Lords of Wrestling

The National Wrestling Alliance was divided into territories. It was thought that each city could only support one wrestling promotion and that competition would kill the business for all. In some sense that may have been true. Under the Consent Decree, a federal document put through congress by Sam Muchnick along with his good friend, Congressman Mel Price of East St. Louis, the National Wrestling Alliance could exist as a virtual monopoly as long as they agreed not to restrict the free flow of wrestling talent which is what they promised they wouldn't do but often promoters did try to restrict the flow of talent. The most important function of the National Wrestling Alliance was to protect the territories owned by the NWA promoters. They weren't supposed to do that either. 

Promoters in those days were well off and each ran his business as he saw fit. Wrestling was generally a local television product and wrestling fans in a particular area only saw the local stars and thought them to be National heroes. Every territory produced a TV show that ran on their local stations. Every territory was different and every promoter was king of his kingdom. 

The other function of the National Wrestling Alliance was the recognition and promotion of the NWA World Champion. To a large extent the strength of the NWA lay in the strength and drawing power of the World Champion. A requirement of promoters joining the National Wrestling Alliance and enjoying the protection is that they recognize and publicize one and only one world heavyweight champion, that being the NWA world champion. Each promotion was required to verify their promotion of the NWA World champion through the president Sam Muchnick.

I was NWA World Champion for four and a half years. As NWA World Champion, I got to meet all the promoters, work their territories and know them personally.

Fritz Von Erich was a dominant personality, physically big and strong. He was a former SMU football player having wrestled as the master of the Iron Face Claw and drawn lots of money. Fritz stood 6' 4" tall and weighed 280 pounds, he was an impressive man to meet. Fritz had invested well in real estate including his home on a beautiful spread near Dallas, Texas. Fritz's territory was all of southeast Texas including large cities of Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio. My important matches as champion in the Dallas territory were against Wahoo McDaniel, John Valentine, Fritz Von Erich, Jose Lothario and Red Bastien.

Dory Funk Sr. came to West Texas in 1947 where he accepted the job of Superintendent of Texas' Boy's Ranch. At the same time he established himself as the toughest wrestler in the Amarillo Territory having epic matches with Frankie Hill Murdoch, Leroy McGuirk, Roger Mackey, Lou Thesz, Wayne Martin and Pat O'Connor. In 1952, Dory Funk Sr. purchased the Flying Mare Ranch just outside Amarillo and a few years later bought into the Amarillo Territory along with the promoter, Doc Sarpolis. In 1966, Doc passed on and Terry and I purchased the remaining rights to the territory from Doc's widow, Lou Sarpolis. The Amarillo Territory covered a vast area extending from Colorado Springs to Albuquerque, El Paso, Odessa, Abilene, Lubbock, Amarillo, Guymon, Oklahoma, Liberal, Kansas, Amarillo and all cities in between. My important matches as champion in the Amarillo Territory were against Lord Alfred Hayes, Rufus Jones, Jack Brisco, Ricky Romero and Harley Race.

Bob Geigel worked at Texas Boy's Ranch near Amarillo, Texas for three years as wrestling coach working under Dory Funk Sr. Bob was a Big Ten amateur wrestler from University of Iowa and had a lot of respect from Dory Funk Sr. who did his amateur wrestling at Hammond High School where he was state champion and at Indiana University. In the early Sixties, Bob purchased a part of the Kansas City territory from the then promoter, Gus Karras. My important matches as champion in Kansas City territory were vs. Danny Little Bear, Ronnie Etchison, Harley Race, The Stomper and Bob Brown.

Leroy McGuirk was an NCAA wrestling champion out of Oklahoma City with a reputation also as a great worker. Leroy was for a period of time the NWA Junior Heavyweight Champion and had a feud with Dory Funk Sr. in the Amarillo Territory back in the days of Dory Detton. At the time Leroy was blind in one eye. He later had a tragic car accident and lost the sight in his other eye.  More...