Looking back at the rassles
By Jerry Gladman from Toronto Sun Televison Magazine July 1986
When the proprietor of this weekly shop decided to do a cover story on TSN's Saturday wrestling shows, there was only one person on this planet to whom she could assign the story.
Me.
Although this may seem, to some, a strange confession, I have been associated in one form or another with the wacky world of grunt 'n' groan for as far back as my mind will take me.
My absolute first recollection of TV was as a six-year-old, watching wrestling from Chicago's Marigold Garden, Bearcat Wright vs. Tarzan Hewatt. The Bearcat, smacked from behind by the swinish villain, tears off his good-guy windbreaker, storms after Hewatt and pins the crumb in 17 seconds. It blew me away.
And even though it's 35 years now, the names that colored those days come rushing back. Chief Sunny War Cloud, Lucky Sumonovich, The French Angel, The Mighty Atlas, The Blue Gardenia, Lou Thesz, Vern Gagne, Killer Kowalski, Argentina Rocca and Sky High Lee. And, naturally, the weirdo who started it all turning sport into great entertainment, the infamous Gorgeous George.
I can still see my grandfather, and armchair wrestling fanatic, twist and turn with each hold. He had one of those big console TVs and whenever his hero was taking a pummeling, he would quietly close one door of the console so he wouldn't have to see the massacre. My uncle, who was one of Canada's premiere sports writers, had wrestling as one of his beats 'cause he loved the action and the characters. He used to take turns treating us kids to the rassles, as he called them, and would drag us backstage later to meet them. I worshipped guys like Whipper Billy Watson and Lord Athol Layton the same way other kids followed hockey players.
The greatest kick for me came when, as a copyboy moonlighting in sports, I filled in for my uncle while he covered the horse races in Fort Erie. It was also great training because wrestling allows you to write with the kind of wild creativity offered by no other sport.
And even though I eventually left the jock stuff behind of other journalistic pursuits, somehow I always managed the occasional return visit to the mat. In the late '60s, when wrestling was in one of its upsurges, I often slid over to sports at the old Tely to cover the regular bouts. In some ways, it was the best of times. Every week Maple Leaf Gardens was packed to the brim as fans turned out in record numbers, praying some Good Guy would finally snuff out the miserable existence of a swine known as The Sheik.
The Lebanese Lout, a throwback to another madman called Nanjo Singh, destroyed anyone they threw in his path. It wasn't so much that he won matches - he stole them, coming back from the brink of certain defeat to win via the most hateful methods imaginable.
The Sheik gave it a good run for about five years but when he finally lost his appeal, so did wrestling. Mostly diehard fans stuck it out at the gate and in front of the tube.
Now here we are in the mid-'80's and it seems wrestling has never been more popular. Thanks to the efforts and marketing skills of promoter Vince McMahon Jr. and his World Wrestling Federation, arenas are again drawing astonishing numbers. And so is TV wrestling.
As for me, I still find it entertaining on occasion, but something is missing. The characters are wilder than ever, but nobody wrestles anymore. Few of today's mat heroes use holds like The Double Bludgeon, The Flying Drop Kick, the Airplane Spin, The Abdominal Stretch, the Wrip's famous Canuck Commando Unconscious and, of course, the fatal Camel Clutch, which drains the blood out of a victim's brain.
Today, it's mostly who can be more absurd than the other guy or come up with the dirtier deed. That's why I enjoyed watching the two guys on the cover, Davy Boy Smith and Dynamite Kid, known far and wide as The British Bulldogs. Those guys wrestle. They use real holds and they bounce around the ring like Olympic gymnasts.
"We learned our wrestling in England where they still do it like the old days," says Mr. Kid. "There are all sorts of characters, but we still believe in using holds and operating under some rules."
Smith said they had great teachers in England who believed in combining the flash with a lot of shill. "That's why we're now world tag-team champions."
And probably starting a lot of other six-year-olds on their way to life-long love affairs with the wacky world of wrestling.
Me.
Although this may seem, to some, a strange confession, I have been associated in one form or another with the wacky world of grunt 'n' groan for as far back as my mind will take me.
My absolute first recollection of TV was as a six-year-old, watching wrestling from Chicago's Marigold Garden, Bearcat Wright vs. Tarzan Hewatt. The Bearcat, smacked from behind by the swinish villain, tears off his good-guy windbreaker, storms after Hewatt and pins the crumb in 17 seconds. It blew me away.
And even though it's 35 years now, the names that colored those days come rushing back. Chief Sunny War Cloud, Lucky Sumonovich, The French Angel, The Mighty Atlas, The Blue Gardenia, Lou Thesz, Vern Gagne, Killer Kowalski, Argentina Rocca and Sky High Lee. And, naturally, the weirdo who started it all turning sport into great entertainment, the infamous Gorgeous George.
I can still see my grandfather, and armchair wrestling fanatic, twist and turn with each hold. He had one of those big console TVs and whenever his hero was taking a pummeling, he would quietly close one door of the console so he wouldn't have to see the massacre. My uncle, who was one of Canada's premiere sports writers, had wrestling as one of his beats 'cause he loved the action and the characters. He used to take turns treating us kids to the rassles, as he called them, and would drag us backstage later to meet them. I worshipped guys like Whipper Billy Watson and Lord Athol Layton the same way other kids followed hockey players.
The greatest kick for me came when, as a copyboy moonlighting in sports, I filled in for my uncle while he covered the horse races in Fort Erie. It was also great training because wrestling allows you to write with the kind of wild creativity offered by no other sport.
And even though I eventually left the jock stuff behind of other journalistic pursuits, somehow I always managed the occasional return visit to the mat. In the late '60s, when wrestling was in one of its upsurges, I often slid over to sports at the old Tely to cover the regular bouts. In some ways, it was the best of times. Every week Maple Leaf Gardens was packed to the brim as fans turned out in record numbers, praying some Good Guy would finally snuff out the miserable existence of a swine known as The Sheik.
The Lebanese Lout, a throwback to another madman called Nanjo Singh, destroyed anyone they threw in his path. It wasn't so much that he won matches - he stole them, coming back from the brink of certain defeat to win via the most hateful methods imaginable.
The Sheik gave it a good run for about five years but when he finally lost his appeal, so did wrestling. Mostly diehard fans stuck it out at the gate and in front of the tube.
Now here we are in the mid-'80's and it seems wrestling has never been more popular. Thanks to the efforts and marketing skills of promoter Vince McMahon Jr. and his World Wrestling Federation, arenas are again drawing astonishing numbers. And so is TV wrestling.
As for me, I still find it entertaining on occasion, but something is missing. The characters are wilder than ever, but nobody wrestles anymore. Few of today's mat heroes use holds like The Double Bludgeon, The Flying Drop Kick, the Airplane Spin, The Abdominal Stretch, the Wrip's famous Canuck Commando Unconscious and, of course, the fatal Camel Clutch, which drains the blood out of a victim's brain.
Today, it's mostly who can be more absurd than the other guy or come up with the dirtier deed. That's why I enjoyed watching the two guys on the cover, Davy Boy Smith and Dynamite Kid, known far and wide as The British Bulldogs. Those guys wrestle. They use real holds and they bounce around the ring like Olympic gymnasts.
"We learned our wrestling in England where they still do it like the old days," says Mr. Kid. "There are all sorts of characters, but we still believe in using holds and operating under some rules."
Smith said they had great teachers in England who believed in combining the flash with a lot of shill. "That's why we're now world tag-team champions."
And probably starting a lot of other six-year-olds on their way to life-long love affairs with the wacky world of wrestling.