Wrestling Heritage

By Ruslan Pashayev

Part 3

The Myth of Farmer Burns.

There is a great deal of discussion about Farmer Burns being the greatest wrestling educator of all times who gave birth to the generations of fantastic wrestlers of the championship class. Burns in fact was a great coach; there are no doubts about it. He was a pro wrestling coach though. Let’s not confuse that with the Olympic wrestling coaches. These two are absolutely unrelated. Burns coached men who wanted to become pro wrestlers, and he was great at that, he didn’t train men to win Olympic golds. Period.

Originally Burns wasn’t a wrestler. He was a circus performer an acrobat short, lightweight very flexible individual, but let’s not forget that in the 19 c pro wrestling often time was referred to as a circus wrestling because many shows literally happened on the circuses arenas and wrestlers troupes were travelling with circuses often time being part of them.

Burns reportedly learned his catch wrestling skill from the English professional by the name of Tom Connor of Wigan, Lancashire whom he wrestled numberless times, they both were part of the same wrestling troupe in which Connor was not only the best wrestler but also a coach.

At some point Burns became so important in American pro wrestling circuits that to become a pro wrestler of quality you had to be trained by him at some point and the best way of learning was of course joining his wrestling troupe. He knew everything about his profession he knew the crowds, knew what they wanted, and how to make them happy, and keep them satisfied that they keep coming and watching his shows. And that is what the profession of wrestler is all about and always was!

Also it was Burns who basically owned the American pro wrestling championship in the late 1890s early 1900s he passed it to whomever he wanted whether it was Canadian McLeod, or Jenkins or Burn’s most famous student Gotch. All those champions were related to Burns. It was his expertise his knowledge that gained him this exclusive status of making champions in wrestling profession.

Burns himself never was heavyweight and soon after he “invented” the actual heavyweight division he paraded the country as light heavyweight champion a title which he passed to Jim Parr of Wigan, Lancashire who was the best exponent of the classical Lancashire catch wrestling in America in the early 1900s.

The Myth of Frank Gotch.

For many people who not only love pro wrestling but also follow the pro wrestling history Frank Gotch always was and still is the greatest American pro wrestler that ever lived. This being claimed by all of his biographers and by the army of his fans. But is this an actual truth? If we measure the wrestler’s success by the numbers they make, then yes, Gotch was the wealthiest pro wrestler of his generation in the world who could turn literally anything he touched into a dollar bill. Maybe not the richest of all time, but definitely in top 5 and I am talking in the modern day money.

The biggest Gotch myth is of course about his technical superiority and him being a type of wrestler who was way ahead of his time. None of that is actual truth. As a matter of fact Gotch was a typical American heavyweight of his era, big strong rough and tough a slam-bang type of wrestler, the Bruno Sammartino of his generation if you will. It was the time when the real heavyweight division was about to be established on the local catch wrestling scene because prior to that all catch wrestlers were short lightweights yes and most of them were foreigners. And the wrestlers like Tom Jenkins and Gotch were true pioneers of the heavyweight division. For everyone who wants to have a somewhat more realistic picture of Gotch I highly recommend to read the 1913 bio book Frank Gotch – WORLD’S CHAMPION WRESTLER by Joseph Bowles, and especially Wrestling and How To Train a wrestling manual written by Frank himself. Reading his wrestling instructions book will give you a good picture of what his actual wrestling method was like and his bio book has a lot of details about his “mat battles”.

Gotch originally started as a member of Farmer Burns troupe. It was Burns who trained him, taught him the profession, and most importantly gave him that push which the latter needed in order to enter the elites of pro wrestling. Mouth of Farmer Burns made Gotch a future champion. Burns made him a challenger first, and worthy opponent next, and then finally a champion pro wrestler of America, a title which Gotch “won” from then champion Tom Jenkins. Jenkins dropped his title claims around that time when he started losing interest to the profession, and obviously he wasn’t committed to it anymore and made no sense for him holding the championship. Gotch was a very smart pro wrestler, he only entered the ring if he was sure about the result that he wanted, for him at that point even the money were secondary all he cared about was his reputation of being always the winner, of him being undefeated. That undefeated status he quickly achieved and he cherished it the most in his life. That is why when his pro wrestling matches record is nonpareil, it truly is phenomenal.

Although Gotch was double-crossed once, as many believe, that happened when he entered the international Greco-Roman wrestling tourney in Montreal in 1906. That tourney was organized by George Kennedy of Montreal who promised Gotch the Canadian championship but Gotch was unexpectedly defeated by the Italian pro wrestler called Emilio Pietro the eventual winner of the tourney a title which he shared with another American heavyweight “Apollo” Joe Rogers. But was it really a double-cross or his defeat was part of an original plot. Prior to the tourney the local press was talking about Gotch being the best of the best, fans sincerely believed that and were putting their money on mighty foreigner who as we know was not even familiar with the Greco-Roman wrestling. I suppose a lot of money changed hands after Gotch’s defeat and considering him not winning that tourney. Despite that defeat Gotch needed to keep his record clean still, because it was Gotch. So shortly after that Montreal tourney was over Gotch and Kennedy and some of the participants of that tourney left Montreal and “continued” the tourney (the tourney which was over!) this time on “catch wrestling conditions” in Buffalo, NY so that Gotch could win it and they also made sure American press didn’t know anything about Gotch being defeated in Canada. They lied to the press and presented his victory in Buffalo tourney as the championship he won in Montreal!

That wasn’t the first time in his career when Gotch participated in such an unfair affair; when he was still a member of Burns troupe they fooled fans bigtime in Yukon territory where Gotch wrestled under the assumed name of Frank Kennedy.

Another a very similar scenario type of thing happened right before Gotch’s first match vs Hackenschmidt (Hack) in 1908. Gotch was supposed to participate and obviously win the international wrestling tourney in Tampa Florida. It was a championship status tourney organized by Jack Curley and the champion silver belt symbolic of American title was supposed to be awarded the winner. All was good, until Gotch suddenly changed his plans and didn’t show up and the result of that he was “stripped off the title” for “no defense”. Fred Beell became the winner, the champ and the belt holder. But neither Curley nor Beell ever pushed their championship claims. American press was silent. Gotch wrestled Hack literally few weeks after that and became the world heavyweight champion.

Gotch dropped his American championship once, to Beell, in 1906, a title the latter held for a couple of weeks before giving it back to Frank, what else could it be? The fooling of fans at its very best!

And of course a lot has been said about Gotch matches he had with Hack. We have to remember that when Gotch first met him in 1908 Hack was a retired pro wrestler. For Hack the championship he “won” from Jenkins in 1905 really meant nothing. And Gotch instead needed it. Hack gets the money, Gotch gets the title and gets his record even better than it ever was. Same as always. Although in their first meeting Gotch didn’t really win the match it was Hack who refused to continue because according to him “Gotch was acting unfair, gouging, biting, headbutting, and was also greased all over his body that a proper hold of him wasn’t even possible to take” and the referee who awarded the Gotch the world title after that happened. Hack “lost the title” but it was not a clean victory on falls obviously when he was back to England he claimed that he was robbed by the ref and Gotch. As the outcome of that show they put together both parties were happy Gotch was the champ and Hack wasn’t the loser but rather a victim!

In 1911 Gotch brought Hack out of retirement once again, this time I suppose he paid him enough to win on fair back falls, a clean wrestling victory that Frank wanted so much! That made him the undisputed world champion! Fair to say that Gotch never defended his “championship” outside the USA, that never happened. Overseas they didn’t know much about Gotch, nor about his wrestling abilities. Tthere was a plan to repeat Gotch v Hack on some another neutral ground, in Europe or even in Australia, but that never happened, Gotch refused to wrestle outside the United States. He had his own reasons not to do that, I suppose. Title for Gotch meant money and he would never risk his money wrestling outside his wrestling territory. But yes, Gotch was bringing a lot of Greco-Roman foreigners here, to America, and decisively defeating them one after the other, he did that with “ease”, and made his championship unbelievable record shine even brighter!

Another important detail to the portrait of Frank Gotch is that he was the first American pro wrestler whose title was not a newspapers made championship. Gotch was a champion by the grace of the powerful promoters from all over the country who agreed that there is no better candidate for heavyweight championship than Gotch, he was the best selling pro wrestler of his time the true champion of the crowds!

And finally the last popular myth about Gotch is his famous “toe hold” being the deadliest submission hold of them all. As a matter of fact this his signature move wasn’t even a submission hold in the true meaning of it. His toe hold was designed in way that when applied properly it makes impossible for your opponent to resist the pain it is causing other than by turning onto their back. And once they are on their back, the both shoulders are obviously on the ground which mean that you won the bout. So to say it was a pinning combination, and not a submission hold if we follow the wrestling terminology literally. And this is precisely what was the famous Gotch’s Toe Hold about!

The King of Wrestlers.

Jack Carkeek was the only American pro wrestler from the 1800s who achieved a star status overseas as well, I mean in England where he “defeated” the best professionals, held various “championships” which he “won” in open to all tourneys, including that of the Tom Cannon’s Promotion World Heavyweight Title and the Gold Belt (yes, the very first Big Gold Belt), the very prestigious championship, also being called the King of All Wrestlers.

Muldoon and Lewis.

They were two different kinds of champs each unique in its own ways the former represented the Greco-Roman style and the latter Catch wrestling and it was them who created the most recognizable gimmicks of pro wrestling that of heel and babyface. Lewis was a typical heel, who was the most feared and most brute wrestler of his time, crowds loved to hate him if you will, and Muldoon was just so opposite he definitely was the first real babyface whom everyone admired, especially the Ladies.

Conclusion.

No secret, that pro wrestling fan is the most faithful fan there is! Let’s first keep that in mind when we approach this subject. And fantasizing about the past, speculating about something that never was that actually never happened and referring to it or calling it the Golden Era of Pro Wrestling is a dangerous thing, because it shows no respect to the current FANS who LOVE IT FOR WHAT IT IS now, and as a matter of fact, and I am here to prove it to everyone, what it has always been.

The actors the wrestlers did change, but the stage, the play, and the authors were always the same and they remained the same! That is why I encourage everyone to appreciate wrestling past as it was, it doesn’t require any kind of whitewashing or anti-historical claims, it is fascinating it is great without it!

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