Dominic Denucci, the Pro Wrestling Hall of Famer, has died. He was 89.
Dominic Denucciaroni was born January 23, 1932. He came to Canada from Frosolone, in the Italian province of Campobasso, in 1955 at the age of 19. He settled in Montreal, where his great-uncle lived. Denucci quickly found friends at the Palais Nationale, where all the amateur wrestlers trained and the pros, like Maurice Vachon, would come by for a workout. He was approached by Yvon Robert and Tony Lanza about entering pro wrestling, and despite the fact that he really didn’t know anything about it, he trained under Lanza.
Denucci started wrestling around Montreal, under a hood as a villainous Masked Marvel, in the early 1960s, but moved on to Detroit where he was teamed with the original Dino Bravo as Dominic Bravo. Stints in Calgary, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Japan (nine trips) and Australia followed for the master of the airplane spin finisher. In Australia, he was a part of the initial Jim Barnett-led World Championship Wrestling crew and was a huge national star.
Coming to the WWWF in late 1969, the 6-foot-3, 245-pound “Italian Sensation” rose to prominence as a tag team wrestler, holding the tag belts with partners Pat Barrett, Victor Riviera and the younger Dino Bravo. Vincent K. McMahon and Denucci had a falling out in 1983, and Denucci left the WWF just before its big expansion. He wrestled around the world until 1988. Denucci got involved in running a wrestling school in Pittsburgh, and trained former world champs Mick Foley and Shane Douglas.
In 2012, Denucci was inducted into the Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame. His induction brought out Bruno Sammartino to the PWHF for the first time, and Sammartino got his ring from his 2002 induction.