ROYAL KANGAROOS - NORMAN FREDERICK CHARLES III & LORD JONATHAN BOYD

 

"KING KONG" ANGELO MOSCA

 

TEXAS ROYAL IN STATESVILLE TOWN

                                                                       May 20 1965

STATESVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA

59 Years Ago...

and I was there

MID-ATLANTIC TAG TEAM CHAMPIONS RIC FLAIR AND RIP HAWK

 

TIM WOODS

 

RIP "THE PROFILE" HAWK

 

THE ASSASSIN (JODY HAMILTON)

 

MR. WRESTLING / TIM WOODS

 

JOHNNY WEAVER

 

RICKY STEAMBOAT

 

SKULL MURPHY and BRUTE BERNARD

 

AND THAT IS ALL THE PEOPLE NEED TO KNOW

 

STATESVILLE, NC WRESTLING

 Statesville, North Carolina wrestling fans (and I was one) were treated to THREE nights of JIM CROCKETT PROMOTIONS wrestling shows during the summer of 1966.

A perfect location for wrestling during the summer months...the wooden grandstand ball park similar to that in the movie BULL DURHAM. Sponsored by the COMMUNITY BASEBALL CLUB, who also gave us DOUBLE A BASEBALL at the same site. The ring was set up at home plate, surrounded by metal ringside seat chairs all around. The grandstand served as the General Admission area. The wrestlers entered the ring from the two dugouts.

No rainouts during the summer of 1966. THREE shows in TWO months.

As a fifteen-year old 'rasslin' fan, I found myself at all three shows parked in my $2.00 ringside seat.

This was the first card of the 1966 summer...

The match results are shown above.

For whatever reasons (maybe analysis would reveal why), two memories come back to me about this night.

(1) My cousin, who attended with me, spilled a cup of Coca-Cola on himself during the matches.

(2) One of The Masked Red Demons (either Billy or Jimmy Hines) came out of the dugout for the main event smoking a cigarette (through the mask), discarding it as he approached the ring. I thought to myself - "Athletes aren't supposed to smoke." Give me a break, I was a naive fifteen year-old who was reading FAMOUS MONSTERS and wrestling magazines, instead of PLAYBOY, at the time. (Don't worry, the PLAYBOYs came later.)

Regardless of my mental stability, I remember the evening fondly.

THE DEAN OF WRESTLING

 

NELSON ROYAL

 

BLACKJACK MULLIGAN