Eddie Rose reflects on his long wrestling career.
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Grant Foderingham (left)
My first friends in wrestling
I retired from wrestling almost forty years ago after 25 years of activity in rings all over the land. Do I miss it? You bet I do! Not the travelling or the wages, Not the sometimes dangerous rings or the equally dangerous opponents or even the wrestling fans who were great most of the time. I miss the wrestlers most of all; a wonderful collection of fine human beings who became good friends.
My very first friends in wrestling were two quite different men and I met them as an aspiring journalist; Tommy Mann who also owned a great club/restaurant in Manchester city centre and Chic Purvey the much travelled Scot. They looked after me, the newcomer, and made life easy and comfortable. Chic, contrary to some inaccurate misconceptions about Scots, was always the first to ask “What are you drinking Eddie?”
More Friends
New friends came quickly when I started to wrestle. They were kind and accepting of a newcomer. At Panther’s gym there were the likes of Ian “Mad Dog” Wilson, Mark Wayne, Peter Lindberg, Ezra Francis, Tiger Delmonte, Alec Burton, Mike “Flash” Jordan, Jim Moser, Wally Delmar, Hillbilly Bert Ellam, Bob Sherry, Bill Blake and “Big” Bill Coverdale.
Then there were my early promoters; Jack Cassidy, Lord Bertie Topham, Josef Szabo and Kevin Cawley among the “Independents” followed by Jack Atherton and Martin Conroy on the Joint Promotions side of wrestling. Gentleman Jim Lewis and his wife became really good friends and nothing was too much trouble for them to give their friendship and help to a young wrestler.
Moving Up
At Wryton Stadium training sessions on Sundays new faces and new friends; Casanova (a Bolton lad!), Tony Barrie, Paul Mitchell, Paul Duval and several Wigan wrestlers who worked us so hard under Jack Atherton’s watchful gaze. I am forever grateful to Jack and to Ken Cadman who taught us so much in a cheerful and positive way. Ken’s brother Alf Cadman, a wrestler of very good vintage, was a near neighbour in Bury and a good mate for many years.
Life in the professional ring was an amazing time (except for some of the long trips by car!). I remember, with a shudder, travelling by car to Cornwall with Tiger Delmonte and we were so bored and stiff that we stopped and had a ten minute wrestle on a wide grass verge much to the delight of other drivers who pulled up to watch and even gave us a round of applause when we finished,
My very best friends in those days (and still are) were Ian Wilson, Pete Lindberg and Mark Wayne with whom I travelled and trained for several years. Good friends to this day I am pleased to say except for the late Peter Lindberg.(RIP Pete).. Others I remember well include John Kenny, Paul Carpentier and a whole team of lads from the Barnsley Gym including the incomparable Pedro the Gipsy who often had the whole changing room in gales of laughter with his antics often ably assisted by Karl Kramer his mate. The most famous of the Barnsley lads is Sam Betts known by his ring name Dwight Ingleburgh who I had the honour of meeting in the ring on one occasion. No prizes for guessing the winner of that bout!
Two Friends from Wigan
Romeo Joe Critchley from Wigan was another character and a wonderfully entertaining wrestler and travelling companion. Quite different from most of the Wigan lads who tended to be more serious, even dour on occasions, although I also got on very well with Jack Dempsey who I always found to be helpful and positive. Another special mate was Gustav LeBrun, Blackpool’s own Arthur Heaton, a very good rugby player and swimmer who shared the gym with us. His promising career was blighted by a knee injury sustained in a fierce bout with the above mentioned Jack Dempsey.
Class Opponents
I was lucky enough to met some top class wrestlers in the ring over the years. The most memorable included Eric Taylor from Bradford, Adrian Street, Bert Royal and Vic Faulkner, Jackie Pallo and JJ, the Borg twins and the LePaque brothers. Perhaps the best remembered was a series of bouts I had, including three at Liverpool Stadium, with the legendary Count Bartelli, a guy for whom I had the utmost respect and admiration.
I cannot leave out Abe Ginsberg Manchester’s king of skulduggery. Abe was a larger than life character, always the centre of attraction and he gained fame as the founder of the Black Diamonds tag team. Towards the end of both of our careers in the early 1980s, Ginsy and Jack Atherton invited me to join the team in the absence of Abe’s regular partner, Eric Cutler. due to long-term injury. It was good fun (?) while it lasted meeting the leading tag teams around Britain under Abe’s direction. I remember a couple of occasions when I made a mistake he administered on-the-spot punishment and treated me to a powerful forearm smash or two that made me see stars!
Wrestling in Scotland
I also made many trips to Scotland from Dumfries to Ayr, Kilmarnock to Rothesay, Paisley to Edinburgh, Motherwell to Inverness. Many were for my very good friends, the Bryden brothers who ran Spartan Promotions. Two or three of the brothers were frequent opponents: Dale Storm, Bruce Welch and young Ian Miller, all good wrestlers and first class men. Rothesay was my favourite venue. It was so picturesque and restful. El Dorado Stadium at Leith was the toughest venue, packed with a noisy and aggressive crowd who took and instant dislike to any English accent especially if facing a local wrestler!
I frequently worked for some excellent promoters who treated wrestlers fairly, notably Brian Dixon, Orig Williams and local to Manchester, Harold Weller, Ian MacGregor and, one in particular, Sid Vickers of Burnley. The problem with Sid was that he also had a team of tough lads and when matched with them you collected good wages and lots of bruises!
It was a good life and one I remember with affection and made so good by the wrestlers I met in the ring and often outside the ring when travelling. The friendship, the humour, the very fact of belonging to such a unique band of brothers gave me both pleasure and pride and lots of great memories.
Eddie Rose (Manchester)
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