Episode 31: Gulf Coast Championship Wrestling 1975 Part Two with Guest Michael Norris

[00:00:02] Speaker A: Time for the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel Podcast. We've got lots and lots of things to talk about and to do today covering the territories from the 1940s to the 1990s. It's the best thing going today, interviewing wrestlers, referees, authors and other media personalities that have made the sport of professional wrestling great. The cream, yeah, the cream of the crop. And now, here's your host, Tony Richards. [00:00:34] Speaker B: Greetings and greetings and kind hellos, everyone from the Richards Ranch in Western Kentucky. This is your host of the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel podcast, Tony Richards. And I'm so glad that you decided to join us for another exciting episode of the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel Podcast. Today is going to be fantastic and I can't wait to get started. It's going to be a little bit longer and but I think you're going to enjoy it because we're going to be talking about a territory today that we did a show on earlier this year and I've gotten a lot of feedback from people wanting more and more. So we've got a little bit more for you today on the Gulf coast territory from 1975. The audio version of our show here at the Pro Wrestling Time Tonal Time Tunnel Podcast is now available on all major platforms where you get podcasts. We now have several of our previous episodes up now that you can download on audio on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Podcast, Attic, Pod, Pocket Cast and many, many others. You can still get all of our shows on our substack channel, Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel, and the video version of our show and some fantastic clips that Dominic d' Angelo puts together for us every single week are on our Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel YouTube channel. I want to also mention that when you subscribe to my substack channel, you support the work I do as a pro wrestling historian and we make the Daily Chronicle, which is a daily wrestling history newsletter that I write that is centered around things that happen on that day in history. Sometimes a couple days after, sometimes a couple days before. Because I'm really sensitive. I'll give you a little insight into some of my thinking about the Daily Chronicle. I know getting an email in your email box every single day can carry with it some kind of fatigue. That's why this, if you subscribe to it, you have to be a pro wrestling history enthusiast because you have to want to learn about pro wrestling history, which is what my daily newsletter is designed to do. It tracks through 50 years ago, 1975, 60 years ago, 1965, 70 years ago, 1955, 40 years ago, 1985 and we're tracking through day by day, year by year, in those particular years, the history of pro wrestling. And yeah, that comes to your email box every single day. So I'm very sensitive to the length and the amount of content in the email because I know it takes an investment of your time to open the email, to look through and read the things that I'm writing. Check the birthday list, check the rest in peace salute that we do. Check the significant pro debuts to see if anybody you're interested in in pro wrestling made their debut on that day. And the article I write, and so I know that is going to take some investment of your time and also an investment of your passion and interest. So I try to keep it at a decent length so that it's, it's a 10 minute, 12 minute, 15 minute read. When it gets longer than that, I may push a day forward or a day backward or two days forward to two days backward on the, on the Chronicle. So it's not all the things that happened on that day, maybe on that particular newsletter, but it's within a couple of days. And so that's just some of my thinking behind that. We've had tremendous growth in the Daily Chronicle this year. Great subscribers. I wouldn't have thought we would have reached 300 by this time. We launched it back in the spring and We've hit the 300 subscriber mark and a significant probably 10, 11% of that are premium subscribers, which they invest $5 a month or $50 for the year. And they're making an investment not only in me as a wrestling historian and the work I'm doing and the books that I'm writing and the Facebook posts and the X post and the podcast and all the different things that we're doing here at the Time Tunnel. We have investors and they're called premium subscribers. And you're a very important part of the community because you're not only investing your time and your passion and your interest, you're also putting a few bucks into the kitty as well. And I want you to know I appreciate that. And for that I write the Evolution of Pro Wrestling, which I just came out with an article this last Monday about the Nick Bockwinkel AWA world title win over Vern Ganya in 1975. Coming up Friday, I'll have an Evolution of Wrestling piece coming out for our premium subscribers about the Terry Funk US Title win in Greensboro at the Greensboro Coliseum, which happened as part of his progression toward the NWA world title in 75. That's all in the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel substack. And I just want you to know I appreciate your investment, whatever it is, time, passion, interest, money, all of that, you are part of the team here. So when you turn on the podcast and you hear Steve Giannarelli and you hear Howard Baum and you hear Brian Solomon and you hear Greg Klein and you hear Jerry Oates and Bobby Simmons and my guest today, Michael Norris, when you hear all of these people, they're part of our family here at the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel, but so are you. I mean, we have great historians that are also sending me things and sending me pieces and sending me reminders and giving me tips and correcting me when I need it. And all of that are all part of this great family that we're building here at the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel, this community of pro wrestling history enthusiasts. And I want you to know I have a heart full of gratitude for you and an amazing amount of appreciation for, for your participation and your interest and your help in putting the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel together. Okay, Today on the show, guest back by popular demand, Michael Norris. Michael Norris is a dedicated professional wrestling historian. And you probably don't know this, but Michael had a website that he built for the Gulf coast wrestling territory history that crashed and he lost everything. He had put all the work for several years into that website and it crushed his spirit as far as being involved in the history of pro wrestling. He got kind of sour on it and was really kind of finished with the pro wrestling history. And I contacted him. And the first time I contacted him, he wasn't interested at all. And he wasn't too thrilled about, you know, the thought of doing it. But I just was persistent and got him back here. And because Michael Norris is an important pro wrestling history historian that we need to help us continue to put together the story of the Welch family, the story of the Fields family, the story of Gulf Coast Championship wrestling. Because we. I saw a post the other day on X where someone said, have we discovered everything about pro wrestling that could be discovered in North America? Gosh, no. There is so much more that we have to uncover and to discover. And Michael is an important part of that. He's followed this Gulf coast territory so closely. It's the territory he grew up in. He became a fan in 1970. He, Lee Fields, was a personal hero of his family and his dad. And so he followed all of that activity all through the 70s. And he spent so much time channeling his passion into preserving the Gulf coast championship wrestling History and the legacy that I want to be a part of that, and I want to encourage him, and I want him to slowly but surely come back here with us and help us discover and talk about it. And so I appreciate him so much coming on the show today and talking about Gulf coast championship wrestling in 1975. And so now I'm welcoming Michael to the Richards Ranch. Let's go to that conversation with Michael Norris and myself right now here on the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel. Hello again, everybody. [00:09:27] Speaker C: Welcome to another Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel podcast. I'm your host, Tony Richards, and tonight, here at the Richards Ranch, welcoming my special guest historian Michael Norris. And we're headed back to the Gulf coast territory in 1975 to explore the history of one of the best territories that has ever been in the territory era that a lot of people don't really talk about. And so Michael is an expert in that, and we had great feedback on the first show we had, and I'm really glad that he's back again. Michael, welcome back to the show, man. [00:10:01] Speaker A: Well, thanks, Tony. I appreciate you having me back. I apologize to everybody that listened to that other one. We really didn't focus the way Tony wanted to. I kind of took over and was. Was booking his show for him and rambling all over the place. [00:10:15] Speaker C: But we're gonna. [00:10:16] Speaker A: We're gonna stay focused this time. So we. [00:10:18] Speaker C: We did well. We covered the whole hit. I mean, we. We covered the history. That was a great introduction of Gulf Coast 101. I'm proud of that show. So I'm glad we did it. And expand on that this week and talk a little bit about 1975. But then also, I want you to talk about something in the Gulf coast history that is really important to you from any part of the history of the Gulf coast territory. And then there's just a few things I want to talk about, but let's talk about just the. The overview of 1975. I've heard you say before that this is kind of a down year for the territory, right? [00:11:02] Speaker A: Well, yeah, it was. Well, it was in the. The middle of the. The slow death of the territory. The territory had great years in the 50s when Buddy Fuller still had. It. Had great years in the 60s. It kind of overextended when Lee tried to go into Louisiana and was trying to run three different territories at one time. But. But they had a lot of great years through the 60s. During the 60s, the Gulf coast was kind of like Charlotte was back in the 60s and early 70s, mainly that it was a It was a tag team oriented area. [00:11:51] Speaker C: So just mainly because. Just expand on that a little bit. So you say Lee was running three territories at one time. So that would have been South Alabama and then Louisiana and then where would the third one have been? [00:12:06] Speaker A: Eastern Alabama, Northwest Florida. [00:12:09] Speaker C: Oh, okay. [00:12:10] Speaker A: So you had Mobile, Pensacola, you had Louisiana, you had Dofen, Panama City, Quincy. So that was three separate things. And it pretty much even after Lee sold out and moved out of Louisiana and moved back into Mississippi, it was still three separate. You had Mississippi, Gulf coast, which was Bob Kelly was booking. That was pretty much under the purveyance of Speedy Hatfield, who was Lee's father. Then you had Mobile, Pensacola, which was probably their two largest drawing towns. And then you had Panama City, Dofen and Quincy, Ozark, Andalusia, that end of of it, which, which was under Rocky Maguire. Kelly had Mississippi, had Mobile and Pensacola. So they were all. Go ahead. [00:13:14] Speaker C: I'm sorry, I was just gonna say. So in the 60s you said it was a lot like the Crockett territory in, in the Carolinas with the tag team. So who were some of the main tag teams back then? [00:13:27] Speaker A: Starting in the in 61 the main heel team was the Mysterious Medics. And this is the original Mysterious Medics. I know it's around the same time Petro Godoy and Juan Sebastian were using the name Medics in and around Detroit. And for those who are not familiar with wrestling going that far back or are familiar with the WWWF in the early 70s mask tag team of the rugged Russians were the same two guys, Pedro Godoy and Juan Sebastian. [00:14:06] Speaker C: So for a little while, a little while in the Gulas Welch Territory in Tennessee I think is one of the few times Jackie Fargo and Lynn Rossi tagged up. And they were had a program with Mysterious Medics too. I think in 65 now I'm not. [00:14:21] Speaker A: Sure if that was Tony Gonzalez and Don Lordy or not. [00:14:24] Speaker C: That's might have been different guys. I mean you might have been. [00:14:28] Speaker A: Well, Goulis and Welch in Tennessee were bad about finding anybody that was Spanish and you know whose visas that they, they kept in the office to keep them from leaving the territory and putting mass on them. I mean Tony, Tony Russo and Pepe Lopez worked a thousand mass gimmicks up there. Frank Martinez and Tamayo Soto worked a thousand mask, you know, gimmicks up there. So there's no telling who it was. Yeah, but it was close enough and you know, Roy Welch and Lee Fields being uncle. And it could have been very well that Tony and Dom already went up there because they now but they were the main heel teams and they worked a lot against Don and Bobby Fields before Don Fields auto accident caused him to have to retire. And then they worked a lot against Don and. And Lee or Bobby and Lee Fields. And then there was the Lucas brothers, Chris and Ken Lucas worked a lot through with the medics. Bad Boy Hines and Billy Boy Hines. You know they would. They would work against the. The medics and then they would be the main. They were supplant the medics as the main heel team. They were back and forth. [00:15:55] Speaker C: Yeah, we were just talking about. Before we went on the air, we were just talking about Jerry Oates. And you were talking to him last week. I. I also was talking to him last week and I text him a picture of the Hines tag team. I said do you remember these guys? And that. You know, I just like getting him going. I like to send him pictures of guys that he watched when he was a fan before he got in the business, you know. [00:16:19] Speaker A: Yeah, the Hines, they were big in Columbus. In fact they settled in Columbus there for a while and they were. They were the main baby faces. Now Billy, who was not a Hines, his name was Owen Yao. He booked Panama City a lot in the Gulf coast area. So he may have been booking for Fred up there. But Jimmy Hines, Bad Boy Hines. I went second grade with his son Gary and I went over to their house a lot of times. So I knew Jimmy from before I even got in the wrestling business. Ate dinner, dinner over there all the time with them. And Jimmy was a great cook. [00:17:03] Speaker C: But you know, even it going into the 70s, I mean even coming into 75 here, I mean a lot of the semi mains and mains and a lot of cards, especially in Mobile are tag team matches still. [00:17:16] Speaker A: Yep. Yeah, yeah. It depended on. On what Kelly was doing. Sometimes Kelly would take months off as the booker and work in the. You know, work in the office and he would push a tag team. But then when the territory kind of slip and he felt he needed to boost it, he. He put himself back on the card. It's real interesting is. Is you know, I give the devil to do. Kelly and I had our differences over the years, but Kelly was a very, very smart booker. He came up with stuff that was just, you know, he told me what he used to do. He kept that the. They had an eye. An old building on an old house on. I'm trying to think what. What's the name of the street was. It was in downtown Mobile. Not. Not too far Away from the. It was like within walking distance of the auditorium in the Expo hall where their matches were held in Mobile. But Kelly had a locked room that he kept a chalkboard in. And he was the only one with a kid, he and a guy named Jerry. I can't remember Jerry's last name. They were the only ones that had key to it. And Kelly would map out a program six weeks in advance how it was going to end up. And he just like a road map and then underneath it he'd start building up the next program that was going to follow it. And you'll see some of this as we go through 75, because how his booking worked. But what, what. Yeah. [00:19:10] Speaker C: Who, who, who mentored Bob? Like, who'd he learned from? [00:19:15] Speaker A: He. Lee. Lee Fields. [00:19:18] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:19:19] Speaker A: I broke into the business and Bob was from. From Louisville. And he broke in, in Louisville under the promoter there. And this will be a name that'll ring, ring, should ring a bell to you. We Willie Davis. Oh, yes, that's who was promoting Louisville when Bob broke in. Bob was a lot older than most people are when they broke, breaking the business because Bob had served in the Marines and you know, he had rodeoed. He was a real, real live cowboy. He, you know, he did the rodeo circuit there for a while. And then he decided he wanted to get in because he was always a fan, but he decided he wanted to get into the business. And we Willie Davis teamed him up with a guy, put him with a guy named Doug Kinslow. Is that a name for. You're familiar with? [00:20:08] Speaker C: Just slightly. I mean, I'm familiar with it, but I don't know a lot about him. [00:20:14] Speaker A: I think he was from Louisville as well, but he kind of, you know, Doug trained him along with Willie. And then as it is with most guys as they, when they break in the business, the person who trained them is usually their opponent for the like the first month that you were actually working the business. But. And then Ken Blow was also, every summer went to North Bay, Ontario to work for the Casaboskis. And he got Kelly booked up there, but he didn't wrestle a lot. He was mainly a referee. And then when the season shut down, you know, because they, they shut down in winter time because all the arenas that they used were turned over, basically hockey rinks. So they had to quit running shows when hockey started back up. So he met. While Kelly was up there, he met and became good friends with Ronnie Garvin. So the Garvin, especially Terry, had been in and out of Louisiana with Lee and so when the season ended up there, Ronnie and Terry were headed to Louisiana. So when they got there, they. And Kelly went home to. To Louisville because he had nowhere else to go. So when he. When the Garvin's got back down here, they told Lee Fields about Kelly, that he was a good referee and could work, you know, worked every once in a while. So Lee called Kelly and Louisville, he packed his whole family up and everything he owned and moved to the Fields Ranch and. And Loxley, Alabama, and lived there until, you know, he could get a place to stay in Mobile. And then once he settled his family, he went to Louisiana and working. That was in 65. [00:22:21] Speaker C: Okay. [00:22:23] Speaker A: And Bill golden was running Louisiana for. For Lee. And then he decided in early 67 that he didn't, you know, he left. Left Louisiana and Kelly, who again, he had been a referee mainly he gotten into. Started. Started wrestling more and more, mainly working with the. The Daltons. And the next thing you know, he's booking Kelly. So Kelly booked the whole year of 1967 in Louisiana. And then when they shut Louisiana down and move back into Mississippi in 68, Kelly took over booking there in 68 and then had Mobile in Pensacola. [00:23:16] Speaker C: So when Bill golden left in 67, left Louisiana, where did he go then? [00:23:23] Speaker A: I think he went back up and was running maybe spot shows out of for Nick and Roy in Tennessee. He eventually settled in Montgomery, Alabama and opened up Tri States, I want to say, in 71 or 72. [00:23:42] Speaker C: Yeah, he was kind of running that little territory within the Gulf coast territory. Right. The. [00:23:47] Speaker A: Well, really, it was. It was more central Alabama. He. His main towns were Montgomery, Selma, wasn't it? Selma and Oxford Anniston over towards, you know, that end and of course Mobile, that territory. Every once in a while, off and on, it would venture up to Montgomery. But this was long before Bill opened up. Sometime in the 60s and 50s and 60s they would run Montgomery. [00:24:19] Speaker C: So he would. He'd ran Tuscaloosa too, right? [00:24:22] Speaker A: Tuscaloosa, yeah, he ran and he was getting his talent. [00:24:26] Speaker C: He's got his talent from Nick and Roy then, right? [00:24:28] Speaker A: At first that he did. And. Well, he used a lot of local guys. He used. It was a mixture. He would use some of Nick and Roy's guys. Buddy Wayne kind of settled in. In Montgomery, I think Buddy was booking for a while. He used, of course, his son, Jimmy Burhead Jones. Jimmy Jones is what he was until he became Burhead Jones, who had worked in Mobile. But, you know, funny thing is a lot of people don't realize Where Melvin Nelson, which is. Was his real name, where he trained and who he trained under. He actually broke in the business working for Tony Santos in Boston. He was trained at the Argentina Rocca Miguel Perez Wrestling Academy in, in New York City. [00:25:32] Speaker C: Oh my goodness. [00:25:34] Speaker A: Another one that came through there and broke in with Tony Santos who ended up working for. In the Gulf coast territory was a guy by the name of Pepe Perez. Well, most people know him under his real name. Roberto Soto. [00:25:52] Speaker C: Yes, Roberto Soto had one of the best mid card careers of anybody I can think of. Just about. Just. Yes, he did Every, every territory, you know, especially. Yeah, especially from Texas to Florida. I mean, just going across and coming back across and he, he. And he was a good worker too. [00:26:19] Speaker A: Oh, excellent worker. Excellent worker. [00:26:22] Speaker C: Oh, he had that, he had that ongoing feud with the guy with the eye patch. [00:26:27] Speaker A: Billy Spears. [00:26:28] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. I mean, they, they. [00:26:30] Speaker A: In fact, the deal with the eye patch was, was legit. That was a shoot. They, Soto and, and Spears had a. At a match in Macon, Georgia and they had a running mid card feud going for years. But a fan swung a belt at Spears and hit him in the eye with a buckle of it. Luckily it didn't pierce his eye, but it just, it caught his eyebrow. But it was, it was serious. It was, it was legit injury. And he wore the, the patch. Now, I don't know when he, when he wrestled with the patch. I think by that time he was pretty much healed and he just used it as a gimmick. [00:27:19] Speaker C: Right. [00:27:23] Speaker A: And you know, so, and, and that thing with Spears and, and Soto, they had, they had a replay of it in the Gulf coast area, but it was with Spears and Ricky Fields. Not Ricky Fields. Ricky gets it. That ran from 1971 to 1977, off and on. You know, Spears would leave the territory, Ricky would leave the territory, or they, if they both wound up there at the same time, it light up again and it was there again and never got above mid card except on the Dothan end. [00:27:57] Speaker C: Right. But man, it had longevity. It had legs. [00:28:02] Speaker A: I mean, absolutely. [00:28:03] Speaker C: They, they'd run those B and C towns in Georgia with those two guys on top and draw pretty good money in those smaller towns, you know? [00:28:12] Speaker A: Yep. [00:28:14] Speaker C: So when, so when Bob Kelly took off for his sabbatical or whatever. So would Lee step in or who, who took over then? [00:28:22] Speaker A: No, Rip Tyler took over booking. Okay. And we'll talk about that towards the end of when we're talking about 75, because that's when all that took place. [00:28:34] Speaker C: Alrighty. So in the. So so just today, just out of your knowledge of Gulf Coast, I mean, just, just tell me about some, tell me about what would be an angle or a match or some kind of moment from Gulf coast that would be something that come to mind for you today. [00:28:55] Speaker A: Okay. Well, again, we were talking about the territory was starting to die, in my opinion, just based on all the research I've done, the peak years of, at least in Mobile, for 1971, 1972 and mainly 71 because of the angle that jumps out at me. And the thing that they made, they, they took a program and had one match every two months and made it last the whole year. Actually, I only had three matches the whole year that they built this program around. But it lasted from February of 71 until December of 71. And that is Lee Fields and Bobby Shane, right? Of course. Bobby Shane was probably the most heated heel or most hated heel for the entire year, 1971, and actually led up until just a couple months before his, his passing in 74 or 75. But he came in, he had been working Georgia, of course, as the wonder boy and he and Doug, Doug Gilbert were the, you know, tag team champions often on there. But when he got ready to leave Georgia, he wanted to turn heel. He'd work baby face everywhere from Hawaii to Georgia, you know, for several years. So he called the Mobile office, talked to Kelly and said, you know, I want to come in, but I'm going to come in as a heel. Kelly said, fine, but I was looking. It changed career. For 1971, he worked everywhere from Houston to Mobile to Tampa on a weekly basis. He'd be a healing in Houston and healing Mobile, be a baby or. No, I take it back. He was a baby face in Houston. Healing Mobile, healing Florida. So he was just, that's, that's what kept him from being in Mobile as a full time, for a full time territory. But he had formed a little. He came in in February. In March, Perry and Jimmy Garvin showed up and they formed a little alliance with Shane. So when, you know, he would make, they would maintain his heat while he was in Tampa or in Houston or wherever it was he was. You know, they were constantly talking about Bobby saying on TV Shane wouldn't refuse to wrestle on television because he said people had to pay to see him. He was not going to wrestle on television. And he kept, he kept on and on about all kind of crazy things going on and everything and he was getting under Leefield's skin. But the end of April, they were, they were out of TV taping. It's one of the few times Shane was actually here and then instead of them just talking about it and Lee Fields was talking about some sort of stipulation he was putting on an upcoming match for, for Shane. Shane walked out and slapped him on television. [00:32:27] Speaker C: Oh, man. Is that where Lee's kid ran out there? [00:32:32] Speaker A: Yes. Ricky Fields, who was, who was there at the TV studio in Pensacola that morning when they taped this. Ricky had never, he was only 14. He had never been smartened up. He ran out there and bit Bobby on the leg. But Lee Fields had not been an active wrestler since 1968. [00:32:55] Speaker C: I was gonna ask how did they, how did they present Lee on television? Did he go out there during the studio taping? Did he do tapes from home? [00:33:04] Speaker A: Yeah, he would come out. No, he would come out on the. He was always there at the TV studio. He would come out, you know, kind of go over the card if anything special was. Was happening, if, you know, if there was a title that was held up or whatever, you know, he was there to explain that. [00:33:22] Speaker C: Now was he kind of the. The on screen authority, but Bob was really booking it or was Lee still. [00:33:29] Speaker A: He owned the territory, so. And everybody knew that everything was presented as, you know, Lee Field promotion. Of course, Kelly back in those days, you had to deal with, with state athletic commissions which were legit. And the rule was you couldn't be a promoter and a wrestler at the same time. So even going back into the days when Buddy 4 was, was a promoter here, when he would wrestle, he would name somebody to be, you know, the, the figurehead promoter. And that was kind of. [00:33:59] Speaker C: That's how Roy and Nick's be worked too. [00:34:02] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And of course, Lee had Rocky McGuire for you throughout most of the 60s as his figurehead. And Rocky really was a promoter over in Dothan and you know, Panama City, that end of the territory. He was, he was listed as a promoter even though Lee, Lee actually owned the license for those areas. And Lee would periodically go over there and work, you know, wrestling dolphin, even, you know, before, after he supposedly retired in 68. But as far as on screen, as far as everybody knew, Lee Fields was, was the promoter. Even to the fact that when this, this event happened with Shane and he announced he was going to come out of retirement, they made, they worked it into the angle. I can't be the promoter and wrestle at the same time. So here I'm naming Bob Kelly as a promoter. Okay, Bob Kel. So that took Kelly out of the ring, put Lee in. [00:35:09] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:35:11] Speaker A: In fact, at the end of this whole thing, this, this whole thing worked from they have their first match. Shane and Kelly or Shane and Fields had their first match in May, May 6 I think it was, which was the very first live event I ever went to. My grandfather when all that happened. Lee Fields was his favorite wrestler in the 50s. And so when Lee Fields announced he was coming out of retirement, my grandfather said I'm going. You coming with me? And I said absolutely. [00:35:42] Speaker C: So that's fun man. So fun. [00:35:45] Speaker A: So yeah, so that's, so that happened. [00:35:50] Speaker C: And so the commission just kind of looked the other way when Lee worked. I mean he, I guess he, they didn't issue him a license to be a wrestler. He has license at a promoter, but just, you know that once or twice a year they just kind of was okay with that. [00:36:06] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. So that first match and you would think, you know. [00:36:15] Speaker C: Lee's obviously putting a lot of money in the commissions pocket, I mean. Oh yeah, oh yeah, that's paying the tax and all. [00:36:23] Speaker A: Exactly. Plus all the wrestlers had to buy their license to work there. You know, I think they paid $6 for him or something, whatever it was. [00:36:33] Speaker C: Probably, he's probably carrying 18 to 20 guys right in the territory. [00:36:39] Speaker A: Yeah, he usually, yeah, he would, when he, when he'd have his big festivals during the year, he would expand and he'd borrow guys from Bill and he'd get guys out of Oklahoma, he'd get guys out of Columbus or wherever, you know, and then of course, you know, he'd fill in with Moolah's girls and Mula. You couldn't book just Moolah and one girl, you had to book a nine girl battle royal where the winner would, would wrestle her so she'd get, you know, all her money and get all their money too. [00:37:10] Speaker C: So Lee, Lee, Lee names Bob the promoter, then he's gonna wrestle Shane. [00:37:16] Speaker A: So then right now think about it. If you're, think of most of the promoters that you know who were that own the territory, that were going to be in a main event, you know, Eddie Graham, Dick, Bruiser Cheek, and they're, they're, they're staging this comeback match, you think they'd win the match, right? Well, he didn't. He lost it. And he lost it on purpose. Well, he lost it as part of the program because I mean it only made sense. And again, this was Kelly's booking. Kelly booked. Sensible stuff. He said it wouldn't make sense. Here's a guy who's supposedly been out of wrestling three or four years he's coming back to work, one of the top guys in the business. He's not going to win, you know. [00:38:06] Speaker C: You know Dory Funk senior used to do that all the time. Yep. In Amarillo. I mean in 71 it was one of the first real big pushes outside of Florida that Bob Roop had and, and, and Terry put him over. Dory Jr. Put him over. And then finally they get to the old man and the old man puts him over. [00:38:27] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:38:28] Speaker C: And he put Cyclone Negro over in a Texas death match. And that was just, you know, that was good old school logic, you know, back in those days. [00:38:39] Speaker A: So naturally Lee wants a rematch. [00:38:42] Speaker C: Oh yeah. [00:38:43] Speaker A: Well Shane's not going to send it, you know, give him a rematch. He's got to beat somebody else first. So they send in somebody at one of one of these big festival cards a qualify, you know, Lee has a qualifying match, he's got a wrestle this guy under which if I'm, I haven't proven it and I never asked him before he passed away but I'm almost positive that was Rocket working under a hood. And I did not, I, I didn't see, I wasn't there to see that particular match. I've never seen pictures of it but I could, I could, I would know for sure if it was Rocket because you couldn't hide Rockets. You could cover him head to toe and you couldn't hide Rocket's body. He was, he had a strange shape about him plus he had these huge hands. But I think that's who it was. And when naturally Lee won that match. So that set up another match another couple of months down the road for his rematch with Shane where he beat Shane at that in that match. And then Shane wants a. Another shot at least. So they, they book in the fall. They booked another major festival and the main event was Bobby Shane and Don Fargo against Bob Kelly and Lee Fields. Well for since now Kelly's also in the ring. Remember the guy named mentioning Jerry? They made, they made him the promoter for the night. So they were saying that that's kind of beat Fargo and, and I mean Kelly and Fields beat Fargo and Shane Lee took back over was, was now the full time promoter. Kelly was back in the ring full time. So that's how that ended up. But anyway that, that whole program, that angle on television was the thing that jumped out at me because that just absolutely drove business for the whole year. [00:40:44] Speaker C: And that was, so was that I was going to ask you is that it wasn't, wasn't there some kind of Deal where Bobby, I mean for a shoot. Bobby wasn't going to come back unless he got a bigger cut or something like he wanted more of the. Of the. [00:41:01] Speaker A: When. When you talking about when Kelly left in 75. Oh, no, yo. Oh, you talking about Shane. Yeah, Shane. They had, they had booked. That wasn't, that wasn't that. That was at the end of the final part of the year or the next to last. It was their Christmas special. They had had a deal where Mike Boyette and Prince Pullins had the. Had won the United States Tag Team Championship from the Alaskans and then Pullin turned heel. So here's. They did this three times during the year they had or twice during the year they had. They had Boyette when the tag team titles with a partner who was suddenly turned on him. So they had to. They allowed each person who held the title to pick a partner and then they wrestled for the title. Whichever winning team won the title. Where they did this the second time, Boyette and Pullens had split, so each was allowed to choose a partner. Boyette chose Kelly. Pullens chose Bobby Shane. So they booked that and Shane decided at the last minute he wasn't coming back. He wasn't going to show up. He wanted 10% of the, of the, of the gate. So Lee said, okay, I'll give it to you. Then he turned around, sold every ticket in the building for a dollar. [00:42:37] Speaker C: I love that story. [00:42:41] Speaker A: So next week supposed to show again. And he didn't show this time, neither he nor Pullens. Which was a shame because Prince Pullens. The only place Prince Pullens ever worked on top was the Gulf coast territory. [00:42:56] Speaker C: Yes. [00:42:57] Speaker A: And he was a hell of a worker. And you know, he was small, but he was, he was well built. Plus he was a black guy in a, you know, the predominantly black fans in territory that drew that predominantly black crowds. [00:43:15] Speaker C: Sure. [00:43:15] Speaker A: And he was over like Rover is a baby face. And then when he turned, he was spices, you know, twice as hated and white. But he got homesick for Indianapolis and went back up there doing and doing jobs for. For Bruiser. Of course, I don't know what Lee paid him. He probably got made. May have made more money working for Bruiser doing jobs and then he did, you know, working on top and mobile. But, but, you know. [00:43:50] Speaker C: Yeah, that was back to that, back to that Shane and Lee Fields program that I try to explain to more modern fans. They're. They're like, well, you know, what was it like back then? Or what, what, what was so great about it? And that just Listening to you go through the intricacies of that program, not only was everything logical, but guys like Lee Fields, guys like Jerry Jarrett, guys like Leo Garibaldi and Tom Rinesto and they paid attention. And George Scott, when he was booking the Carolinas, they paid attention to the little details. They made sure, they made sure there wasn't anything the fans could say. Hey, wait a minute, that, that, that doesn't make sense. Like, I mean, they, they went to the nth degree to make sure everything was, was taken care of and covered. And I, that's one of the things I love about the territory. [00:44:50] Speaker A: Well, the, the most perfect example of that was, and I know that again, we're rambling. We're not on the year. [00:44:56] Speaker C: No, we were. [00:44:58] Speaker A: But the, the year before, what we're going to be talking about 1974, they had a program with, between the wrestling pro, which was Leon Baxter and Ken Mantel. [00:45:13] Speaker C: Yes. [00:45:15] Speaker A: Kim Mentale being the junior heavyweight champion of the world. He, he had come in, he had a running feud. Baxter had beaten him or come close to beating him or something. So he was running from him and he was, you know, was, was refusing to give him another title match and all this stuff. So they worked a deal out the year before or in 74 with the Mighty Yankees, which there were three sets of Mighty Yankees at work that year. The constant being Curtis Smith, who was the Mighty Yankee number one. Well, during a suspension, Duke Miller started wearing a mask and was the mighty Yankee number two. Well, he and Curtis Smith, mainly he and JC Dykes had a falling out, so he quit and started still wearing the mask, calling himself the X Yankee. And they brought in a mighty Yankee number three, which was somebody you're familiar with from the Phil golden days in Paducah, Bruiser Mike McMahon. Yes, he, he was the mighty Yankee number three. We're doing a match between the X Yankee and the pro against the Mighty Yankees. There was a different mighty Yankee number three. He was unmastered in the match and it was Ken Mantel. Oh, man, he was trying to, you know, trying to put the pro out of action to keep from chasing, you know, chasing after his belt. So once again, this is during a period when Kelly was not active again. He was, he was promoting again. So. Or he was called the Matchmaker, kind of like Grizzly Smith was in Mid South. But so they finally signed another rematch between Baxter and Mantel for the world junior heavyweight title. We're doing that match. Mantel unmasked the pro because you didn't see his face he covered it up with a referee shirt or whatever. So Kelly came out afterwards and said, okay, Mantel, you will never wrestle here again as far as I'm concerned for I don't care about the nwa. This man right here, the wrestling pro, is the world Junior Heavyweight champion. They presented him with his own belt, you know, and all this stuff. And they started having, every week they had bounty hunter come in that was supposedly sent by the NWA trying to take this belt off of Baxter. [00:48:06] Speaker C: So now I can't remember for sure, but did they have tapes of Muchnik on the television show or did they just have letters from him for these? [00:48:18] Speaker A: I don't think. No, they, they didn't. No, they didn't have anything from Muchnik because. But they brought in Lou Fez. Yeah, Baxter beat him, which, which everybody was worried. Everybody kept telling Rocky McGuire mainly kept telling Lee, you're, you're crazy working that angle with Fez. Fez is going to come in here and beat your man. He's not going to go with the program. Well, he did. Lou did the job. They brought in Jerry Briscoe. Jericho worked Baxter and Cole as a special, you know, bounty hunter for the nwa. Well, Baxter beat him. They sent Stan Vashon. Baxter beat him. But the point I was coming with, how, how de detail Kelly did this. The final match they sent in iron. Iron Mike McCord was coming in. He was. And if the pro beat him, then Mantel would, would wrestle him again for the. To unify the titles. Well, they never had McCord even booked. They just build him. And for those who don't know, Iron Mike McCord later became known as Austin Idol. Yes, this was before the plane crash. So Kelly came out time for the match. Baxter's in the ring wearing his championship belt. Jack Bitterman, who was the house ring announcer in Mobile, is in the ring. Kelly comes out with a Western Union program or yet Western Union telegram. He gets on the microphone and reads, this is a Western Union Telegram from Mike McCord. I am not going to do the NWA's bidding. I am not going to do Ken Mantel's bidding. I'm not coming to the match. He wads the paper up, throws down the audience. I want you to know that was a genuine Western Union telegram. Well, I don't know if he knew somebody in the Western Union office that he went down there and slipped a five dollar bill and had him type that out or what the deal was. But yeah, you know, the fans dove for it after he threw it out in the crowd. So they Read it. [00:50:31] Speaker C: I wonder where that is today, man. Wow. [00:50:33] Speaker A: No telling. No telling. But that's. That's the type of stuff that. That they did. I mean, they were. They were k faved. I mean, even after the business had changed and, you know, they started doing the reunions and everything, we had a little get together up at Bobby Simmons church up here. And Bobby Bob Kelly and Bobby Fields came up and we were all in. In Kelly and Fields hotel room up here in Atlanta. And I was with them. And, you know, we were just talking the business. They knew, they all knew I would. Had been in the business. I was on the board of directors of the Gulf coast reunion. Kelly started talking about something, you know, breaking kay faith to me. And I'm the only one in the. The hotel room with him. And Bobby Fields is literally sitting over in the corner shaking. You could. Between the Welches and the Fields, you know, you couldn't get anything out of them. No matter if you've been in the business a hundred years. They were not going to break kayfabe. I don't think any of them other than Kelly ever smartened up their wives. [00:51:48] Speaker C: No, I don't either. I think a Mantel went back program man told McGurk. [00:51:59] Speaker A: I don't know. But they had. The next week they had the unifying match. And of course Mantell beat extra. That bell. That was their junior world Junior heavyweight title. Ended up being the second version of the Alabama state title. [00:52:16] Speaker C: Yeah, right. [00:52:16] Speaker A: I don't know whatever became of it either. [00:52:19] Speaker C: Yeah, they. They brought that pro, they brought that program over to the McGurk territory and they work Ronnie Garvin into it too. And that, that was a. That was a good little deal. I. I wasn't sure what the whole background to that was, so. I appreciate you going through that. That's. That's. That's good booking. [00:52:39] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah, it was. But anyway, let's talk about 1975. [00:52:44] Speaker C: All right, sir, Go ahead. [00:52:46] Speaker A: Where did we live off June? Let's start at the first of June. [00:52:49] Speaker C: All right. [00:52:50] Speaker A: And we'll go through these town by town each week. The week, of course, 1st of June was a Sunday night. Sunday's week always start on Sunday night in Pensacola. And that was. It was an interesting card. They had two opening matches. The first, the. The very first opening match was Randy Collie, which is a name which a lot of people are familiar with. [00:53:17] Speaker C: I just watched the whole shoot. I just watched the whole shoot interview on him. He was very entertaining to listen to. [00:53:23] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, Randy was a great guy. He did our show too. The thing about Randy was Randy had worked so many places and worked so many gimmicks. He ranked right up there with Don Fargo and Stan Fraser as to how many different gimmicks he worked. You know, it was, it was hard for him to remember where he was and who he was and all that stuff. But Randy wrestled a young man by the name of Ricky Neal. And why they build this guy as Ricky Neal, I have no idea, because everybody knew it was Ricky Fields. He'd already been wrestling as Ricky Fields. He refereed from the time he was 15 years old until he broke in as a wrestler as Ricky Fields. He was Lee Fields son. Everybody knew that. But there for about three months in 1975, they were billing, billing him as Ricky Neal, which was his middle name, right? The second match was the attack team match, the Bounty Hunters versus Dick Dunn. And there again Johnny Wayne. Johnny Wayne was Johnny Wayne Fields, who was Don Field's son. And he'd been working as Johnny Fields too. Now when he was a referee, he did referee as Johnny Wayne. And there his. He was named Johnny. John Wayne Fields was his name. His father's name was Donald Don Wayne Fields. And when Don broke in, he broke in as Don Wayne. Back in the early 50s. Now for Pensacola, a lot of these towns, they, they, I don't know results, because they didn't, didn't put results in, in the paper. Sometimes did, sometimes didn't. Mobile always Diderman, who I mentioned earlier, was the house announcer in Mobile. He was, also worked for the Mobile Press Register. And he had connections with or. No, he worked for WKRG radio and tv, but he also had connections with the Mobile Press Register. So they always got big write ups in Mobile. [00:55:43] Speaker C: Now let me jump in here just for a second since you mentioned that. Now who is doing the television commentating at this time? [00:55:50] Speaker A: A gentleman by the name of Don Griffith. Don Griffith was a, was a disc jockey for WSB radio. Not wsb, that's here in Atlanta. WBSR radio in Pensacola. There again, he was a radio personality going back to the 50s, just like Jack Bitterman was therefore a spell in 74. Don had some health issues and they brought in somebody else who knew nothing about wrestling. Don didn't know a whole lot about wrestling, but he, you know, he was, he was a good, good commentator. [00:56:31] Speaker C: That was the Pensacola Pensacola show. Different than the Mobile show. [00:56:36] Speaker A: Mobile didn't have a show. [00:56:38] Speaker C: Didn't have a show. [00:56:39] Speaker A: TV, they had three TVs they had, they taped on Friday mornings in Hattiesburg. Mississippi, for the Mississippi Loop. And they bicycled that tape around. [00:56:55] Speaker C: Who was the commentator there in Mississippi. [00:56:58] Speaker A: Originally was a guy by the name of Clem Courtney, who was. Also. Had had refereed at one point or another. Clem Courtney for the. From 68 to 72, 73. Clem was. Clem Courtney was the commentator over there. He left and they brought in a guy named Romeo Sullivan, who was there until they stopped. Until everything over on that end pretty much shut down in 76, 77. Don Griffith was the main one. They taped that Saturday mornings at wsb. What was this? What was the TV station over there? Wasn't wsb. I keep going back to Atlanta tv. I don't remember what it was, but anyway, it'll come to me later. [00:57:57] Speaker C: And then you have the atv. [00:57:58] Speaker A: WWATV is with the TV over there. [00:58:03] Speaker C: All right. And then you have. [00:58:07] Speaker A: I'm taking it back. WATV was Hattiesburg. I'm sorry. [00:58:10] Speaker C: Okay. [00:58:10] Speaker A: But anyway, they take that at the actual TV studio on Mobile highway in Pensacola, Florida. Don Griffith was the announcer there for a period of time. I don't remember who the young guy was who they brought in to fill in for him for a few weeks while he was sick. And then Lynn Tony filled in for time. Lyn Tony was another local Pensacola guy who. Who had a kiddies program. He was. He was called Tony the Tiger. Wore Tiger outfit and did that. But he was also a radio personality. And you can see Lynton, if you look, there's a TV taping from late 1976 from Dolphin TV. Len Tony is on there, help with John Gauze, who was the normal announcer in Dothan. Dothan was always live. They taped it. Taped it and live and then showed it. It taped it at four o' clock in the afternoon and it went out live on Gauze. Yeah, John Goss. G A G A U S E Gauze. And then. Then they would go work a house show somewhere, either Quincy or Ozark that night. But. And then from the Pensacola, Mobile picked up Pensacola's show. [00:59:48] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:59:48] Speaker A: And on a good clear night, if you turn your TV antenna right, you can pick up Biloxi, the Hattiesburg taping. When they showed it on the Biloxi TV channel 13. Where of course, Biloxi's only 30 miles from Mobile, or not about 45 miles from Mobile. That's called only 45 from Mobile. So you could. You could watch both those programs. [01:00:11] Speaker C: Yeah, and they. They had that on a VHF on channel 13. So it had a pretty good signal, I would imagine. [01:00:17] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [01:00:19] Speaker C: All right, go ahead. [01:00:22] Speaker A: They staggered it. The Blux of TVs started 10:30, Channel 3 TV started at 10:00. So you could sit there, you could sit next to the TV and if you didn't have a remote, which they didn't have back in those days and turn the channel back and forth and catch the first 30 minutes of the Mississippi show, that's what I did. I didn't, I didn't miss the Pensacola show. I watched every second of that because that was, that was my, my home grown thing. [01:00:51] Speaker C: Sure. [01:00:53] Speaker A: All right, back to this card. The main event was a six man tag team for the Gulf Coast Six Man Tag Team Championship. That lasted all of about four matches. It was Dr. X and the Mighty Yankees against Big Bad John, Rip Tyler and Ken Lucas. Now who was determined as champions? I don't know. This whole thing started, I don't know why and I never did think to ask Kelly why he came up with this. I have a feeling I know why, but, but I just. Which I'll explain. Back in April they invented this six man tag team championship. They've had the first match, they had a six man tag team and match and the winners were going to get this title and this trophy and all this stuff. Well, here's what the car. The match was, it was the Mighty Yankees and Cyclone Negro against Dick Dunn, Bobby Fields and Jack Briscoe who just happened to be the NWA World champion at the time. [01:02:07] Speaker C: Right. [01:02:08] Speaker A: The Briscoe, Dunn and Fields team won it. But what are you going to do? You. One of the members of the team is the World Heavyweight champion. So this thing didn't even come in the thing in April after that happened, it was never mentioned again until in June, this match here. So I've got the history, I put together the history of this title. If you don't mind, we'll go off on this a little bit. [01:02:36] Speaker C: Yes. [01:02:37] Speaker A: The title became. Became inactive until May 25th in Pensacola. The mighty Yankees and Dr. X defeated Ken Lucas, Rip Tyler and Big Bad John to claim the title. Then the title was not defended again until July in Pensacola when Mike York and the Bounty Hunters defeated the Mighty Yankees and the wrestling pro to clean the title. And then it went away. That was it. Three title defenses in two cities and was never heard from again. [01:03:18] Speaker C: And did they have belts, a trophy or what? [01:03:20] Speaker A: No, it was supposedly a trophy. I never saw it. They never had it on tv, you know, so I don't know. I've never seen if it, if it was a trophy. It was Some trophy that, you know, probably the old brass knuckles trophy that Kelly dug out of the closet office. [01:03:38] Speaker C: Yeah, some trophy they used before. [01:03:41] Speaker A: Yeah. And then after all this was over, they had a special lights out match between Dr. X and Big Bad John. And there again, I don't know the results. [01:03:54] Speaker C: It's a little unusual for Big Bad John to be a baby face, right? [01:03:58] Speaker A: No, he was always a baby face in Mobile. [01:04:00] Speaker C: Was he? I mean, he was a heel almost. [01:04:04] Speaker A: Yeah. Except Florida and Mo and Mobile were the only two places I know he worked baby face. He had been in, in 73 as a baby face and had was gone and came back in 75. We're still a baby face and see. And then the next night we jumped to Monday night and we're in Panama City. Now Panama City was strange. Sometimes they ran on Monday. Half the year they ran on Monday nights. And then the half a year they switch and run on Thursday nights. Now why they did that I don't know. Oh, and the building, the Pensacola was the Mobile of the Pensacola Municipal Auditorium, which was down on, at the end of Canal street in Pensacola. It was on the bay. It was literally on the bay. In fact, my grandfather ran, he ran, worked for a guy named Bill Brown that ran charter boats from that pier. And my grandfather had a. And this is a different grandfather than the one that took me to the Lee Field match. This was my father's father who worked a little trailer, had a little trailer set up right up probably 50 yards from the, the auditorium there where he sold charters. I'm sorry it's getting noisy out there, but it's. He sold tickets to the charter boats and so bait and candy and drinks and stuff out of that, this little trailer. And an eight year old me, that was the first job I ever had was working in that trailer for him. Running an old fashioned cash register and booking, booking charters on the, on the charter boats and all that stuff. But anyway, that, that auditorium was later changed to the base called the Bayfront center and it no longer exists. It was torn down. [01:06:13] Speaker C: What they draw in Panama City. [01:06:20] Speaker A: I think the capacity of that building over there was about 3000. And they generally drew between 1500 and 2000, depending on how hot the program was. [01:06:31] Speaker C: That's awesome. And, and how did Pensacola draw? [01:06:35] Speaker A: That's what, that's what I was talking about was Pensacola. [01:06:37] Speaker C: Yeah. Oh, okay. 1500 to 2000. [01:06:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Now the Panama City, they wrestled on a skating rink. They called it the Rainbow Gardens, but that was fancy. It was Rainbow roller rink. [01:06:52] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:06:53] Speaker A: I think the Capacity of that building when set up for wrestling was about a thousand. [01:06:58] Speaker C: I gotcha. [01:06:59] Speaker A: And that's where we are. That. Go ahead. [01:07:02] Speaker C: I'm sorry, I was just thinking they draw probably between depending on the program, you know, 500, 750 maybe. [01:07:09] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Now, I don't know if it was this year. I think it was in 74. They actually booked Jack Briscoe in this roller rink and he defended the world title against Duke Miller and a skating rink. The only thing I know worse than that is when. When Charlie Smith booked Ric Flair to defend the world title at a Quonset hut in Georgia at the end of a Runway on a. At an airport. [01:07:39] Speaker C: I. I thought you were going to say the roller rink in Albany, because I think that used to. [01:07:43] Speaker A: Down there. [01:07:44] Speaker C: They used to run there. [01:07:45] Speaker A: Yeah, they did. I don't know if they ever booked the world champions in there, but. But that's where we are the next night we're in Panama City at the Rainbow Garden. Now this one I actually do have have results. Dynamite Dick Dunn and the Yankee number three went to a draw. Ricky Fields and Don Duffy wrestled to a draw. The Fields cousins, Ricky and Johnny, beat duffy in Yankee 3. See a pattern there? The main event was the mighty Yankee number one, which was Curtis Smith. He beat Ken Lucas in a bare knuckles match. And then they had a special lumberjack match where Dick Dunn beat JC Dykes, who was the manager of the Mighty Yankees. And I think number three on this car was Mike McManus. So that was on Monday nights again, this building, right? Yeah, this building. I think the roller ink, I think the capacity of that was probably 700, 750 somewhere in there. I don't know. The building's gone. So they later turned it into a flea market. But it was, it was destroyed in the early. The early 2010s. A hurricane, whichever hurricane went through that area, totally destroyed the building. [01:09:20] Speaker C: Got any idea what the ticket prices were back then? [01:09:24] Speaker A: Hold on, I may be able to tell you. No, they don't have it listed in the ad. Generally, probably this time of year. Ringside was probably $3. [01:09:38] Speaker C: Amazing. [01:09:39] Speaker A: General admission was a $50. [01:09:42] Speaker C: What amaz. That's amazing. I love it. [01:09:47] Speaker A: Yeah. Next. Next night in Mobile, Alabama. Whereas Bob Armstrong used to say, mobile, if you will. This was at the Expo Hall. The Expo Hall. The capacity of the Expo hall was. I just read that because I was. I've been doing some research. They tore it down last year. They tore the Mobile Municipal Auditorium, which became a civic center. Tore all that down they wiped it all out. It was the principal auditorium which became, it was later named the Mobile Civic Center. It was built in 1964. And one of the very first events they had in that was a wrestling card which the main event was Lee Fields versus Dick the Bruiser. They flew in Dick the Bruiser, Wilbur Snyder from Indianapolis. They brought up Don Curtis and somebody else out of Tampa. But there again, Lee always did that with his big car because he rarely ever carried more than 18 guys on his payroll. [01:10:59] Speaker C: Right? Right. [01:11:03] Speaker A: Most of the time it was usually around 12. But anyway, this particular night, the opening was a tag team match and who Johnny and Ricky Fields the night before in Panama City were now Johnny Wayne and Ricky Neal and Mobile. And they beat Don Duffy in the Intern. Now who the intern was at this point, I don't know. The interns in 68 were the original interns of any team that was called the Interns. And that was Bill Bowman and Joe Turner. Of course the Billy. Jim Starr and Billy Garrett would. Would switch back and forth between the in call themselves the Interns and the Medics. There were medics in Florida and Oklahoma. They were the interns in Tennessee. I think by this point Billy Gear was gone and Jim Starr was teaming with Tom Andrews as the Interns up in Tennessee. So who this intern was, I don't know. I asked Joe Turner if it might have been him because Bill had gone. Bill Bowman had gone into semi retirement, was selling cars in Atlanta at this point. Joe was in and out. And Joe, this Joe said it wasn't him. But I have a feeling it may have been because he does show up on some cards later on in 75. So it could very well been him. But anyway, the next match, Armand Hussein and Bobby Fields, hunters. And this was David and Jerry Novak, the ones that worked Memphis. [01:12:46] Speaker C: Did they have a manager while they were in Gulf coast. [01:12:51] Speaker A: For one week till Kelly fired him. They brought in general Homer o'. Dell. [01:12:56] Speaker C: Oh, man. [01:12:58] Speaker A: And I don't know what happened. Something happened. Kelly fired him the same week he showed up. [01:13:03] Speaker C: What a character. [01:13:09] Speaker A: Another the next match after that was a feature about ken Lucas beat Dr. X. And this Dr. X was red. Red Osborne, yeah. Who was double X in AWA and then was Dr. X for McGurk who was former NWA world junior heavyweight Champion. And then the main event was Rip Tyler and Big Bad John defending the Gulf coast tag team champions against the Yankees. And the Yankees won and won the tag team title. So that was Mobile. I couldn't find anywhere Wednesday night. They didn't Run anywhere Wednesday nights in Mississippi or anywhere else. Wednesday at one point with Mobile until 73 Tuesday was, was Pascagoula. Kelly switched it to Tuesday in Mobile and killed Pascagoula which was Bobby Hillsdale. He said Bobby didn't speak to him for a week after that happened. [01:14:28] Speaker C: The hometown of Plowboy Frazier. [01:14:30] Speaker A: Yep. The hometown of Fraser. He was always building cowboy over there. But so the next night, I take it back Winston. Thursday night was the next next night when Hattiesburg, Mississippi at the Wade Kennedy Arena. Now that sounds fancy doesn't it? That was actually an auction barn out in the middle of the neighborhood where they, they had dirt floors and, and you know they usually auctioned off cattle and sheep and stuff in there. [01:15:02] Speaker C: They. Did they put a tarp down or anything or. [01:15:05] Speaker A: No, it was, it was a dirt floor. Same with the Houston County Farm center in Dothan. It was a dirt floor. [01:15:11] Speaker C: So they just. [01:15:12] Speaker A: I hated working that building. [01:15:13] Speaker C: They put the ring just on the dirt floor. [01:15:16] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And you, you, you hope they didn't have any kind of animal show in there within a couple of days after that because that dirt would be all churned up. You step out of the, step out of that ring and you sink up to your ankles in that loose dirt. [01:15:32] Speaker C: Oh man. But fortunately a lot of guys just didn't turn ankles and get hurt. [01:15:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I hated, I hated working in that building because you know you'd have on nice clean boots and stuff. You'd get thrown out of the ring and slide for a mile hitting that dirt. The in Hattiesburg again this was Kelly Book misses all of Mississippi. So this was, was his town the first. This was a double main event. They had a semifinal and a double main event. They didn't have any opening matches. The semifinal was Ken Lucas and there again Ricky Neal working against bounty hunter number two and Jack Dalton. Now this particular Jack Dalton was Jim Boggess real brother Jack. Jack. The original Jack Dalton of course was Don Fargo back in the 60s there for a while for Billy Golden. Randy Collie worked as Jack Dalton. But you know what, this may have been Randy working as Jack Dalton in Mississippi. I think it was because he was on these other cards. So I bet it was. This was bounty hunter number two which at that it was Jerry Novak the bigger of the two. And I'm gonna say Jack Dalton here was Randy Collie. Even though The Daltons, the second set of Daltons that worked in 70 and 71 were Jim Dalton and his real life brother Jack who also worked in Paducah for the gym and Jack Dalton for Bill Golden. [01:17:25] Speaker C: Absolutely. They showed up at Kaintuck territory one time which was a little amusement park down at Kentucky Lake and had their. [01:17:34] Speaker A: Manager, Colonel Maxi York. [01:17:37] Speaker C: That's it. [01:17:42] Speaker A: So again here I have no results so I can just tell you what the, what the card was. The first match is of the double main event was three matches in one with no referee. The first match was a Texas Rules match. Cowboy Bob Kelly versus the Bounty Hunter number one, which was David Novak. The second match again was Bob Kelly versus the Bounty Hunter number 1 was 5 two rounds of boxing judged by three people from the crowd. [01:18:21] Speaker C: Oh my gosh. [01:18:22] Speaker A: The third match was an English rules match which was again by rounds judged by people in the crowd. And that again was Bob Kelly versus the Bounty Hunter number three. This was again some Achilles invented booking. And then the second match, the final match of the double main event was big Bad John vs Dr. X. That was on Thursday night. Friday night we moved to Dothan and the beautiful Houston County Farm Center. There we had again no results. Rick Tyler versus Jim White was the opening match. Dandy Jack Donovan and Dirty Don Duffy versus the Fields cousins Ricky and Johnny. Second match, the wrestling pro versus the Yankee number three. And then the semifinal was an Alabama championship match. Dick Dunn who was the champion defending his title against JC Dykes. [01:19:30] Speaker C: Oh man. [01:19:33] Speaker A: Then the main event was Ken Lucas versus Yankee number one. The Yankee number one, Curtis. Curtis Smith. If there was a mask, masked heel and the other than the wrestling pro who went back and forth, he was a baby face, sometimes a heel other times. But if there was a mask like the Blue Yankee, the spoiler, the Mighty Yankee and back again the, the challenger and then back again to the Blue Yankee was always Curtis Smith. Curtis Smith was the only guy I knew from the business who never worked without a mask. He said he had. He told me he had one or two matches at the very beginning of his career without a mask. Another rest time. He was either one of JC Dykes's Infernos with his brother Rocky or he was in Mobile territory under a hood of some part or another. And from 1974 on his usual partner and if he was working with a partner was usually Mike McManus and they were the, let's see him just in Mobile alone. They were the Mighty Yankees. They were the challengers and I think they did a shot there as the Interns, but they were the interns version of the Interns that went out to LA with JC Dice and held the America's Championship out there. And that was the final, final version of JC Dykes's Inferno. So Mike and. And Curtis were together for four years, I think. But anyway, you were going to ask me something about this card. [01:21:27] Speaker C: I was going to ask you about Wade Kennedy arena and Farm Center. They're both dirt floors, but what did each one of those capacity wise. [01:21:38] Speaker A: Wade Kennedy I think probably held 500 people. Like I said, this was. This was literally a metal barn out in the middle of a neighborhood. It had a very small. It had. I think the seating capacity was like 500. And they had parking places for maybe 60 people and a lot of bleachers. Probably right now. I'm talking about the parking lot. Yeah, a lot of bleachers. But. But most of the crowd there came from their houses and walk there because it was literally in the middle of the neighborhood. [01:22:11] Speaker C: I was just thinking it was a livestock sale situation. I just. [01:22:15] Speaker A: It was, but it was. It was in this. It was in this field in the middle of a neighborhood with a small parking lot in this big tent barn probably a year or so before they tore it down. I went over there with Kelly, and Kelly had not wrestled in that building. Let's see, this was probably 2006, 2007. Kelly hadn't been there since 76. So 30 years. People were coming out of their house, this Cowboy Bob Kelly running up to us standing in this parking lot. And so far, every building that I have mentioned, with the exception of the Farm center, no longer exists in the Farm. The Farm center in Dothan, Houston County Farm Center. It's still there. I was there when I was with the Circus in2011 and 2012. We held the search set up in the parking lot of the Farm Center. At that time it was owned by Homeland Security. I've recently read they're. They're doing something to renovate it now here within the last year, I think I read something about that. So it's still standing. It's the only one of. Out of all the regular buildings that they worked. As far as I know, this is still standing. In fact, Laurel, which is where they used to run on Monday nights in Mississippi until November 1973. And that this was a nice city auditorium, you know, that would have been there since the 50s. You know, like most small cities that have a city auditorium, you know, it was very similar to that. It burned down in November of 1973. And they never went back into Laurel. And see, on Saturday nights they used to take that back. On Friday nights they ran Meridian at a building out at the fairgrounds there. So I'm not sure what it was like. I never been able to find. It's no longer there either. I've never been able to find any newspapers online or anything like that that even lists Meridian. So I have. I've never had results from Meridian, so. So I don't know how that city worked. That again was one of Kelly's Mississippi towns. But the fairgrounds has been abandoned now, at least the last time I looked, which was probably five or six years ago on Google map, that fairgrounds is abandoned. There's. There's an old building out there, but it's not big enough to have been something that they'd run matches in. Probably. Probably a kiosk for games or food or something. But anyway. [01:25:26] Speaker C: And all the remnants of the territory are just gone. That's just sad. [01:25:31] Speaker A: Yeah, it is. It is bad. You know, stuff like that. Okay, so on Saturday night now, I'm not sure what they ran on Rockies in. Usually they ran somewhere like Andalusia or. I don't think they'll know if they were still running Quincy this late in the game or not. I know in the 60s and early 70s, they ran Quincy, Florida, which is just outside of Jacksonville. Tells you how far these guys had to go. So they would do live TV on Saturday afternoons and Dothan and drive to Quincy the days they did that, or if they did Ozark. But they usually didn't run Ozark unless they weren't running Dothan because they were so close together. They're only like 15 miles apart. So I'm not sure where they were running on Saturday night on Rockies in. But I know they were. But here, let me see. On Saturdays on. On the Mississippi end, they ran Gulfport. So let me pull up golf for real quick. Forgot to pull it up. [01:26:42] Speaker C: Which for people who are not familiar with the area, Gulfport port is south of Biloxi. Is that right? [01:26:50] Speaker A: No, actually, if you. If you took Highway 90 out of Mobile, it runs. You go Mobile across the Mississippi state line, and you're almost immediately in Pascagoula. You go another 10, 12 miles, you're in Biloxi. You go another 20 miles, you're in. Go forward. Gold is west of Biloxi. [01:27:24] Speaker C: They ran Gulfport rather than Biloxi, right? [01:27:27] Speaker A: Yes. Yes. I don't know. I never. I don't know why they ever did that. They never ran. At least as long as Lee had it. They never ran Baloxi. Now, they would run Bloxy back during the days when it was kind of Split between Joe Gunther and Billy Romanoff. They would run Biloxi every once in a while, but it was never a regular weekly show. You know, they would run three weeks, be gone six months, come back, run three weeks, be gone six months. It was. It was strange. But Lexi, I don't know if it was. If it was the military didn't want something like that for theirs airmen to go get in fights over or. Or what the deal was, or they couldn't compete with the bars in the. And the house was a prostitution that were right outside Keesler Air Force Base, or what the deal was that they just never ran there. But, yeah, Gulfport was a regular town from 68 to, I think, 76. Hold on. My computer's thinking. I'm waiting to get into my clippings here and there again, they ran past Kagula and, you know, Pascagoula was. Was no further from Gulfport than Pensacola was from Mobile. They just. They didn't worry about. They. Then they had fans that they would drive and show in both cases to go all the matches. That's. That's another thing that. That Lee had his bookers do smart that most people didn't. And one thing, a few weeks I worked for Ron Fuller, that aggravated me about Fuller's booking. He would book the same card in every town. Same finishes, same everything. So if you had. Except Pensacola, they would always do something different. Pensacola, because Pensacola was close enough where somebody could drive. But if you had somebody that was, you know, industrious enough to get that lived in Mobile or lived in Montgomery, it went to. Joe would drive, you know, two hours up the road to Birmingham or an hour and a half down to Mobile. They'd see the same match, the same finish, the same everything. And that just to me was that it was lazy booking. Yeah. And no knock on. On Ron because he did the business, you know, in that territory after he bought it. [01:30:14] Speaker C: But, you know, I'm sure you had fans that lived in between that probably went to both. [01:30:19] Speaker A: Oh, I'm sure. Okay. So Saturday night was. It was in Gulfport. And this one here, I actually have. Have results, Frank. The opening match, Frank Dalton beat Randy Collie in 11 minutes. So again, that intern had to been Randy or that Jack. Jack Dalton had to have been Randy Collie. And why they booked him over there is Jack Dalton. I have no idea. Or maybe it was just a misprint on the. The cards. Dolphin Rocky had a guy that worked in his office named Shorty Turner. He was also the guy that worked Rang the bell at the farm center couldn't spell to save his life. If you come across some dofen car I don't know if we'll come to him while we're looking at here. But some of the spellings of these people's names are just atrocious. But the second match was. Was supposed to be David Novak the bounty hunter number one against Armand Hussein. Armand Hussein did not show up so big bad John replaced it and he won that match on disqualification when bounty hunter number two came out and they double teamed John. The semifinal was Dr. X and Randy Collie team to take on Frank Dalton and a young man by the name of Anthony Shane. Anthony Shane's name was Anthony Shane Hatfield. He was Bobby's, one of Bobby Fields three sons. He never wrestled as far as I know except for this one match. He was always a referee and he worked as either Anthony Shane or Tony Shane. [01:32:18] Speaker C: Wow. That was it, huh? [01:32:21] Speaker A: Yep. And then the main event was big bad John and Bobby Fields against the bounty hunters which was young one by Fields and John when by big bad John 10 bounty hunter number two. So that was the week, the first week of June. Any questions about any of those cards? [01:32:48] Speaker C: No, I just wish, you know. I mean it just seemed like a. Just a, a compact territory. You know what I mean? I mean just. [01:32:58] Speaker A: Yeah, the furthest, the furthest trip was depending. Most of the guys either lived in Mobile or Pensacola. Lee lived in Irvington out at the racetrack. He had a home on the, on the grounds of the racetrack. And plus he also had the Fields Brothers ranch in Loxley which was on the other side of Mobile Bay between Mobile and Pensacola. Kelly lived in Mobile. Most of the boys lived in Pensacola. I know Lucas lived over Eddie Sullivan Tyler live over there. Boyette lived, lived over there. So that's where most of the boys. [01:33:44] Speaker C: I mean I can, I can see where a lot of these, A lot of these guys just kept coming back to it, you know like Ken Lucas, you know he just homesteaded. [01:33:53] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean he pretty much the trip for short. You were home every night if you chose to be the only one that you may not have been. Some of the guys would. When they go do Dothan TV they get a hotel room in Dothan. And especially if they went to Quincy rather than drive all the way back to Pensacola, they come back to Dothan, spend the night there and then go to wherever they would then go on Pensacola to do Pensacola Sunday night. Now the, the building that they ran in Gulfport was called the JC Sports Center. It was Also on the fairgrounds. On a fairgrounds. Now, I don't think this building exists anymore either because I worked in Gulfport for a year and I never, I drove around and I never could find a Sports center on 30th Avenue and go for it. So I'm assuming it was torn down as well. [01:34:59] Speaker C: These guys are working every night, seven nights a week. But it's such short trip. [01:35:06] Speaker A: Exactly. The only, the only night that you had always like Wednesday. And then sometimes they'd fill in, you know, they'd find a spot show somewhere in Mississippi or, you know, they work, you know, high school in, in Niceville, Florida or something like that. [01:35:27] Speaker C: How business was during this June 75? [01:35:37] Speaker A: Well, basically, considering most of the guys hung around all year and didn't, didn't go somewhere else, I must have been paying decently. So they must have been drawing decently. I know the minimum, I think Kelly told me the minimum that they would pay guys, you know, regardless of showing up, just if you showed up, they paid you. It was either 25 or 35. And it didn't change much because in 81, when I worked for Fuller, the minimum was 45. So that's six years later. So it didn't change much. [01:36:14] Speaker C: Right. [01:36:15] Speaker A: I think the Atlanta area, the minimum was 60, 60 or 65. That's just for showing up. [01:36:26] Speaker C: But you weren't driving, you weren't driving the Tennessee territory and you weren't driving Amarillo. [01:36:31] Speaker A: And you know, Bill Bowman and Joe Turner used to tell horror stories about the sick working because they had live TV everywhere. [01:36:39] Speaker C: Right. [01:36:39] Speaker A: They had live TV in Huntsville. They had live TV in Birmingham, which they taped at midnight. They had live TV in Nashville, so they were all over the place. Chattanooga, they had live tv? [01:36:56] Speaker C: Yep. [01:36:59] Speaker A: I can't imagine, I cannot imagine. [01:37:03] Speaker C: I tried to map it out on a map once and my gosh, that's. [01:37:09] Speaker A: Why they had, you know, they had an over a heel team that was over under mask. You know, they'd have four or five different guys, you know, or six or eight different guys working under the same mass in different towns calling themselves whatever, you know, the Blue Infernos, Red Infernos, the, the Green Assassins or whatever. [01:37:31] Speaker C: I, I found a, I found an article in 75 that said that they had television in 18 markets. Of course, some of those by 75 were syndicated. They were still doing television in Nashville. They were still doing television in Chattanooga. They were still doing television in Birmingham and they had stopped doing the television in Louisville and just doing the Memphis, you know, show. So they had, they still had about five towns where they did television and then they sent it out to. Out of those five towns, they sent out to 18 different markets, but they were. They had 150 guys on the roster in 75. [01:38:16] Speaker A: Which I don't know if if by 75, if the tri States area of Bristol. [01:38:26] Speaker C: Yeah, that was. That had gone to Ron I think by then, wasn't it? [01:38:29] Speaker A: Yeah, I think. Yeah, I think Fuller had it by that time. Bo James would be your. Be your man there. But. But at one point when, when Ron Wright and Whitey Caldwell were over that, you know, the Johnson City Bristol, what was the other one, the main one. [01:38:47] Speaker C: Not Kingsport. [01:38:50] Speaker A: Kingsport. They went. They would venture over into West Virginia. So you know, that whole Tennessee thing, I mean and maybe that's where Lee got it. How to divide up the Gulf coast because Tennessee was that way. I mean you had the Memphis in. You had. You had Tennessee. I mean you had Nashville. You had John Kazana had his whole thing down there around Knoxville. You had Don Barnes or I think was the guy's name that had Kingsport. [01:39:19] Speaker C: Mickey. [01:39:20] Speaker A: Mickey Barnes. Yeah, Mickey Barnes. But they were all, you know, they were all there in cahoots together anyway. But they drew most of their. Their talent from. Except for the guys that homesteaded in Kingsport, Kazana and Memphis. You know, we're all using, you know, Mid south booking, which was Roy and Nick's guys. [01:39:47] Speaker C: Right. [01:39:49] Speaker A: And that all went on. When did, when did Jerry split off in 74, 76. Okay. [01:39:57] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. March of 77. March of 77 is when they split. But when they bought Memphis in night. When they bought Memphis in 1956, Sam A.V. and Sam Mushnick had been booking it and they almost. When they bought Memphis, they almost got a whole nother territory. I mean they got, you know, Arkansas from that they got. And then they, I mean they, they got a whole nother. [01:40:34] Speaker A: Yeah, because they can. They continued up until I guess when Laura and Jerry Jared had it. They were still running Jonesboro, Arkansas. [01:40:43] Speaker C: Right. [01:40:43] Speaker A: They were running Evansville, Indiana. I mean it's just you know, there again those fingers of Roy Welch. That's why what you were talking about wanting him to a reason for him to being the observer hall of Fame. God, his influence went everywhere. I mean think of all the states that he was. Was at least had some, you know, piece of the pie in. [01:41:13] Speaker C: Yes. And the thing I was working on for a, for a case study for it to put out on my sub stack. It's multi four generations. I mean he, he had amazing legacy, you know, through four different generations that kept wrestling going throughout the South. [01:41:36] Speaker A: It's amazing if at the time that wrestling was still territorial. Ron Southeastern was one of the last to fall Southeastern slash Continental. At that point, I want to say mid-80s, there were 27 different members of the Welsh family or connected to the Welches, some through marriage or whatever that either wrestled, promoted something and then it's probably larger than that because when I did that count, when I made that list, I didn't count any of Bobby Fields's kids who all either wrestled or refereed. I mean, just from the four brothers. You mind talking about this? You want to Continue on with 70, 40, what do you. [01:42:34] Speaker C: No, from the Four Brothers. Yeah. [01:42:36] Speaker A: Roy. Roy of course was the oldest, Albert, who wrestled under the name Jack. Jack Welch, he was the next oldest. Then Herb, then Lester. Lester's Roy's son, Buddy Welch or Edward Welch became Buddy Fuller. He wrestled his. His two sons wrestled. Jack's son Doyle wrestled for a while. Jack's sister in law wrestled. You'll see her various places is billed as either Joanne Welch, Joanne Phillips or JoJo Welch. She wrestled. Then there was Herb. No, Joel was Herb son. I'm sorry, it wasn't. Jackson Doyle was Herb son. He wrestled Lester's two sons, Lester Jr. Which was Jackie and Roy. Lee wrestled the sister. They're the full brother. Sister Ruby Mary, Speedy Hatfield. His three sons, Don Lee, Don and Bobby Hatfield, the Fields brothers. Lee's son Ricky Donson, John. Bobby's kids, Anthony, Bobby Jr. And Randy all refereed and or wrestled. Don Fields's brother in law, Buddy Carson wrestled as Marshall Fields and refereed as Buddy Carson. Was Roy Welch's sister daughter married Bill Golden. [01:44:52] Speaker C: Yeah. That was Ruby, right? [01:44:55] Speaker A: That was Ruby, yeah. What was. I remember what I said. Ruby was married to Speedy. But what Ruby. Ruby was Bill Golden's. See, without a road map I can't show all this stuff. But Ruby was married to Bill Golden. Bill golden of course promoted, refereed, even got in the ring every once in a while. His brother Phil ran Paducah. And I still say and will say to my dying day that that whole thing over there in Paducah was a setup between Roy Welch and Saw Weingra to put squeeze on Nick Gas to make. [01:45:38] Speaker C: Ever since you told me that, I can't get it out of my head because it just makes total sense. [01:45:43] Speaker A: The reason I say that is because Roy did the Same thing in 67. He had Lee come up and run Nashville in Nashville for a month. The night after The Hippodrome car, or I think that time they'd already built the arena. Yeah, the arena out on the fairgrounds. Arena out. And Lee was running the Hippodrome the night either the night before, the night after, Ghoulish was running. And Skip Wetchen's the one that clued me in on it. He said, roy used to do that stuff. He said, Roy. He said all those Welches had twisted senses of humor. So, you know, Roy really didn't like doulas all that much. I don't know. Even though their partnership lasted forever and was successful, I think. [01:46:34] Speaker C: Well, I just read an interview with Bunk Harris. And so Roy first came up here to Paducah in 1932, and he met. And he met up with the guy here named Hot Gillum. And George Harris says that when Roy first had the idea to do the territory, the first territory, which would have just been Dyersburg and Paducah, and. And, you know, he didn't go to Nashville to 1940. So he was putting together the little, you know, first little circuit. And he offered the partnership for the territory to Hot Gillum. And Hot turned him down. And so then a couple years later, close to 1939 or so, hot Gillum shows up at Roy's office in Dyersburg and says, well, here's some money. I'm ready to buy into the territory now. And he said, well, you're too late. I just made a deal with Nick Goulis. [01:47:39] Speaker A: So I think that was in 39, because Gulas was still Gulas. How he. From what I understand, because I never met Nick Ghoulis, never spoke. I had a conversation with Nick Gillispie just from talking to all the boys. Gulas was a referee somewhere along the line. And the reason, once he bought in with. With Roy and was put into power, the reason he was so tyrannical was to all the boys and treated all the boys the way he did was when he was a referee, whatever boys he'd ride with, they'd make him ride in the floorboard and put their feet on him. And so he always carried that grudge, you know, and his. His famous thing. I'll have you farting through silk, boy. Come work for me. I'll make you a millionaire. [01:48:31] Speaker C: Was that when he worked for Jordan in Alabama Christian? [01:48:34] Speaker A: It could be, because I know that's where he started. He started. He. He was from Birmingham, the Gulas family. And there were three brothers that got beside. Well, there was Nick, Gus, Alex, and I want to say there was another one that dabbled in the wrestling business. The others, Nick was the only one that was. Stayed in it pretty much full time. The others would promote here and there and here and there. But it was always, you know, working with. With Roy and Nick. But he was either in with Jordan or Joe Gunther. But they all owned a string of restaurants, Greek restaurants based in Birmingham. In fact. I don't know if it's still there. There was a Ghoulis's restaurant in Mobile for a hundred years. I don't know which one of them ran it or if it was any of. Any of the. The Alex, Gus or. I know Nick didn't do it because he was living in Nashville, but. So, but that's where their money came from. [01:49:42] Speaker C: He. He had him in Tampa in 1940. 41, something like that. And they just started the work in Nashville in 1940. So I. I think that's where Nick came in. [01:49:58] Speaker A: Sounds about right. [01:49:59] Speaker C: Yeah, but. But HOT came back ready to buy in. [01:50:02] Speaker A: And Roy said, well, he ended up promoting somewhere. Because I've seen Hot Gilliam's name listed somewhere as. Yeah, as a promoter back in around that time frame. [01:50:13] Speaker C: Yeah, well, he, he kept running Paducah. I mean, he ran Paducah till 1949 or 50, something like that. [01:50:22] Speaker A: And I mentioned Speedy Hatfield earlier, who was Roy's son in law. He was the Jonesboro promoter for years before they opened the Gulf Coast. [01:50:33] Speaker C: And by the way, Roy's sister's name was Bonnie. [01:50:36] Speaker A: Bonnie Bond. Yeah. Ms. Bond. She made all their jackets. You always. Those two, Tone. If you, if you look at pictures of the seventies, of the Fuller brothers, of Jimmy Golden, Roily Welch, Bond made all those. All their jackets. [01:50:56] Speaker C: You know what's amazing to me? Yeah, you know what's amazing to me is there's that picture of the three of the Welch brothers. Herb and Roy and Lester walk into the ring. They all got cowboy hats on. And the first thing I noticed was no pads. No knee pads, no elbow pads. [01:51:16] Speaker A: Oh, no. Even when I broke in in 79, guys would look at you funny if you showed up with knee pads. What's the matter, boy? [01:51:32] Speaker C: And then the, the other thing too. The, the other thing too is. And, and I know you've got a particular name for these people that worked for them for so long, that had. That are not family. But they are family. You know what I mean? [01:51:46] Speaker A: The brand. The Branch Welches. Yeah. Bunk hairs. You mentioned him. Bunk Harris was definitely a Branch Welch. Because he was from Dyersburg. [01:51:53] Speaker C: Yep. And out in West Texas, where Roy broke into the business with Cal Farley and Dutch Mantel. There two other guys out there. One of them was the Green Shadow, Pat Malone. [01:52:12] Speaker A: Pat Malone, Pie face. Yeah. [01:52:14] Speaker C: Yep. And the other was Charlie Carr. [01:52:16] Speaker A: Mm. Charlie Carr. When I was talking about Kelly. When Kelly came from Canada through, you know, Louisville and. And ended up staying on the Fields Ranch, one of the first things he did was Don Fields, who was probably the biggest river out of all the Fields brothers. He. He said, I want. He told Kelly, so I want to see how you do. He said, let's. Let's try you out a little bit. He said, see that old. That old drunk up in the ring up there? Get up in the ring and see what you can do with that old drunk. They had a ring set up on the ranch. It was Charlie Carr. Charlie Carr broke all the. All three of the. The. Well, the field for other 10. He broke Buddy Fuller in. He helped break Ron and Robert in. He broke in Bill Bowman and Joe Turner. Because at one point he was living downtown Mobile at the. At the ymca. He split his time between the Field Ranch and there. And Bill Bowman's father was the manager of the YMCA in Mobile, the downtown ymca. [01:53:27] Speaker C: I just read Kirk Nielsen's Plowboy Frazier book. [01:53:31] Speaker A: I did too. I just. [01:53:32] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. And they. He talked about, you know, he's looked at this small guy, thought, oh, man, I can take this guy, you know, but ended up roughing him up pretty good. [01:53:44] Speaker A: Did you read Don Fargo's book? [01:53:48] Speaker C: It is on its way to me. I have not read it. [01:53:51] Speaker A: I'm not to give anything away, but it's just a. He talks about how he broke in the business in Ohio. He. He went to Al Haft. Al have. Did the same thing. Put him in the ring with an old guy, an old shooter by the name of Jewel Speedy Loranz. Here I am, this bodybuilder. I'm gonna get in here with this broke down old hayseed, you know, up in there. And he said Loranz stretched him from one end of the ring to the other. That's how you broke guys in, though, in those. [01:54:23] Speaker C: Well, see, now, that was the stopover. See, Roy left West Texas, and then he went up an hour. Haft was running Ohio, just kind of getting started running Ohio. And he worked in Ohio and a little bit in Battle Creek, Michigan. He worked in Toledo, and he stayed up there about three months, and then he started working his way south through Indiana, Kentucky. And then I think when he got down Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, he thought, I can do here what I saw in west Texas and what I saw in Al Haft in Ohio, I can, I can. I can build me a little. Little circuit here. And it's just amazing that when you go back and, you know, the way Dutch Van Tael broke in people in Amarillo, the way Al have broken people, and Roy, you know, instituted all that stuff. And if you go back to your list, I mean, it's over 30 family members, plus you got all these other guys like Pat Malone and Charlie Carr. How many people do you think was influential in the business? [01:55:28] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, because definitely Roy had his. Had his crew, and that's what he built the mobile territory around. When he. He sent Buddy down here or down there. I'm in Atlanta. But he had. He had Charlie Carr, he had Mario Galento, of course the three Fields brothers, his family. He had Lester, he had Herb. Jack would work every once in a while. Jack promoted Dofen when they. When they finally opened the territory up on board. Whereas Buddy had Mobile, Pensacola in that, that area there. Dothan. This was all pre interstate. So Dothan was. Was a bit of a haul away. But. But Jack was the promoter there. Of course, he was listed under his real name, Albert Welch. Not to put the two together, but Jack had a bad habit. Even up until Lee bought. Bought the territory, including Dolphin in. In the early 60s, Jack had a habit of billing some major superstar to be on his card. And damn it, he just had. He. He had traveling issues. He. He can't make the main event. I'm gonna work the main event. Jack would put himself. He built Fred Blassie to work Bunk Harris. And, you know, main event time came and Freddie wasn't there. So Jack's all getting in wrestling. You know, that's great. [01:57:04] Speaker C: I love that. [01:57:06] Speaker A: But. Yeah, and then somebody, Somebody needs to write a book about that family. [01:57:12] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Well, it's. It's on my, you know, dream list to do. But I got two books I got to finish first. But I, I just cannot. I. I want to see Roy get in the hall of fame. And the problem is now that you've got so many modern voters that they just don't have any idea how influential this guy was. I mean, he, He. But he affected the wrestling business in ways that people can't even understand anymore. [01:57:41] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely, absolutely. And through him, his brothers Herb, you know, probably the biggest name that. That Herb Welch broke into business. Dave. Yes, but, you know, Herb trained a ton of guys. And I won't break kayfabe while we're on air, but remind me later to Tell you, there is a, there's another member of the Welch family that most. A lot of people. Well, I'd say 90 of the people that know who this person is and you know who he is. He is actually a member of the Welch family, too, but it's never been known. Well, but I'll leave it at that. I'll pick your curiosity and I'll leave it at that. [01:58:31] Speaker C: I want to wrap up the show now. [01:58:34] Speaker A: But yeah, I mean, you go through, through Roy Buddy and look at where all Buddy promoted. Buddy promoted Florida. He was, he had a hand in Florida, as did Lester. Had a hand in Georgia, as did Lester. Buddy bought out not Ernie Muhammad, but the Rod Fenton out in Arizona. [01:58:59] Speaker C: Yes, Tucson. [01:59:02] Speaker A: And, and ran out there. And if you look at, at the cards that were run out there, look at the names on those cards. Mario Galento, Greg Peterson, you know, Big Dunn, guys that, you know, were from, you know, this area here. You bet. [01:59:22] Speaker C: You bet. I mean, just amazing, just amazing effect on the wrestling business. And, you know, I don't, I don't want to take anything away from Jerry, but, but Roy mentored Jerry Jarrett and absolutely brought him into Memphis and made him the booker and supported him. And, and Jerry did a lot of great things. I mean, he opened up Louisville, he opened up Evansville and all that, but he did it with Roy's backing. He was for work for Roy. And, you know, everything that came after, when Jerry and Nick split, you know, one of the amazing things was he partnered with Buddy Fuller, but they didn't call it Jarrett Fuller Fuller Wrestling. They called it Jarrett Welch Wrestling. And they, they were going to take advantage of the Welch name because it still meant something, you know, and it still means something. And I, I, I just want to get Roy in the hall of Fame. [02:00:19] Speaker A: Well, one of the things that's indicative you remember back. Do you ever get the Wrestling Review magazines back before the Canadian company bought them out and they became. [02:00:34] Speaker C: They were awesome. [02:00:35] Speaker A: Yeah, you mean was. It was Wrestling Monthly that Jerry Lawler did the cartooning for. He did a cartoon and we saw Weingroth had a column in the Wrestling Review, but he did a cartoon that saw Weingroth ran on in one of his columns. That is indicative of the reach that promotion had. It was a cartoon of Lance Russell sitting at a desk on the moon saying, we present the first Welch Ghoulis presents, the first wrestling card ever held on the moon. That was what it was like. [02:01:14] Speaker C: Yes. Yeah. [02:01:18] Speaker A: But, you know, in a way, you look at an even further Connection with Jarrett and Welch. Who was, who was Roy's right hand in that office? [02:01:30] Speaker C: Teeny Chris. Dang. [02:01:32] Speaker A: Yeah, same thing. Jared's office. Who was his right hand? What's your name? No, no, Ms. Richardson. Tommy Rich's mother. [02:01:45] Speaker C: That's right. Yeah. [02:01:46] Speaker A: So there you go. You. So, so Tommy Rich in there is a Branch Welch. And I'm sorry for this noise. There's a dump truck backing up across over here. [02:01:55] Speaker C: Yep, yep. Tommy Rich, you know, brought Bill Dundee to this country. [02:02:01] Speaker A: Yep. [02:02:03] Speaker C: Bill Dundee and George Barnes. Just, it's just, it's just fascinating. And you know, going back to the Florida thing, and a lot of people don't connect Florida with them, but back there in, in 40. From 40 to 45, 46. Somewhere around there. Good. Five or six years. I mean, they promoted in Tampa and, you know, Saul Weingroft promoted Daytona beach and, and they had, they had a little crew down there, you know. I don't know. [02:02:33] Speaker A: You had a guy by the name of Pat o' Hara ran Miami. [02:02:38] Speaker C: Yes, that's right. And I don't know exactly why they didn't want to stay there, but they eventually got out for Cowboy Luttrell. [02:02:46] Speaker A: But a lot of that has to do with. And I learned this from talking to Skippy Wetchen about why Lee didn't stay in Louisiana. A lot of it had to do with the local politics and how much of a cut they wanted and all that stuff. And, you know, who knows? You know, Tim Deal, the ones were not exactly philanthropist. Everybody talks about Angelo Poffo being a miser. The Welches could give him a run for his money. [02:03:27] Speaker C: Yeah, I knew how to do it, but, but Tim Deals has done a fascinating book. I mean, he, he does Tennessee with me here on the show and he did a Tennessee Athletic Commission book. And just if you look at the amount of money they paid in tax to the commission and I doubt that they reported everything, but I mean, just an amazing amount of money they made just in the state of Tennessee. I mean, not taking in Kentucky and Missouri and Arkansas and Mississippi and. [02:03:58] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. If Bobby fields. I'm not Bobby Field. Bobby Simmons, the only time he worked as a full time wrestler, because most people know him as a referee and then Barnett's office manager here in Georgia. But he had, he once, Tom Ernesto, who was booking Atlanta at the time, said, look, I want to try wrestling full time. I've never, you know, I want to be a full time wrestler. And I know they're not gonna let me do it here in Georgia. Can you help me out. Tom picked up the phone, called Rocky McGuire and sitting down to Mobile. This was at the beginning of 77. Kelly was gone. He. Kelly had retired by that time. So Rocky was between Rocky and Rip Tyler. They were pretty much booking and running everything for Lee. They, with Kelly quit, they pretty much let Mississippi die because neither Bobby nor Speedy want to continue to deal with it over there, even though Speedy was living there. Speedy was living in Mosdale, Mississippi, wherever the hell that is at the time. But that's. Who held the promoter's license for Mississippi was Speedy Hatfield. But they had. I want to say the name of the town was Macomb, Mississippi. They booked over there. They booked Bobby. Handful of the guys to work over there. Bobby, when he got over there, the only people there were Speedy Hatfield, who was refereeing Sonny King, Kervin. Yes. That was the only three that showed up. Nobody else showed up. So Speedy walked out and looked at the crowd and came back and said, we got him outnumbered. There's more of us here in the dressing room than there is in the audience. So Bobby Fields was there and he said, here's what we're going to do. He said, we're going to have. We're going to have one match. He said he sent Bobby Simmons and Kurt Von Hess out there. He said, you guys work about 25, 30 minutes. Kurt's going to get heat on you, Bobby, and then Sonny's going to roll out and. And make save. And then they're going to fight for 10, 15 minutes, then we're going to go home. Obviously, they worked the deal. You know, he and Kervon has worked about 25, 30 minutes. You know, he was getting hate on Bobby. Sonny King came out. Bobby rolled out of the ring. Sonny King took over. Bobby said he got back to the dressroom, there's this little guy standing there with handout saying, I'm from the Mississippi State Athletic Commission. Said, do you have your license? Bobby said, no, I don't have a license. He said, well, I can sell you one right here. He said, it'll be $10. Bobby said, I only got paid 15. He said, you can keep your license. I'm not coming back here. And he walked out and that was it. I mean, that's. That's just the way the business was back in those days. Yeah, anybody that could get a cut. And the promoters all went along with it because what, you know, that kind of greased the wheels. [02:07:21] Speaker C: Of course, they weren't like. [02:07:22] Speaker A: And they didn't have the money. Barnett did by, you know, state officials and, you know, hobnob with the, the people, you know, like Barnett did here in Georgia. [02:07:34] Speaker C: Yes. Well, I'm gonna wrap it up for today, man. Another great show. Thank you for, for coming on. I mean, your knowledge, experience, and it's just a wonderful thing. And I, I'm so happy, you know, to have you to be on here to talk about this territory and talk about these things, because I, I want to keep these things out there for people and, and Michael, you just, you've accumulated all this knowledge and all this stuff over the years, and I want to keep sharing it. So thank you so much. [02:08:06] Speaker A: Absolutely. Well, when you get ready for if, when you get your able and we're both still alive and kicking, we'll work on the Welsh book together. I tried to do one, I tried to do one about 15 years. No, it's been long. Yeah, about 15 years ago. And I tried to do it right. I, I approached it, the Gulf coast reunion one year. I approached Roy. Well, Roy Lee Welch and was Lester youngest son and Ron and Robert, they were all there. And Jimmy golden and we'll get back to you. We'll get back. Well, let's see that. Because, you know, they've got ingrained in them, too. They've got ingrained that, that kayfabe mentality. In fact, I was shocked when, when Ron started doing his own podcast, and even then, you know, he didn't totally open up. But not only that, but they, they've also got that. As Bob Boyer told me one time, where do you think the, the, the term welch on a deal comes from? You know, they were seeing dollar signs for themselves and what can I make out of it? And I got firsthand, I, I got firsthand experience about that. And I'll tell you about that another time, too, in dealing with the Welches on, on money, stuff like that. [02:09:32] Speaker C: Well, when I, when I finish and I, you know, if I can get this funk book done and I can get at least the Barnett book about halfway done, we'll start on the next one. So, but, but that's, that got me all excited. That, that, that'll get me energized to get these other two done, so we can get to this. [02:09:51] Speaker A: Well, I'm glad, I'm glad you're doing a book on, on Jim Barnett, because Bobby Simmons and I have said for years somebody needs to do one on him because there, again, if he's not in the hall of Fame, he needs to be. [02:10:02] Speaker C: Yeah. [02:10:03] Speaker A: Just for the influence he had. [02:10:05] Speaker C: Oh, absolutely. All Right. Well, thank you, Michael. I appreciate it. [02:10:09] Speaker A: All right. Thank you, Tony. I appreciate it. [02:10:12] Speaker B: Well, that conversation could have gone on forever. I enjoy so much talking to Michael, as you can tell. And actually after we finished recording the show, he and I talked another hour about some great things in the Welch family because Michael's helping me put together. He's one of several historians and enthusiasts that are helping me put together another series for Briscoe and Bradshaw on Roy Welch and the Welch family. And that will be we will start recording that here very, very soon in the next week or so. And there's been so many people that have been helping and I'm going to make a list of those and mention all of those both on the stories with Briscoe Bradshaw show when we do it and also here on the Time Tunnel show because so many people that are involved here also that help me all the time by giving me things that they found and sharing information. And Michael Norris is at the top of the list. And so he'll be back again coming up next year in 2026 as we dive into 1976 in all the territories throughout pro wrestling. And Michael is a part of our family now. I'm not letting him go. He's got to stay here and he's got to help us and he's got to continue his important work with the Gulf coast territory and with the Welch family. I publish that history newsletter every single day called the Daily Chronicle. I talked about it at the top of the show. You can find that on our substack channel. And you can also be a premium subscriber for just $5 a month or $50 a year. If you want to save 10 bucks and you get those analysis and writing on the history of territory wrestling in the evolution of pro wrestling series, you can also come and join our Facebook channel, our Facebook group, Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel. Follow me on x at Tony Richards 4. And coming up here on the show we have Steve Giannarelli making another appearance with the WWWF in 1975. Also coming up, Tim deals in 1975 in the Tennessee Territory. We're going to cover Amarillo 1975. We're going to cover East Texas, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston with Greg Klein. And in addition to those, we are also going to have a fantastic Thanksgiving special that I'm working on. I'm trying to pull together that show and a great Christmas episode coming up and a great two part episode to wrap up 1975 and 1985 and move into 1976 and 1986. For the new Year week and weekend. So it's going to be a lot of great stuff here at the Time Tunnel. Thank you so much for sharing our show with other people that you think would be totally interested. We only talk about pro wrestling history here now. Every now and then something sneaks in about the modern product, but it's very, very minuscule. We talk pro wrestling history specifically in the Territory era from the late 20s to 1990 and really a lot of focus in the 60s, 70s and 80s. And if you think that somebody would enjoy being part of that, invite them to join our community in some way, either through the newsletter, the Facebook group, the X Channel, or here on the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel podcast. Thank you so much everybody for joining. We will be back here again with another show next week with Steve Giannarelli and I thank you so much for all your listening, all your watching and all your sharing. Join us again here next week. This is Tony Richards, your host, reminding you. And you know what I always say, if you want better neighbors, and at a time like this, in a culture of our country, we need to remember this. If you want better neighbors, just be a better neighbor. Just be better to everyone and they'll be better to you. So long. From the Richards ranch in Western Kentucky, this is Tony Richards saying bye bye from the Bluegrass State. [02:14:23] Speaker A: Thanks for tuning in to the Pro Wrestling Time Tunnel podcast. Tune in for another great episode next week, interviewing wrestlers, referees and media personalities that have made the sport of professional wrestling great. We'll release a new episode soon. Don't you dare miss it.