I liked him too and he was very talented. He was good in this Saint episode. I think career wise he got a bit pigeon holed into comedy roles once you’ve been a big success they try and keep you in similar roles at same time as this Saint he filmed OUR MUTUAL FRIEND for the BBC a Dicken’s novel in which he plays a chilling role as a black mailer and he is really good. 😃

Was Jackie Junior in his late forties in 1978? On the credits at the end I think it said Jackie Pallo not Junior only saying.

What a sad ending to his life. I have seen him twice on you tube on I think the CHICAGO classics and he looked very fit and impressiv. I can’t imagine it was smart to eat two pound of cake before going in the ring, but what do I know I am no expert.

You’ve got something in your eye let me get it out

But surely that is way too old for a very physical activity like wrestling? Teachers say dealing with pupils is stressful and too difficult to continue beyond sixty, nurses and fire service , police retire earlier jobs like bus drivers, HGV drivers would you like to be driven on a bus knowing the driver was in their mid seventies? I retired at 60 I had enough by then and have enjoyed the last five and a half years. Can I ask is STEVE GREY still wrestling? I know he must have been about 20 around 1970 but surely that would make him possibly 70 maybe older now?

Like several of you have already mentioned I thought Bert Royal was superb. To me he never looked clapped out always put on a good show. Seeing all the old posters it’s amazing how long and how far back their careers went, these posters show Kidd, Colbeck, McManus from the late forties. On a slightly different note what concerns me and I don’t think was good for professional wrestling was how long they stayed champions I don’t think this was good for the sport. You need a buzz , a constant change in the dynamics to keep the punters interested otherwise it becomes stale and predictable and folk loose interest. George Kidd, world champion till mid seventies but does not appear to have been very active, a world champion we just heard Kent talk about with reverence. Brian Maxine a champion from 1969 who made it plain with the addition of the title GOLDBELT Maxine that he was here to stay, and he was, long after tv wrestling was finished until the millennium and beyond. I am not talking about their ability maybe they were the best but to my mind it’s not good long term. Thank goodness there were also wrestlers like Jim Breaks who won, lost, and had feuds with the best of them Saint, Grey, Faulkner, Dynamite Kid, Danny Collins etc don’t you think he made the light divisions exciting and interesting partly due to their unpredictability? Fans were not certain how it would end and if the good guys like Saint, Grey would prevail, sometimes they did, sometimes not for that Breaks was great. But if you have say a Maxine who is a champ like....forever and usually is victorious with a single leg Boston submission how long will that keep fans coming? Personally I would have liked to see some of the unsung heroes like Mike Bennett or Alan woods etc a chance to shine. I remember Kent Walton saying of Robby Baron his ambition is the British middleweight title and thinking to myself dream on....

@Peter you have the advantage of understanding the language so it will make a lot more sense to you. To myself it just seems for some reason ( unknown) the camera is taken away from the action in the ring at crucial moments back to the commentator for what seems an undeterminable time sometimes when it pans back to the ring the action as moved on! I do find it fascinating to see the french audience however, again, personally I have no idea what they are saying but those near the ringside who come up to the ring sometimes try and hit the wrestlers etc, it looks pretty hairy when they start to mob around the wrestlers. I wonder what Kent would have thought?😁

Yes it was you some OUTSTANDING research taking a lot of hard work and dedication and thank you for the link

Yes it was you some OUTSTANDING research taking a lot of hard work and dedication and thank you for the link

Now you mention it, and I had completely forgotten I saw the wrestling from the Pontin Holiday Camp at Ainsdale a few times. It was a great place we could watch the wrestling whilst having our lunch! Happy days.

I was thinking I experienced something much worse with a lady also wearing a fur coat! One of our champion stud dogs pet name Jack could be a handful. He was popular at stud and earned quite a lot of money off one year of his earnings he purchased us a brand new estate car ( remember there was no tax on his stud fees) and I purchased him a leopard print collar and lead he wore for visiting bitches. He was advertised as a keen and willing stud and he was certainly that but he could get frustrated if he did not get a bitch every two weeks or so. I was not not fully concentrating on one of his walks and a women in front of us stopped and suddenly bent over no idea why....and he was on her back in a flash immediately thrusting away. She went BALLISTIC at first because he was strong as a bull hard to pull off, fortunately her teenage son who was with her could not stop laughing and it blew over with my profuse apologies. I wanted to laugh myself but dare not........

@te666x Hi could be correct but unless it was nationwide from all over the uk how can it be deemed accurate

I think you are right the name you mention sounds familiar! Also just the last couple of pages at the back of the magazine bet it was THE RING. But how could they be so accurate on their results UNLESS they had access to ALL the results everywhere in the UK which hardly seems feasible.

Thanks really looking forward to seeing a few Geoff PORTZ bouts and keen to see his son Garfield in action too!

Sorry if it came across as snotty not meant to be I assumed you were joking or had never been. I understand what you mean about Southport, after all Blackpool is nearby and you would think with its massive tourist trade would surely be more ideal and put on a lot more shows and Venues than Southport?

Love it! That’s superb. Ha Ha!

Where do I look on you tube for Geoff PORTZ wrestling in the USA please?

Your helping to save these times so they are not lost forever that is very important. Sometimes when things are gone they are gone forever that’s sad. I did history upto A level standard but not at university. The french blog whetted my appetite to learn more and on that wrestler data site there was lots of interesting stuff and you could see where a lot of UK wrestlers like PORTZ wrestled in Europe. I am pretty sure you will be fully aware of it but one researcher had done amazing research on spanish professional wrestling from late forties till early sixties. Including the promoters, the biggest Spanish wrestling stars and foreign including UK WRESTLERS who did tours. He concentrated on two venues one was I think Barcelona. They used the Spanish bull rings and wrestled outdoors ( sometimes it was rained off) Thousands came it must have seemed like wrestling in the ancient collasium the atmosphere must have been fantastic. Lots of British toured like Jackie Pallo, Johnny Kwango was very successful ( he was called black kwango) and by sixties Scottish wrestlers toured together as a Scottish team sometimes v Spain! Clayton Thompson looks impossibly young on one of the pictures, it’s another aspect of the British scene, wrestlers abroad and fascinating. And yes, I agree 100% what a shame we could not hold on to our homegrown talent. Even in the UK some of the biggest stars not on tv anymore for a long long time......and we were reduced to seeing the same faces big daddy, Steve grey ( who is good) virtually EVERY WEEK their rostrum being so deleted.

Thank you for doing that now all wrestling heritage members can see them. And some of us ( myself included) are not that great with computer technology. You must be very proud of Wrestling Heritage site it covers so many aspects of post war wrestling in the UK in incredible detail. I was conscious I was becoming a bit of a pain banging on about the french blog but the two overlap to a degree. Remember the best ever documentary on the Second World War? Granada tv‘s THE WORLD AT WAR? And how it portrayed all aspects of the war from all over the world? And how you got interviews with survivors and the war from the German perspective as well? ( to me it should be compulsory viewing part of their education for all school children). Well try and think of these late fifties / early sixties TV bouts as parts of the overall picture, a chance to see exactly what it was like it is different but I think as close as can get to experience the times then.

Okay got the message you worked a few places in Southport. 😁😁