Wrestling Heritage

For me these bills are  real collectors pieces.  We have all but missed it, Burmister was here, one of Australia’s finest. One of them with Sam fighting the man he taught wrestling, Bob McMasters, the Leeds Rugby player from New Zealand. McMasters was doubling up doing some wrestling on average twice a week, more in the off season.

These bills are hard to find.  I don’t even know if there are a few more in my archive, but what has been reported is that the six month, one time only Burmister tour, took in 54 matches. What we have completely missed is that Sam went home undefeated. Yes, and he fought some good wrestlers, even Bert Assirati.​

It was in November 1948 when Sam set sail on the Orgades to come and stay at 25 Kingswood Drive in Leeds. Former pupil McMaster had been making it big in England and had written back to Australia that a good heavyweight here in Britain could earn £50 a week and that Sam would be a sensation. McMasters was working for Relwyskow and that proved to be the way in. Hence the above bills in Scotland.  Sam had done it all in Australia, a legend possibly, but it was all a long time ago.

Let’s go back to 1925. 

​Burmister had been a Music Hall Strongman a claim of the Worlds Strongest man. At the same time in England there was a Music Hall Comedy Strength Act known as Mello and Nello.

​Mello, who went by the name Ernesto Cervi was to lose his partner Nello, the strong man of the act, real name Giovani Periglioni, because Giovani was sentenced to 18 months hard labour and recommended for deportation because of  a blackmail and demanding money with menace affair. The new Nello was to be a young Bert Assiratti.

Almost a quarter of a century later Burmister and Assirati were to meet in England. A look at Burmister’s career as a wrestler in Australia shows how he fought all the top men and yet again we find that recognizable faces worked on more than one continent.

The Strongman act went on in parallel to the wrestling. Burmister, an Estonian by birth had been brought up in the United States, hence the billing.

We flash through the years of the 1930’s in Australia, Meeske and Lurich two of Australia’s Champions;  what a bout it must have been with the bald bullet headed tough Reginsky who had gone to Australia from England probably unable to get any more work after getting tough with Ring Syndicate referee Phil Meader.​

All this demonstrates the pedigree and toughness of this man Sam Burminster. By 1939 Sam is “Australia’s Own”.​

So where is all this leading?  What exactly was Relwyskow Jr.  getting for his money?​

I have been holding back on this up to now and the facts are that this was a tough man, born in 1897, but that made him 52 years old as shown on the shipping documents. Our own great champion of the 1930’s Doug Clark had faded away long before this kind of age. 

Over the years Burmister had blown up to the best part of seventeen stones; was he going to be used against smaller men? Well of course this is wrestling and it was easy to give Burmister bouts with McMasters who he practiced with and one of the jewels in the Relwyskow Crown was his own discovery The Farmer’s Boy.

​The opponents I managed to find I list here and as I always say, this is wrestling, for many he would have fought them several times: The Farmer, Chick Knight, Harry Brooks, Bill Benny, Sandy Orford, Bomber Bates, Olaf Svenson, Garth McClarity, Harry Pye, Ray St Bernard  and, of course, Bert Assirati.

​In 1949 Bert Assirati was British Champion and although 41 was still at the peak of his powers.  What could possibly have been worked out for a result of these two strong men meeting? The promoter looked kindly on Burmister and Assirati was disqualified that night on 21st February at Leeds. 

​I could not find Sam lighting up Belle Vue, Manchester, or St James, Newcastle, instead he fought Bill Benny at Levenshulme and Bomber Bates at Willenhall. Time was catching up with him. The truth is that he had been unable to get much work in Australia and had done very little since the early 1940’s. This tour was a comeback.

​In the Assirati match at Leeds he got three front teeth knocked out as a souvenir of his time in the UK. He went home with a kayfabe story that he had offered Bert Assirati a side stake of £200 each for a crack at his Empire Title. Bert ducked it……..Pure Fantasy.

​

After a lot of checking I found a third bill with Burmister on but disappointingly with no named opponent.

Sam Burmister should have come fifteen years before he did. As a big name though, he had almost slipped the net here in Britain as far as this unbeaten tour goes.​

It was actually easier to find some of the info in Australian newspapers and the breakdown reported was as follows.

• 54 fights, 48 wins, 1 draw, twice disqualified, and three bouts stopped.

One Australian newspaper reported that the three bouts that were stopped were stopped by the police. On two occasions he says he fought twice in one night, even being chauffeured by Rolls Royce between venues. Maybe he did.​

Burmister boarded the Barrow in Furness built Orcades on 21st June 1949 bound for Sydney and in those days the journey home was almost four weeks. Sam Burmister allegedly turned down work in Malaysia after this and found a small amount of work back in Australia.

​In truth he went back into theatre doing a few stunts as a comedy wrestler with well known comedians. He did quite a bit of slapstick wrestling in Brisbane’s Royal Theatre during the remainder of 1949. The picture above shows Burmister in 1949 back in Australia.

In the summer of 1950 he did do 15 matches in Singapore, but I am not certain if this was also comedy. He says he fought the giant Hungarian King Kong six times over there. Losing three but winning  a match where he broke the giants nose. A draw, and the inevitable police broke another one up. Funny how they always got there so quick.The promoter Runme Shaw as far as I can make out was in the “Film Industry”.

​In 1951 his wife divorced him and in 1954 he stood trial for an incident with a girl in a Turkish baths. He was not found guilty and charges were withdrawn. At one time he had a bar in Brisbane.

​Burmister died 3rd October  1962 and is buried in Toowong Cemetery,  Brisbane.  His burial suggests that he was born as early as 1893.

​Finally, Many thanks to Ray Plunkett for access to his index which picked up thirteen fights out of the 54. Shows the size of the task for us historians, my own archive having a handful of wrestling bills with Burmister in the UK.

Historyo

2401