I donāt know how but when I was a kid my parents were somehow friends with the crockets, scottās and Presleyās back when it was all starting. During summers my brother and I would ride in a Winnebago with all the wrestlers from clt to Conway, Spartanburg, Greenville and other near by places and walk around the crowd selling pictures of the wrestlers to the fans while the matches were going on. We made .75 a pic and the fans were crazy, especially the females. What was funny is they would fight each other that night and get back in the Winnebago to head back to CLT after. In the same ride was Flair, paul jones, wahoo mcDanielās, black jack mulligan etcā¦ and the guy driving the bus was the guy with the tennis racquet, Jim cornett, or something like that. it was such a small boot strapped operation back then and to turn into a multi billion business is amazing.
Magnum TA shops at the HT in Ballantyne, he is there often, his wife shops there too, she is the ex-wife of Tully Blanchard, Magnum is confined to a modified wheelchair due to his automobile accident, sad story
Loved old school NWA back in the day, Rock and Roll Express, the Midnight Express, the Road Warriors, the Four Horseman with the Andersons, Flair, and Tully, Dusty Rhodes, Magnum TA, the Koloffs (Nikita and Ivan), Mr Wrestling 2, Wahoo McDaniel, Steamboat, Junkyard Dog, Garvins (Jimmy and Ron), Freebirds, Von Raschke,
NWA > WWF
AEW last night was a great time!
- trish
- stacy
I think Iāve told all my rasslinā stories on here before, but that was one of the cooler things about growing up in this town, especially in the 80s when youād see them all over the place. I definitely saw them at my high school job, all the time. They seemed to love that place.
Agreedā¦NWA>>>>>>>>>WWF/WWE
My best story is a Kannapolis cop I played softball with would work security at a lot of the NWA wrestling shows in Charlotte. Sometimesā¦Flair and his crew would pay them to go out and be security for them after the matches when they went out drinking. Tully passed out drunk and they had to carry him to his apartment. He was the TV Champion at the time and had the belt in his duffle. They took turns taking picks with his belt!!
Growing up if we saw a limo anywhere in town it was Ric Flair. We were sure of it. Wrestlers were Charlotte royalty.
Scaffold Match at memorial stadium or the raging bull at the armory - huge party of my childhood. Then in college years after I stopped watching we were at the old spring fest uptown and wcw nitro broadcast live from trade and tryon and I was sucked back, I was shocked wrestling was being broadcast live every week. I was in for another 10-15 years. After the rock and Austin left I quit paying too much attention until about 5 years ago when AEW started and the 6th ever dynamite was from Charlotte we went and I was sucked back in.
AEW really reminds me of some of that old school stuff. Itās not the huge show and production WWE has become. Last night Jimmy and I sat ringside and talked about old Charlotte wrestling days. Man it was fun. Got my sign taken and ripped by a wrestler lol
Nikita lives in a mill house in Kannapolis behind my auntās real estate agency (or at least he did for a while)ā¦met him a few times. Crazy nice dudeā¦very active in churches now. First time talking to him and he didnāt have the broken English with a hard Russian accent blew my mind. He actually speaks very deep, clear and overly proper (enunciates everything very well). Told him the Best of 7 vs Magnum was one of my alltime wrestling memories.
Alsoā¦the referee Charles Robinson lived in a mill house in Kannapolis too (not sure if he still does either). He bleached his hair for a while and would ref Ric Flair matches to Ricās benefitā¦was called Lil Naitch for a while. Had it on his license plateā¦so you could always tell when he was driving around town.
Got the Road Warriors autographs at the Super Show in Atlanta and was amazed at how short they both were. They had the muscle but when you see them in action on TV you assume they are titans. If I remember correctly, Koloff the āRussian Bearā was short and stocky too. He was a nice guy and would talk to the fans.
One of the Road Warriors would come in weekday mornings to the Showbiz Pizza I worked at, drinking coffee, reading the paper, and typing on his big clunky late 80s laptop, sitting in the balcony seating overlooking the arcade. Always seemed to be a strange place to do that, but we never bothered him, which I think he liked.
Nikita was the sameā¦and they were all from Minnesota too!
Apparently thoughā¦to your point of them being thick but not tallā¦Nikita was almost cast as the Russian in Rocky 4ā¦but he was apparently so jacked and thickā¦he looked too jacked and thick next to Sylvester Stallone. They went with tall and lean (Dolph - still jacked but lean) over short and thick.
Minnesota was a hotbed for pro wrestling people for quite a while. Nobody was hated more than the Andersonās āMinnesota Wrecking Crew ā (Ole and Gene) but they were really pretty nice guys. Never met Lars but he wasnāt a real Anderson.
Loved Arn Andersonā¦or loved to hate is a better way to put it.
Arn & Tully as a tag team with JJ Dillon as 1/2 of the Horsemen was as hated of a team as the NWA had back in the day
I remember when these unfortunate events occurred. Ric Flair a lucky man!
The 1970s in general a bad decade for aviation accidents. Included the Marshall and Wichita State football team tragedies, the Lynyrd Skynyrd crash that claimed Ronnie Van Zandt, and, of course, Eastern Air Lines flight #212 in Charlotte.
I remember when Magnum TA had his wreckā¦a lady I worked with a few years later at SouthTrust Bank said she was the one that approved the loan for the car he wrecked!
The Saudis are paying big money. Its insane they are doing this though. A few years ago half the wwe roster got detained by the Saudis after an event there.