Your earliest pro-wrestling memories

[raymond35]

Wirehawk, who was it that used the German Claw against Ron Miller and Larry O'Dea in the mid 70s? Was it Von Erich, maybe under a different name?
I think he scared the crap out of me, saying if we didn't support him he'd turn up at our houses in the middle of the night.

 

[hawks realist]

Saturday mornings early 80's.....Big John Studd, Andre, Don Muroco, George "The Animal" Steele, The Missing Link, The Moondogs - Spot & Rex.

Then pre-wrestlemania 1 Thursday nights 11.30pm - rock'n'wrestling with Vince McMahon and Bruce Sammartino commentating, with Gorilla Moonsoon, Lord Alfred Hayes and Gene Oakerland doing special events and interviews. Only probably was the TV show "Carson's Law" kept going overtime and delaying the start of the wrestling every week without fail.

Ahhhh.....the good old days, when a heel or fan favourite turned, people were actually shocked.

I can remember Tiger Mask flying all over the place. Iron Mike Sharpe with the Lloyd like forearm guard. Definitely Missing Link and Greg "the Hammer" Valentine. Adorable Adrian Adonis. Bruno Sammartino was old but wrestled occasionally. The good old days

 

[NSWCROW]

I don't know the year (possibly around '85) but I still have the memory of Hogan getting beat down in the ring and Hillbilly Jim coming down for the save.

That was the King Kong Bundy " Pearl Harbour " on Saturday nights main event iirc

 

[Rusty Brookes]

Yes Rusty, I did write for 'Piledriver' in the late 80's and early 90's.
I wrote under the name 'Precious" Pete, which was assigned to me
by 'Leaping' Larry, a Richmond fanatic, who wrote extensively for the mag.

I was named after 'Precious' Paul Ellering, manager of the Road Warriors
and not 'Precious' who was Jimmy Garvin's valet! At least I hope I was!

Loved your writing in Piledriver (and the sly Hawthorn references you'd sneak in ) - in fact, I loved all the writing in Piledriver. For those of you who don't know Piledriver was an Australian Wrestling Magazine, more like an underground fanzine, which still rates as my favourite wrestling mag ever. Some of your work is here:

http://australianwrestling.org/index.php/library/33-magazines/piledriver

 

[WireHawk]

Wirehawk, who was it that used the German Claw against Ron Miller and Larry O'Dea in the mid 70s? Was it Von Erich, maybe under a different name?
I think he scared the crap out of me, saying if we didn't support him he'd turn up at our houses in the middle of the night.

By the mid seventies Waldo Von Erich wasn't a visitor to Australia due to a change in promoter.
Jim Barnett was the original promoter and he worked for the WWWF run by Vince McMahon Sr.
This was why we got so many big name wrestlers here. It was taken over by Tony Cologni(?) and the
quality dropped significantly.

All the German wrestlers would use the iron/German claw.
You may be thinking of Ox Baker ,who was a frightening looking man.

 

[mackem]

My memories of WCW in Melbourne was picking up they guys at the airport on the Saturday and taking them to the Southern Cross Hotel then Festival Hall that night. Returning them to the hotel. On the Sunday morning taking them to channel 9 studios in Richmond then after the taping of the show either back to the hotel or to the airport.

I used to take them to the country shows as well.

During the war between Big Bad John's Army and the Peoples Army I was picking up Big Bad John, Waldo Von Erich, Bulldog Brower, Abdullah the Butcher as well as others.

I was never paid for this and people would to say to me "You are being used" and I'd reply that while I was getting enjoyment out of it I wasn't being use.

I also use to take photos of the wrestlers and sell them at Festival Hall.

 

[The Sultan]

Firs memory this is the mid 80 was catching a WWF superstars that was on the end of a vhs when I taped hey hey it’s saturday, it used to be on late Saturday night where we lived.

 

[Deathly]

I still remember the first wrestling thing I ever experienced - It's a bit hazy but it was some match with Sting during WCW.

I remember I was watching it, mother kept saying "Turn that rubbish off, that's the kind of stuff your grandfather watches"

Fast forward a few weeks later, my mother tells my grandfather about me starting to watch wrestling, he sends multiples boxes full of all his WWF magazines, tapes and figures (those hard plastic / rubber 80s? ones that had short legs and you couldn't pose). The rest is history.

 

[Toump Ass]

I was about 5 and my dad took my older sibling and I to Festival Hall to see Nikolai Volkov & The Iron Shiek take on the Killer Bees

Legends of the ring Junkyard Dog, "Iron" Mike Sharpe, "Special Delivery" Jones & Steve Lombardi were on the bill too.

 

[Rusty Brookes]

I was about 5 and my dad took my older sibling and I to Festival Hall to see Nikolai Volkov & The Iron Shiek take on the Killer Bees

Legends of the ring Junkyard Dog & "Special Delivery" Jones & Steve Lombardi were on the bill too.

Man, colour me jealous.

I had tickets for the WWF in early 1987 - Andre the Giant, Tito Santana, The British Bulldogs, Bob Orton, Don Muraco. A killer lineup.

I remember getting the phone call from Bass tickets noting the show had been cancelled and we were getting refunds. Genuinely one of the worst days of my life.

 

[Toump Ass]

Man, colour me jealous.

I had tickets for the WWF in early 1987 - Andre the Giant, Tito Santana, The British Bulldogs, Bob Orton, Don Muraco. A killer lineup.

I remember getting the phone call from Bass tickets noting the show had been cancelled and we were getting refunds. Genuinely one of the worst days of my life.

Oh man, that sucks! I think that was a year or two after the show I went to. Tito may have been on the bill that I saw too, I think it was him v. Greg Valentine.

I still have some photos from that night. At the time Junkyard Dog had this gimmick where he'd pull kids out of the audience to dance with him after he won. My sister and I got picked. I must have been too scared to jump in the ring itself but my sister did. There's photos of me looking sheepish while Junkyard's carrying my sister around on his shoulders

From memory I think my Dad enjoyed it more than anyone.

 

[Rusty Brookes]

Oh man, that sucks! I think that was a year or two after the show I went to. Tito may have been on the bill that I saw too, I think it was him v. Greg Valentine.

I still have some photos from that night. At the time Junkyard Dog had this gimmick where he'd pull kids out of the audience to dance with him after he won. My sister and I got picked. I must have been too scared to jump in the ring itself but my sister did. There's photos of me looking sheepish while Junkyard's carrying my sister around on his shoulders

From memory I think my Dad enjoyed it more than anyone.

Yep, I remember the dancing gimmick well. That's an awesome story.

I was hoping someone might put together a website with stories and photos from those WWF tours because they're sort of lost to time.



And the Toyota ads at the time

 

[Rusty Brookes]

And the best of the lot

 

[Toump Ass]

Have a look at how happy he is to be on a TV commercial!

One of the all-time great jobbers. Disgraceful he's not in the WWE Hall of Fame already. (edit: was a 2019 abductee. Few years too late though, should have been one of the first in!)

Along with the photographs from the night I still have (buried in the garage somewhere) the program from the night and the merchandise my sister and I bought- we both got baseball caps, one of us got Rowdy Roddy Piper and the other was the Junkyard Dog.

My other bit of WWF memorabilia is a (personally) autographed photograph of Sean Michaels

 

[Rusty Brookes]

Have a look at how happy he is to be on a TV commercial!

One of the all-time great jobbers. Disgraceful he's not in the WWE Hall of Fame already. (edit: was a 2019 abductee. Few years too late though, should have been one of the first in!)

Along with the photographs from the night I still have (buried in the garage somewhere) the program from the night and the merchandise my sister and I bought- we both got baseball caps, one of us got Rowdy Roddy Piper and the other was the Junkyard Dog.

My other bit of WWF memorabilia is a (personally) autographed photograph of Sean Michaels

I also managed to score an autographed Shawn Michaels photo which I won a wrestling night when I did a Cactus Jack impersonation. Not sure of its authenticity. I do have a signed Kurt Angle photo, a signed Chavo Guerrero photo (got that three weeks ago out at Coburg and a killer photo), signed Ted Dibiase DVD (got an awesome photo with him as well) and a Hulk Hogan photo which again I can't vouch for its authenticity.

That all pails into insignificance however when I remember back to that 1986 tour I posted. A kid I went to school with claimed to have lived next door to Big John Studd for a couple of years while living in the US. He said he'd prove it to boot. He came back from the show with a program where every single wrestler on the tour signed their page. Either he had lived next to Big John Studd or he wrecked his WWF program in order to impress us all.

 

[Toump Ass]

I also managed to score an autographed Shawn Michaels photo which I won a wrestling night when I did a Cactus Jack impersonation. Not sure of its authenticity. I do have a signed Kurt Angle photo, a signed Chavo Guerrero photo (got that three weeks ago out at Coburg and a killer photo), signed Ted Dibiase DVD (got an awesome photo with him as well) and a Hulk Hogan photo which again I can't vouch for its authenticity.

That all pails into insignificance however when I remember back to that 1986 tour I posted. A kid I went to school with claimed to have lived next door to Big John Studd for a couple of years while living in the US. He said he'd prove it to boot. He came back from the show with a program where every single wrestler on the tour signed their page. Either he had lived next to Big John Studd or he wrecked his WWF program in order to impress us all.

Man that's an awesome collection you have.

I got a little bit of other wrestling stuff: a (sealed) Chris Benoit lunch box my mum bought me from a dollar bin at Coles about a year after he killed his family, probably a few complete sets of the 1985 Topps WWF collector card series (https://www.cardboardconnection.com/1985-topps-wwf-pro-wrestling-stars-wrestling-cards), a bunch of 80s figurines, and a couple of Wrestlemania's on VHS

Wasn't a huge Dibiase fan at the time but in hindsight that was one of the best gimmicks ever... imagine a rich white guy coming to the ring with a black servant these days. Amazing.

 

[PoppedCorn]

Some nice old school talk going on...

I've boxes of ppv on tape from the attitude era and nwo era i think
Worth nothing now, vhs copies from ppvs that can easily be downloaded today.
Had a HHH signed hardback of his first book...sold.it
Had a stack of wwf mags, pwi mags and about the first dozen wcw mags....sold them too

 

[Tso1967]

Me too regarding the WWE PPV's on tape (i would have 2 or 3 on one tape long play)

First memories were in the 70's where we used to have British wrestling on World of Sport
on Saturday afternoons in the UK (Big Daddy.Giant Haystacks etc)

Even though i had Sky Sports from 1994 i never got into WWE until 1999 (20 years now)
Started watching it because somebody at work was into it.
Back then we never had Raw/Smackdown 'live'.
Raw was first shown on Friday evenings and SD (which aired on Thursdays) on Saturday evening.
Also the PPV's were free not like these days (I watch them online now for free)
Raw and SD are now 'live' which is better.

I started watching when it was the Austin/Vince feud when Stephanie got abducted by Taker

 

[NSWCROW]

And the best of the lot

FACK DE UNBEATABLE FREEDOM !!! ( hack-tooey )

 

[NSWCROW]

Will still never forgive my mum for getting my little brother a " Hulkamania " shirt and i got a ****en " Karate Kid 2 " shirt

 

[WA ROO]

World Championship Wrestling on TV early 70's
Bulldog Brower and Stan Stasiak iirc

 

[raymond35]

I was about 5 and my dad took my older sibling and I to Festival Hall to see Nikolai Volkov & The Iron Shiek take on the Killer Bees

Legends of the ring Junkyard Dog, "Iron" Mike Sharpe, "Special Delivery" Jones & Steve Lombardi were on the bill too.

I was at that show. Our seats were right next to where the wrestlers came out. We were all grabbing at and hugging JYD as he left the ring, and he was absolutely bathed in sweat.
The whole night was awesome.
When Jim Brunzell bought out the Australian flag to wave at Iron Sheik the crowd went nuts.