Combat Sports Historian and Martial Artist
In 1899, Martin “Farmer” Burns was transitioning into the role of part-time wrestler and full-time trainer. One of his most famous pupils would be Frank Gotch, who Burns defeated a week after this match. Burns was 38 years-old and had lost his American Heavyweight Wrestling Championship two years earlier. Burns blended both roles on a very busy December night in
William Hayes Shaw, who wrestled as Pat O’Shocker through most of his wrestling career, found himself in the spotlight in 1933. O’Shocker wasn’t looking for this sort of fame though. Newspapers were carrying a story about how wrestling promoters tried to use O’Shocker in a planned double-cross. Joseph “Toots” Mondt booked wrestlers out of New York and was aligned with
In 1933, about 10 years into his wrestling career, Jim Browning would win the world title. Starting his career in Kansas and his home state of Missouri, Browning would have to leave these familiar grounds, if he intended to reach the highest pinnacle in professional wrestling. Because World Champions had to tour nationally, and often internationally, the world title was
I’ve written in the past that Fall Guys: The Barnums of Bounce by Marcus Griffin is a problematic source. While Griffin has insider knowledge due to his time in the Buffalo promotional office in the 1930s, he wrote the book for the purpose of revenge against the promoters who fired him. The book contains factual information mixed in with interesting
James Hiram McLaughlin holds the distinction of being the first American professional wrestler. While people wrestled professionally before McLaughlin, he was the first to earn a professional living from wrestling. McLaughlin began wrestling professionally in 1860 at 16 years of age but the Civil War interrupted his career for a few years. McLaughlin began wrestling again in 1866. By 1877,
On July 2, 1921 in Jersey City, New Jersey, reigning World Heavyweight Boxing Champion Jack Dempsey met light heavyweight boxing king Georges Carpentier. Boxing fans flocked to event resulting in the first million dollar gate in boxing history. The match would prove the old boxing adage, “A good big man always beats a good little man.” Even though Georges Carpentier
In the early 1920s, Christos Theofilou began wrestling as Jim Londos after several years as the gimmicky “Wrestling Plasterer”. Londos probably didn’t realize that the name change would be the first step into him becoming the biggest box office attraction in 1930s professional wrestling. The second step was his emergence as a main event wrestler in St. Louis. Born in
On July 4, 1922, Alan Eustace received his shot at the World Heavyweight Wrestling Champion Ed “Strangler” Lewis. Eustace, the Kansas Champion, won a qualifying match with “Farmer” Bailey in March 1922 to qualify for the match with Lewis. 31-year-old Eustace was the same age as “Strangler” Lewis but Lewis was far more experienced. Debuting at 14 years of age,
I was recently honored to be a guest on The Martial Culture Podcast. Coach Rene Driefuss and Matt Peters were excellent hosts. I truly enjoyed my time on their podcast. We spoke about one of my books, Gotch vs. Hackenschmidt: The Matches That Made and Destroyed Legitimate American Professional Wrestling in particular. However, we spoke in general about the history
Since its emergence as a spectator sport in the second half of the 19th Century, promoters and wrestlers were under a cloud of suspicion that they were working their matches. While professional wrestling would eventually consist almost exclusively of staged exhibitions, many, if not most, of the matches were legitimate contest prior to 1915. Promoters and wrestlers went to great
