Word: gotch
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Armand Schuel of Alsatian parents in San Francisco, Jack Curley changed his name when he ran away from home to become a reporter, mechanic, waiter, trainer to Barney Oldfield, then a famed bicycle rider. In 1899 he promoted his first major sports event, a Chicago wrestling match between Frank Gotch and George Hackenschmidt. Subsequently he promoted the famed Havana prizefight between Jack Johnson and Jess Willard, bullfights, Annette Kellerman, Mrs. Pankhurst, Rudolph Valentino, Georges Carpentier, William Jennings Bryan, William T. Tilden II, dance marathons, a flea circus and the U.S. tour of the Vatican Choir. In 1929 Promoter Curley...
Died. Martin J. ("Farmer") Burns, 75, onetime world's wrestling champion; in Council Bluffs, Iowa; of senility. Burns defeated Evan Lewis (the original "Strangler") for the heavyweight title in 1895, when choke holds were allowed, lost to Tom Jenkins three years later, trained Frank Gotch to throw Jenkins. Trainer and Chautauqua lecturer, he boasted: "Only one man out of Cedar County, Iowa (Herbert Hoover), ever made more money than I did and he got to be President of the United States...
High-minded sportswriters who sputtered indignantly at these revelations forgot what revolutionary changes had occurred in a sport which now grosses $5,000,000 a year from the U. S. public. In the days of Farmer Burns and Frank Gotch wrestling was, indeed, an exhibition of skill and strength. When Ed ("Strangler") Lewis, Stanislaus Zbyszko and Joe Stecher began to trade their "world championships" with peculiar regularity, U. S. fans became perturbed. In the 1920's the sport sank deep in the doldrums...
...discovered his real vocation in Chicago. He began by promoting Wrestler Frank Gotch, progressed by promoting the Johnson-Willard fight, William Jennings Bryan, Caruso, bullfights, Annette Kellerman, Mrs. Pankhurst, Rudolph Valentino, the U. S. tour of the Vatican Choir, Georges Carpentier, William Tilden, several dance marathons and a flea circus...
...authorized Promoter Jack Curley-who had arranged the match because wrestling gate receipts have lately declined-to disregard the ruling which says that in New York wrestling bouts are "exhibitions" not "contests." The crowd (35,000) was the biggest at a wrestling match since the one which saw Frank Gotch defeat George Hacken-schmidt in 1911 in a bout which appeared so fraudulent that no professional wrestling has been conducted in daylight since...