On the right is me, at an Atlantic Wrestling Federation show, owned and ran by the late Sylvano Sousa, in Manchester, New Hampshire. This was back on July 12, 1997 and i was working behind the scenes, helping to set up the ring, chairs, helped set up and take down a cage for a cage match, etc etc. I was a newsletter writer and tape dealer back then so I was able to film the matches and after giving Sousa a the master copy, could trade and sell them as i wanted.
Students of Kowalski's shows would work these shows, and two of them that went on to bigger things were Matt Bloom (who now trains people at the WWE Performance Center) and the late Steve Bradley, who had a WWF developmental deal and wrestled in Memphis (against the likes of Kurt Angle and William Regal), OVW and Puerto Rico.
Someone was nice enough to remind me of this earlier today by sending me this picture. I love it when people try to say I never worked in wrestling, never sought the knowledge of the legends, etc. Because this pic shows me literally, sitting under the learning tree of Walter 'Killer' Kowalski. I always sought out knowledge as i wanted to learn more about all aspects of the wrestling business and Sousa, Kowalski, and later on when I went to work for WWA New England (who had an agreement with the WWF and their training dojos headlined WWA shows), I got to pick the brains of Bruce and Tom Prichard, Dory Funk jr., Cornette and others.
As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, so I figured I'd share this.
4 comments:
NICE! Kowalski, Funks, Cornette and the Prichards? That's a world class level of knowledge right there. At least you got to live your dream. You should write more about what that was like.
I have a couple of times, the old Angelfire page where I had posted stuff doesn't exist anymore but there is some stuff I had cut and pasted over to this site I can redo again.
And yes, world class of knowledge indeed. I may not have had what it took to do what they do in, the ring, but I wanted to know about all the aspects of the business so who better to ask, than the guys that have been there.
Didn't you once interview Kowalski? I seem to remember an interview you did with him for a newsletter called Wrestling Then And Now. My brother subscribed to it and I remember you writing about him.
Yep, I actually asked him about that at a WWA New England show in Woburn, Massachusetts. Since I grew up watching Dick The Bruiser and Baron Von Rashke do the claw, along with the Von Erichs and Blackjack Mulligan, I figured who better to ask about who really originated the Claw than someone who was one of the first to do the move. Funny fact is when i asked Kowalski, Tito Santana, who was headlining this show, was standing right next to us and wanted to hear it as well.
If your brother was a subscriber he may remember that i also interviewed the late Sylvano Sousa(the guy who gave me my first break into wrestling) as well.
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