The Infernos and The Loaded Boot (1967)

JULY 1, 1967 - "THE LOADED BOOT"
By Carroll Hall, All-Star Championship Wrestling

My two brothers and I were really wanting to go to the wrestling matches on that Saturday night in Winston-Salem. It didn't look too promising early in the week leading up to the card because Dad wouldn't be getting off work until 10:00 p.m. that night and I was not
quite old enough to drive yet.

By mid week we got lucky and worked out a deal with Jimmy, a close friend of the family. My brothers and I would help Jimmy chop the weeds out of his tobacco field in exchange for him driving us down to the Coliseum. He loved wrestling too.

My mom had never learned to drive at this point but she had made up her mind to do so. She had just bought a 1957 Dodge with the big fins on the back for $200. She let Jimmy drive that old Dodge to wrestling because the only thing that would run on his farm that day was his tractor. Well, Jimmy must never have driven anything so powerful as that old Dodge. He flew past every vehicle we came upon that night between Mt. Airy and Winston-Salem. Just imagine if you will three kids and one nut(just kidding Jimmy) flying down U.S. 52 in a "Batmobile" going to wrestling!

The old Coliseum was hot that night as it was nearly a full house and I don't believe that grand old building ever had air conditioning.

George Becker had made a promise on "Championship Wrestling" the previous week.....

Read the entire story on the All-Star Championship Wrestling website. >>

The Very First U.S. Title Switch in the Greensboro Coliseum

by Dick Bourne
Mid-Atlantic Gateway

It's often said that the night Johnny Valentine beat Harley Race for the United States Heavyweight Championship in 1975 was the first time the U.S. title changed hands in Greensboro. But that would be wrong. It actually happened in 1962 when Hans Schmidt defeated then U.S. champ Pat O'Connor for the honors in front of 5,800 fans in the Greensboro Coliseum. O'Connor regained the title in the same building about 5 weeks later.

Anyone could be forgiven for not knowing about two such events 13 years apart. I never knew about that title change until I began research for my book on Jim Crockett Promotions' United States Championship. I was not even a year old when the 1962 matches happened. But additional research by Carroll Hall and Mark Eastridge shed light on this historic switch during an earlier era.

Carroll Hall recently posted both newspaper clippings from those two cards on his All Star Championship Wrestling blog. You can take a close look at those here:

The First U.S. Title Switch in the Greensboro Coliseum
Post by Carroll Hall
All Star Championship Wrestling

As an additional reference point about this time in history, O'Connor had been awarded the United States championship by the National Wrestling Alliance after Buddy Rogers had defeated him for NWA world heavyweight championship. It was during a brief time when the NWA board actually recognized a U.S. title in that era.

It's fun to take a look at who else was on that card:

• Long time area veteran George Becker teamed with national sensation Argentina Rocca. 
• Even in 1962 Johnny Weaver was already battling Rip Hawk. 
• Abe Jacobs was a perennial star in the area over two decades.
• Women wrestlers were prominent on the cards, as Johnny Weaver's wife Penny Banner was on the July card wrestling Ann LaVerne. She would become one of the biggest names in women's wrestling. The August card featured a women's tag match with four African-American women wrestlers, a rare such booking in wrestling during the era of segregation.  They were Babs Wingo, Fuzzy Robinson (replacing Marva Scott), Ethel Johnson, and Virginia Franklin. 
• Ringside seats were only $2.50 in 1962!

A blooper alert - - We noticed in the results clipping for the August 16th card where O'Connor regained the U.S. title, Johnny Weaver beat Luis Tillett on the undercard with a dreaded SWEEPER hold!

 

Originally posted on the Mid-Atlantic Gateway on September 25, 2015.

 

Jim Crockett's Earliest Foray into Televised Wrestling (1956)

by Dick Bourne
Mid-Atlantic Gateway

All-Star Championship Wrestling

Carroll Hall, who publishes the "All-Star Championship Wrestling" website, has unearthed information on what most surely was Jim Crockett's earliest foray into televised wrestling.

In May of 1956, WFBC Channel 4 in Greenville, SC announced they would begin airing live wrestling matches in the studios of WFBC beginning on June 2, 1956. The show was called, appropriately enough, "Carolina Wrestling."

Here is the text of the announcement that appeared in the Greenville Times.

Channel 4 Will Have Wrestling Ring in Studio

Wrestling in the studios of WFBC-TV on Rutherford Street will be presented "live" by Channel 4 each Saturday afternoon from 4:30 to 5:30, the television station announced yesterday.

A 20 x 20 regulation ring will be set up in the spacious studios and name wrestlers will appear regularly. First performance will be next Saturday afternoon.

The wrestlers who have been scheduled to appear at various times include Mr. Moto, Kinji Shiduya, Gene Becker, Jack Whitzig, Don Arnold, Don Eagle, and Cheif War Eagle, Lea, Chick and Leo Garabaldi, Carl Von Hess, Dick Steinborn, and Angelo Martinelli. There will also be girl and midget wrestlers.

Commentator for the events will be Claude Freeman.

According to Hall's research of newspaper archival TV listings from that time period, the show ran for just over three months, with it's last appearance on the TV schedule being Saturday, September 8, 1956. Demand for the free tickets to the studio show grew so quickly that on at least one occasion, WFBC moved the show to the famous Textile Hall in Greenville, site of many Jim Crockett wrestling events in the 1950s and 1960s. The move was reported in the Greenville Times to accommodate the huge demand for tickets to the live broadcasts.

WFBC-FM radio personality Claude Freeman was the host for the program. Freeman had been on WFBC-FM going back into the 1940s, hosting a popular morning program called "Kitchen Capers."

To put this show in historical perspective of the times, WFBC Channel 4 had only been on the air for two and a half years at this point, first broadcasting on December 31, 1953. Jim Crockett would not put wrestling on WBTV in Charlotte until January of 1958. So the June 1956 "Carolina Wrestling" show was bound to be the first ever affiliated with Jim Crockett Promotions.

The show proved to be quite popular, both in ratings and in interest for tickets, which begs the question why it was relatively short-lived. As reported on the Mid-Atlantic Gateway, wrestling would return to the studios of WFBC in Greenville in 1960 with hosts including Bob Poole, Bill Krieger and Billy Powell.

For Carroll Hall's first post on this information visit:
"Carolina Wrestling" on WFBC 4 in Greenville, SC"
http://allstarchampionshipwrestling.blogspot.com/2017/10/carolina-wrestling-on-wfbc-4-in.html

Traffic Jams & Friendships

by Carroll Hall
All Star Championship Wrestling

Saturday March 12, 1983 was the 29th birthday of my brother Kenneth and also the date of the infamous cage match in Greensboro, NC: Sgt. Slaughter and Don Kernodle defending their world tag team championships against Ricky Steamboat and Jay Youngblood. Originally I had a prior commitment for that night but when those plans changed, I surpised my brother by taking him to the show in Greensboro. Up to that point in time we had always bought our tickets at the door because with our work schedules, it was generally on the day of an event before we could be sure we could go. This would be the first time we were turned away from a show since we started attending arena shows in May 1965.

We did not make it too far from where we exited I-40 when the traffic came to a crawl. When we finally made it to the Coliseum entrance, I rolled down the window and a police officer asked if we already had tickets. When I said no, he replied all the tickets were gone. We kept going at a crawl until we finally made it back to I-40 West. By the time we got through the traffic jam and got back home it was between 11 and 11:30 which was not far off of the time we normally got home from a show in Greensboro. This would be the last time we would ever travel to Greensboro to see wrestling. We were lucky enough to see Steamboat/Younglood vs. Slaughter/ Kernodle in three Greenboro matches prior to this on October 23, November 6 and December 26 in 1982.

Fast foward to Friday March 12, 2004. I had just recently joined my first wrestling message board. On this date I sent a PM (private message) to another member who was participating in a thread about that fabled cage match. That member turned out to be Dick Bourne of the Mid-Atlantic Gateway.

Two days later, on Sunday March 14, 2004 in the late afternoon, Dick Bourne visited me at my home. As it turns out we live in the same area but had never met. That was the beginning of a friendship that I treasure more than simple words can describe.

The First U.S. Title Switch in the Greensboro Coliseum

It's often said that the night Johnny Valentine beat Harley Race for the United States heavyweight championship in 1975 was the first time the U.S. title changed hands in Greensboro. But that would be wrong. It actually happened in 1962 when Hans Schmidt defeated then U.S. champ Pat O'Connor for the honors in front of 5,800 fans in the Greensboro Coliseum. O'Connor regained the title in the same building about 5 weeks later.

Anyone could be forgiven for not knowing about two such events 13 years apart. I never knew about that title change until I began research for my upcoming book on Jim Crockett Promotions' United States Championship (coming out this fall.) I was not even a year old when the 1962 matches happened. But additional research by Carroll Hall and Mark Eastridge shed light on this historic switch during an earlier era.

Carroll Hall recently posted both newspaper clippings from those two cards on his All Star Championship Wrestling blog. You can take a close look at those here:

The First U.S. Title Switch in the Greensboro Coliseum
Post by Carroll Hall
All Star Championship Wrestling

As an additional reference point about this time in history, O'Connor had been awarded the United States championship by the National Wrestling Alliance after Buddy Rogers had defeated him for NWA world heavyweight championship. It was during a brief time when the NWA board actually recognized a U.S. title in that era.

It's fun to take a look at who else was on that card:

• Long time area veteran George Becker teamed with national sensation Argentina Rocca. 
• Even in 1962 Johnny Weaver was already battling Rip Hawk. 
• Abe Jacobs was a perennial star in the area over two decades.
• Women wrestlers were prominent on the cards, as Johnny Weaver's wife Penny Banner was on the July card wrestling Ann LaVerne. She would become one of the biggest names in women's wrestling. The August card featured a women's tag match with four African-American women wrestlers, a rare such booking in wrestling during the era of segregation.  They were Babs Wingo, Fuzzy Robinson (replacing Marva Scott), Ethel Johnson, and Virginia Franklin. 
• Ringside seats were only $2.50 in 1962!

A blooper alert - - We noticed in the results clipping for the August 16th card where O'Connor regained the U.S. title, Johnny Weaver beat Luis Tillett on the undercard with a dreaded SWEEPER hold!

Republished on September 12, 2020 on the Mid-Atlantic Gateway.

All-Star Wrestling: The Loaded Boot (1967)

JULY 1, 1967 - "THE LOADED BOOT"
By Carroll Hall, All-Star Championship Wrestling

My two brothers and I were really wanting to go to the wrestling matches on that Saturday night in Winston-Salem. It didn't look too promising early in the week leading up to the card because Dad wouldn't be getting off work until 10:00 p.m. that night and I was not
quite old enough to drive yet.

By mid week we got lucky and worked out a deal with Jimmy, a close friend of the family. My brothers and I would help Jimmy chop the weeds out of his tobacco field in exchange for him driving us down to the Coliseum. He loved wrestling too.

My mom had never learned to drive at this point but she had made up her mind to do so. She had just bought a 1957 Dodge with the big fins on the back for $200. She let Jimmy drive that old Dodge to wrestling because the only thing that would run on his farm that day was his tractor. Well, Jimmy must never have driven anything so powerful as that old Dodge. He flew past every vehicle we came upon that night between Mt. Airy and Winston-Salem. Just imagine if you will three kids and one nut(just kidding Jimmy) flying down U.S. 52 in a "Batmobile" going to wrestling!

The old Coliseum was hot that night as it was nearly a full house and I don't believe that grand old building ever had air conditioning.

George Becker had made a promise on "Championship Wrestling" the previous week.....

Read the entire story on the All-Star Championship Wrestling website. >>