Dave Cameron is something of a legend amongst serious wrestling fans despite the fact he wrestled in Britain for just a short time when he came over in the late 1950s. In his home country of New Zealand, dominated by heavyweights Dave discovered that his impressive amateur credentials were not enough to allow him to make the grade as a professional wrestler. In Britain he wrestled lighter men whilst working for Dale Martin Promotions. Of greater value was the insight he gained into British wrestling and its history.
It is for his work as a wrestling historian, documenting the history and development of wrestling in New Zealand and around the world that Dave is celebrated. Many fans of the 1960s will remember him as a regular contributor to The Wrestler magazine, where he brought us news of the New Zealand wrestling scene. John Shelvey reminded us, “He has authored hundreds of stories for countless wrestling and boxing magazines around the globe and also has written and published the first of two books on the history of New Zealand wrestling.”
At the time of his death we add this tribute from his friend Steve Ogilvie.
Dave Cameron passed away on the evening of 24 March 2025 (New Zealand time). He was 91. Dave had battled with some health issues for the past few years and was living in an assisted living facility in Auckland.
Dave’s interest in boxing and wrestling dates back to his childhood, and he became interested in the history of both early on. His first scrapbooks were put together in the late 1940’s and he continued to make these up to around 2018. He competed in boxing and wrestling at an amateur level, and took up photography, as well as writing his first articles on both sports in the early 1950’s. He made friends with the other competitors, keeping track of their records and often taking their first promotional photos.
Dave was an avid corresponder, and wrote letters and was in written contact with wrestlers, boxers, promoters and magazine publishers through most of his adult life. He once located rare amateur boxing photos of Nelson Mandela, sending them to his office during the time he was Prime MInister of South Africa. They were mailed back to him autographed as requested.
Dave moved to the UK in 1958 hoping to get into professional wrestling due to the wider range of weight classes, but he was still undersized and only had a handful of bouts for Dale Martin Promotions. However, he found other roles in photography, journalism and publicity. He also met his wife Shirley, in London.
There’s too much to write about Dave so I will just bring it back to the topic of wrestling historians. Dave was a rare link in the chain. He corresponded with historians & researchers of yore such as Tom Gannon, Jim Craig, Ernest Sodergren, Ed Briggs, Burt Ray, Ron Dobratz, Jim Melby, Gerhard Schafer, Charles Mascall, Ray Plunkett, Koichi Yoshizawa, Wally Yamaguchi, Nat Loubet, Lew Eskin, Wallie Ingram, Michel Bezy, Paul Boesch and many others who have passed into history. He was still contributing to boxing & wrestling projects until only recently.
Dave was a big believer in sharing information and connecting the dots. He was happy to hear the modern era of wrestling historians were in communication with each other.
Ruslan Pashayev recalls Dave Cameron
I met Dave online in 2012. I was still living in Kharkiv, Ukraine at that time, and unfortunately I cannot remember how exactly we met, it was I either saw his own article, or it was some other people’s article on pro wrestling in which they highly spoke of him, maybe it was on that Canadian Slam Wrestling website, but whatever it was…most importantly they even had his email address provided there. So I decided to write him an email. Obviously the questions I had were about the historical pro wrestling champion belts, and I even remember which one I was researching around that time, it was the very famous Dean Detton Belt, one of the most iconic American wrestling championship belts of the twentieth century.
Dave responded to me. I was so happy about it. And he kindly shared with me info and photos he had of Dean and his belt. And since then Dave and I became distant, virtual friends. Also, Dave admired the Mighty Ukrainians, the Klitschko brothers who dominated world’s professional boxing around that time. I sometimes emailed Dave asking my questions on the history of the pro wrestling game. He was always very kind and always responded to me providing the answers to my questions with all the details imaginable, always accompanied by a plenty of photos of champion wrestlers from the past. He would even make photocopies of some of the wrestlers with belts pictures from his enormous collection and mail them to me when I lived in Delaware, Ohio. That was just a few years ago, before the Covid. Oh yeah, our friendship continued for all these years
Dave Cameron 1933 – 24th March 2024.
Page added 25/03/2025
17961
Wrestling Heritage 