Combat Sports Historian and Martial Artist
Posts about professional wrestling history from 1870 to 1930.
The following excerpt is from my new book Double Crossing the Gold Dust Trio, which will be out this summer. During the summer (of 1921), the Zbyszko brothers received word that their mother was gravely ill. Making quick preparation, they let Curley and the other promoters know they would be leaving as soon as they could arrange passage on a
Charles Green, a skilled English catch-as-catch-can wrestler, traveled to the United States in the late 1880s to wrestle the best American wrestlers. Green got his opportunity on July 21, 1889, when he wrestled American Heavyweight Catch-as-Catch-Can Champion Evan Lewis. To prepare for this match, Green took a handicap bout with journeyman wrestler Bert Scheller in late June. Scheller was born
On January 30, 1930, Gus Sonnenberg defended his AWA World Title, based in the Boston promotion of Paul Bowser, in Boston Arena against former world champion Joe Stecher. Two minutes of film survived from the hour-long match. Gus Sonnenberg traded on his celebrity as a professional football player to become a wrestling star. Sonnenberg helped the Providence Steam Roller win
Whether it was a double-cross or an attempt to setup a legitimate contest, Paul Bowser’s attempt to secure a match between Joe Stecher and Joe Malcewicz nearly resulted in a riot on March 11, 1926. Events of the previous year actually set this debacle into motion. From the end of 1922, the Gold Dust Trio of Ed “Strangler” Lewis, his
Tom Jenkins had the distinction of being the only wrestler to defeat Frank Gotch multiple times. Jenkins and Gotch traded the American Heavyweight Wrestling Championship between 1902 and 1906. At the time of this match, Jenkins was the champion again. Fred Beell had been campaigning for a match with Jenkins for months. Beell finally convinced Jenkins to meet him but
On Joe Acton’s 33rd birthday, March 8, 1885, he wrestled fellow countryman Tom Cannon in a 2-out-of-3-falls match at Sportsman Park in New Orleans, Louisiana. Acton and Cannon had a long history together. Both men were born in England in early 1952. Cannon was born a month later than Acton on April 19, 1852. Both men started wrestling in the
Joseph “Toots” Mondt wrestled professionally from the early 1910s through the 1930s but he made his real mark as a booker, booking agent and promoter. While Ed “Strangler” Lewis considered Mondt his equal in a legitimate wrestling match, Mondt has a genius for creating angles and finishes in worked wrestling exhibitions. Mondt would join Lewis and his manager Billy Sandow
When discussing Stanislaus Zbyszko’s title reign from 1921 to 1922, the main reason given for taking the title from him was that his title reign was a box office failure. Do the numbers validate this belief? Prior to wining the championship, Zbyszko wrestled former champion Joe Stecher at the 71st Regiment Armory in front of 7,000 fans. In 1915, the
When William Muldoon retired as the World Heavyweight Greco-Roman Wrestling Champion in 1889, there was no ready successor to the championship. Evan “Strangler” Lewis was the best wrestler in the United States not named William Muldoon but his specialty was catch-as-catch-can wrestling. The best American Greco-Roman wrestler, Clarence Whistler, had died in Australia during 1885. Muldoon’s handpicked successor was German-born
Joe Stecher started out 1915, a fateful year for his career, with a victory over Adolph Ernst. Ernst wrestled under the name Otto Carpenter for this match but was known to professional wrestling fans as Ad Santel. Santel had a deserved reputation for being a vicious “hooker”, a wrestler skilled in submission holds. Stecher was a 22-year-old Nebraskan, who made