A lot of readers may be wondering what Vincent J. McMahon’s feelings would be toward his son for splitting with the National Wrestling Alliance in 1983 and taking over the wrestling world as he has done today. Some of you maybe thinking Vince McMahon, Sr. is rolling over in his grave at the thought of such an idea. Well, if you are one of those people, my guess is you would be wrong. Why? Because Vince McMahon, Sr. tried the very same thing when he first took over the northeast territory of the NWA and turned it into the (then) World Wide Wrestling Federation in 1963. This month we’ll take a look at this split.

The NWA had been in operation for about for approximately 12 years and was running relatively smoothly until several organizations began to think about recognizing their own world champions again. Perhaps they were frustrated because the NWA recognized World Champion could only defend his title in their respective territories on a limited basis. If they had their own World Champion, the title could be defended in their territory more often, drawing bigger crowds, and bringing in larger gates.

Therefore, a plan was devised. Then champion, Lou Thesz, would lose a controversial match to Edouard Carpentier in Chicago in a match promoted by Fred Kohler on June 14, 1957. Carpentier would then go around the country losing a "World Title" he did really own, because the NWA board would not recognize the title switch. However, Vince McMahon, Sr. did not jump on the bandwagon of owning his own World Title just yet, but a neighboring promotion run by Tony Santos out of Boston would. Under the NWA rules, Santos would not be allowed to invade a fellow member’s territory, but by defecting from the highly recognized organization, Santos would not have to abide by those rules, and there began a promotional war in the northeast between Santos, and other promoters led by Vince McMahon, Sr.