Category: Early Professional Wrestling History

(This post is an exert from my newest book Masked Marvel to the Rescue: The Gimmick That Saved the 1915 International Wrestling Tournament available on Amazon.) The fall version of the 1915 International Wrestling Tournament was struggling with attendance and interest, when promoter Sam Rachmann struck promotional gold by introducing a masked wrestler into his tournament.  The Masked Marvel stormed

When Billy Sandow and Ed Lewis decided Stanislaus Zbyszko’s title reign had run out of promotional steam, they decided to “win” back the title in March 1922.  St. Louis promoter John Contos was able to secure the big rematch, which would occur at the St. Louis Coliseum on Thursday, December 14, 1922. By this time, American professional wrestling outside of

On Saturday, January 30, 1904, George Hackenschmidt defended his Greco-Roman World Wrestling Championship against Ahmed Medrali.  “The Russian Lion” would have to defeat “The Terrible Turk” to retain his championship.  Promoters selected the giant Medrali, who was 6’02” and 224 pounds, to defeat the seemingly invincible Hackenschmidt. George Hackenschmidt stood only 5’09” tall and weighed 209 pounds.  Despite his smaller

On Monday, December 13, 1920, Ed “Strangler” Lewis won the first of six World Heavyweight Wrestling Championships from Joe Stecher.  The fact he won the title from his biggest rival and business enemy must have been particularly satisfying. A year before this match, Stecher and Lewis met in a match lasting over three hours.  Lewis made a mental error in

On March 22, 1881, Greco-Roman World Wrestling Champion William Muldoon met Collar-and-Elbow World Champion John McMahon at the Terrace Garden in New York City.  Muldoon and McMahon met in a best-two-out-of-three-falls match. The first fall was conducted by Greco-Roman rules.  The second fall would be contested using collar-and-elbow rules.  The last fall would be decided via what The New York

On Thursday, November 22, 1923, St. Louis promoter John Contos hosted a controversial card topped by a match between Joe Stecher and Dan Kolov, an up-and-coming Bulgarian wrestler.  The card was covered by John E. Wray, the Sports Editor for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The card was controversial because two of the biggest stars in wrestling were advertised but didn’t

Yusuf Ismail only wrestled in the United States for six months in the first half of 1898.  In his first significant match, he was disqualified for a vicious foul.  In his only other significant match, he gave Evan “Strangler” Lewis the beating of his life.  Yet his short tour of the United States made him a legend. Ismail entered the

On a Thursday night, November 25, 1909, World Wrestling Champion Frank Gotch met Polish Wrestling Champion Stanislaus Zbyszko for a handicap match in Buffalo, New York.  Gotch agreed to forfeit the bout if he could not throw Zbyszko twice in an hour. Zbyszko’s size and strength created problems for Gotch, who weighed 190 pounds to Zbyszko’s 260 pounds.  However, Zbyszko

Wrestling promoter Samuel Rachman created the International Wrestling Tournament in Spring 1915 to highlight the abilities of Aleksander “Alex” Aberg.  Aberg was the Russian Greco-Roman Wrestling Champion.  Rachman believed Aberg could beat any wrestler. Rachman also wanted to lure Frank Gotch, the last undisputed World Heavyweight Wrestling Champion, out of retirement to wrestle with Aberg.  Gotch wrestled George Lurich in

In a blog post last month, I wrote about the difficulty promoters had in staging the  Joe Stecher vs Jess Westergaard match.  Originally scheduled for Omaha, Nebraska, the Omaha Chief of Police and Police Commissioner were concerned about the match being prearranged or a “work”. They didn’t want gamblers being taken in by the exhibition. To prevent this occurrence, they