Florida’s Great wrestling cities: Orlando, 
and promoter Milo Steinborn

Orlando, Florida. The very mention of this bustling 
metropolis evokes mental images of crowded theme parks, tourists wearing goofy hats and knee-high black socks, and the Orlando Magic basketball franchise. But, before this Central Florida City was synonymous with Walt Disney World and "Boy Bands" producing top 40 pop hits, Orlando was known for great professional wrestling shows.

Milo

Wrestling legend and six-time NWA World Heavyweight Champion Lou Thesz once called him "The strongest man I ever wrestled." He was a "wrestler’s wrestler" whose feats of strength seemed literally impossible at the time and earned him the nickname "The World’s Strongest Man." He was also the man who successfully ushered the era of professional wrestling into Orlando. That man was Henry "Milo" Steinborn.

Born in Sieburg, Germany on March 14, 1893, Steinborn left home at the age of fifteen to become a merchant sailor. In 1914, while residing in Australia, World War I broke out and Steinborn was placed in German internment camps. It was during his time in these camps that Steinborn learned to wrestle and his passion for weightlifting developed. He would train religiously to pass the time spent in these camps. Upon his release from these camps in 1919, Steinborn accomplished an amazing feat of strength that has yet to be topped. An unassisted squat with 557 pounds, squatting three times.

When Milo arrived in America in 1921, he chose Philadelphia’s Herrmann’s Gymnasium as his main training facility. The impact of this powerful German strongman was felt immediately as he astounded the weightlifting world. Steinborn lifted 375 pounds in the two-arm clean & jerk, and 240 pounds in the one-arm clean & jerk. He also popularized the squat, which today is a part of any dedicated lifter’s repertoire. Milo used no supports or wrappings of any kind, simply lifting the barbell over his shoulders. Milo would set three records in 1921, smashing the old marks for the squat, one-arm snatch, and continental lift.

Milo began his professional wrestling career in 1922, working such states as Tennessee, New York, and Georgia. In his prime, Steinborn was five feet nine inches tall and weighed 220 pounds. "Milo wasn’t the biggest man in the world," recalled his son, Dick Steinborn, a professional wrestler and promoter for over thirty years. "But he wrestled all over the world from St. Louis to Paris to Germany. Dad was so stiff...stiff meaning that you couldn’t move him because once his legs were planted, he wasn’t going anywhere. He didn’t have a stomach, either. He was as solid as could be."

Steinborn also accomplished a feat of strength that was unheard of in the early 1920s. Possessing tremendous leg strength, Steinborn would lie on his back with his legs upright acting as "beams" to support one end of a bridge. Then a car, weighing in excess of 5,000 pounds would drive over the bridge. He did this several times until an accident occurred doing this very feat on March 7, 1926 in Los Angeles. Milo was severely injured in the process and would take several months to recuperate, putting his wrestling career on hold. He also never did the leg bridge act again.  More...