Good Friends are hard to come by...

I went to work for ABC Booking in 1969 at the ripe old age of fourteen. My job was to put up the ring at the TV studios in Atlanta for "Live Atlanta Wrestling". I made $10.00 a week for the honor of being in the business. I would have done it for free had they asked me. Charlie Harben was the office manager and my boss. Charlie refereed for years in Atlanta and also wrestled for years before that. Charlie and his brother, George were a pretty formidable pair in their day. Some of you may have known George from his days of working in the Charlotte office for Jim Crockett. At the age of fifteen they allowed me to start ushering at the City Auditorium in Atlanta for an extra $10.00 per week. Imagine, the biggest fan in the world being paid $20.00 a week to do what he had been paying to see for years, only in America......

I am 47 years old and have actively been in the business for 32 years. I have been truly blessed to have lived my dream. My heroes as a child have become my working associates and in rare cases my friends. We throw the word friend around loosely. There is a major difference between friend and acquaintance. I want to tell you about a couple of my friends over the next few stories...

Bill Dromo was on the card of the first live matches I ever attended. It has been the source of many jokes over the years. I have had many wonderful times with Bill. I have beaten on him until he was so red I thought he was going to bleed. As a referee when you go to break up the wrestlers you work as they do. A gentle pat on the back and a stern voice does the job, but with Bill I never worked the pats on the back. I would lay them in. I have hit him so hard that it hurt my hand. One night in Athens, Georgia I wrestled as one of The Assassins. Joe Hamilton was double booked, so I took one of his outfits and me and Randy Colley wrestled there as the Assassins that night. Nick Patrick, (Joe Hamilton, Jr.) was the referee that night. I told him if he called me dad one time I would shoot him.

The last event that night was a battle royal. I ran from Bill all night until he was finally eliminated. I watched him go up the aisle toward the dressing room and I dropped my guard and went on about my business. I don't remember who it was but they turned me so that my back was toward the dressing room. Something hit me in the back and I thought the ring had fell on me. I turned around and guess who is standing on the apron laughing at me.

One other Dromo story. Charlie Smith ran a show at the high school in Conyers, Ga. I was working under a hood and was booked against Bill. I arrived early and got dressed and never took the hood off. Bill had no idea who I was. Charlie began to tell us what he wanted and Bill had this look on his face that said who is this guy and can he work. I said since you are going over I will get my heat by slamming you several  times and back dropping you...that was as far as I got. He grabbed me and said I will tell you what we are going to do. I raised my hood and he would have liked to have beaten me to death. We went into the ring and he rode me like a Shetland pony just to show me he could.

Might not seem like much to those of you reading this, but that very first match I ever attended I fell in love with a business I did not even understand and to grow up and not only be part of it but have the people you admired and looked up to as a kid become your friend... Many want to play for The Packers, or The NY Yankees or whomever and admire their heroes from afar. I can go to my phone and call my heroes. They became my friends...

Big Bill thanks for being my friend, there is not another one like you...

Thank God...