also lose some inches in height. The funny TV clip of him slamming a TV presenter, he looks like a real giant. A few weeks ago, I saw a picture taken of him in a ring (empty building) holding apart William (Steve) Regal and Triple H, I think regal said they were wrestling in the UK and Haystacks just called by the building in the daytime, to say hello. Regal and Triple H wanted to do a publicity shot and Regal asked Haystacks if he would like to be in it. Anyway, the point of all that was that in the photo, Haystacks doesn't appear taller than Regal or Triple H, who I assume to be 6ft 2 to a max 6ft 4 ??? Bernard Hughes Hi Anglo, now you are starting to make some sense on weights, unlike on the other thread. Just a point Hack, Could we/you ask some of the retired wrestlers that you know or who come on here (Paul) just how often anyone asked them their weight? I bet that it wasn't too often after they had started their career. frank thomas Think Jackie Pallo summed it up perfectly in "you grunt I'll groan" when where discussing championship matches, when he said: 'it's not like boxing where you get a weigh in, have you ever seen a wrestler weigh in? " No! Of course not, because if he's little he's a lightweight, if he's average size, he's a middleweight and if he's big, a heavyweight! By the way, i saw Jon Cortez win the world middleweight title in a KO tournament at Liverpool Stadium in 1978, and two weeks later was introduced by the MC as "the speedy Dulwich lightweight, Jon Cortez!" Smoke and mirrors indeed! Mad Mac Two glaring examples for me: 1) Mick McMichael, who went (Waltonism alert!) "up and down through the weights" but never looked any different 2) Colin Joynson challenging Marty Jones for the Mid-Heavyweight title even though he looked no different to the way he had for years. I remember thinking that he might have been a Mid-Heavyweight when he was about 14..... John In November 1977 there was a bout on TV where Peter 'Tally-Ho' Kaye challenged the Dynamite Kid for the British Lightweight title. I was just 12 years old and even I could tell that Kaye looked significantly heavier then the Dynamite Kid. I remember that it was a very good bout though. Also, Alan Dennison, who Kent Walton had often said weighed 14 stone 2 lbs, the light-heavyweight limit, took on and beat Jim Breaks for the British Welterweight title in 1980. I remember they had some very entertaining bouts on TV against each other. Do we forgive the promoters for lying to us about the wrestlers weights, if that lie was what it took to create some entertaining title bouts for us to watch. Paul Pete Roberts was someone who could tussle with Marty Jones at Mid heavy one night and then be challenging Bridges for the Heavywieght title the next. Marty Jones, towards the end of his career, was billed at heavyweight, and probably had grown into being one. The Ost The answers I've received from retired wrestlers are; "The never weighed us." and "The promoter asked me once how much I weighed. That was it." Bernard Hughes Thank you to The Ost. That was exactly the point that I made early on in this Debate (?) I knew that wrestlers were not usually asked what their weight was but I am pleased that someone else backed up that knowledge. Philip Kenyon I was never asked my weight, but there again I was a heavyweight of some 105 kg, so nobody cared. Anglo Italian Wow, that makes you the Kilogram Champ, Mike! How unusual to hear kgs mentioned in our context. Let me see: 16st 7lbs? Bernard Hughes Yes Anglo, good calculator you have got. Anglo Italian In my head, Bernard, otherwise I wouldn't have asked! Wait till you see me on Countdown. Philip Kenyon Yes, when we forget the ounces, absolutely correct. Sorry been abroad for much too long! david franklin It's interesting to hear, with the “progress” of wrestling over the last 50 years how “weights” do seem to have become less important. I wonder if weights became less important because wrestling became less credible? or perhaps Wrestling became less credible because weights became less important? I certainly remember as a youngster being very impressed when on every show at the Colston Hall in Bristol MC Francis P Blake announced the exact weight of each competitor when he was introducing the match. Was he making it all up? Did they simply tell him their weight? Did they have scales in the dressing room? None of this really matter because we all believed him and he made it seem to be more of a serious competion. It would be interesting to know if the Colston Hall was the only venue to follow this practice? Anglo Italian Fascinating. I never witnessed such precision, David. And I never saw Frankie Blake as anything other than lazy and imprecise. So your post comes as a shock in both respects. Philip Kenyon Hi David, In my wrestling career I never saw or heard of scales being in the dressing rooms, nor was I ever asked my weight. In the case of MC’s announcing the weights, this was usually done if a wrestler had an unusual anatomy of height and or weight i.e. Big Daddy, Giant Haystacks etc. or in the case of a catchweight contest. Never came across an MC announcing the weights of the various wrestlers. Bernard Hughes Hi Phil, I know that is true in northern England anyway. Please tell me (and Anglo) more about what you knew as a catchweight bout please. Philip Kenyon The catchweight contests were when two wrestlers who had two different weights i.e. Light heavy against heavyweight / Middleweight against light heavy weight were put on against each other. This was usually the case when the lighter of the two was speedy enough to get around the weight advantage of the heavier guy. Bernard Hughes Thanks Phil, that's how I understood it. Different weights Anglo, does that ring a bell? Anglo Italian Hi Bernard Phil also says Catchweight was when the lighter of the two guys was a speedy mover. So that would include Mick McManus taking on, say, Bert Royal? Phil is giving his own experiences, also about weights and scales. Just because you didn't see bills where Middleweight v Hvy-Mdwght was classified as a Middleweight bout doen's mean these didn't exist (you have seen them from my Frank MalmoasO nor that they were invalid. Also, I never ever saw Les Kellett taking on Yearsley, Sharron or Nagasaki when it wasn't billed as heavyweight bout. Never seen a bout like that billed as Catchweight. I didn't go wrestling in the north of England often enough to make comments about how the precision of northen promoters, But I certainly did witness lots of Middleweight and Heavyweight bouts of the type I describe. This is an ongoing feud Barnard so let's try and bring it to a conclusion. Are you saying I am mistaken and I have invented these bouts (that I posted images of, for example)? Or that the promoters I saw applying this rule were mistaken and shouldn't have? I think we all know Catchweight bouts were the scourge of professional wrestling and to be avoided or at least minimised. You could have had four catchweight bouts on a bill sometimes. At 231 lbs, I am imaging Catchweight went under Phil's radar and he was always in heavweight bouts? (Against Les Kellett☺) Paul Boxers often switch between cruiser and heavyweight. Anglo Italian By the way, with Ron's latest IoM posting we can see a billed middleweight contest between Bill Howes at 14 stone and the Mask at 12.5 stone. These duly fall between the 12st 7lb and 14st 2lb limits. Mind you, there's also a light-middleweight bout, but that's another story.... Bernard Hughes Hi Anglo, I tried to post this earlier but went I pressed submit, I lost the page.This happened 3 or 4 times. There is no feud on my part, just a difference of opinion. I don't think that you are inventing things, I think that once again the promoters were using artistic licence. Now having said all that i still believe that a bout between two different weight classes is a catchweight contest. I guess that we are going to have to agree to disagree. Anglo Italian No feud, I agree, Bernard, we are just chatting in the pub, just the beers are missing ☺ And wrestling does set us dilemmas that are not easy to solve and do need good thinking through. For me, part of the problem is the word Catchweight. It was at times a dreadful justification for sloppy and even improbable match-making. So Catchweight was to be avoided; and the Frank Malmoa principle was the partial solution. Light-middleweight, to my way of thinking, is a nonsensical one-off distracting invention. matey dave i remember trainee being sent out for a long weight and left handed screw driver Bernard Hughes Matey Dave, Anglo and I were having an almost sensible conversation and then you came along. Anglo Italian Almost? So Giant Haystacks. I saw him billed from 31 st to 46 stone. I saw him look immense, and I saw him look anorexic (relatively) Is there any way we can establish his true max and min weights? Bernard Hughes Probably not Anglo. Going back over what has been said again on this thread-----Wrestlers do not have their weights taken often if ever. They may be asked what their weight is , not often. That may be right or more likely the wrestler does not know his exact weight. Then, probably, if necessary the promoter or his representative (often the referee) would make a guess. beancounter One of the things causing me to lose all interest in Wrestling during the mid 1970s was a bill at Preston where Marty Jones fought Ray Steele for "The British Lightheavyweight Championship". The wrestlers were accompanied into the ring by seconds bearing Union Flags and we all had to stand for half a verse of the national anthem. Steele must have weighed over 15 stone and looked far heavier than Jones who, of course, won by 2 - 1. (Wouldn't have done to have a heavyweight Lightheavyweight Champion, would it?). The whole doubtful operation was overseen by Mr Crabtree. I don't think I ever attended again. Paul I think the weight cateogires were important because they gave wrestling to sense of realism and helped distance it from the American equivalent where weight was irrelevant. I know after wrestling went of air, it became a bit of a free for all and the likes of Marty jones was mid heavyweight one week and heavy weight another. I remember one night at Croydon where Jones was challenged by Pat Roach and Brian Dixon simply refered to the belt as 'the title.' David Mantell Jones won the Briish Heavyweight title in 1996 and lost it some time in 97/98, but it isn't clear how. Wikipedia says he retired, but see below. Style mag Sleaze Nation did an article on All Star in '98 where they list Karl Krammer as champion. Jones kept hold of his World Mid Heavyweight title until '99 when he lost it to "Legend Of Doom" Johnny South. A year later in 2000, he was back as a blue-eye again and feuding with Kendo over the Wrestler of the Millenium trophy, leading to a big 16th June 2000 tag match in Hanley, caught on camcorder, where Kendo and Vic Powers beat Jones and Darren Walsh.. He still had the odd match up to about 2003-ish. lofty waterman Good answer Ron, and yes of course most people put on the pounds as they get older. Kendo is an interesting one, because he looked a solid build in the late 60's, then when his TV career took off, he became leaner, and in fact looking back on some of his TV bouts in the 70's, he looks positively skinny. His mid-late 80's TV, with Blondie Barratt, he looks like a proper heavyweight. Being up in a ring, made people look taller, and of course the high up angle of the TV camera made them look taller as well. We often talk about Haystacks and how tall he was really, and I think we all agree that he did clap the weight on as he got older, and also lose some inches in height. The funny TV clip of him slamming a TV presenter, he looks like a real giant. A few weeks ago, I saw a picture taken of him in a ring (empty building) holding apart William (Steve) Regal and Triple H, I think regal said they were wrestling in the UK and Haystacks just called by the building in the daytime, to say hello. Regal and Triple H wanted to do a publicity shot and Regal asked Haystacks if he would like to be in it. Anyway, the point of all that was that in the photo, Haystacks doesn't appear taller than Regal or Triple H, who I assume to be 6ft 2 to a max 6ft 4 ??? hi saxon wolf i watched an interview with Mick Mcmanus and he said that Giant haystacks was a bout 6ft 9 ins so was haystacks 6ft 9ins or 6ft 11ins. all the best keep up the good work Regards Lofty Waterman Ron Historyo Got great doubts about Haystacks height Lofty. Six seven makes a huge man. Pat Roach was six four and a half , you can even see just a bit more than six three Jimmy Nail. On Youtube you can see Roach and Haystacks and you can see Roach and Skywalker (Tyler Main) Tyler has since admitted he is six seven. Haystacks was minimum four inches less that WCW Giant who was shy of seven feet or maybe near when young and slim. I am sure Haystack's weight lost him a couple of inches as he grew older. Only an opinion and to be honest You could not judge him to an inch if you stood next to him. Would not be suprised if late in the day he was down to Six Six. I always thought Jim Moran was as tall but never saw them square up. (all been said before) Weight probably gaining for most of his adult life. 40 stones though takes some doing. Here he is with Roach and compare the ref,. SaxonWolf Anyway, Lofty, I think Haystacks was probably 6ft 7 or 6ft 8. If you look at the pictures on the link below, you can get a good idea, as a friend of mine once met Big Daddy and said he was surprised that Big D was about the same height as him, and my mate was not even 6ft tall, so if Daddy was around 6ft maximum, then Haystacks looks around 6-8 inches taller. https://www.ewrestlingnews.com/articles/the-best-of-british-vol-9-big-daddy-vs-giant-haystacks ; Mad Mac Met Pat Roach in Glasgow Central station many years ago, and the 6'5" he was typically billed as seemed right. SaxonWolf On a similar subject to weights and heights, I was reading a US forum where someone asked the true height of Andre the Giant and most people said 6ft 10. He was always billed (in later years) as being over seven feet tall, but I remember as a young lad in the 1970's, when he appeared in "The Six Million Dollar Man", and I was reading about him in the TV Times and it said he was 6ft 10. It was the first time I had heard of him. Hack There were some ridiculous catchweight matches, and we discussed them once before. But I do disagree with the suggestion catchweights were all bad. They could be used to create interest.

What happened to king Ben is he still alive and also he had a son who started wrestling as tag team with his dad.I think they came from Wigan and was under contract with best wryton promotions.How many more father+son tag teams were there ? frank thomas King Ben was one of my favourite wrestlers, he came from silsden in West yorkshire, his son was Mark, who wrestled under the name "Kid Mc coy" think he was british lightweight champion. They also wrestled one on one in a TV knockout tournament which was a clean scientific match with "no angle" with regards to other father & son tag teams, there were a few around. The most famous being Jackie "Mr TV" pallo, and his son JJ (Jackie junior) Jackie also said in his book that he insisted on being billed as "Pallo & Son" as I said earlier, there were a few father & son teams around, but it was said by Jackie that they tended to be billed as an "elder brother" in order not to make "the old man" look "too old".. January 16, 2018 at 1:51 PM Edit Delete Flag Quote & Reply SaxonWolf Not sure about "tag team" but Les Kellet was the father of Dave Barrie (who died before Les, which must be a terrible thing for any parent) and I think we all thought at one time (on this site, and others) that Robby Baron was related in some way to Mick McManus? (nephew?) frank thomas Saw Les tag once with Dave Barrie. I think against the Broughton Rangers, Johnny South & Paul Mitchell Hack Yes I think father and sons were billed as brothers to disguise the age of the father. Vic Stewart was the father of Pete but they were advertised as brothers. John In the late seventies, the Wensors (Ed and Gary) were a tag team and were billed as brothers but I think it was discussed on this website once that Ed may well have been Gary's father. I can't remember if anyone ever came up with an answer to that question. Anglo Italian Well, it's professional wrestling. So it's fair to assume that if they were described as Brothers, they may well not have been. But I do think the Mitchells were brothers. We have spent a lot of time speculating as to any baby Bartellis, but never made any decisive progress. For me, it's the hidden ones that are fun to unravel, such as Kellett and Barrie. I remember my shock when I discovered Wild Angus's sone was such a clean shaven clean wrestling goodie. Let's not forget Wayne Bridges' son who passed away very prematurely. Dean Briscoe. Roy Bull Davis and Skull Murphy. I always thought Mike Marino looked like someone who had a wrestling son, but have never identified one. Just a few. Bernard Hughes The Rawlings family from Stockton , were I believe, father and 2sons. All appeared at Newcastle at times. Dave Sutherland Correct Bernard Hack Jack and Dominic Pye. I don't think they were ever known as anything other than father and son. Fred What about jimmy hussey and son rollerball Marc Rocco I think they were father and son but don't know if they ever paired up for tag team action. Bernard Hughes Hi Hack. Jack and Dominic Pye were not the only wrestling connections in that family. Some brothers got involved too. Bernard Hughes Hi Fred. Possibly Jim Hussey was getting a little too old, when Mark came into the professional game. Fred Yes Bernard come to think about it your probebly right as when Marc came on the wrestling scene his dad Jim was the owner of a pub in kearsley near bolton. Ron Historyo Rocco certainly must have travelled a lot with dad in his early years so the opportunity was there. Having said that I can't remember them tagging . Anglo Italian I confirm that in 1970 and 1971 Mark Rocco and Jim Hussey invariably appeared on the same bills together, as they also toured on DM bills. Tom H Bob Archer O'Brien had two sons Bob and Chris Anthony who tagged together. But I don't know if Bob Archer O'Brien and Bob Anthony worked together. Ron Historyo For more than a decade Lew Faulkner had ample opportunity to tag with son Bert and even could have gone in with Vic. frank thomas Remember seeing a Joe Pye at Liverpool Stadium, he was rumoured to be a nephew of Jack, had the look, black tights, white boots, black slick backed hair. But alas none of the skill! Honey Boy Zimba threw him from pillar to post! Hack The Joe Pye you mention here is in the A-Z Frank, as are all the Pyes. A sad story about Jack. He made an ill advised comeback around 1970. I interviewed him for a magazine. Everything seemed fine. It was all very complimentary. Then at the last minute Jack said he didn't want it publishing, that he was finished with wrestling. Other than that he wouldn't give any reason for his change of mind. ballymoss The fighting Fishers were a well known wrestling family of which easily the best known of the seven brothers were Charlie and Arthur. They were a useful tag team combination, who could easily make the switch from "blue eye" to "heel". Charlie who went on to become a well known MC, had a son who wrestled for a short time in the 1960's as Brian Sparks, but then like so many faded away. Anglo Italian SaxonWolf The Taylor familly have not been mentioned yet have they? Hack No neither of them.Taylors of Bradford and Taylors of Accrington. College Boy Charlie Law and Len Britton were brothers but don't know if they tagged together. Mike Dallas had a brother, or so we were told. Was it Peter?

Anglo Italian As I watched a BBC documentary last week showing The Bridges pub in Kent run by Wayne Bridges and where the annual wrestlers' reunion takes place, I wondered just how many pubs associated with wrestling we have mentioned over the years on this site? Tibor Szakacs' Lord Palmerston in Fulham closed in 2011. Saxonwolf, do you remember you told me about ten years ago about Eric Cutler's pub in Eckington? Did Andy Robin have a pub in Auchterader? Could be fun to compile a list ... and then to embark on the ultimate Heritage Pub Crawl! SaxonWolf Yes Anglo, that was the Angel Inn, in Eckington, a small village (now really more of a suburb of Sheffield, situated south of the city, on the edge of South Yorkshire, North Derbyshire and North Nottinghamshire. The pub is still there (or was last time I drove past) on the main road through the village. Didn't Danny Lynch run a pub in Kent after he had retired? james morton Since I am defeated by the latest Venues here's a few pubs to start you off. Prince Kumali had the George Canning in Brixton; Wayne Bridges had a couple before The Bridges, one in Greenwich. I think Josef Zaranoff had one in Old Compton Street the name of which I can't remember. I may be compeletly wrong but I think Mike Marino had The Greyhound in Streaham and I'm told Black Butcher Johnson had one in Highgate. Bernard Hughes Hi Anglo, I have mentioned before that they had wrestling at "The Merry Fiddlers"" pub at Chequers Corner,in Dagenham. Bert Assirati was a regular. There was talk on here that Mrs. Assirati was the promoter. It was the scene of a well documented bout between Bert and Bill Coverdale masquerading (Poorly) as The Ghoul. Philip Kenyon I recall very well that Dennis Keegan from the Rochdale family of Keegans was landlord at 3 different pubs in the Accrington area: 1: The Commercial Hotel in Accrington. This pub was by the way just in front of Bob Bannister’s Gym, where we would regularly have a drink after training. 2: The Griffins Head in Huncoat (2 miles from Accrington). 3: The Thwaites Arms in Oswaldtwistle (also 2 miles from Accrington). Dave Sutherland Steve Viedor/Bell had the Tudor Hotel, Castle Donington or the Derby/Leicester borders for a while in the late seventies. Although it was never managed by wrestlers The Strawberry, Newcastle was in such close proximity to St James Hall (assuming I'm still allowed to mention the place) that it will always be associated with wrestling. Many of the wrestlers had a pint there prior to getting their lift home or bought a bottle for the road; meanwhile some of the punters and Hall workers got a quick one there on the way home. JNLister Marty Jones had the Angel in Oldham for many years. It doubled as the exterior of the "local" in Life on Mars. Ron Historyo Roy St Clair had the Wecome Inn and I am pretty sure Jim Hussey had a pub in Bolton Bernard Hughes Norman Walsh kept the Dog & Gun at Knayton near Northallerton and Ron Jackson had an off licence at Hartlepool before moving to the Railway Arms At Thurne Doncaster. Mad Mac Here's what I recall: Andy Robin - The Sheriffmuir Inn, Sheriffmuir, Stirlingshire Colin Joynson - The New Inn, Bolton (built on the site of the old Wryton Stadium) Terry Rudge - The Three Tuns, Bedford. Terry and his wife were last heard of in the B&B trade in France! Pat Patton had a pub in Cannock where bizarrely, one of the regulars was Scrubber Daly! The one Wayne Bridges had in Greenwich was, I believe, The Prince of Orange Didn't Rex Strong have a boarding house in Blackpool? Others that spring to mind: Johnny Kincaid, Zoltan Boscik (around the Wembley area?), Jim Breaks, the late Vic Stewart (Pete's father). David Mantell Didn't Rex Strong have a boarding house in Blackpool? That's a bit of a harsh way of talking about the Hadley Hotel. james morton Mad Mac I think Waye B also had a pub valled the Rosendale but I can't this minute think where that was. marcus63 I think neil sands owned a pub in hintlesham Suffolk to add to your list. That's another little gem. I think they had wrestling there occasionally too grahambrook When Jimmy Hussey retired from the ring he opened up "The Old Man and The Scythe" in Kearsley, Manchester. I remember visiting Steve Haggetty's pub in Portwood, Stockport, but forget its name. As one would expect, there were framed phots of himself and his confreres on the walls and I do recall smiling when I saw the name over the door, "Leslie John Good". djg4jan The Rosendale pub was run by Wayne Bridges in West Dulwich South London. David Mantell Really? Blimey, that's within walking distance of my parents' house. I used to buy imported American wrestling magazines from Rosendale News just a few doors down! beancounter I think Vic Faulkner once had the Station Hotel at Euxton, Chorley. During the early 1970's Steve Logan ran the Battery Hotel on Morecambe's West End and was a popular figure in the area. During the 1960's shows were televised regularly from The Festival Inn, Trowell, Notts. Duncan Which Steve Logan? marcus63 Logically the older I think duncan beancounter The original Steve Logan, who else? Duncan Sorry to have upset you Beancounter. The reason I asked the question was that the pub mentioned was in Morecambe and with "the original Steve Logan, who else" living in London there was just a chance it could have been the younger version. Next time i ask a question, I will make sure i have my crystal ball with me. Jon Waters l believe Jim Breaks pub was called Seconds Out and was in the town of Batley, close to Bradford and Dewsbury. Mad Mac That rings a bell, if you'll pardon the pun. beancounter My apologies Duncan. I didn't mean to cause offence, it's just my brain stays planted in the 60's and early 70's as far as the Wrestling is concerned and steadfastly refuses to budge any further forward. I'd no knowledge of a second Steve Logan, but will look him up, if he is featured in the A-Z. David Mantell Steve Logan the blue-eye from Birmingham in the 1980s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVEQpi5p67o matey dave The one and only steve logan of south london moved north to morecambe when he retired as that was his wife’s home town SaxonWolf Vic Hessle?Lew Faulkner (Father of Bert and Vic, The Royal Brothers) had the Bulls Head Hotel in Bolton. Anglo Italian Doesn't Steve Viedor still have a pub in Dorking? And what was Johnny Kincaid's pub in Bletchley? We have the A-Z comment that the wrestlers used to go back to Honey Boy Zimba's pub in Manchester, but which was the pub? Tony Jack Pye had a nightclub in Blackpool the Castle Casino I think. Remember going there in the 1960s Jack himself was on the door two and six for membership. Hack Carl Dane had the Robin Hood in Manchester. nagasakisno1fan Pat Patton (Ian Stenna) ran the Apple Tree Coseley where his mate Malcolm Hardiman (Scrubber Daly) used to go.....I also visited Jack Cassidy's pub The Gorton Brook in Belle Vue in the 80's and met Skulls ex wife Lolita Loren Malcolm Edward Flanagan Steve Veidor ran The Greyhound in Esher [just off A3] for some years. Danny Lynch ran a couple of pubs in Ashford Kent area - 1 was in Appledore - now closed. Though not a pub " Zaranoffs" Joe Zananoff had a super restauraunt in Warwick with his wife for many years. Paul Kaye Steve Veidor used to run the Tanya Manor in Castle Donington. It is still there but under another name, also is the Seconds Out still open in Batley, I have a photo,taken with Jim Breaks, inside the pub. nagasakisno1fan Jack Cassidy Gorton Brook Belle Vue

The Riot Squad Many of us on this forum have been chatting away for years, more than ten years in some cases. We wondered if that might be a bit intimidating for some newcomers? So we are hoping this topic will be one that any newcomer can confidently tell us a bit about themselves, and find out how easy and enjoyable it is to take part. Not that we should leave it to the newcomers. Even if there's a risk of repeating ourselves, and let's face it many of us are of an age when we are forever repeating ourselves, please let's have everyone have a go, and introduce yourself irrespective of how long you've been around. Hack I was born in Leyland, Lancashire, in 1954. My interest in wrestling began to develop when I was about nine. My dad, who of course always told me it was fixed, talked about going to the wrestling at Belle Vue in the 1950s. He was a bus/coach driver and was regular driver of a coach night out from Leyland to Manchester to watch the wrestling. After not too much nagging he agreed to take me to the wrestling when I was ten years old. The excitement is still with me. When the house lights went down and the ring light came on I was surprised, I hadn't expected wrestling in a dark hall. That first show was an independent promoter, Cape Promotions, with Mike Marino, Crusher Verdu, The Wildman of Borneo and Lord Bertie Topham on the bill. I was hooked. Cape and later Brian Dixon put on independent shows at Preston Public Hall with Morrell/Beresford at the baths down the road. Although the big names were on the Morrell shows my heart was always with the independents. When I was fifteen I started writing, and was one of the writers for the northern Promoters (Morrell, Beresford, Relwyskow & Green) programmes, Ringsport, The Wrestler and Ring Wrestling in America. By the mid 1970s life was moving on, wrestling was beginning to change and my interest evaporated. That was it. I gave away all my magazines, books, and posters, leaving myself with just the memories. That was until the internet came along. I was amazed to discover others, like myself, with memories of the old days, but they were talking about them on these things called forums. For months I read the messages on the One Stop Wrestling forum. I didn't make any comments myself, I didn't think I had anything worth saying (so I do know what it's like for newcomers). Eventually I posted a comment about Jack Dempsey, then Jackie Pallo, and then Jack Pye. I got a private message from someone calling himself Anglo Italian asking if I had a thing about men called Jack? Some time later, 2005 or 2006 Anglo Italian was working in Britain and we met up in Wolverhampton. After a curry and a few drinks the seeds were sown for our own website. I'm sure Anglo Italian said there would be money in it. Idiot! All it has done is cost us money, but given us loads of fun. In April, 2007 Wrestling Heritage was born. The greatest pleasure of getting involved in wrestling again has been making new friends, and Anglo Italian is a genuine good friend. My wife and I have visited him and his family in Italy twice and he has visited us every year since 2007. I've met a few other members at the Reunion, and liked every one of them. Meeting John Shelvey (who had come over from Australia) and Philip Kenyon (who had come from Switzerland) were unexpected delights. There are also members who I haven't met that I would consider friends. Can anyone lend me a fiver? Anglo Italian As a youngster in the sixties I was fascinated by The Outlaw. With my wife in hospital in June 2004 and time on my hands, I googled around to try to find out who was behind the mask. This was my first rekindling of interest in British wrestling since 1978.That googling led me to other places including Kendo Nagasaki's site where I signed the guestbook to say that though Nagasaki was a big favourite, my all-time favourite had been Alan Garfield, whose picture I post here as a tribute.One of the positive aspects of those initial years was meeting a number of true wrestling fans over the net, many of whom proved to be real gents. One particularly generous contributor was Hack. After further forum frustrations, Hack and I decided to form our own permanent site with our hard work at nobody else's mercy, and the rest is history. I enjoy my Anglo Italian identity enormously, and love it when people get on friendly terms and call me Anglo. If I had to select two things which identify Anglo Italian's contributions, I would select the following. I always try to write what I enjoyed about wrestlers' work and I hope that these remarks spark interest in others to the point where they, too, share their memories publicly. Too many forum posts just write about facts or even results, when it was the entertainment that was important. I'd like to see more comments about how well or hard or risk-takingly wrestlers worked. Secondly, I think I am one of the very few with an interest in Fans and I actually started another forum Topic in 2005 entitled Tracing Fanpower. It wasn't especially successful but for me it was just as important as the others. I was a Fan all those years and enjoyed that status and I have no desire to be jumping ship now to become an insider. As a fan, I don't have to pretend I know all the ins and outs, I can just pursue my Sherlock Holmes research and occasionally make fascinating discoveries, usually due to someone else's help. Now that our Wrestling Heritage site is so established, new challenges and frustrations have come along. Plagiarism is the biggest one, along with the fact that of the contacts we receive, 99% are asking for info rather than contributing. I keep smiling and happy, this is a hobby after all. I own my own cherished memories, and personally compiled autograph collection which is safe in my hands (even though someone has uploaded some of it to Youtube without permission!), and I have the great satisfaction of owning a sprawling and successful site and enjoying every second of working on it with a skilled and generous partner in Hack. SaxonWolf I was born in Sheffield in 1962. One of my earliest memories (pre school) was me and my mate Glyn pretending to be the Royal Brothers, and pretending the rug in front of his living room fire was a wrestling ring. In the early years of my life, I only saw Wrestling once a year, on holiday in British seaside towns. Went to more shows as I got older. Like most of us, I was hooked on World of Sport. I spent most Saturdays at my grand parents, both avid wrestling fans, especially my Grandma, who would shout things like "stop him referee!" at the screen. Everything would be ready by 3.55pm, sandwiches, biscuits, a pot of tea (tea leaves, not bags, of course), all in place for 4pm Wrestling. As I hit my teenage years, wrestling became a guilty pleasure, all my mates had grown out of it, no one dashed home for 4pm on a Saturday anymore, except me. A friend of mine went to work overseas, first on a Kibbutz for 6 months in Israel and then on to Australia for 18 months. He wrote letters to me (pre internet/email of course) saying that US Wrestling was huge overseas (World Class in Israel and WWF in Australia) and that the wrestlers were huge body building types. As I was weght lifting at the time, I was intrigued, so went in to a shop and bought a US Wrestling magazine. Imagine my surprise to see a picture of Adrian Street in it, I wondered where he had gone! and Chris Adams as well. More shock when WWF shows started appearing on UK TV, and Dynamite Kid and Davey Boy Smith appeared, totally transformed from skinny light weights to huge muscular powerhouses. I can't remember how I stumbled onto the old "one stop wrestling" web site, but so glad I did. That s where I first met most of the people on here. These days, I am more nostagic than ever, a sign of growing old guess. I still try to get on here and post when I can, despite a busy work and home life. Keep up the good work Hack and Anglo! Oh, and as an explanation, "SaxonWolf", originates because as a lad, I was hooked on the Beowulf story, a heroic warrior, who faces danger with no thought to personal safety. Ann I am Ann Richardson I became interested in wrestling in early 60s and I took over the running of four star fan club if any of the members or wrestlers that I supported are on here it would be lovely to hear from you powerlock I was born in 1957 in Newcastle and remember sitting down at early age (about 5or 6) with my dad and grandad regularly on a Saturday afternoon to watch the wrestling till one afternoon after tea dad and Grandad told me to put my coat on, and off we went to get the train to Newcastle I still didn't know where I was going till we got to St James Hall, the atmosphere, the brightly lit ring, and the colour, before that visit wrestling was in various shades of grey on a flickering screen, but now it was so much more exciting, so more real, I was hooked and looked forward to my visits to St James every few weeks or so till eventually it closed and wrestling decamped to Newcastle City Hall. The City Hall didn't have the same atmosphere but held around 2500 and could still build up a pretty good atmosphere, I went fairly regularly till I was about 13 or 14 when paper rounds, music and girls started to take priority along with Newcastle United (although that obsession started when I went to my first match at 5 years old) so I would catch the wrestling periodically on TV and by the time I left school I had lost interest in watching the increasingly stale fodder that was dominating wrestling on tv. By the time I was 18 I was working in different parts of the country doing relief at various hotels in the chain I worked for, occasionally I would go along to an independent show where I was working with workmates. I started to get back into wrestling when I was 23 when I was in Florida for over a month and attended a couple of shows on nights when we weren't up to much and was surprised to see a couple of Brits on the bill including Geoff Portz. I was working in the music business by then and usually watched wrestling on tv depending where I was. When I finally came home to Newcastle in 1983 wrestling shows were not very regular. The odd Independent shows, Joint Enterprise shows and I think All Star had started to make inroads into the North East and I saw shows in a few places around the North East. I eventually got married and both my sons went the same route as me but also including the big American shows, WWE and WCW, as the national scene more or less died out we started looking for more local shows, some were very good some not so. I also brought wrestling to the local community via my role as community coordinator at festivals on a couple of occasions and had both Pac(Neville - the current WWE champion) and Sheamus on the shows on differing occasions before they went onto bigger things. I also produced posters and publicity material for a couple of wrestling promotions locally and helped with insurance as I have experience at event management. Nowadays I still occasionally go to shows, be it in a Social Club or Sports Arena and probably see about 6-8 shows a year in the flesh, the rest I watch on tv., online and trawling through bouts from the past on youtube. Wrestling has changed so much not always for the better and no doubt will continue to change, will I continue to watch. I would like to think so, we will wait and see. Dave Sutherland I was born in South Shields, Co Durham in 1948 and I became interested in wrestling around 1960 via Saturday afternoon television. Over the next couple of years I tried to build up a store of knowledge regarding the UK wrestling scene from magazines, posters etc. until I started work in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1963 and began attending St James’ Hall on a Saturday night (after the afternoon at St James’ Park) which became a weekly event over the next couple of years. Having become a regular at the Hall and my friend with whom I used to attend the shows, Alan Patchett, securing a job selling ice cream, peanuts and orange drinks on a Saturday, I too was asked whether I would like to sell their wares and therefore get paid to watch the wrestling! I had the pleasure of watching just about all of the big names on the Joint Promotions circuit during my days as a punter and as a Hall employee I got to see many more at close quarters. While I saw some great bouts from my vantage point with my confectionary tray or from the hot dog stand to which I later graduated and managed to fill two autograph books after a couple more years I found my interest waning and the lure of music was pulling me in another direction. Patchett was feeling the same way so in mid 1966 we gave in our notice in order to make our fortune in the specialist (folk, blues) music world; within two years St James’ Hall had closed down although I stress our actions had no bearing on that outcome. In order to make a small fortune in specialist music you need to set out with a large fortune and considerably more talent than we possessed; even so I have actively maintained my interest in the music for over fifty years and have written columns for The Sunday Sun and, currently, Nottingham Post. Moving to Nottingham for work in 1978 I still maintained my interest in wresting via TV but at a very early age my son became fascinated by American Wrestling (WWE etc.) so I was to take him to a few events locally but none were a patch on the bouts that I enjoyed back in the sixties and seventies. Somewhere around 2008 while searching the Internet for my favourite wrestlers from that era, Francis Sullivan, Billy Howes, Dennis Mitchell, Geoff Portz and more, I discovered Wrestling Heritage. Where there are forums like “name your favourite 10 wrestlers” I couldn’t keep my nose out and found that my contributions were welcomed. This in time led to suggestions that I submit some reminiscences which became “Ice Cream, Hot Dogs, Leg Locks and Toe Holds”; rather self – indulgent but some readers were very kind about it. Still living in Nottingham and the possessor of a Nottingham Forest season ticket I watch the modern day version of the wresting on TV or DVD on spasmodic occasions but I cannot drum up the same enthusiasm. Finally I have to say that a fortnight ago Patchett and I got together for the first time in five years, down in London as South Shields had made it to Wembley in the Final of the FA Vase (a worthy 4-0 victory too) and over a few (many) drinks we caught up on the old days – St James’ Hall for sure! david franklin I am David Franklin, and have been known in wrestling circles for a long time as "Old David". A name I acquired on the 1Stop site to highlight that I was older than Young David, who was later better known as the British Bulldog Davy Boy Smith. Yes, I am that old! I am a retired Production Control Manager who worked in Book Printing Factories in Chippenham and Bath. I now do as little as possible and enjoy being as big a burden on society as I can ----- my turn now! I live in Bath with my second wife Michaela (Micky) who is quite a few years my junior. We have one grown up son Alex, and I also have two (grown up) children Emma and James from a previous marriage. I've been a wrestling fan since the 1950's when I first watchrd it on TV. In the 1960's my dad took me to local shows in Bath and Bristol and I was hooked. I was an almost fanatical for for many years thereafter, visiting halls in my local area -- Bath, Bristol, Westbury, Weston-Super-Mare, Swindon, Yate, Trowbridge, Melksham, etc. I had quite a few wrestling "pen friends" and we kept one another up to date and swopped programmes and results, and I joined quite a few of the many fan clubs that were around at the time. I started to lose interest slightly in the mid-1970's when the quality of the bills dropped considerably, and "interesting" foreign visitors seemed to dry up. Suddenly all the bills were starting to contain all the same old (boring) faces. Life, marriage, and children, I'm sure added to my waning wrestling interest as well. This was the era when Mike Marino & Mick McManus were "in control" at Dale Martin Promotions, and I was certainly very pleased when Max Crabtree took over and injected some "northern life" into our local shows. Independent shows (Dixon, Orig, Cyril Knowles & Jimmy Hagan) were also offering some interesting events as well. This lasted for a while until the "Big Daddy Circus" killed off my interest in attending live shows, and around that time they also stopped running shows (regularly) at Bath and Bristol. I then "retired" from supporting wrestling and I had no interest in it for well over 10 years. The Internet and "OneStop" got me back in touch with old wrestling fans, and an Internet friend persuaded me to attend a local show once again. It worked and I have been back visiting "live shows" for well over a decade now. Besides wrestling (At least twice a month) I am Dungeon Master of two different groups of elderly gents who meet to play "Dungeons & Dragons" and who all flatly refuse to grow old gracefully! We have been "playing" together for over 30 years. In any other spare time I have I enjoy walking in the countryside with friends and regularly run local quizzes. Wrestling has changed over the years, as everything does, but the quality is often very high. I'm enjoying my wrestling so much more now than I did when those Big Daddy shows (that some of you guys remember so fondly) "embarrassed me away". ;) frank My name is Frank Leonard and I followed wrestling from around 1977 when my father would take me to Fairfield halls in Croydon every second Tuesday. I saw most of the greats that were around at that time and loved every minute of it. But sadly I lost interest when the whole thing became The Big Daddy show and Legends like Mark Rocco were being used as Daddy fodder. Used to meet a lot of the wrestlers in the cafe area before the show and all apart from one who shall remain nameless were absolute gentlemen to this wide eyed 13 year old with an autograph book in his hand. Great dayz indeed! yorkie I am Alan Bedworth I was born in 1956, I live in Knottingley West Yorkshire. My first memories of wtching live shows was at Pontefract Town Hall with both my parents, one bout I can just remember seeing was The Royal Bros v Adrian Street and Bobby Barnes, they had the Hall bouncing with their antics, then when we were on holiday at Bridlington we would always go watch the wrestling, I saw many of the top stars there. Then after I got married and had a son, as he got to about 5 years old, we started taking him to Bridlington when we were on holiday. After that we occassionally went to Pontefract, which were an independant promoter. I haven't seen any live wrestling for about 15 years, although I do see adverts locally for shows, I find it hard getting about now, plus I'm undecided as to what type of show it will be. Philip Kenyon I was born as Philip (Phil) Kenyon in Accrington Lancashire in 1943. I started to be interested in wrestling due to certain circumstances: At the age of 16, I was interested in weight lifting. I used to travel to nearby Blackburn to the YMCA Gym twice weekly. This was time consuming and (in those days) expensive. In 1962 I discovered that there was a gym in Accrington run by Robert (Bob) Bannister (wrestling name Retsinnab), where apart from weight lifting, wrestling was being taught. It wasn't long before I got interested in wrestling. I learned all that I needed to know about it from Bob Bannister, and a few other guys in the same gym, such as: Andreas Swajics (worked in the same factory as myself), Ian St. John, Don Plummer, Norman Kenworthy, Ray Steel (of Rishton) and others whose names elude me. My professional wrestling career (amateur from 1960) began in 1962 and ended (sadly) in 1967. I must say it was really hard in those days as I was learning all this during my engineering apprenticeship, which also included night school! My first fight as a professional (heavy weight with 110kg) under the name of Mike Agusta was at the Padium town hall (not far from Accrington). I was billed against "Bob MacNab", who to say the least was a real mean guy. This bout ended in a disqualification of MacNab. Some memorable moments that I encountered were the following: Meeting and training (getting tips and hints) from Joe Reid in his gym in Leigh nr. Manchester. Also training with his Son Marcus (the Great Marcus) at the same gym. A future fight occurred in Morecambe in 1964 where we put on a great fight. The same applies to Bob Sherry who visited our gym on some occasions. I also had the pleasure of meeting him at the armature world championships held in (1963 or 1964?) in Belle Vue Manchester. He was very active in the British amateur side of wrestling! My biggest billing was at the "Floral HallÂ? in Morecombe, where I was billed along side of: Domonic Pye vs. Cowboy Cassidy The bill (if I can remember) was titled "Great Britain Vs Rest of the World".In 1967 due to my engineering background, I was offered a job in Switzerland, where I've been ever since. Must admit it was pure chance that I got to know this website. I received a CD from my Brother about the Mick MacManus / Jackie Pallo era, which included the name of Â?wrestling heritageÂ?. Sorry that I donÂ?t have any photos of me as a wrestler, but I do remember that one time I was billed against Don Plummer in an outdoor contest somewhere in Yorkshire (maybe Settle) at a Miners Fete. This was filmed and was shown, or so we were told in Miners Clubs and Convalescent homes around the North. I also got great pleasure in meeting a lot of the "older" wrestlers in Blackpool 2016 and as Hack says true friendships have developed. David Mantell Born 1974, brought up to be a fan from an EXTREMELY early age - about 2 years old - by my paternal grandparents, as they did with several of my relatives (my dad's got a slide of two distant relatives of mine wrestling in my grandparents' back yard from the early 70s). My Great Uncle Jack (my Grandma Ann's brother) was a Lanchasire Catch Wrestling shooter in the gyms of the East End during the Edwardian Era and years later when his branch of the family went to live in Canada, he would watch wrestling - I expect it was Al Tomko's old promotion - with his grand-daughter, my second cousin Diane, and would afterwards giive her some training in wrestling holds - IIRC she can still do a decent double wristlock but has forgotten everything else. However, my 82 year old dad and my nearly 8 year old nephew in Israel are both judokas - there seems to be an alternation between.generations in my family over wrestling vs judo. 2bus I've been a wrestling fan since the late 1960s. Born in Kettering so used to go to see local Brian Dixon shows in the early 70s. First ever show had a main event of Doctor Death v Billy Two Rivers. I used to be scared to death of Dangerous Danny Lynch and still regret going to football instead of seeing him take on Haystacks Calhoun (later Giant Haystacks of course) in a blood-bath that made the local paper the next day. Always been a big fan of Kendo Nagasaki. In later years you might remember the Piledriver mag that I used to edit. mark I was born in 1957 in Acton and went to my first show back in 1972 at the Brent Town Hall in Wembley. I loved it. Got many autographs over the years and was never refused and remember on that first visit chatting to Steve Grey at the interval and asked him to sign my programme. What a nice man he was and to a young lad meeting one of his tv Wrestling hero's its still a great memory. Ray Hulm Born in London in 1942 my interest in wrestling came as an offshoot of my interest in boxing and physical culture. I didn't go to a live show until I was 15 but in the first few shows that I went to I saw both Bert Assirati and Dara Singh, Two of the all time greats. I was smitten. Years later I became very involved with martial arts, started to hang out and train with various wrestlers and was even allowed to work on a show (best leave it to the experts was the general view). I can't remember the last time I watched live wrestling but I have never lost my fascination with the game. If you are new to this site or have been reading the forum for years but never contributed, why not have a shot. There are some very knowledgable folk on here but at the end of the day it's just a bit of fun. We have bored our families near to insanity. At least we only drive each other mad on here. Come on. Give it a go. frank thomas My name is Frank Thomas 56 years old, and started attending wrestling shows at the renowned Liverpool Stadium in 1972. Hardly ever missed a Friday night right up until 1978, when I started work and discovered "wine women and song"! Started attending local shows again in the late 1980s to the mid 1990s, but the magic had gone for me alas.. Discovered this site three or four years ago, and almost a daily contributor to the Forum. Come along and relive old memories and get into healthy, friendly debate! Tom H I was born in 1945.I started going to wrestling at Ilford Baths in 1961 I saw Doctor Death, Shirley Crabtree, The Great Bula ,The Monster and Big Bruno Elrington. At the end of the year the promotor joined joint promotions. In 1962 I began going to the Dale Martin promotions at Barking Assembly Hall. I went with my father who loved the wrestling as much as me. I bought the tickets my father paid the bus fare. Gernot Freiberger I am from Vienna Austria and born July 67. Watched the local wrestling scene (heumarkt) since the mid 80s. I collect now more then 30years all about european wrestling bassically. After all these year I met and talked to a lot of european legends. Paul I am 47 and have lived in Reading all of my life. I watched Wrestling from the late 70's and went to the halls, mainly the Hexagon Reading into the early 90's. Like Mr Mantell, I follow Brian Dixon and All star as the tv lights went out and visited Croydon as and when I could. So a lot of the names talked about on here are a mystery to me, but i am loving the depth of discussion. SarahBrad73 Hi, my name is Sarah and I'm from Doncaster. My daughter came across your site while doing research on my great grandfather for my grandads Christmas present. My great grandfather was Rex Maxine aka Freddie Rex and she came across a discussion on here from a few years ago about my great grandfather so thought I'd drop by. Les Prest Hi my name is Les Prest, I was born in 1950 in the village of Gt Ayton , North Yorkshire, also the village where Captain James Cook the famous circumnavigtor lived and was educated as boy in the 1700s. I left school at 15 with no qualifications, but while at a school fet'e playing in the brass band, the top attraction was St Lukes ammature matmen wrestling club (S,L,A,M) for short in which I was very impressed. Later on that summer (1964), I was at Castle Howard steam fair when I came across a wrestling/boxing booth, and on top was Gordon Lythe alias Klondyke Bill from Old Malton, this colossus of a man dressed in a sheepskin body warmer and an horse shoe on a chain around his neck absolutely blew me out of the water, and that is what planted the seed for my wrestling career. After leaving school I started to serve my time as an apprentice agricultural engingeer ( in which I still have an affection for old vintage tractors that I restore to this day, hence email address prestytractorboy). Then in 1966 I enrolled with St Lukes mat men doing wrestling charity shows raising money for such as Dr Banados &Toch H,. while at St Lukes I was fortunate to train with Norman Walsh the british and european midheavey weight champion, then in 1969 I had my first professional bout at Crimdon Dean nr Hartlepool for promoter Ray Diamond earning £3. Because I turned semi-professional officially I could'nt wrestle for them but I was able to train there untill 1971 when Lukies closed shop. After Lukies I tained for awhile at hardwick hall and wrestled for hardwick promotions with Pete Ross alias Farmers Boy, and then onto Johnny Peters gym in Grewelthorpe training with Magnificent Maurice/ Colonal Brody and Fat boy Floyd Craggs. (Promoters) I wrestled for Cyril Knowels ,Allen/Taylor, Kellett/ taylor ( Eric Taylor was one of the most genuine promoters Ive ever known and a real gentleman), Don Robinson who I probablely wrestled for the most, Brian Dixon, all for the opposition, then Relwyskow &Green for joint-promotions. Then in 1981 while wrestling Terry Jowett I broke my ankle badley having to have an operation and having pins and a plate fitted, then told I wouldnt be able to wrestle again, so after a while myself and Sean Mcneil bought a wrestling ring off Don Robinson who had ceased promoting st the time, so we promoting ourselves for a few years untill wrestling died a death the late 80s. Also while we were running the wrestling, I was running my haulage business and finding it difficult to both enterprises, although the ring was being hired out regularly for kick boxing, we decided to sell up.So now I rely on wrestling heritage and reunions to keep in touch with the lads, although almost every monday morning round at Jimmy Devlins house Dicky Swales, Sean Mcneil, Lord Bertie St clair (John Welsh) myself and several others including Black Jack Mulligan and Norman Cooper, meet up for a few hours to chat about the good old days of wrestling. best regards presty tractorboy!!! P.S. I always have a p.s. Klondyke Bill who first influenced me into wrestling,was one of the most friendly wrestlers in the game, although a top of the bill wrestler he had such a friendly disposition always offered you some jelly babies in the dressing room and had time for everyone, and he had such an high pitched voice for such a big fellow, which I found quite amusing. Gordon you were the greatest!!! God bless you. best regards Presty. Stephen My name is Stephen and I was born in 1955. I moved with my parents to the south coast (Worthing) when I was 7. I took a keen interest in wrestling in my teens and met my father in London (where he worked) and attended a number of wrestling events at the Royal Albert Hall. We sadly had to leave before the end to get back to Worthing! In the early 1970s initially in Worthing I was asked by Dale Martin if I would be a second in the ring and also help to take the ring down at the end of the evening. I was Â?handsomely paidÂ?. I did this for a number of years before we moved away in 1978. My activities took me along the south coast and included Brighton, Bognor Regis, Littlehampton and Portsmouth. Some summer shows were weekly. It was a great way to see wrestling close up though some wrestlers antics made me cautious (especially Kendo!). I got to know Georgeous George a bit and we chatted often. I was in Portsmouth when Veidor beat Elrington 2-0 to take his local Championship belt. Less of a surprise for me as IÂ?d Â?heard Â? the outcome in advance! When we moved to Bristol in 1978 I went to wrestling at Colston Hall but family became a greater priority. I read the web site with interest. I have a book or two of autographs and most wrestlers Â?obligedÂ?. Some were easier to talk to than others! I still enjoy watching the old matches on you tube. Sadly it will never be the same The Ost My name is Steve (aka Ost) from New Zealand, and i'm a bit younger than most of the posters here, only started following wrestling in the 1980's. Luckily, my grandfather who was a wrestling fan, attended bouts in the 1930's so I knew wrestling had been around a long time. I've also been lucky enough to be friends with Dave Cmaeron for well over 20 years, so i've had help piecing together wrestling's history since then. Lately i've been focusing on NZ wrestlers overseas, and that has lead me to getting a full picture of the history of British wrestling. I've been reading this website for a few years, finally feel like I can contribute. It's also why you'll see me asking some seemingly dumb/obvious questions. beancounter I was born in 1948 in a village near Lancaster. We got our first TV in1962 and I became an avid fan of the wrestling. I'm fairly sure my first televised show included a bout where Dropkick Johnny Peters won by a knockout. On leaving school I attended bills at both Preston venues, Blackpool Tower, Morecambe, Lancaster and other local spots. By the mid 1970s married life and my accountancy practice took precedence and I got increasingly fed up with the new gimmicks, American style antics and The Big Daddy/ Haystacks factor and so lost interest. Discovery of this website some 8 years ago renewed my interest in the 60's scene and I've posted contributions from time to time on the forum. I've also been able to keep the members informed of the progress of our oldest living British Wrestler, Gerry Hoggarth, 96 years young this April. Caulkead Born and raised on the Isle of Wight - which is what makes me a Caulkhead. Saw my first live promotion (Paul Lincoln) at Ryde Town Hall in 1963, and then became a regular. Every week during the summer, and every month out of season. The occasional promotion (Joint) at ventnor Winter Gardens, depending on who was billed. Seen very little live since moving to "the mainland". Have attended 2 of the reunions in Kent, enjoying the company of other attendees. Kenny Morrison Born and raised in Paisley, 45 years old and wrestling was a huge part of my Saturday afternoons as a kid. Around 16 years ago, I set up a promotion called Scottish Championship Wrestling and tried to do my small bit to kick things on. I only promoted for around 4 years, but had the pleasure of booking Drew McDonald and having the Scottish Heavyweight belt around his waist. I did hope to one day work with him again, but sadly that never happened. I now keep the 80's era of UK & European wrestling alive through my work on unofficial historical mods for a PC based wrestling promoter game (I'll not name it on here). It's been an absolute pleasure to read these forums. The site itself has been invaluable in my research on the aforementioned game mods. The Hooded Crow Hi! My names Kenny and I'm up in the highlands of Scotland. I used to post under the old site under the name of Black Tiger. I'm looking forward to talking to you all and hopefully catching up with some old friends (Dynamite Dwayne, you out there?). ?? Nik A Hi I'm Nik from Southend, I've watched wrestling all my life as my Dad loved it and his Step Dad 'Ernie Monk' was a time keeper (long before my time) till Prince Kumali fell out the ring and landed on him or so the story went. I watch loads of wrestling from all round the world and really enjoy NJPW but have to admit the old UK scene was the best - happy memories. Bernard Hughes Hi All. My Name is Bernard Hughes. You may have seen some of my posts on this site. I wasn't going to post under this thread because all of my far off day's memories are already on this site somewhere. However as so many of my fellow posters have ventured, I will do the same, although cutting out many of the repititions. If you want to know about my early wrestling watching memories at St. James Hall, Newcastle, most of them are in the "Memories" section. Born Poplar London , moved to Newcastle when I was 4. (my Father's work was originally in shipyards.) Started watching the wrestling at 12, often getting into the St James Hall by putting the bolts into the steel roller doors for the head British Legion man on the door.Nice fellow was George,always talked to me. Had to do this sometimes, had the bus fare, not the entrance money. Mr Welch the manager ,was also a nice man, always dressed in a black coat with long tails , had to look the part! Got to know Norman and Flo Walsh and once, they and Felix Kerschitz picked me up in Norman's car from home. You should have seen my mothers face when Felix came in! He was a big man. But nice and gentle to talk to. Not as bulky as The Ghoul but as tall. Went in the RAF at 18, got posted to RAF Seaton Snook, halfway between West Hartlepool and Middlesbrough. Joined St Lukes amateur matmen (The Slam boys) and trained with many that went onto make the grade as Les Prest reminds us. Met and trained and fought Dicky Swales, another lovely man. Move to a cousin in Welwyn garden City to take up a better paid job at De Havillands. Then the opposite sex came into it and my time for watching was sadly curtailed. Now living in Beccles Suffolk, a lovely village right on the edge of the broads. If you have any particular queries you know where to find me---On this site. I can't go without pouring praise on Hack and Anglo, who had the wonderful idea of setting all of this in motion. For me ,and I guess many others, a lifeline back to the golden days of wrestling. I was so glad when I found this site by accident, gradually all my memories came flooding back, and I could post them for others to enjoy. Love this site! Ruslan Pashayev Dear Friends, my name is Ruslan and I am pro-wrestling fan from Delaware, Ohio of USA.Besides that I am a ballroom dance coach.I did hobby wrestling history researching for my own education since probably 2005. And it was mostly American Pro-wrestling History, 1870-1950.In 2012 I met Dan Anderson researcher from Wisconsin and he kindly presented me with results of his “English Studies”. That episode changed my life. Dan's Studies had a great factual content as well as many “new names from the very long ago”. When I first read it questions started popping up here and there as mushrooms after the rain. Since then I mostly researched English Wrestling History. All styles which were historically practiced and wrestling territories which were present on England's wrestling map. Some of them exist in some forms some of them became extinct. Of course my main focus was Lancashire Catch-as-catch-can, and what was most surprising, that I shortly figured that there was definite uncertainty about its origin and evolution into current pro-wrestling, and literally no official records, no documentation was left from the “olden days”, mostly verbal traditions, which people believed and treated it as historical truth. Dan and I were working together on English Wrestling studies for few years. Last year I met Ron Historio and shared with him some of my ideas and results of my studies, after that Ron suggested me to put together all the facts which I have and write a story of catch. Ron helped me a lot with better understanding of local Lancashire geography which was crucial for understanding of the Catch's Evolution. He also did a phenomenal work on building up the biographical background of the catch-as-catch-can heroes.Its interesting but Originally Birth of Catch wasn't even my major topic, my biggest concern was the so-called Wrestling Boom Era (Hack's Era), 1904-1914 as well as all the great tournaments and forgotten titles and characters from the late 1800's early 1900's. But the more I was digging into it the more I wanted to know about “what was before that”, what pre-dated it. And that's how my research switched from Music Halls Era to the pre-1870 Era. And then I discovered for myself a completely New World , unknown chapters of catch history and I want to share this exciting “Story of Catch” with all the wrestling fans members of Heritage. This story has many heroes who affected catch at its early stages the most and remained in the History as true symbols of Lancashire Wrestling, but the whole story is dedicated to the memory of the Lancashire catch-as-catch-can Pioneer from the 1840's Adam Ridings who saw it all, birth of catch, its evolution and the final picture the music halls of 1890's, which pretty much it still is even now. Special thanks to Dan and Ron for all their help. I wish everyone have a fun time reading this series (Out of Darkness) and hope it'll bring some interest and discussion on the forum regarding the subject it covers. I would like to introduce my hero to whom I dedicated the “Story of Catch” – Adam Ridings of Bury, Lancs (1820-1894), who was also known under the nickname of “Dockum of Bury”. Adam Ridings was the pioneer of Catch Wrestling and without a doubt was the most prominent and popular wrestler of Lancashire in the 1840’s-1850’s. He was remembered as a champion wrestler among residents of Bury even in the 1940's, 100 years after the peak of his sporting career, his portraits decorated walls of local Bury pubs. Adam successfully wrestled at all existing back then styles: Cumberland Back Hold, Cornish/Devon in jackets, and Lancashire Catch. He participated in all major competitions of his time and had a greatest accomplishments wrestler of that era could achieve defeating the best wrestlers of his generation in countless number of challenge matches and finishing as the runner-up at Rochdale’s Nudgers, Catch (1844) and Manchester’s, Back Hold (1846) and finally becoming champion of Lancashire at Manchester’s, Back Hold, Belt Holder (1847). Originally a collier just like many other wrestlers he soon becomes a beer-seller, owner of the pub “Lancashire Wrestler” which was located at his own house in Moor Side, Bury and in many articles he is simply referred as such – “Adam Ridings, The Lancashire Wrestler”. Ridings was all-around athlete and besides wrestling Adam was local champion at running high-leap competition (1847), he also was a puglist (boxer). He was promoting Lancashire Catch in the sporting circles of Victorian England and his influence on popularization of the game was significant, it was during his time and also due to his efforts that Lancashire catch became known to English wrestling fans all around the country, he was among organizers of the first catch tourney of the championship class where the different weight classes were introduced (championships were held among heavies and lights), 1846 Sundial Pub, Bury Lancs. Prior to that, competitions were mostly open to all weights contests or had a specific weight limit, let’s say open to everyone not to exceed 11st. In the mid-1850's Adam was still the most important player on the local stage but he wasn’t that active anymore and already started thinking of retiring from sports. Back then average age of Lancashire champion wrestlers was pretty young, the age of 20-25 was considered the peak of sporting career, and by the age of 30 they would usually retire giving the chance to younger wrestlers, yeas it was a “young men sport”. So he decided to pass the Lancashire Heavyweight Wrestling Championship to the young wrestler from Ashton - William Swann. The tradition of youngster defeating the legend, passing the championship torch was known and very popular among locals; just like in 1842 young Adam beat famous Jack O' James of Oldham. Also looks like Adam also was a “party man”, apparently a dancer, he would often have “dance parties” at his house, and I truly enjoyed that fact since I am myself a professional ballroom dancer and coach. When I was writing “Story of Catch” I tried to see the evolution of Catch as my hero saw it, he started it in the 1840's, saw Golden Era of the 1860's, and its decline, music halls in the 1890's. To me Catch is his story, story of his life. Thanks for your attention and happy reading to everyone. Kind regards, Ruslan

frank thomas 2017 sees the 30th anniversary of the demolition of this great Hall, which as well as wrestling, stated boxing(amateur &pro) rock concerts, as well as trade union meetings! I was a weekly attendee on Fridays and saw pretty much everybody who was anybody in wrestling(with the exception of Mick McManus) but that's another story! Memories thoughts anything else on this great Hall thanks dear members.. Hack The Stadium was the one big hall that I dreamed of visiting, but never did. I remember seeing it on a tv news report when a union meeting was being held there. the ring looked huge. frank thomas It was a championship boxing ring hack permanently installed, they took the ropes down when the rock concerts and union meetings were held, the thing that fascinated me most as a kid was the illuminated round indicator, suspended over the ring! I always longed to see it reach "ten" but it never seemed to(most bouts staged over 10x3 minute rounds then.. then one night it did, in a bout between Johnny saint and Kevin conneely.. ambition realized.. Ron Historyo I went a few times and really enjoyed the place. Yes a fantastic big ring and good atmosphere. Seem to remember it Friday nights circa 1972-1973 , home from work , a quick tea and off to Liverpool down the East LancsRoad. The place had real history, frank thomas Friday nights and the place packed to the rafters, I went there from 1972-1978, the excitement of seeing Billy two rivers, who turned out to be a major disappointment, Hans streiger(everybody's favourite "German" and was max Crabtree took over, giant haystacks, Steve Logan mk1 Mike Marino etc.. and of course my all time favourite the great Albert "rocky" wall, a man you'd love on your side when the going got tough! The 1978 Kid It was watching Brian Dixon's shows (under the Wrestling Enterprises of Birkenhead banner) at Liverpool Stadium that got me hooked on wrestling. They were far more exciting than what could be shown on ITV. It was great seeing the continued careers of TV classics like Adrian Street, John Cortez and Tony Borg, watching the growth of young wrestlers like Dave Finlay and Chic Cullen and seeing one TV star after another joining the ranks of the Stadium wrestlers: Kung Fu, John Quinn, Tony St Clair etc... maskedmummy I went to my first show in July 68 and have a list of every show till it closed Billy Best was the promoter in68 The mc back then never used to get in the ring but stood by his table outside the ring It was only when Wrytons took over that Stopped At the end of their tenure we had the dark days of Tug Wilson era low crowds etc Max took over then Brian then Max ran a few more shows then Brian had couple more with Max running the last one which he also was Mc Please dont hesitate if anyone has questions to ask me re this period The 1978 Kid Would it be possible to tell us When Wrytons took over from Bill Best and why. When Max took over from Wrytons. When the last show from Brian Dixon was.When was the final show which apparently Max ran? Thanks maskedmummy Billy Best I would guess retired it is hard to put a date on this but I would say Wrytons took over in April 72 I got rid of my programmes years ago but Billy used the Mat Review while wrytons had their own the changeover of programmes would give the correct date Maxs 1st show at Lpool was 30/5/75 But the bills had been put together by Wrytons upto 20/6/75 when Max took the matchmaking over this was the show that both Haystacks & Shirley worked on Brians 1st show was on17/6/77 & his last on 16/3/84 which had no shows from Quinn Bridges Mason & Tina Starr Max ran his last show on 11/1/85 Hope this is of interest to you The 1978 Kid Very interesting indeed, thank you for taking the time and trouble. I started going to the Stadium in February 1978 but from September that year I was away at university so my attendances were somewhat sporadic. maskedmummy No problem frank thomas Remember the dark days of tug Wilson as related earlier, seemed to face Johnny saint(pre world champion days) on an almost fortnightly basis, then along came max! paul mitchell The stadium was special superb to work in.In defence of the fag end of Wrytons shows,Martin was finding it hard to bring up wrestlers south of Stoke for various transitional reasons with joint. However Eric Wilson could wrestle some of Max's exotically named replacements couldn't but at least on paper is bill matter looked good.That's one of the many reasons I admired Mike Marino top guy who would venture north.I take Franks point about samey bills but both Eric and Maurice Hunter were regular sub's at Belle Vue and the stadium. frank thomas You were a fairly regular performer there Paul, remember you in tag with Johnny south in the broughton rangers against the "Wonderboys" Marty Jones & Steve wright, also as a replacement for Bert Royal in tag with Vic Faulkner against the undertaker's, and an appearance in "heel mode" as "mad Mitchell" in a mixed boxer v wrestler contest with Jackie Turpin.. by the way, you were the first wrestler in my autograph book!Hope you're well maskedmummy When Wrytons took over I think we all agreed at the time shows were great a bit more focus on the lighter weights maybe but no complaints at that time Martin Conroy was in charge The problem was late 74 early 75 when Eric Wilson who seemed to be on every wryton tv show at the time ran the shows with Ian Burns Martin seemed to vanish from the stadiium but he was on tv even when Max took over I think Stan Rylands took over mc duties at Lpool There was a tv show from Preston normally a morrell hall at time which Martin mcd which seemed strange at the time I must also add as a wrestler I liked watching Tug Wilson a decent baddie Good times maskedmummy Just checked my old records in 1974 Tug was on 19 shows at Lpool 2 as a sub he had 6 bouts with Saint including 3 tags He went in with Maxine Barnes Steele Matu Joynson Guildon & Kung fu amongst many It was not that he was a poor wrestler it was just we had too much of him he rarely had a poor bout 1975 saw him on 8 shows up to May when he departed 2 contests v Tony st clair I remember He did not appear then till 12/8/77 when worked for Brian Dixon Should also in the 74/75 period Wrytons had aroun 9 tv shows and he done 7 of them + 1 for R&G Hack As I never went to the Stadium I can't add anything, though do remember Martin taking over at Wryton and the improvement at Southport, with new names coming over from the opposition. Main reason for the post is to thank maskedmummy who has combined vivid memories with worthwhile information. Thanks. maskedmummy No Thanks needed Yes I do remember Martin at Southport I remember seeing the Undertakers who we had never seen there and as you say others came across with them I think it was after Martins time but there was a Tv show there with Andy Robin on a rare Wryton show for him frank thomas Hi maskedmummy. Remember the show at Southport featuring Andy robin. He wrestled Bob Abbott from Nottingham in a clean scientific match, unusually for Andy he never got the chance to use his "powerlock" speciality.. The bout ended due to an injury to Abbott as I recall scoop I went to Liverpool Stadoum shows from around 1975-1979. What a treasure having a full list of shows must be. It would be great to see them published here. The Riot Squad Hello Scoop, thanks for making your first post. Yes Masked Mummy the invitation is open. Bernard Hughes As I have said before, I never got to Liverpool stadium, although I would dearly have loved to go there. My father stirred my interest bacause whan he was working there he saw Jack Pye and Bill Benny in a bloodbath (so he said). Then when I was at St James' 2 boys who had relatives in Liverpool told me about the wild fights that they had seen. Long long ago ! Ron Historyo Best sold out in 1972 but seems to have bought back in and on 31st May 1974 the new advertising was Best Wryton. Reasons given at the time to the press were. Attendances had fallen from 3000-4000 to 700 and they were running at a loss. It was cited that there no longer was a Jack Pye , Ricky Starr or Billy two Rivers to pull em in. Dixon took over from Max Crabtree on 17th June 1977 from what I can see. The previous week 10th June was a Crabtree bill with Big Daddy I have bills from this period but at the moment can't get them into the galleries. Max came in in May 1975 but on behalf of Joint and it looks like the name Best Wryton was retained Hack Bill Best, Wryton, Morrell and Beresford all went into liquidation in December 1974. Use of the name after that would have no connection with Bill Best himself. frank thomas Can remember the first Dixon bill, it featured Mitzi Mueller V Hellcat Hagerty, Carl Mc Grath V Steve Haggetty The bill topper should have been The Masked Mummy V Abe Ginsberg. A preliminary match between Johnny Palance & Woody Waldo opened the card. Abe was "indisposed" due to tv work commitments, and the winner of Palance\Waldo(Palance) faced the masked mummy. Think Jon Cortez also featured, possibly V Jackie Pallo Sr, but stand to be corrected on this. maskedmummy Have to correct you Frank Dixons first show 17/6/77 Haggetty 1-0 Mcgrath Haggetty subbed for Cortez Mitzi 2-1 Lolita Loren Kincaid bt Streiger disq Pallos/Mcgrath 2-1 Haggetty/Barron/Cortez The second show 1/7/77 was opened bu Palance v Waldo Palance won the bout which meant he subbed for Abe v Mummy Abe was switched to top the bill v Kellet which replaced the Starr v Cassidy match Conneely v Gilmour & Mitzi v Patti McGoohan made up the rest of the bill Hope this clears up any confusion frank thomas Cheers for that maskedmummy..mists of time!

george johnson I was watching the dvd for the Tv series England,their England. The episode which was about Mitzi Mueller and is the only dvd I have ever seen which shows Mitzi wrestling. Anyway as the closing credits rolled it showed Peter Rann as dubbing mixer. Would this be the same Peter Rann who was the hard man of wrestling. Iknow he stopped wrestling in the mid 70's and this TV episode was about 1978. ballymoss Although obviously possible, I doubt if this was the same Peter Rann. He was indeed, a very hard man, and unusually for a wrestler, quite weatthy. He used to live in Chiswick, where I sometimes saw him, fashionably well dressed, sipping coffee in an upmarket trendy cafe. Because of his reputation, I a timid youth, lacked the courage to approach him. His out of wrestling activities made him quite notorious, as he acted as a debt collector, notably for the late unlamented Peter Rachman. Despite this nefarious activity being widely reported in the national press, or perhaps because of, he was retained on Dale Martin's books. Not surprisingly Peter Rann became the subject of lively "banter" from some wrestling audiences, although this appeared not to bother him in the least, and few people would be brave enough to reproach him. To his credit he was a wrestler of some ability and enjoyed a lengthy productive career and formed a successful partnership with Pasquale Salvo in a tag team, ofton termed the "Riot Squad". Peter Rann also had the repuation of being a practical "joker" and no doubt was kind to his family, friends and animals, but I have my reservations as to whether he in general, was a particularly admirable human being. Anglo Italian Did he ever win his Southern England Middlewight title from anyone? Did he ever lose his Southern England Middlewight title to anyone? Did he ever defendhis Southern England Middlewight title? I bet there were plenty of wrestlers he never wrestled. Look what happened when he did face up to Les Kellett - i remember those 1972 midweek tv shows so clearly. Did he ever wrestle McManus or Logan? He seemed to have a small pool of opponents that included Clay Thomson and Billy Torontos and Johnny Kincaid. JK would be able to shed light on the real Peter Rann. david franklin He defended his Southern Area Title successfully quite a few times. I remember seeing handbills for title defences against Kalman Gaston and Jackie Pallo, both of whom had beaten him in non-title matches. They did seem to keep him away from young inexperienced opponents who might “irritate” him with their lack of expertise. From what I hear an “irritated” Peter Rann was not something anyone wanted. ;) I suspect that the Southern-Area title “died” when Peter Rann retired. I’m pretty sure he never lost the title in the ring. Some interesting questions there, it would be certainly be good to get more answers. james morton I once saw him as a blue eyes on a Paul Lincoln bill against Linde Caulder. As for practical joker he apparently used to lead poor Mad Fred Rondel into all sorts of scrapes. I was told he was fond of egg sandwiches, used to practice his falls on the concrete in Kensington Gardens and went to iive in Blackpool where he died. I can't vouch for the accuracy. ballymoss Peter Rann did win the Southern Area Middleweight title after a tournament was held at the Fairfield Halls, Croydon.In the final he defeated Ken Joyce. He certainly defended the title successfully, and although I am far from certain it was for the championship, I can recall him having a couple of heated contests with a wrestler of similar style, the underated "Iron Jaw" Joe Murphy. I believe Murphy won the first and Rann the second, so it may have been for the title. Peter Rann had a lengthy career from 1951 to 1974, but what is puzzling, is why he carried on so long,particularly after attracting adverse publicity as a Rachman "heavy" in the early !960's. Surely not for the money. He was rarely a wrestling headliner, but clearly a wealthy man, the bulk of which was obviously earned from his somewhat dubious outside activities. He certainly continued living in affluent Chiswick after he retired, but without disparaging Blackpool, if he did die there, what were the circumstances- did he move there, on holiday- as truly fascinating character. I agree I believe the Southern Area Middleweight title became extinct after Peter Rann retired. SaxonWolf "...and although I am far from certain it was for the championship, I can recall him having a couple of heated contests with a wrestler of similar style, the underated "Iron Jaw" Joe Murphy. I believe Murphy won the first and Rann the second, so it may have been for the title...." Joe Murphy beat Peter Rann in a tournament final in London, 15th February 1965, Jack Dempsey had beaten him two days before in Eastbourne. Graham Bawden I remember Peter Rann from Kent Walton`s book, This Grappling Game. He was described by Walton as the likeable rule breaker. Anglo Italian And so in true Heritage tradition, one narrow thread based on the southern memories of a few can open up to the statisticians. So it seems clear that Peter Rann was the only ever holder of the Southern England Middleweight title. That's quite something. It's not going off topic: can anyone name any other British wrestler who was the only ever holder of their title? Ray Fury? Wild Ian Campbell? Killer Ken Davies? Wayne Bridges? Jumping Jim Hussey? Tony Costas ? (barring geography debates!) even Alan Colbeck at European level? beancounter Hi Anglo: Ted Hannon? Jim MacKenzie? Chic Purvey? Lee Sharron? (Billed once on TV as "Jewish Heavyweight Champion") Hack Robert McDonald was champion before Ian Campbell, and both Sandy Orford and Bill garnon were champions before Ken Davies (I presume you mean Ken Davies father of Gwyn and not Killer Ken Davies off the independents). Anglo Italian No, I did mean the smaller Killer Ken Davies. David Mantell Tommy "Jack Dempsey" Moore was the only ever Empire/Commonwealth Welterweight Champion. Won tournament to become the inaugural champion in '54. Held for 12 years, by the end as a quadruple crown with the British/Euro/Wolrd (Euro version) Welterweight titles. Vacated the lot when he had to retire suddenly in '66 and the Commonwealth Wwt title has remained vacant for 52 years. frank thomas Bill Clark. Much maligned "nagasaki clone" and later "king kendo" I saw him billed in a match with the late great gwyn Davies as "eastern area heavyweight chsmpion" think he was the only one in the eastern area in all probability.. December 18, 2017 at 8:55 AM Edit Delete Flag Quote & Reply Bernard Hughes Hi Anglo, carrying on from your post, can anyone think of a wrestler who never lost, and retired undefeated? ballymoss The sage of Hollywood- Doctor Death- was he ever unmasked, and I mean the real good Doctor- Paul Lincoln. james morton Plenty of times after he joined with Joint. I think the first was Peter Maiva in Chelmsford. But, Bernard, was The (real) Ghoul? I don't think so. Ron Historyo The masked men mentioned above are just one identity of a wrestler who started out and paid his dues. It was great for masked men to have an unbeaten streak , but most started without the mask and lost many times as did famous wrestlers Mcmanus , Pallo, Pye, Assirati and all the rest Lincoln and Bomber Bates had plenty of losses. Nagasaki of course started with a mask , but on the quiet lost a few times in the 1960's. In the Wrestling Industry , I doubt if anyone ever was unbeaten. You are required to Learn , Peak and Fade and give to the business. Or am I wrong Geoff Shoots You have probably seen the only Peter Rann match on you tube Vs Johnny Kincaid, here is the link to part 1 anyway. Interestingly Kent Martin says he was born in Doncaster and now lived in Chiswick so he was a Yorkshireman! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=on4U2jN_G2w I saw Rann Vs Clay Thompson in Hastings White Rock Pavilion must have been at the back end of his career. They must have fought each other so many times and made for a great match up with Rann generating more heat than any heel I ever saw live. He threw Thompson through the top 2 ropes and Thompson dangled there with his neck in the twisted ropes for quite a time as I remember. Probably my top live wrestling memory from the good old days! Anglo Italian Yeah, that quiet tv bout with Johnny Kincaid isn't representative of what Peter Rann was really like. He had blue hair for a start! He did that knee-kick reperatedly and crowd hated it. Although he was regional champ, he used to lose more than he won. The title was enough on the posters. james morton Ron, I should have said Bomber Bates as The Ghoul never lost - or did he? Bernard Hughes James you are right, Bates as The Ghoul did not lose in that guise and retired undefeated. Yes Bomber Bates lost many times, but The Ghoul didn't I think that all other masked men did lose with their mask on. Bernard Hughes Now Anglo, going back to your query, for ignorants like me, would you kindly give us a list of wrestler and the title that you are talking about.? Then we can try to give some answers. Anglo Italian I doubted myself, Bernard, but see this time for once I wasn't befuddled. Peter Rann and his Southern England Middleweight Championship. Apart from the fact he was from Doncaster, was he a southerner who never wrestled up north? Is he quite unknown to northerners? djmask I believe Peter Rann was well known 'up North' as this photo in the following link shows him and other wrestlers, in 1966, (Including Paul Luty) watching Ernie Baldwin training some youngsters in Morley, Leeds; http://www.leslieoverend.com/20th_anniversary_0016.html david franklin I can definitely remember seeing a poster with Peter Rann working in Scotland (in the main event) against none other than George Kidd. palais fan Between 1954 and 1969, Peter Rann wrestled 59 times at The Wimbledon Palais, and I was there for most of them! As people have said he seemed and was, a very hard man, who normally wrestled in a rough and tough style, and clearly knew what he was doing in the ring. My best memories of him are in tags with Pasquale Salvo, a very under rated villian, in my opinion.The pair of them enlivined any bill they were on and had a little feud going with The Silent Ones (1969 version) at one stage. I also remember him tagging with other partners against Doug and Ken Joyce. Entertaining singles bouts I recall, were agasinst Karlton Gaston and Ken Joyce. I can't remember the source of the story but it was said that he frightened some would be tough huys at a chippy on the way home from wrestling one night, by brandishing a weapon he just happen to be carrying. A man not to be crossed, in or out of the ring, I suggest. Re title bouts I have a note of Peter Rann beating Ken.Joyce for the Southern Area Middleweight title, in August 1967, at the Wimbledon Palais. Anglo Italian Some of these regional title holders would lose regularly but assumed majestic invincibility in title bouts. Dave Sutherland Although I never saw him live I was certainly well aware of Peter Rann and from his televised performances he epitomised the uncompromising hard man. While he could mix it by either fair means or foul, when the going got rough against him I never saw him make any effort to hide from his opponent; thus my disappointment at never seeing him in the flesh. He did however, according to Ray’s essential list of results, appear twice at Newcastle and losing on both occasions; in 1954 to Brian Trevors and in 1955 against Jim Lewis; both well before my time there. grahambrook I only saw Peter Rann live on two occasions, both in the early seventies at the tail end of his career. I saw him lose to Les Kellett at the De Montfort Hall, Leicester, and I saw him draw with Brian Maxine at The Brent Town Hall in Wembley in what was billed as a "battle of the middleweight champions". Rann was the blue-eye (or, at least, bluer-eye) but this was no surprise for I also saw Maxine fight Mick Mc.Manus (at The Royal Albert Hall) and Steve Logan (at The Fairfield Hall, Croydon) around this period and both Logan and Mc.Manus were the blue-eyes on those occasions also. Hack I only saw Peter Rann on television, but even there he seemed to stand out as a hard man and an exciting wrestler to watch. grahambrook I only saw Peter Rann live on two occasions, both in the early seventies at the tail end of his career. I saw him lose to Les Kellett at the De Montfort Hall, Leicester, and I saw him draw with Brian Maxine at The Brent Town Hall in Wembley in what was billed as a "battle of the middleweight champions". Rann was the blue-eye (or, at least, bluer-eye) but this was no surprise for I also saw Maxine fight Mick Mc.Manus (at The Royal Albert Hall) and Steve Logan (at The Fairfield Hall, Croydon) around this period and both Logan and Mc.Manus were the blue-eyes on those occasions also. I was also at the Brent Town Hall when Peter Rann took on Goldbelt Maxine. I was about 14 at the time and was out with my parents walking around Chiswick Park about 4 days later, when i spotted Peter Rann walking his Doberman and puffing a cigarette. I walked up to him and told him that i thought he had been robbed in the contest at Brent Town Hall on the previous Monday night and the Ref was out of order. He smiled and asked me if i enjoyed the show. I replied "Yes" and he just gave me another smile and said, "See ya son " and walked away. I'll always remember that moment. frank thomas Just read on a dedicated web page to Peter, that he moved to Blackpool with his family, and died there aged in his early 60s, this was authenticated by a family member. My interest in Peter was reawakened by reading Adrian Streets book, "so many ways to hurt you". Remember sneaking downstairs as a kid to watch his first bout with Les Kellett, that was deemed too gory for family viewing on World of Sport, and Les winning the return a time later. David Mantell Tommy "Jack Dempsey" Moore was the only ever Empire/Commonwealth Welterweight Champion. Won tournament to become the inaugural champion in '54. Held for 12 years, by the end as a quadruple crown with the British/Euro/Wolrd (Euro version) Welterweight titles. Vacated the lot when he had to retire suddenly in '66 and the Commonwealth Wwt title has remained vacant for 52 years. PETER Peter Rann was one of those mid card wrestlers in fact better than some of those at the top of the card The Ost Kid Pittman was the Southern Area Middleweight titleholder in the mid 1950's. ballymoss Peter Rann has always been one of the most fascinating characters in Wrestling and one who has attracted great interest in this forum. I always wondered why he was allowed to continue to wrestle for Dale Martin after such adverse publicity concerning his out of ring activities, and why he decided to leave affulent Chiswick in West London for Blackpool. True he was a Northerner by birth, but that was Doncaster. A true hard man in the ring, Peter Rann remains an enigma. By the way I was told on good authority that his son became a solictor!!

The Riot Squad We are sad to report the death of former wrestler Scott Thomson, a Heritage contributor under his birth name of Tommy Stevenson. Tommy was born in Govan, Glasgow. Following a chance encounter with Dale Storm after a show he was persuaded to attend Dale's gym for a tryout. Having been taken under the wing of several top stars, he emerged as a formidable opponent, not only in his own lightweight division, but could hold his own with most in higher brakets as well. Being one of the fastest and strongest in the lightweight class, he excelled in the ring in most of his one to one contests and even found some fame along with his regular tag team partner Jeff Bradley when it came to a four up. Occasional spells as a referee helped improve his overall knowledge and understanding of the finer points of wrestling and he quickly became a huge crowd pleaser nationwide. Amongst his toughest opponents he lists Ireland's Michael O'Hagan, Jim Morgan (the younger twin in The Fabulous Harlequins Tag Team), also former (independent) British Lightweight Champion Ian McKenzie and Aberdeen's Len Ironside. His greatest achievement must be Perth, in the late 1970's where with the bout evenly balanced at one fall each, an accidental shoulder injury prevented a first career win, over one of the UK's best ever, Mr Johnny Saint! After he retired Scott moved to the Scottish Borders where he and his wife Margaret lived until her death in 2016. frank thomas Read of this gentleman in Dale Storms excellent book. RIP SaxonWolf RIP Tommy Stevenson