| Might as well go from the top. You first remember seeing wrestling when you were about 8 or 9 years old, and this would have been in Ohio, and your first idol was Buddy Rogers, What was the first match or angle with him that you remember seeing? Gosh, you know, I just remember seeing Buddy� in terms of angle, I think a guy that I met at Cauliflower Alley a couple years ago that I kind of marked out for was Billy Darnell, because I do remember that he and Rogers had some tremendous matches. But Rogers was the first guy that really jumped off the page at me in terms of �here�s the guy I wanna be like, here�s the guy that for some reason just IS the guy�, and then of course once I got IN the business, then I knew that my choice had been tremendous, because at that time he was the greatest worker IN the business period. Now Buddy was a babyface consistently in Ohio, and I believe only in Ohio, am I correct? I don�t know about only in Ohio, but I never remember him being anything else here. Of course I believe he was a heel most everyplace else. I�m sure you met Buddy at some point--- You know what? I never have. REALLY? No, I shouldn�t say that---I have a picture of myself and Buddy when I was 12 years old, and that�ll go up on my website. But you know, the funny thing is, you remember Ernie Roth, the Grand Wizard. Ernie�s an Ohio boy too, but we first met when I went to work for Barnett and Doyle here in �62, and so of course in conversing and getting to know the guys, I realized that Ernie had actually learned the business at the knee of Buddy Rogers, and he had lived with Buddy and Buddy�s wife Terri in Columbus for a period of time when he started in, he had started life as a disc jockey. So once he knew that that was my childhood idol---in fact once, he tried to get me to New York, Buddy was working there, and at the time, I don�t remember where I was, but I was wise enough to the business to realize that New York was the Land Of The Giants, and I WASN�T one, so I just knew that career-wise this wouldn�t be a good move for me, so I passed on it---now I wish, of course, that I hadn�t, because it would have been my chance to probably work with Rogers at least once, which if there was something that I really, �Gosh, what did you miss, Les?�, that would have had to have been it---being able to work with Buddy. Was there anybody else you regret not getting the chance to work with? Dickie Steinborn. I thought he was a great, great worker and I never got the chance to work with him either. Who are some of the other guys you remember watching at first? Lord Blears, Ivan Rasputin, Jackie Nichols, Marvin Mercer---� gosh, you know, back then---I�ll be 64 this October---wrestling was on here in Cincinnati, gosh, I don�t know, from Chicago twice a week, New York twice a week, films or kinescope recordings or whatever the hell they were called at that time from Hollywood Legion Stadium, Texas Rasslin�, we saw, god, a BUNCH. So once I fell in love with it, I was watching everybody. At the time, Al Haft here based out of Columbus probably was, I found out later from talking to some of the veterans, one of the biggest territories in the country and one time I guess there had to have been 70 guys on his roster. He promoted Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky, Indiana, and West Virginia, among others. When I started watching in the early �60s, of course we got the Tampa show regularly, but for a little while maybe around �61 or �62 we got the Boston show, and who I remember is Frank Scarpa and Frank Shields. (Boston accent:) Frankie Scaapa. And Frank Shields who went on to be Bull Bullinski. Well, now when I broke in the business up there in �60---July 4, 1960 was my very first match---when I started my training, both Frank Shields was a cabdriver in Boston and wrestling at the time, and Frankie Scaapa, or Manuel Cortez as he was also called, was a toll collector for the Port Authority. And this is while he was headlining the promotion? Yes. Tony Santos---at the time Santos was the only promotion of record I guess in New England, but Eddie Quinn out of Montreal ran with Abe Ford who was the local promoter, and the talent that came into the Boston Garden at that time was promoted through Eddie Quinn, and actually at that time, I left there in November of �61 and never worked the territory again, there was no TV in Boston at all. Santos at the time was probably the only wrestling school of record, I read about it in Wrestling Revue, and I was driving myself crazy trying to get myself some kind of in around here, and as I said Haft was running maybe one of the major territories in the world at the time, and I drove up to his office outside of Columbus. And he and Frankie Talaber didn�t exactly open the door for you. Well, when I stop and look back on it, once I learned the business and got some hindsight on it I realized that they had some of the best talent in the world. I was like 175 pounds and I was a jock in school, I played football, basketball, baseball, wrestled at the YMCA, and when I saw that what I wanted was to be in the ring as a professional wrestler, I started some correspondence, and it was 350 bucks in 1960 for my training, and got on a Greyhound in February and went up there, and well, I haven�t looked back. Who were the actual trainers? Gene Dundee or Gene Santos or Gene Sanizzaro--- Wait---Gene SANTOS? Is he Tony Santos� kid? Yes, Sanizzaro, that�s their real name, or Flash Monroe as he was called---he conditioned us and did a lot of the basic stuff, but then like Bull Montana would come in, Kirk Douglas, Ronnie Hill would all make themselves known, and then Alex Medina--- I�m sorry---�Kirk Douglas�? Yeah. Not the movie star. Huh. Never knew there was a wrestler by that name. Yeah. Well, he was local from up there, and he was one of the shooters because he was the guy that Tony, he was the out front guy, there were several guys that took on all comers at the fairs, but Douglas was the main mover and shaker, he was the policeman I guess you�d call him. Okay, so Tony had the guys doing the AT show thing as well? Yeah, I worked both summers for him, we worked AT shows in New Hampshire and Maine and Vermont at the fairs, which was an experience. Any stories from that? Ohhh� nothing, you kn---� well, you know, not, not (breaks out laughing) Okay, you just thought of something. Well, you know, it was, actually, it was a great, I mean� they would take midgets up there, they would take girls, the young guys, Douglas and Ronnie Hill were the veteran shooters I guess to take on all comers, they�d throw, if it looked like it was decent, they�d throw kids in there, I remember once midgets wrestling teenagers just simply because I guess the kids liked it. Sonny Boy Cassidy was the midget. What they would do of course, they�d try to get one of the locals to take on one of the vets so there would be the big crowds, but if that wasn�t happening, well, they might throw in a mixed midgets and girls tag in, or just a girls match, because obviously back then the girls were much more of an oddity at the fairs and little theaters like that and would draw probably better then the guys. So it would be a combination of taking on all comers and presenting matches? Right. Us real entry-level guys were refereeing the girls matches, the midget matches---I�ll tell you a story about refereeing one of the shoots in a minute---take on people occasionally and of course Tony didn�t want to lose his money, and I don�t know how much money, so he was real careful about what he let the young guys do in that respect. �Beat The Champ And Win Fifty Bucks�? Yeah. I can�t for the life of me remember what the money amount was but yeah, there was money on the line. But then, we might work as much as 8, 9 times in a day, you know, in a 10-minute match. And of course if you talk about being weary at the end of the day, even for a 19-year-old kid, because you didn�t get a shower right away, there�d be a bucket of cold water in the back and you�d wet yourself down, towel off, slip into some jeans or something and go out and walk around the grounds, get something to eat, come back, and wait in the back until it was your turn to be out there again. One of the craziest memories from that point in time, and I don�t rightly remember which state or which fair, was when a local guy had been drinking and he had it in for Ronnie Hill, and he and his brother-in-law kept coming back and finally they set up a deal where he was gonna take Ronnie on. So the Joey Chitwood Thrill Show was at this fair at that time, and as it were a guy that I ran around with here in Cincinnati and we used to drag race together, he used to drive for Chitwood and I think was working one of those units, now he wasn�t at the one up where we were, but that was the common bond that linked me with some of the drivers. So Ronnie Hill�s gonna take this guy on and we got a packed tent and I�m gonna referee the thing. So the guy had a few drinks I would say, he wasn�t falling-down-drunk, but he wasn�t feeling any pain, and I forget just what it was he did, he didn�t just come out trying to wrestle Ronnie, but it was something he might have seen on television at some time, and anyway it was insulting to Ronnie, and you just could see the blood raising in Ronnie�s face. Was it like a gesture�? Yeah, or tried, I forget, to punch him or slap him, and then I had to call him on it, and �well, I saw that on TV�, and the guy�s brother-in-law was sitting with some of his buddies, and the tent was, there was no restraining railing or anything like that, the people were jammed up against the apron of the ring and all the way back to the tent walls, and some of the Chitwood guys had been watching as well. So Ronnie is just getting hotter by the minute, so finally he sees the opening, hooks the guy, takes him down, and ends up with a Camel Clutch, you know legitimately, I mean just like the Sheik used, but he had it on as a shoot. And of course I�m in front of the guy asking if he wants to give up, and all of a sudden he�s not saying anything, and like I said I�m 19 years old and dumb and young, and all the sudden I see his eyes rolling back in his head and I say, "Ronnie! You better let him go!", and Ronnie says, "Screw�m!" And I say, "Ronnie! You better---!", I was afraid the guy was gonna DIE, you know, and I don�t know if the brother-in-law must have caught the look on my face, or saw his brother-in-law�s face in the ring, but all the sudden Ronnie says, "Get him!" I said, "Huh?" "Behind you, dammit!" And here comes the guy�s friends, and I�m thinking �aw SHIT�, and of course other people are starting to make moves at this point, and I�m like I said young and dumb and don�t know if they�re coming in the ring, but I notice this tent is packed with a lot of locals, and Ronnie Hill and I are the only two that AREN�T. And I�m thinking �okay, as good a place to die as any, I guess, at the age of 19�, but what saved our butt and I hadn�t seen them come in, a couple of Highway Patrolmen and county police, sheriff, I�m not sure, that had been walking the grounds and heard that there was a challenge going on, so they�d come in the back to watch, and so the Chitwood drivers are there, so that was, and of course the carnies �Hey rube!� whenever a fight breaks out, and send �Hey rube� out and then the boys are bailing out with clubs and everything else from all the tents, but that was what saved our rear ends was the Chitwood drivers and the Highway Patrolmen, but I was like I say 19 years old and scared out of my mind, you know, at that age you�re probably crazy enough to fight a bear, if they told you to, cause you want to be a professional wrestler and I mean legitimately fight a bear and not just wrestle one in a work, but I was smart enough even at 19 to know that there�s about 70 people in this tent and in case you haven�t noticed 68 of them aren�t Ronnie Hill and are after you�re ass and well, it�s been a good life. But it was a fun time, it really was. But you can�t BUY that kind of experience today. No you really can�t. And it was, you know, pile in the cars---Ronnie Garvin, we were talking about this down at the Gulf Coast Reunion too. Up there Ronnie was saying what he made, and I said, "See, Ronnie, this is what�," I said, "I was a smart American and knew how to get along." And he said, "What do you mean?" And I said, "Well, when I went home, after I broke in, for Christmas, in �60," I said, "I brought my car back," and we could take carloads to all the clubs, and the office paid trans for the cars, so the driver, gas was, you know, what, 22 cents a gallon, so if you�d get 10, 15 bucks for driving the car because you had a load, you know, times 4 or 5, and plus, you know, a $10 payoff, maybe 15 or 20---25 or 30 was a BIG payoff---but back then, for a 19-year-old kid if you�re working 4 or 5 nights a week, add that up with the transportation money--- --- and convert to that to current dollars� � 100, say 125 bucks a week for a 19-year-old kid in 1960, no one�s gonna be the next Donald Trump, but my friends, at home, with whatever jobs they had were maybe making 55, 60 bucks a week. We were living in a rooming house over on Westland Avenue, Ronnie and I were arguing over the address, I said 72 and he said something else, doesn�t matter, now 6-figure or 7-figure condominiums, back then though they were $10-a-week rooming houses. Pat Patterson, Ronnie, Terry Garvin, Golden Boy Ronnie Dupree, Don Kindred who was �Black Magic�� Luke Graham and Frank Hill used to live at the YMCA over on Huntington Avenue at the time� What name was Luke going under? Well, his real name is Grady Johnson� and Grady Calhoun was the name I think he started with. Funny thing was, he was legitimately a big fan of Jerry Graham. So when us kids used to sit around on the porch at night and talk about the business, you know of course Buddy Rogers was my guy, and his was Jerry Graham. I remember his first match was in Brockton in �61. So after I left there, one day I picked up a Wrestling Revue magazine, I looked at the cover and I did a double take, and I took my hand and covered that white beard, and that white hair, I said, �My God, that�s Grady.� And he BECAME a Graham for Christsake. So he got to live his dream out, and that was great for him. A bunch of guys started out up there. Rufus Jones, and Bob Harmon---�Beautiful Bobby�---he was out of Cincinnati as well� Now was this before the sound alike gimmick stuff? Oh, you talking about Pfefer? Well, see, here was the thing: Pfefer had I guess bailed Tony out, as of one point I guess Tony was in a little bind, so Tony was always, THAT, I was smart enough to see, that Tony always felt an obligation to Jack, and Jack never really ran the territory but Jack would come in, and of course you knew when Jack was coming, because those like you say those sound alike names would pop up--- Was this already happening back then? Yes. Even before my time. Yes. Like there was a kid named Austin Johnson, little black kid, good body, a good acrobat actually, but they ended up calling him Hobo Brazil. And then Haystacks Muldoon was actually a guy named Bill Tooey, I think---don�t know how to spell it, sounds like �two e�---yeah. They found him on Long Island, driving a Good Humor truck, they broke him in up there. I�ll tell you a funny story about Pfefer, is, a local guy up there named Joe Sasso, they called him Red Sasso, he resembled (Pat) O�Connor a little bit except he was built more like Bruiser on a smaller scale, played football at Boston College, they broke him in and I don�t think he ever wrestled out of the territory, worked a little while and then quit and went to a job. They were wrestling Boston Arena where Tony had his office, he had shows on a bi-monthly basis, there wasn�t much going on at the time, and Pfefer was in town. Sasso had never met Jack Pfefer from beans, and was one of these guys who hadn�t been a big wrestling fan so wasn�t really hip to the history of the sport. So Sasso is like the first babyface to show up in the babyface dressing room at the Arena that night, so he walks in the dressing room and here�s this little man with stringy, greasy-looking gray hair and clothes that look like they come from a thrift shop because they had, and he�s asleep on the bench in the babyface dressing room---and in the neighborhood that the Boston Arena�s in, Sasso thinks this is some bum who�s wandered into the dressing room. So he�s shaking the guy, �wake up�, and the guy starts waking up and starts sputtering and trying to figure out what�s going on, and Sasso, "You gotta get your ass outta here!" And, "I�m Pfeehfeh blehbleh---!" And, "I don�t give a damn, you get outta here!" So Sasso physically takes the guy and shovels his ass out the back door, and that guy was Jack Pfefer, and that was Sasso�s introduction to Jack Pfefer, which wasn�t a very good one, obviously. It was a great time. I was 19 years old, a bunch of young guys---Pat Patterson�s I think a year younger than I am or a year older, I never remember---five guys to a car, you didn�t make a lot of money but you had fun. And we learned the business. So from Boston you did go back to Ohio? Yeah. Came back to Cincinnati, I got married in �61, came back to Ohio, and of course was looking to get my foot in the door someplace, and as it were Emil Dupre, who is Rene�s father, that�s one of La Resistance--- I didn�t know Emil was his father. Yeah. Yeah, that�s Rene�s dad. And we had worked, I met him up in Boston, and I saw his name on the card here at Cincinnati Gardens, for Barnett/Doyle, and so I--- Okay, they ran Cincinnati, and Haft ran Columbus and his circuit from there, is that---? Well, Haft ran, they actually BOTH ran here. Starting, I�m gonna say starting in �58, I don�t know if it was a war, it was and it wasn�t I guess---Haft ran, say like Haft ran in here on the first and third Saturday, and Barnett and Doyle ran in here the second and fourth. Okay now were they running out of Detroit then? Well, Indianapolis AND Detroit actually. Doyle was based in Detroit and Barnett was based in Indianapolis. So anyway both offices were running in here at the time, and Haft later just kinda folded his tent up and dropped out, as he was getting older and Barnett and those guys finally got a foothold, but for awhile, I was just a kid, you know, before I broke into the business, �58, �59, I was attending matches in both the Music Hall downtown, the old Music Hall�s where Al Haft promoted---he had Rogers, Buddy Austin and Fritz von Goering, and (Sweet Daddy) Siki and Bearcat (Wright), (George) Becker at the time, Maurice and Barend---Gene Dubuque and Johnny Barend---and Barnett and Doyle were running Cincinnati Gardens, and I would go there and see the Sheik Eddie Farhat, Dick the Bruiser, Ray Stevens and Roy Shire as the Shire Brothers, Wilbur Snyder, Angelo Poffo, I think they had Yukon Eric at the time, and Art Nelson as a matter of fact---and anyway, I saw that Emil was on the card in the Gardens, so I went over to say hello and, you know, I was looking to do something, so he said �Well, here�s the guy, send pictures to this address care of Les Ruffen"---he was the booker---"and ask him, my name, and I�ll give you a reference." And so then I got a phone call a few weeks after I sent the pictures, from Les Ruffen, and the first thing he asks, "How old are you?", and this would have been like January or February of �62. "Well, I�m 21." "Are you sure?" "YEAH, I�m sure." "Well, have you got proof?" And I said, "Yeah," cause I DID look younger, I knew that, but he didn�t think I was 18. So he said, "Well, bring your proof, and we�ll put you on TV Saturday here in Indianapolis." So I went to Indianapolis, found the TV studio, walked in, and walked in the dressing room, and I mean I, you know, during my time in Boston, Firpo had been up there, who was tremendous with the young guys, I met Pat Patterson, Erik Pederson, you know, and some guys up there like the Brunettis---Joe Tangaro and Guy Brunetti---but I walked into this dressing room in Indianapolis, a neophyte, and I looked around and here�s Fritz von Erich, Dick the Bruiser, the original Sheik Eddie Farhat, Art and Stan Nelson (or Art Nelson and Stan Holek), Angelo Poffo� Christ, I don�t even remember who else, all these people I�d bought tickets for, I wasn�t sure I shouldn�t just turn around and walk the hell out of that dressing room, you know? But I worked the first, they did a live show then they did a taping, and I worked the live show with Poffo and the tape with Sheik, and that�s what broke the ice and got me into a bigger promotion. So then worked around here off and on, and of course the focal point is to get a big break, cause usually if you were local, it didn�t matter, if you were considered a bad worker, a good worker, an in-between worker, probably gonna be a jobber, you know, a carpenter as we called them then. But anyway Les got me into Calgary, �62 was the first year that they had run the summer. Dennis Hall--- Was that where you met Dennis? No, well, I had actually met Dennis in Indianapolis, and Roger Kirby, in �62. Well, actually Kirby started a little bit later, Hall and I got to know each other, and then Dennis actually helped Kirby break in. Roger is from Dunkirk, and Dennis is from---I�ll think of it in a second. They were, they actually legitimately WERE cousins. REALLY? Yeah. By marriage. Actually that�s how Roger got in the business, because (laughs) he jumped up on the apron as a fan one time at a spot show up around Dunkirk where he was---Newcastle, that�s where Dennis is from, I told you I�d think of it---but anyway, almost got his ass handed to him by, because he jumped Art Nelson, which would be the wrong guy at the wrong place ANY time. And so somebody in his family said, �Well, you know, Peggy, your cousin, is married to a wrestler.� �No! Really?� �Yeah, Dennis Hall.� So Roger came down to see Cousin Peggy and meet Dennis Hall, and that was how it all started. But yeah, we worked that as a gimmick and WE weren�t related but that was where we got the idea to do the gimmick because they actually legitimately were related by marriage. So we head up to Calgary, and that, there�s six chapters for a book right there, along the trip. Jim Grabmire, who was from Springfield, Ohio, and Hans Hermann, his fianc�e, and Dennis and myself. You got Jim Grabmire and Hans Hermann in a car, that�s taking up a lot of the room right there. Well, Hans had this old Cadillac limo, not a stretch limo obviously but it was a limo, and we all met in Indianapolis and we drove into the wind to get to Calgary. And it was just� Hans is kind of, was kinda like Monk, if you�ve ever watched the TV series, I�ve turned into a pretty anal guy in situations like that myself, but at the time Hans was---he would stop, and put a muffler on the car, I mean the things that kids, even Dennis and I, just starting in the business knew, shoulda been done before you ever LEFT on this trip, would be part of the day. �Well, today we�ll get a tune-up, tomorrow we�ll get a muffler,� this and that and everything. So we get to Calgary, and they turn Dennis into �Magnificent Max�. Stu was running of course, and some of the guys there were Ronnie Etchison, Mark Lewin, Ben Sharpe, Sandor Kovacs---Kovacs was the booker I think, Dave Ruhl, Jesse Ortega the Mighty Ursus, John Foti, Primo Carnera, and Sam Menacker was the TV guy, he and June (Byers) were living there, Ernie Roth was there as a manager, in fact he managed Dennis. Working the loop in Calgary, and we got to go to the Stampede, we were there during the Stampede which was a lot of fun. But working with Dennis, first time I saw Dennis come out, he was, because Ernie had been Armstrong Kaye or Mr. Kleen or whatever the hell, they changed his name there in the territory when he managed Dubuque and Barend, several times, but they needed a heel, Dennis had a good build, so they said they�ll change him---now, you know, back then, you weren�t in the same dressing room, so the first night, �you�re working with Magnificent Max,� and I said, "WHO?" "Magnificent Max," they said, "that�s Dennis." I said, "OH. Okay." I knew they changed his name, but I didn�t---when he comes to the ring, he has on pink ballet slippers, pink tights, and a pink beret and sunglasses. Sounds like Magnificent Maurice II. Yeah, and I�m about to bite through my fuckin� tongue. (laughter) Cause I looked across the ring and think �oh FUCK! That�s Dennis HALL doing that!� But as I mentioned earlier I looked younger than my years. And, you know, the babyfaces rode in one limo, and the heels in another. So Etchison, Lewin, Jesse Ortega were some of the babyfaces, and because of my youthful look, I was dubbed �Sweetie Pie�. Oh boy. I mean it was meant, it was just initiation, you know, it was a rib. And they would, when they�d stand out watching my match, you know, and I�d start to go to a comeback, I could hear them yelling, "Go get�m Sweetie Pie!", which I don�t know if the fans were sure who the hell they were yelling at or not. But I knew, it was hazing, and I knew that, and it was no problem to me. So one day we�re doing a spot show, and we, they went by to pick Stu up, Stu was going to the spot show, I don�t remember where it was at, Stu was going with us and of course he never made the loop, he only saw us when we worked Calgary. So went by Stu�s house and picked him up, so we�re heading down the road, and Etchison said something about (imitates gravelly voice) Sweetie Pie this and that, Ronnie got this gravelly voice, and Stu came to attention, he said (nails Stu Hart voice), "Ehh, Etch� ehh� who ya� ehh� callin� Sweetie Pie?" And Etchison said, "That�s Thatcher�s nickname." Stu looked back at me, I was in the back, and said, "Ehh, Thatch� ya know ya ehh� ya, ya don�t want� the guys callin� ya Sweetie Pie. Come on up to the house, and ehh� down to the basement and I�ll show ya a thing or two." I said, "Stu, don�t mind the nickname at all!" I was a na�ve kid, but I wasn�t THAT na�ve. There was a Greek kid had just come from Greece, had been a good amateur over there, to what degree I�m not sure, and had wrestled pro in Europe. First time to the North American continent, and he�d come into Calgary. And HE had made the mistake of going to the basement. And, I don�t remember his name, Tarantis I think it was, but I remember, didn�t see him on the start of one of the loops. And then we came into Calgary and I remember hearing Stu say to Kovacs, "Booker man� where is� that Greek� bastard?" Sandor said, "Well� " "Why isn�t he� ehh� workin�?" And Sandor said, "Well Stu, you cracked two of his ribs." "Ehh. The pussy." But I spent a good part of the summer up there and came home and I worked in and out of the Indianapolis territory. That was kind of base because I would think of Cincinnati as home, and at the time my dad and I were still drag racing. That was my second love---or first, whatever---and I always booked myself, for the first two years in the business I would book myself so that I was for the, mostly, except for that �62 in Calgary, so that I was, once I got based here, got to where I knew a few territories, I would work outside this territory, come back home in the early Spring so that we could get the car ready to go, and then I�d work this territory whether it was good bad or indifferent, through the drag racing season, and then I�d book myself out, during the Winter, and the higher we got up with the racing, I mean we did all right, we had some partial sponsorships, and that�s something I considered as a career as well. But then I also realized that I was costing myself money by pursuing my hobby, and once we finally hung it up totally in �66, I never raced after that. But my mouth still gets dry when I watch drag racing. Anyway, came outta Calgary in �62, worked around here for the drag racing season, went to Charlotte for the first time in �63--- Okay, now hang on. I got a card here, November 17, 1962 at the Cincinnati Gardens: Mark Lewin and Stan Neilson fought to a time-limit draw. Dale Lewis pinned Art Neilson. Dr. Big Bill Miller pinned Frankie Talaber. Fabulous Moolah pinned Judy Grable. Don Jardine pinned Doug Kinslow. Emil Dupree pinned Pierre LaBelle. Les Thatcher and Dennis Hall battled to a time-limit draw. Okay. Oscar Verdu won by default when Bearcat Wright failed to appear for the match. Bearcat no showed a match that early back? I never knew. (laughs) Well, you know� Bearcat� Dick the Bruiser pinned Hans Hermann. Joe Blanchard KO'd Fred Blassie at 1:58 of the 4th round of a boxing-wrestling match. Wow. That Cincinnati Gardens? That�s what it says. Right. Well, see now, a lot of those guys---Talaber one time had been Al Haft�s booker--- But this would have been for Barnett and Doyle? Yes. Exactly. That was after, that�s when Haft had basically closed the doors, because a lot of the guys would work one side or the other, and ended up just working for Barnett and Doyle. Well, then Talaber of course, he made his home, he was originally from around Chicago, but he made his home in Reynoldsburg, Columbus area. So that was---I remember the first time I met Frankie once I got in the business, at the old Parkway Arena here in Cincinnati which is an outdoor place, I introduced myself, and he said, "Wait a minute, is this the first time we�ve met?" And I said, "No it�s not. I came around the office in Columbus trying to get hooked up in the business." And he said, "Well, you made it," and he said, "maybe we should have looked at you." And I said, "Well, okay, whatever." And that was when I met Talaber, but, yeah, a lot of those guys were---well, you know, I mean as far as being able to learn, my God, you just read off some great talent. Being around in here was---well, everyplace at that point in time, you know, that was the great thing and the big difference between then and now in terms of learning, was that back then you couldn�t HELP but learn. I mean you go from one territory to another even just doing jobs, and you were, I mean you go do a job for Angelo Poffo, you go do a job for the Sheik, you go and do it for whoever, you come out of there with more knowledge, because each one of these guys maybe specialize in one particular thing, and they were better at that one thing than anything else, and then you�d move to another territory, cause jobbers obviously didn�t stick, HOMESTEAD, for any long periods of time. I know the first time I went to Charlotte in �63, you could not get IN that territory without a reference. I mean if I had just sent pictures, I STILL wouldn�t have been there, but as it were I had worked with the Scotts, well, not WITH them, they were babyfaces, but we had worked together on cards and became friendly here, when they were in here for Barnett, and Johnny Heidman who made his home in Charlotte and was a fixture there, Johnny also was in here for awhile, and Jim Grabmire who went to Charlotte at least once a year for a few months, so I got in there in the Spring and Summer of �63, and it was strictly jobs, but it was a great learning experience too. Lubich and Bogni with Homer O�Dell were one of the big heel teams, and The Assassins---or the Bolos, Renesto and Joe Hamilton--- Okay, that was Renesto and Hamilton as the Bolos at that point? Yes. Was it Joe or Larry? No, it was Jody. I didn�t meet---I met Larry that Fall, of �63, in Kansas City. So I was there for a few months, but it was also my first experience in the South. And the very liberal Les Thatcher, his mother thought �well, you will probably be hung by the Klan.� Cause I am not---I�m not into that, that�s not my bag, and it WAS a culture shock to me to see, you know, the white and black water fountains and that sort of thing. It just, it rankled me. I grew up with that. �White� and �Colored�. I remember, as a little kid, not understanding it. Yes. See, I grew up, the grade school I went to was, I don�t know what the percentages were, but it was a combination, did I ever have any fights with blacks? I sure did, but it didn�t have nothin� to do with color! My first baseball coach was a black gentleman by the name of Ed Dixon, who I had tremendous respect for, and to be honest, the kids I train say I�m a screamer, that I just get cranked up, part of that came from him, I thought that was the way you were supposed to be. He was a guy who had played minor league ball, and here we were, 9, 10 year old kids and we�re getting fined for not taking the extra base, or for overrunning a base, I say �fined� and I�m talking about nickels here, but this guy broke a pair of sunglasses about once every other week, in his passion to be sure his team was winning. The team, we had about 15 ballplayers, and it was close to half and half in terms of black and white, and Ed�s son Leander was a second baseman, and we played for Ed from the time I was 9 right up until I was 16, but there were years that, if there was a better second baseman, no matter what his color, HE was gonna start, and Lee was gonna pick splinters out of his butt. Ed was, it was about winning, and about being good, and about being disciplined and structured and that�s the way I grew up in Cincinnati altogether. But one incident we DID have, and, it was nothing to be proud of I guess, but it was just, again, I was, I just never heard the n-word, I mean I shouldn�t say I had never heard it, but it was something that I would have had my mouth washed out the same as if I had said �hell� or �damn�. And we were playing a rather �affluent� white area, and some of the �affluent� white children had no manners, and they had used the n-word. And some of the black kids, you know, obviously were offended. And Mr. Dixon, I mean, the conversation never pointed at me for the obvious reasons, but I was privy to it and heard what was going on, and he said, well, �no, just ignore it and let it ride, and that�s the way it�s gonna be�. So I think these kids took that to mean that, you know, �they�re chicken� or whatever, and I was the catcher, and---only time I�ve ever been thrown out of a baseball game in my life---and one of the guys from the other team came to the plate to hit in the middle of the game, and made the mistake of using that word and saying that, you know, �you must be trash too�, and, I didn�t ask the umpire�s permission, I threw the mask off and nailed the son of a bitch, and off we went. I got thrown out of the game, and the black guys stayed. But, you know, to me, that�s� I�m not a racist, I�m sorry. At any level. So of course, see, you know, like the blacks had to sit upstairs, and of course back at first, even when I first came in �63, blacks had to wrestle blacks. They could not, you know they had to travel in pairs, which was just� I mean Luther Lindsey was the finest gentleman I ever met in my life, period, end of story---of ANY color, or description---and I was--- And I have always heard one of the best legit wrestlers who ever walked the earth. A tough S.O.B. I was gonna say, I was a pallbearer at his funeral, and he spent time in my home, and it, which must have been a hard adjustment, you see, one night, we came in to do television---this�ll be the next time I was in Charlotte, I�m jumping too far, this is getting me past Atlanta, so we�ll save that. So I was down there in �63, then came back, and like I say worked Indianapolis, Bruiser and Barnett, they had---you know, Bruiser and Barnett went to war here too. But for some, you know, the funny thing was, none of us, Dennis, Roger, myself, the guys who were local, never looked at it that way, and in fact for whatever reason, we weren�t frowned upon if we worked, you know, worked for both offices as long as we were jobbers, you know, we were just jobbers, didn�t mean anything, if you want to call it that. So eventually it became Bruiser and Snyder, and that was where I first met Bobby Heenan, in fact the first time I met him he was carrying my jacket. So I came back in here briefly and then went to Kansas City in �63 where I first met Harley (Race) and worked with him, and (Bob) Geigel of course and O�Connor were two of the big stars here for Al Haft when I was a kid, but that was one of the neat things, I think, because a young man in the business is going places for the first time and meeting the people that I purchased a ticket to see, and, obviously, the opportunity to work with them. Kansas City, it was a lot of traveling, and again I was just there basically as a jobber, but each one of these was a learning experience, a funny story that I�ll never forget, I thought I was gonna hafta get fired, I hadn�t been there---you know who Ripper Roy Collins was. Okay, HELL of a worker. And he and I had worked, I can�t think what the town was, up in Iowa someplace, and O�Connor and somebody were the main event. I had never worked with Roy before in my life, and we�re having a three-fall match. So we went out there, and I just went along for the ride, Roy obviously called the match, and we had a HELL of a match, I mean I could feel it, I knew it was there, and he just called a tremendous match, and we went three falls, to fill the time, and we had the people rockin�, I mean, you know, it�s one of those things, you just KNOW it�s there, you can�t make a mistake, you know it�s right, and not only that, the people are responding. So, match is over, and we go back to the dressing room, now you go down a long corridor, they can�t see that you�re all in the same dressing room but we are at this point in time, so Roy is ahead of me by quite a few steps, so as I round the corner he�s just passing O�Connor and they�re getting ready to go to the ring, and Pat says, "DAMN, Roy, how the hell do you expect anybody to follow THAT?" And Roy stopped and looked at him, he said, "Pat, if you can�t follow it, you should precede it." And I�m saying to myself, "Oh FUCK, he�s talking to one of the OWNERS, and a former world CHAMPION, and I was in this match, SHIT, I�m probably gonna get my NOTICE, you don�t go out and upstage the damn OWNERS, and then CROW about it!" Of course, I wasn�t the one crowing, it was Roy---and I think they were, like the relationship was such that Pat realized he was, he was ribbing on the square basically as we call it in the business---but in essence as I got older, I agree with Roy: if you can�t follow it, brother, go on BEFORE it. And also you mentioned the Hamiltons, this was the first place I met Larry, who scared the hell out of me the first time. I had never seen Larry Hamilton work in my life. I worked with him on Waterloo TV, which was live on Sunday night of all the damn things. I had to, who wants to work live TV when you live in Kansas City and Waterloo TV is live Sunday night at 10 o�clock? I mean Waterloo, Iowa, on Sunday is not Party Central. Not for the young guys, I don�t know what it mighta been for the older guys, but for us young guys it certainly wasn�t. So I had never seen Larry work, and never met him. So he�s telling me this and this, "Now when I stop, I�ll let you know, but you throw me out of the ring, and then just get ready for my comeback." "Okay." So the point comes, "Now, Les, throw me out!", so I pitch him out of the ring, now I don�t know if you ever watched Larry work or not. Many times. Okay, well, you know how he gets out there and starts running in place? Gets that wild look on his face? I saw him crankin� up outside with that look on his face, I said, �My god, what did I do WRONG?� I didn�t know if he would come back in this ring and just kick my ass, or what� and when he came in, I wasn�t, I mean, you know, I just stayed there, the situation was, if somebody was gonna cut your throat, you wouldn�t have run, because you know that if you had, you wouldn�t have had a job, I mean, you�re gonna stay and take it, whatever happens, you�re gonna stay and it�s gonna happen. Of course, there was nothing---this was just Larry�s way, but I didn�t KNOW that---but for a moment, he had me a little anxious. That�s like one time up in Windsor, we were talking about Windsor TV, Johnny Doyle (the owner) and Mark Lewin pulled a rib on me. I was gonna work with Sheik Eddie Farhat, who I ended up working a lot with---and in fact was very proud as a jobber that some of the bigger guys would ask for me, which to me was quite a compliment, cause they knew you could get the job done they needed done, that�s how you work past a jobber, for Christsake, do what you�re told and do it and in fact embellish it if you could---so anyway I was working with Eddie, on Windsor TV, and Doyle and Lewin called me over and said, "Les, you really wanna enhance this match?� "Yes." "Well, you know, you�re a good babyface and hell, we beat you all the time, you know, so we want you to get a little done, you know, so the people keep liking you and everything." "Okay, so what d�you--- " "So listen, when Eddie, when Sheik gets down onto his prayer rug, right� ?" "Uh huh, okay." "� he�ll have his back to you� " "Okay." "� you really wanna get over with the fans, you know, as a babyface---go kick him in the ass." "Whaaat?" I�m not gonna tell the OWNER and Mark Lewin �no�. I SHOULD�VE, but I didn�t, okay? But the good thing was that I had worked with Eddie a few times already at that point, and he knew that I did what I was, you know, he never had any problems with me. But he came up offa that fuckin� rug, and turned and if looks coulda killed I�d a died right there in the Windsor ring. And I thought �aww SHIT. I have SCREWED up� but he didn�t, I didn�t have to pay for it. |
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| CONVERSATIONS: LES THATCHER |
