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Mum and dad look down with pride at their boys. So they should. They brought up their sons to do the right thing; to care for others and be generous to those in need. Typical characteristics of a close knit working class community where no one had a great deal and people looked out for one another. Money was tight but the Bryden children never went short.
That community was Mossiblown, a coal mining village in South Ayrshire. The boys’ grandparents and father had worked in the pits, as did their eldest son. One grandparent was the first man to operate a fully mechanised coal cutting machine in the busy Ayrshire coalfield in the 1930’s.
Andrew and Margaret Bryden parented four boys, William, Andrew, Gerald and Ian. All four became involved in wrestling, as indeed did mum,dad and Andrew’s wife, Lilian. William, Andrew and Ian became well known wrestlers in their native Scotland, though the names Bruce Welch, Dale Storm and Big Ian Miller were the names displayed on the posters. Gerald was a well respected official at wrestling shows around Scotland. As for mum and dad, well their role was essential.
Bill and Andy succeeded in talking the committee of the local Health and Strength Club into allowing them to use the mat in their well equipped Martial Arts Judo Dojo. Not long afterwards they took over a derelict pre-fabricated building in the local primary school grounds following the intervention of the head teacher who used his persuasive powers on the education committee. This was to become The Old Mossblown Gym.
Conversion of the pre-fab into a functioning gym was completed in just one weekend, entirely due to enthusiastic members who turned up to help with the conversion process. The building had no shower facilities and no central heating so it could get very cold in the winter months. Visitors to the gym included Eddie Rose, Mark Wayne, Ezra Francis, Adrian Street, Linda, Joe Critchley, Jackie Pallo.
To showcase their young talent Andy and Bill bought a ring from the Dam Park Hall. Spartan Promotions were on their way. For ten years they promoted wrestling around Scotland, not just in the smaller halls and holiday camps but at big venues that included the Dam Park Hall in Ayr and the Pavilion in Rothesay. Stars that worked for them included Klondyke Bill, Adrian Street, Peter Preston, Romeo Joe Critchley, Les Kellett and the Manchester lads that made a trip up north every summer, Eddie Rose, Ian Wilson and Sugar Ray Dodo.
Spartan Promotions staged wrestling throughout Scotland in the 1960s and 1970s. Young wrestlers, like Scott Thomson, Young Starsky and the Harlequins trained at the gymnasium in the Ayrshire village of Mossblown, and would then appear on Spartan’s bills.
The senior members of the Bryden family opened their home to many of the visiting wrestlers, and are remembered fondly until this day. Eddie Rose and a car full of Lancashire wrestlers availed of the Bryden’s hospitality each year, “The Bryden family always made us Manchester lads most welcome and fed and bedded us in their own home (does that sound quite right?). They never asked, nor would take, a penny in return. It was a privilge to know such genuine, straight talking people.”
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