Greenville's Ring Bell: Nikita Mulkovich Made More Than Championship Belts

Greenville SC Memories
by Don Holbrook
Mid-Atlantic Gateway Contributor

PROMOTER PAUL WINKHAUS

The Greenville Memorial Auditorium had a Crockett-owned ring that was kept in the building. It was used each Monday night but also used in Anderson and any other show in the area except Spartanburg. That building had their own ring. 

One Monday the maintenance crew began setting up the ring for the night's show and discovered the ring bell was missing. They never found it. 

One of the maintenance guys remembered they had a telephone speaker/bell in the supply room. They quickly wired up a push button, placed the bell on the ringside table and ran a drop cord power. It didn't work real well. That night the wrestlers in the ring could hardly hear the little bell with all the crowd noise. It caused confusion in every match.

NIKITA MULKOVICH

The following Monday, Paul Winkhaus (Crockett's local promoter for Greenville, Asheville, and area shows) came in carrying a brand new gold-colored bell mounted on a beautiful gold colored wooden base with a nice little eagle attached to the base with a handle for carrying. I asked him about it and he said a fellow made it for him. It was several months later when I found out that fellow was Nikita Mulkovich- the famous belt maker.

I remembered back to the only night they used the electric telephone bell - -  during intermission, Mulkovich came out to the ringside table and with his arms folded, stared at that electric bell for a minute or so, then he walked away shaking his head.

Mulkovich made some on-of-a-kind championship belts. I thought it was cool that Greenville had what was obviously a unique one-of-a-kind ring bell!

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More Greenville SC Memories from Don Holbrook 
Two Ton Harris, Angelo Martinelli, Wally Dusek, Wahoo McDaniel, Abe Jacobs, Super Destroyer, the "Big Brown Box", and more!