Ep. 365: The Lapsed Funk: 'Into the Ring'

You know, good for nothing, eggs sucking, dumb leasing man. We did it our way because we love it that way. We love it that way, and I have this wonderful gun feeling, and I've had it all my life. When it's time to go, I think it's now. There's time to go, son of a gun. One sunny afternoon in May of nineteen sixty two, three power, powerfully built men paid an unusual visit to

the offices of the Lubbock Avalanche Journal. They looked strangely out of place as they strode through the editorial rooms, feverish with the clacking of typewriters and teletype machines, but editor Charles A. Guy was expecting them. The trio wrestlers Dory Funk and Ricky Romero, and promoter Nick Roberts, a former grappler, heartily shook hands with Guy. Then Funk, spokesman for the group, fished

a check out of his wallet and handed it over here. He told Guy, is the one thousand we promised to donate to charity from the five thousand dollars winnings of our last match. Give it to whatever charity you think best, or divided among several We prefer not to make the decisions because we're not familiar with Lubbock's needs. Guy smilingly accepted the check and gave them a receipt, but said he couldn't do as they had asked. The grapplers were surprised.

Why not, Funk said, we aren't worried about what you'll do with the money. Well, it isn't that, Guy explained. But I think the best way for me to handle this is to get a secret citizens committee to select the most deserve and charity or charities. It'll have to be done that way for two reasons. First, I don't want the responsibility. Second, I don't want the phone ringing with please and suggestions. The committee will quietly do the surveyant, and when the decision is made and the funds turned

over, the Avalanche Journal will make the details public. Good idea, Funk agreed. When the news got out, Dorry was asked one the reason for the generous gift. It was a simple one. Lubbock, he said, has been good to Ricky and me. We've had fine crowds and a lot of support, and we just wanted to do something in return. Fans who had seen Dorry and Ricky shed blood for their money, frankly thought they deserved to keep every penny of it. Dorry, in particular, was always sure

to put on a spectacular show for sheer guts. Nobody could equal him in Texas's famed Panhandle or anywhere else for that matter. Still fresh in their memory was Dorry's Titanic death match in quotes with Sir Nelson Royal in fair Park Colisseum.

In this bout, fought under the primitive quote rules that prevail in the brawling lumber camps of the Canadian wilds, Funk marshaled all the rough house cunning he had developed in ten years after the match, one hard bitten cattle raiser said admiringly, well, that Dora sure makes me proud to be a Texan. It was a great tribute in more ways than one, for Funk is not really a Texan. He hails from the lush grazing country of Indiana.

Some twelve years ago he stormed into the Panhandle to carve out a big steak for him, and that was before he opened the ranch. It's all going so well. There a big stake for himself. After starring as an amateur wrestler at Indiana University. He succeeded so well he was able to plunk down forty thousand dollars for a sprawling branch about a dozen miles southwest of Amarilla, the Flying Mayor Ranch, located near Umbarger. Is that also where Dusty Rhoads

is from? Oh sorry, that's Amberger. That's just cheeseburger. Actually it's where he's from. Cheeseburger Texas. Oh my Umbalge, located near Umbalge extends to be the best Umbo Texas extends in all directions as far as the eye can see. Dori took to Texas like a jack rabbit. Everything he did was on grand scale. He raises a fine herd of cattle, he handed, He handled horses and guns like a native, and he had a no

nonsense, straight from the shoulder attitude that endeared him to everyone. But it was in the ring that Funk showed the kind of spunk that stamped him as a true Texan. A guest at Funk's ranch recalls the time he accompanied Dorry to a match held in a small town about sixty miles from Umbarge. Funk tore down the dusty roads. I've right Daddy as if he were competing in

the Indianapolis five hundred mile race. He was doing over one hundred miles an hour, but was as casual as a guy relaxing in his living room. Nervously, the guest watched the cacti whip by. Suddenly, Dory let out yelp, reached into the back seat for a rifle and started shooting. Brother Pow pow pow. Three jack rabbits that a series of flips and tumbled dead. With one hand on the wheel. Funk fired again. Four more jack rabbits hit the dust. Then he turned to his guest, don't just sit

there, pardon, help yourself to a rifle and join the party. The guest was a mighty shaken man by the time they reached the steaming hot arena. Ran there, he ran into an even more unsettling experience when Dorry bounced into the ring d wrestle Gordo Chihuahua. The guest felt a shiver as he appraised the Mexican fans. They sat grim and silent, fingering knives stuck behind their belts. The atmosphere was saturated with menace, but Dorry, who lives

on menace, Lap laughed as blubbery Gordo came charging in. Slipping aside, he quickly caught the Mexican by the arm and catapulted him to the mat. Gordo is a tough ombre, though, and blasted right back. Soon the blood began to flow. After a sizzling spate of action, Gore smeared Dorry, swung Gordo against the ropes and rammed him in the belly. On the rebound, you could hear the escape from Chihuahua as he hit the canvas. Dorry let out his rebel victory yell and prepared to leave the ring. Just

then a group of venomous looking fans advanced toward him. Cocking his head, Funk gave them a hard look and said, looking for some fun boys. Come on, let's see how brave you are. First guy in the ring gets a crashed skull. The fans didn't understand him, but there was no mistaking the look on Dorry's face. They stopped and glowered, but no one dared make the first move. Then Dorry sprang to the ring apron told them

to seat to scat, and marched off to his dressing room. Later, his white faced guests said, my god, nor those fellas could have murdered you. Funk Grinn. Wish they hadn't back down. I was itching for a really good fight. Gordo was just an appetizer. The amazing thing about Dorry is that he wasn't bluffing. He'll fight anybody, even Sonny. Listen. Someone once asked him, even listen. Never saw the day I couldn't lick any fighter. They say Sonny's a tough ombre. Well, Pardner,

I've eaten steaks that were a lot tougher. Direct hit yep. On the way back to Umboche, Dorry slowed down to a crawl, only ninety miles per hour or so. He was in a reflective mood. Funny thing. I'm always in a big hurry to get to a fight, but afterward I feel kind of sorry. It's all over, and I just poke along. I don't know why, because I can't wait to get home to my family.

Dorry glowed right through his bronzed tan brother, taking that tan dude as he got to talking about his wife, Dorothy and his kids, Dorry Junior twenty one and Terry Brother nineteen. Remember what I said about Dorry Junior last time I saw you, he said, and then answer and answered his own question. I said, I was going to make a wrestler out of that boy, and by golly, you ought to see him now. He's been undefeated since he turned pro the first of this year. Junior's success is not

surprising. His dad started teaching him the ropes when he was only six. Oh. He he knows more about wrestling than any other wrestler I've known, says Junior proudly today. The six foot three, two hundred and twenty five pounder who was graduated from West Texas State University this June, is one of

the most popular grapplers in the Southwest. For many years, he was called Dunk, a common of Dory and Funk by his friends and family, but since launching his matt career, he has been known as Dorry Funk Junior in tribute to his famous dad. At college, Dunk majored in physical education and minored in speech. The speech course was a smart move. Junior always liked radio and TV. His dad has starred in his own weekly TV show for years, and he figured this might be a good field to get into if

I should ever be disabled in the ring. There's not much chance of that happening if his luck is as good as his dad's. Dorry Senior has taken some savage poundings during his career, but has never been quote disabled. Wrestling, as anyone in Mbalge will tell you, seems to run in the Funk

family. Terry, who was following his older brother's footsteps on the West Texas State football team, may also take a whack at the matt game when he graduates, and Dunk's own son, appropriately nicknamed Dink, is still another prospect, though he is only two years old. If Terry and Dink are half as good as Dunk Bill, they'll turn out to be mighty fine wrestlers.

And if Dunk is one quarter of the man his dad is, he'll be one hell of a grappler at From the October nineteen sixty three issue of Wrestling Review by Hubert Patrick, Son of a Gun, The Funk Boys have been seasoned, The Funk Boys have been unleashed. Oh yes, on the wrestling business. Welcome to the Lapsed Funk Episode two, Funkin into the Ring. Thank you very much, We're very glad that you're back with us. And what a picture they used to paint in those magazines in the sixties. Huh,

Absolutely amazing, Absolutely, I love that. It's funny how I don't know if Yeah, I feel like we would if they went into this kind of detail and wrote this kind of way about it today, we'd fucking be all over that shit. Yes, total full of lies. We don't care, you know, it's just kind of like I wish, I wish that there was a way to make me care like this like this is That's a

phenomenal piece of writing there. That isn't that isn't phony sounding. I mean, obviously there are the stories and stuff like that, like you know, I don't know about you know, the guys with knives or whatever. I don't know that's true or not. But but it gets the character of Dory funk over, you know, by the end of that article, what he tries to project right exactly, and what he's trying to project now increasingly as the fifties become the early sixties, onto his two boys, Dory and Terry.

You notice story getting top billing in the earliest days of the coverage of Funk coderly with Terry not an afterthought necessarily, but definitely one a one b rather to a Doe Funk Junior's one for sure, for sure, and it was it was a time where the Funks were, now, you know, sort of trying to figure out is it going to be football? Is you know, they're Texas boys, they grew up in Texas, and if you can make it in pro football, that's the best way to make sure your

father doesn't feel disappointed in you. Oh of course. And so there's you know, legitimate sports is always the best way. Absolutely. We learned that in the limitable tragedy visa VI Fritz van Eric. And there's going to be a bit of a teasing out process for Terry Funk here as he takes the field at West Texas State and wins a fair degree of plot. It's on the field he's hardly the standout player on the team, neither is his brother.

But still we're still here in tracking the full journey of Terry Funk's remarkable pro wrestling career, in this early gestational stage where he's sort of weighing a few options, deciding what it is he's going to do. But the point is, no matter what he decides, there will be an attendant press ready to record his decision. He is of enough significance in his part, yeah,

you know, Texas and the Panhandle. His father carries enough mystique in Aura and good community relations that whatever comes of the Funks will be documented. And that is very much to our benefit here at the Lapsed Fan as we continue our look at the career of Terry Funk. It's the Lapsed Funk. It is indeed, it is indeed. And someone made a great joke I think was on Patreon about how like we're about ten hours into this thing and

the subject matter of the whole series just was born. It's exactly right. We're going. We're going. Yeah, we're going from from A to Z, all right, and there's nothing and everything in between. There's nothing anybody can do about it. That's right, because I once heard a challenge that nobody can encapsulate the career of Terry Funk, and I said, oh, really yes, And we released a T shirt and record time. If you go to a Pro Wrestling Teas dot Com slash Lapsed Fan, the Adam Funk

shirt is now your it is. We're there already. So of course, Adam Funk, the grandfather of Terry Funk, the father of the aforementioned Dory Senior, but nobody fucking knows about it. The best part, that's the best fucking part. There's about twenty people in a pine box in Indiana cemeteries that know exactly who the fuck out at you was. I don't say they're definitely a slew of dead bodies that certainly that they definitely felt the funk.

But in terms of wrestling fans, I think we're I think they're getting an education. Yeah, I think so. I think we're all learning, and we're all getting a distinct sense of place as well as well as person. Here m hm, as we dig into the funks setting down roots in Amarilla and becoming a Texas family, we heard, Yeah, the sound of Dory Funk Senior's voice last time there is no Texas twang. It is entirely appropriate that you gave him one and reading that article from Wrestling Review, but he

still got that, you know, ministries still get that. A Midwest act in Midwest, I know, it's so funny, and so they're still becoming Texas. And the stuff that Dory Funk Senior is made out of, as that article indicates, is going to be the stuff that the wrestling world has soon to assume his boys are made out of And here's Terry Dunk in one of his shoot interviews done with our video over the years, talking about how his dad prepared them for the ring. I think my father handled pressure better

than most wrestlers with sons that brought him into the business. I think he eased the pressure from us. And how he eased it from us at that time, which I didn't realize he was doing this. We'd come back to the dressing room and he would start at us as soon as that door open.

He wasn't in for fifteen twenty minutes of just chewing our asses out, telling us what all we did and wrong, and the other boys was just you know, I mean, and he was he was so hard on us, which was really a wonderful thing in the long run, but we didn't know at the time, but the other wrestlers thought, god, you know, I mean, must help them tarry out, you know, And that's kind of the way it went back. And you know, he was he

was very demanding, you know, I've seen him. I seen him take guys like Walton McDaniels and whenever he was teaching one who to start with my brother and just break you down into tears, you know. I mean he was a tough, a tough, tough individual whenever it came to teaching somebody the business, you know. But that's wonderful though, because we learned it

well, you know. And the other thing that was such a wonderful thing, why I had it somewhat easier than the other boys in the business because my father had been around for years wrestling around the country, and he had the knowledge of who was promoting here and who was promoting there. They were aware of him and who he was, and therefore they were aware of my

brother and myself. So we would go ahead and call up and you know, I mean, if we wanted to go somewhere, well the promoter knew who we were immediately, whereas if it was just, you know, somebody without the name. The name was a wonderful help you that. And I'm not saying that that Junior and I didn't have wonderful ability. I'll say my brother had more ability than what I ever had. He was he was wonderful

in the ring. I mean, he really was. But my father was responsible for that, and it just gave us a four year start on everybody else. Like if you took somebody with a with a name that wasn't known around the country, he didn't have to go into each territory and make a name for himself. At least we would get a decent look at you know. I mean, promoter would look at us very seriously. You know. But we produced you know, but they produced Boss. That's the tree.

That's the key. Producing is key. And I think one of the things I never thought about till he said it, there was the benefit you got breaking your kids into the business as a wrestling star by being extra hard on

them in front of the other boys. What are you laid out? There was a not in the same way he was hard on the boys at Kyle Farley's, but but in terms of, like, you know, making the other wrestlers feel bad for your kids because the old man was being so extra hard on you and so demanding and so meticulous and what he expected of you

in the ring. That's almost like a sneaky indirect way of completely eliminating any whiff of nepotism, right right, any whiff of a guy saying, oh, they're only getting that opportunity because you know, the old man created the glide path for them, and they didn't really have to develop their pay dues. I mean, Funk says it right there. We started with a four year head start over anybody else that would have had year one in the business.

But a very savvy move there from a dory Funk Senior to you know, it's tempting just to say, you're you're a hard ass, a Texas hard ass in your kids, and that's the beginning and end of it. Of course, the echoes of Fritz van eric never leave our brain here at TLF right, Oh for sure. I mean that's that. Yeah, it's

first and foremost, you know. But I'm developing somewhat of a sense that Funk Senior was a little more cagy than Old Fritz in terms of when and how to use the whip and in terms of how to get his boys respect from the rest of the wrestlers from the beginning, not to say the von Erics wherever. It certainly it was understood in world class that there were you

would always be the second tier babyface. If you were a baby face in that territory, you simply could never be at the top of the card because it had to be the one Eric boys, and that was not really it was begrudgingly accepted, but no one really held it against you know, Carrie and Kevin and David and Mike, but still it was it was clearly something where even if you're Mike who clearly has no it doesn't take to the ring at all, but they throw them out there and have them work Rick Flair

for an hour. That that's not a criticism that Dory Funk was going to allow to be levied at Dory Junior and Terry, it seems because he was going to take it to him. That's right. Back to Dory Funk Junior's book. This is just a little vignette that I think illustrates it well. Uh. The chapter is called The Boss Is Gone. That's right. Damn you, Terry, loosen up. I could hear the damness cussing. You could imagine coming from the backyard of our home with the flying mare ranch intombugger

Texas. Damn you, Terry. If you don't loosen up, I'm gonna get up and kick the shit out of you. God damn you Terry turned loose, or I'm gonna kick your ass. Brother who's talking dude, I could hear the voice of my little brother, thirteen year old Terry Funk. No, Dad, I can't turn loose. That's what he sounded at thirteen. Dad decided like that when he was fucking five. I know what they'll do to me if I turn loose. Fucking can God damn you, little

bastard turn loose? Now? Dad? Can you make me some pancakes this morning for breakfast? We'll see. Let me hit you with a flapjack first center of the ring. I couldn't imagine what was going on, Dory Junior writes until I walked back behind the house. Dory Funk Senior, as an amateur wrestler, was a leg wrestler at Hammond High School, Indiana. He was a state champion the skill on Indiana University and into the professional interfessional wrestling.

His kids growing up, his word to us was that we had to learn amateur wrestling first and get an education. Then it was our choice if we wanted to go on to professional wrestling. But there he is caught in a hold by Terry at thirteen years old. It's almost like the old man should start. I don't know dialent back a bit. I want to cool it with the hole. You want to shoot partner? That that's scene in the in the piece you read. You know you want to have it.

You want to have a go. What do you want? What do you think? Do you think you think you can handle it? It just seems that it's starting to become just a little bit clearer that Dory Funk Senior might think he's got more years as a cowboy in and than he actually does. Are you are you a bitch? Huh? Son? Are you a bitch? I don't I don't really know how to answer that question. Dad, Well, because you can't answered it, I can tell you right now you

are a fucking bitch and I want to kick you in the ass. And you're gonna like it, you know why, because you're a bitch. So all right, So he's not that different than it didn't take that didn't take long. Tell me what do you think? Uh? What do you think the lessons are that Dorry drove home when they were on the mat. You know what do you think he's telling Terry to watch out for when when you're out there grappling Terry? What are you going to said to? What you

understand? Son? Is that when you're out there grappling, you're not trying to do anything but kill a man. That's your focus. You bury a man in that mat, you want to make sure he gets out of there and he doesn't never want to get back in again. If he dies the next day, great, If he dies in the mat, fine, But I want you to understand that you have to deliver the pain. You have to make him realize that his life is on the line. If you don't do that, your life will be on the line. Back to Daddy.

At the Dory Junior, Terry Funk's blue sixty five Ford Mustang Hatchback was flying down Fourth Avenue in Canyon, Texas when a car pulled out onto his left side. There was the squealing of tires, a crash, and the sound of crunching steel. Terry's new Ford Hatchback Mustang was destroyed. Fortunately, even though he was shaken up, he felt no broken bones, cuts their injuries. He looked over to the right seat, where his passenger, Dandy Jack

Donovan was sitting. Donovan seemed to be okay too. Thirty seconds passed his char Jack Donovan, Oh, we when did he come up? On the last episode, well, he said, I said, heard Dandy, and I'm like, what the fuck is going on here? I think Jack Donovan was the one that yeah, well nicknamed apparently dandy Jack Donovan, I see that was the one that had those record crowds with Cal Farley. Ah, yes, you know they called the ticket office. That's right. At thirty

seconds past, Terry contemplated how close they had come to serious injury. His next thoughts concerned the wrestling business. Even though he wasn't wrestling against Donovan that night, Territory rules were that Jack Donovan and Terry were not supposed to be seen together. Terry said to Donovan, quick, Jack, you've got to get out of here before someone sees us. Jack, get out of here.

You got to disappear before my daddy comes home. Now, at least a minute had passed with Donovan showing no signs of injury, Terry said, go go. You're a heel in the territory. Yeah, you're a hero in the territory. You're a heel. You're a heel, Terry, but I'm all fucked up, But no, you're a heel. I can't be seen talking to a heel. Get out of here before someone sees you. Jack Donovan looked at Terry, then reached up, grabbed his shoulder and said,

Oh, I've injured my shoulder. Get me a doctor. Donovan wasn't going anywhere but to the hospital in the canyon, and the whole town would know the two were riding together. Nineteen sixty five was Terry's first year in the business, and he wasn't going to miss a shot for any reason, not even an accident that destroyed his car. Terry called his mother in law, any Weaver, and told her of the problem. Terry asked if he could borrow her blue sixty five Ford Victoria so he could make the town.

A police report was completed, Donovan was taken to the hospital, and before the wrecker could load up Terry's new sixty five Ford Mustang and haul it off to the junkyard, Terry was on his way to Cisco, Texas, and his mother in law's new sixty five Ford Victoria by himself. Boss Terry Funk is on the road. That's right, Terry, there is something wrong with you. You have been heard in that car wreck, and even though you were able to go into the ring and have a great match tonight, there

is still something not right about you. I want you to go straight from the arena home. I do not want you taking a long way through breck and Ridge and buying beer. I want you to go direct to your house and get some rest. I don't want you drinking beer on the way home, but I want to. That's why I'm telling you not to Son, because I know you wanna what Terry. Oh on ahead, and Terry said,

yes, Dad, I will do just as you say. Dorriyfunk Senior asked Jack Briscoe to ride back that night with Terry, who helped them drive and keep them company on the long trip after the matches. As they left the arena, Dory Funk Senior was following them to make sure that they didn't take the long way through Breckinridge to buy beer for the trip home. He followed them, Yes he did, You damn fucking right he did. Terry floor boarded the accelerator and pulled away. Then he made a quick turn to

the left, circled the block, and shut off his lights. They watched as dorriy Funk Senior drove by looking for their car. After Dorry Senior's car had passed Terry and Jack pulled out and headed in the opposite direction on the way to Breckenridge to buy beer for the trip home. Once in Breckenridge, they went to the liquor store and bought a case of cores and ten pack bags of fried pigskins. Now they were ready for the three hundred mile trip back home. Damn right they are. At four a m. They were

lost for Matador in Katakway on a dirt road. Traveling eighty miles an hour. Terry hit the brakes and yelled, watch out travel got a little Steve Austin in there. I'll admit it. Hey, they're both from Texas.

Makes sense, ye. Traveling at least sixty miles an hour, his mother in law's blue sixty five Ford Victoria ran through a t intersection into the bar ditch on the other side and went airborne through the barb wire fence and landed in a wheat field on the other side, destroying the second car in one day. Wow, Jesus Christ, So it's muntic. It started early for the funker. I guess so a human car crash Racleusly, Terry and Jack

were not seriously hurt. The first words out of Terry's mouth came with tears. So I've wrecked two cars in one day, and my father is going to kill me. Terry and Jack walked to a farmhouse, where Terry called his father to let him know what had happened. All Jacket here was loud cursing on the receiver, and Terry answering, yes, Dad, I'm sorry, Dad. You're right, Dad, it won't happen again. Dad. I'm sorry, Dad. I should have listened to you, Dad, I'm

sorry. When Terry arrived home the next day, he received news that he was being sued by Jackdawnovan for injuries received in the first accident in Kenyon, Texas. Nineteen sixty five was Terry's first year in professional wrestling. He spent that year paying for two cars. Oh my god. Last year at a cauliflower alley con mentioned in Tampa, Florida, I saw Dandy Jack Donovan.

His first words when we met again after some thirty years were, Dorry, do you remember the day in the old Amarilla Territory that Terry wrecked two cars in one day? So it's not gonna be I don't think that somebody he'll ever live down it's apparently not. It's not going to be without calls to Canyon and Amilla police. The beginning of the mad cap wrestling career of Terry

Funk. That's so, that's unbelievable. We learned all the way back from the Cal Farley days, right, Boss, When you pitch your tent in Amriilla, you got to work the local press to introduce you to the fine people, don't you, absolutely, And to make sure you have a strong command of the sports pages. Get some features written up about you, just you know, make sure that they think you're worthy of spelling ink to move

fucking tickets and calculate gates. What do you think this fucking is? Certainly Dory Funk Senior had had been a presence long enough in Amarilla by this point, by the point that his sons were getting into the ring, that the folks at the Amarillo Globe Times certainly saw fit to cover each in every step they were making, in particular Terry on the way to that first year in the business, before the car crashes, before the hard lessons began to be

learned. Amarillo Globe Times, August eleventh, nineteen sixty five noted that Terry Funk was still playing football, but during the course of his playing at West Texas State, he was framed as wrestling in the off season, much like Wahoo McDaniel had done, another West Texas guy who wanted to be a much more famous football player than any of the Funks were. A pretty much any pro wrestler ever was, with perhaps the exception of a Bronco Degirsky or an

Ernie Ladd. But no, that was the thing. Why who would you know, play in the regular season and wrestle in the off season. And it was a huge deal that he would wrestle, and he made more money wrestling than he did playing pro football. So eventually the transition happened. So crazy you imagine someone taking the field every Sunday and then when the seasons over,

being a pro wrestling headliner. It's like, okay, think of this, think of between like for the last twenty some odd years during the off season, Tom Brady was a wrestler, sure, or Travis Kelcey or Tom Brady cutting promos against John Cena in that time period while active, Yeah, exactly. So that was the early blueprint that Terry Funk saw as he teased out whether he actually might be able to make it as a pro in football.

This running in that edition of the Amerlo Globe Times, it says Wahoo just finished another American League season Sunday as the New York Jets upset the Buffalo Bills. Terry, starting West Texas State tackle last season, came out with the victory over Sputt Nick Monroe in his matt debut two weeks ago. So that's coverage of Terry Funk's first pro match that woul at least got coverage against put mc monroe and already. The point is that the commonality is being drawn

in the local press between Wahoo McDaniel's career path and Terry Funks. So they're trying he's they're trying to get the people to think of him in the same way as someone that could do equal parts pro football and pro wrestling. I don't know, I don't know if I buy it. We move from August to October of nineteen sixty five, and this hits the Mbillo Globe Times shortly

after what appears to be Funk's match with Wahoo McDaniel. He actually, uh, that'll be coming up at the top of the year, So let me circle back before that article runs, I did want to make note rather that it wouldn't be long before Terry Funk not only was being compared to in similar tones Wahoo McDaniel in the pages of the Amarilla area sports papers, but he'd also step into the ring with Woaho McDaniel as early as January of nineteen sixty

six at the Sports Line in Amarillo. No shit, Harry Funk and Wahoo Daniel going over Ricky Romero and Dorrifunk Junior. That's right, Terry on one side of the ring, Dorry Junior on the other, all the way back in nineteen sixty six, taking place of hitting each other with fucking cow bells and shit two out of three falls for the NWA Southwest States Tag team titles, according to Wrestling Data, very prestigious twenty six minutes of action there.

So Funk not only being talked about in similar terms as Wahoo in the pages of the local papers, but also being put in the ring departner might as well be like the fucking huh Poughkeepsie fucking tag team Championship. Well, I guess I mean what Southwest States at the time, one of the biggest times

I'm sure. I'm sure was prestigious. It is always. It always makes me laugh about, you know, these the crazy amount of titles that were around, you know, for like various and that were very that were so fucking location specific, so regional. Yeah. Yeah, with the exception of the world in the junior heavyweight, NWA didn't really have national title. They

really didn't care what the different areas called their belts. To create local champions and local draws, you had not a world champion, but an area champion. Your heritage, Missouri heritage were of the belt would be and those would be the stepping stones whoever your local champion was as the most likely contender for the world champ when they came through local draws or a local puke. Well more on that as we talk about beyond the mat that's a very good point

coming up soon. So think of the Wahoo McDaniel career path as something that was in mind early for Terry Funk. This hit the paper Emerald, Globe Times October fourteenth, nineteen sixty five, and then here on December nineteen sixty five. It's being written up this way. I'm going to share this one with you, Boss. You can give this one to the people. This is at the very tail end of Terry Funk's West Texas State football career,

before he had really made the transition. And I think it's it's kind of telling because they kind of talk about you can read between the lines here and kind of figure that Terry Funk didn't necessarily deliver on his promise on the gride West Texas. It took him a whole lifetime in college football to have a signature game. He kind of looks a little like Bruno, doesn't he.

Now, Yeah, he definitely does. Senior Terry Funk, the two and thirty pound tackle from Umbarje, has been selected by vote of his teammates and the West Texas State coach of staffa is the most valuable player in the team's final game of the year last Saturday against Texas Western. So there's West Texas State and then Texas Western. You know, think what normal right? Confused

as absolutely? It's like, you know, you can have fucking you know, it was Amherst College, and then you can have a West College in Amerson Hampshire as well. University of Michigan, Michigan State. What's the problem. Oh my god, it's because you weren't a college athlete. I can't appreciate how important these distinctions are. I'm just saying these schools could have done a better job at distinguishing themselves. That's all. Are you now, son?

Did you go to West Texas State or do you go to Texas Western? What's the difference? Oh campus card? Did you just say that? Did you just fucking utter that shit out your mouth? Are you asking to die? The Terry Funk Story, The Bulls dropped a thirty eight to twenty one thriller to the minors. The Funk, one of the key players on the team for the past three years and probably the most influential leader among the

seniors, turned in one of his customary high quality blocking jobs. His name will be the final one on the Buffalo Touchdown Club plaque, which honored at least one player for the outstanding performance in each game on the nineteen sixty five schedule. Others chosen included end not really not not a specific end, just

end end. Yes, it's enough, Butcher, Walter Sheed, linebacker, Dave Gasser, quarterback Hank Washington, cornerback Tom Krapinsky, full back Tom Moody, defensive tackle Mark Allen, center Bill Ouz ut Seleno, tackle George Allen, and halfback Don Dennis and end Roy armand Trout. He's a real names. I don't know what, tell you fucking I know what water sheed ut Seleno, George Allen, Dennis, armand Trout, and Frank are On. Funk are senor senor. So that's the big game for Terry Funk here as

he's wrapping up his career in the West Texas Football Field. Voted MVP towards the end of the season. That's in the talent of sixty five now right around this time, just a couple of days prior to the publication of that article. As a matter of fact, the MRLLO Globe is running with some speculation that, yeah, that old Terry Funk from the West Texas Gridiron may be considering a wrestling career. Here's how it brings. Will Terry Funk start

his pro wrestling career right away? The son of Dory Funk Senior and brother of Dorry Junior, was an outstanding offensive tackle, but he will be one of the top wrestlers right away. He's double tough and aggressive. I asked Dorry Senior what wrestler he would rather have on his side in a street fight. I'd rather have Terry than anyone I can think of right now, said Dorry Senor. I asked who else sin Dorry Senior said that iired Mike DiBiase.

Rest in Peace would be a great one, but I might find myself on the ground after we whipped our opponents. It also notes did you notice where Terry Funk caught a pass for two extra points against Texas Western on a tackle eligible play? Terry played football three years at West Texas State and didn't make a point until his final game. Well, we can't say the same about his wrestling career. He certainly made a point way before the servile match.

Yes, yes he did. Yeah, It was basically noted that, you know, Senior was very protective of Terry and Dorry Junior as well in terms of their earliest matches in pro wrestling. That's part of what Funk was talking about when he said the four year advantage. They really never lost singles matches despite being fresh as a daisy in the business and green as you could be in terms of, you know, in ring experience, and they were usually towards the top of the card and made events so not unlike the Van

Eric boys in terms of presentation. And I mean, were they they were they worthy of that of that kind of atomic push would seem that way, right, I mean, certainly. The problem is that there is no footage I've ever seen of Dorry or Terry working in the sixties. The earliest stuff I've seen in his early seventies, and I believe that's the earliest stuff that exists on video. I don't think you really are able to see complete video

of Terry wrestling in his first five or six years in the business. But certainly it's something that the fans in the territory, the loyal wrestling fans and the territory took to and we're being told in the pages of the newspaper to take very seriously and care about and that's half the battle, you know.

Yeah, And it's very very similar to the Von Eric playbook. And in fact, according to Meltzer, Funk didn't lose his singles match Terry, that is until he ran into the one and only Fritz von Eric wow Etbut in sixty five did Terry Funk mid sixty five, he didn't lose until June sixty six to Fritz Van Eric of course, at the time the biggest star in the state of Texas in the wrestling business. It's hard to say exactly when

Terry Funk's very first match was in the ring. He has a colorful story around the match we've referenced already, and we'll get into more detail of Poud against Sputt. Nick Monroe, of course, was a well traveled star of the sixties and particularly a huge deal in Memphis. But Terry has talked about how there was a match before that, but he can't quite place who was in it. He does remember, though, having worked at least once before

the Sputnik Monroe match that has sort of served as his origin story. I still I find it so and again, you know, I don't have the frame of reference to to really be able to put it, to be able to understand. I can't believe how little or how confusing it is for them to remember where, you know, their first matches and stuff like that. To me, I mean, yeah, I can understand some of them along the way, you know, you kind of forget, but your first match,

how is that not etched in stone in your brain? Right? Yeah? That completely befuddles me. It always has. I also never understand my wrestlers can never tell you when they realized how to work. All these old timers have stories about how they're thrust into the ring with no idea how to actually get through a match. No one explained it, how to work a match. Give me a break. And in some way I can kind of believe that, because they had to spend their years fucking lying about it.

Anyway, I can kind of understand that, But I really can't. I can't fathom that they wouldn't even because even in even in k fabe terms like remembering your first match would be a big deal, I would think so,

and exactly who it was. Most records have the first match December ninth, nineteen sixty five, Amarillo, right, as, of course, the college football season would have been ending, as intimated by those articles we just read, and Meltzer noted he actually had done one or two matches in the days before his quote unquote debut in smaller cities in the territory, with his first

match in Brownfield, Texas against Jim red Osbourne. That is, in fact, the first match listed for Terry Funk and Wrestling Data dot Com December sixth, nineteen sixty five, Civic Center, Brownfield, Texas read Osbourne versus Terry Funk went or unknown. But in shoot interviews he's talked about another match that he distinctly remembers as his first one. He told our video, I had

a warm up match that nobody knew about. It was in Clovis, New mex and it was myself and I'm trying to think of the name, but it was Kane Noble and Jack Kane against myself and a little bitly short girl that wrestled all the time. I can't remember what her name was out of Kansas City, and he fails to call up the name, but he remembers that being his first match, and he says it was just me getting used to the crowd and everything, just because it was a small town. But

then I had two nights later a match in Amarillo. My first match there. It was against put Nick Monroe, and that was my first advertised match, that taking place December ninth of nineteen sixty five at the Sports Arena in Amarilla and certainly got some attention to the local press. This from December third, nineteen sixty five, who said Jake Smith was tough, asked diyed Mike

Dibiassi with a big laugh, how does he look now? Mike and his manager Jack Kine that just worked over the Forrner Pound Kentucky and Thursday night at the Sports Arena, Kane was supposed to be handcuffed to Luke Brown, Jake's partner, Kane, slipped the cuffs on Brown and slipped through the ropes. Kane and DiBiase slugged Smith until referee Jene Guleay forfeited the match. Jack Donovan and Ivan Verpo to be the future of Pampero. Verpo failed in their bid

to the North American Tank Tam Championships from Dorrifunk Junior and Ricky Romero. How does anyone expect me to win with a partner like Ferpo Aske Donovan I even as a good fellow, but he's just stupid. Jack won the first fall with the press on Dorry Junior in five eight forty rather a Funk took the second with a spinning to hold on Furpo in four to fifty one, and

Romero Pindonovan with a press at nine fifteen. Brown came out with the victory in the semi final over Tokyo Tom with a bear hug in ten seventeen. Doug gilbertio Tom, Tokyo Tom Okay. I'm sure that was a perfectly fine gimmick. Yeah, that would be appropriate today and not the least bit offensive. Nope, not at all. I can definitely see that getting over pretty well. Doug Gilbert, who is not that Doug Gilbert, of course, this being the sixties, that is to say, the brother of Eddie Gilbert

was. It was a wrestled by the name of the professional, the pro, Doug Gilbert. He also worked under a mask as the professional and has no relation to that family. Stop the law man that to be Don Slattin, who we talked about back in the World Class Days with the Press and the opener. At thirteen twenty five, and we're getting close here, an injury caused Tosey Lothario Reads to forfeit his match against Jane Gula and last paragraph

here the first reference Terry Funk was introduced. It says the son of Dorry Senior and brother of Dorry Junior, may start his professional wrestling career next Thursday night. Wow. So there was an event apparently where Terry was just unveiled

to the crowd December second, nineteen sixty five. I take it according to this article where he didn't actually wrestle, but he was sort of unveiled, and we got a flavor from the local press coverage of his final days at West Texas State that certainly wouldn't have come to a surprise to close followers.

Evolve things Funk at the time. Then we hit December eighth, nineteen sixty five in Themeral Globe Times, Matt Duo claims, new surprise, We have another big surprise and store for Luke Brown and Jack Smith, says Iron mac DeBiase. So they go more into that feud involving Iron mcdibiassi, of course before his untimely death that we talked about in our last episode of The Lapsed Funk. Yeah, and further down the article, it reads, Terry Funk

goes against Sputt mc monroe in his wrestling debut. In the other main event, the semifinal will have Dorriy Funk Junior, Ricky Romero and Jose Lathario facing Jack Donovan, Ivan Furpo and Tokyo Tom. So there you have it. It's promoted in the paper as his debut match makes a ton of sense why he would be remembered as such, and this is an interesting match for Terry

to say the very least. Spotnik was a guy who was a well traveled veteran and a well established star, and certainly was a really big gesture from Dorriyfunk Senior to put his young son in his first match before the people,

for all intents and purposes, in there against a veteran like that. Trying to think what the equivalent might be today would kind of be like debuting someone debuting like Vince McMahon's son or Shane McMahon's son against HM the Miz in his first match, or yeah, yeah, maybe a higher chier than that, maybe, like a is there a higher chier now? I don't even know. I don't know this business, gunter. Maybe Ah, there we goout the undefeated streak. So we turned now to Tory Funk's interview with k FAB

Commentaries, where he reflects upon this formative experience against Sputnik. It was against Sputnik Monroe, and that was my advertised first match was against Sputnik, and I was in the ring and it was completely insane. Oh in his own lovely way. Yeah, and he go ahead and he is telling me in the ring here you know, it's uh, you're doing good, kid. Just lay there, kid, stay down, kid, just a little bit

longer, kid. I was in a ten minute match, you know, and now the minutes are running by, you know, So now it's about six or seven minutes going by, and I've looked like a I don't know, I looked pretty bad. You know. I wasn't doing a damn thing, but just laying there like you stay there, a kid, you're doing Did you ever get back up? Did you ever get back up? Oh? Yeah, I sure did you know when I got back up? When

you beat him? No? No, Well, my old man came down there any games, came down in the ring, and he hollered at me, God, damn it, get up off your ass. Now you're making family look bad. Yeah. Blow my I fired I fired up and went like a maniac for the last two minutes. But that was a true story

there about him and there so wow. Interesting. I can't tell if this is a spot where the old man runs out and gets his young son fired up to make the comeback, and that's a spot or if Terry is not not doing what it takes to earn the respect of spotnefun Road to looks strong in the ring, you know, right, you have to give it back if they're going to give it to you stiff, right, you gotta come

back right right. And it seems like it's more frustration from Dorry Funk Senior here that his son is looking weak and he doesn't really have the instinct yet to fight back. The way Terry Funk describes it in his book might provide a little bit more illumination. He wrote, Spuck was a great heel, but he didn't feel like giving too much to a kid having his first match. And see again with Terry can never tell is he working here? You know what I mean? Is he like, is he trying? Was Sputnik

really giving it giving a hard time? Or was it just the world may never know. Yeah, he led the match, and every time I started to look strong, he would say, okay, kid, that's good. Now let's get back down on the mat and I'll get this hold back on you. Also, I was gassed, just exhausted early in the match from nerves. In fact, my nose started bleeding. I was doing everything he said, and he was guzzling me until my dad ran down a ringside.

My father yelled, goddamn you, you son of a bitch. You're letting him meet your ass up, Get up off your goddamn ass and do something, or I'll beat your ass. I heard that. I jumped up. Stop button, Stop letting him meet your ass? The fuck do you think this is? I want ahead and told him I love it. I love rim jobs. Dad, I don't see the problem. You know that's a you got a kfe that shit, son. We're not shooting bor At here,

my shooting boor At. But I'm fucking bored and watching you. Right, we're not shooting bor At, but I'm bored at shooting or what a what appears to be shooting before my eyes? You piece as shit. And I heard that I want ahead, drummed up, hit some moves quickly and pinned Sputnik. But Dad had some more choice words for me when I got

back to the locker room. I was this match covered December tenth, nineteen sixty five, Membrello Globe Times. Of course, they were talking like it was a big deal that he was going to make the debut in the first place. Of course they covered it Terry Funk wednesdaybut as grappler, don't give that kid too much credit. He was just lucky. He hopped me before I was ready. Those were the words of sput Nick Monroe after he lost

to Terry Funk Thursday night at the Sports Arena. It was the professional wrestling debut for Terry, who just finished his football career at West Texas State. The veteran Monroe kept kicking the ropes and wouldn't let Terry in the ring. Rufferey Leonard Miller pushed Sputnik away. Terry jumped in the ring and pinned his

foe with a double leg lock in ten seconds. Now you tell me why the newspaper would have recorded the Terry Funk's debut match was over in ten seconds, and Funk would never have mentioned that in his retelling of this story of this match. Terry, we love you, but I think the further we go in the lapsed Funk, the one thing that's going to echo is Dusty Rhodes in that shoot interview one time saying Terry is a worker. He's a worker, he will work you. The article continues, Monroe begged for five

more minutes with Terry. It also says that the ten second finish was a new record for the Sports Arena. Monroe begged for five more minutes with Terry, who agreed to ten more minutes. Neither one had a fall, so Terry came out with a victory. The crowd, including the Buffalo squad, gave Terry a standing ovation when he entered the ring and left Bill Cross nineteen fifty West Texas State. A little All America fullback also was introduced. It

isn't known when Terry will be at the Sports Arena again. He is booked in Kansas City and several other places over the country, even from day one. That's right, that's the way it goes, funk on the road, being booked outside of even the Ambillo territory proper, getting that early introduction to a multi territorial circuit. And we'll get into that this all was to set

up. This is why I'm a little skeptical about whether the whole scene that Terry describes of his father throwing a fit at his lack of offense in the match was a work because they come back in the paper and talk about how Daddy's going to get revenge for young Terry. I mean, maybe maybe it didn't happen in the ring, maybe it'd happen, and maybe maybe it happened backstage. Maybe what happened backstage, you stupid piece of ship. You're a

fucking loser. Your shit sucks. You didn't show any fire out there, Terry, How the people want to believe in the name. You want to know what I saw out there, you stupid fuck. All I saw was my son on the mat with another man and his face deep in his ass eating ass. You just Terry, he was eating your ass. Dad? Did you see the same match I did? I really don't know if John needed to see and I saw him eating your ass, piece of shit,

just meant something different back then. December sixteen sixty five in Melo Globe Time, Senior gets shut at Monroe. Dori Funk Senior is so anxious to meet spute Nick Monroe that he is paying his expenses from Alexandria, Louisiana as they clash in the second main event Thursday night at the Sports Arena. The offer came after Monroe slugged Terry Funk a few times last week in Terry's debut.

I didn't expect any special favors for Terry. But I didn't think anyone would do things like that to a young man just starting out at a Dori SR. I don't even think ironed Mike Debiassi would have done anything like that. Let's see what happens when Monroe pulls that stuff on me. Work alert. Terry went ahead and not chewed out nonetheless in his uh in his first match. So all right, maybe dor maybe Dorry is is a source of truth. Maybe is that? Is that asking too much? Do you think?

Uh? It depends on the story. I'm willing to believe it or not. Yeah, And that's a that's often a very wide open question. I'm trying to remember if he even addresses it. Actually, I shouldn't have telegraphed that if I don't know for sure. Let's see anything here about the fine spot, Nick Monroe, Dory, Dorrance Dorrance, This collection of just completely Dorance Junior, Dunk, Dunk or tink. Oh Hi, I'm Dunk. You'll see the hair at the back of my how my name is Dunk.

So the hair is at the back of my head. And I'm gonna book the territory in such a way that I think Terry's gonna gonna count well for himself. One thing we can know, of course, for sure, whether the spinning toe hold will win in forty five twelve or in sixty five minutes in overtime. Can I ask you a serious question? Have you ever not woken up from a nap? Have you ever? Can I ask you a serious cause you're turned around and walked into a broom closet and thinking it was

the door. I've heard like three different wrestlers tell the story. Dusty says he did it in front of him. A Dusty Wolf said he did it in front of him. Just turn around and walk through a closet door instead of the hallway door. And Todd Gordon in his new book describes Dory doing the silent cowboy routine where he just shows up at a building that he's not even necessarily wrestling on. It just says nothing the whole time. Can I cask you s Can I ask you serious question? Have you ever eaten a

broom handle like a hot dog? I can't say I have. Oh well, not just something you might want to try. Also might not be something I want to try. There's that so fulks work in the circuit now December eleventh, Herford against Jack Caine. December thirteenth, Abilene against Von Ferpo the

Future Pimpero Ferbo the Wild Bowl of the Pampas. Thank you very much, Yes, December fifteen sixty five and Lubbock at the Fair Park, callus see him for what I think is the very first time Dory Funk, Dory Funk Junior and Terry Funk all team up for six man tagg against Diving Furbo, Jack Donovan and Tokyo tom So. Early on, not only was Terry getting spotlighted in prominent matches and getting a lot of hype about his being introduced in

coverage of his debut match, but the legend himself is standing shoulder to shoulder with the boys in the ring tag matches. That must have been something to see. I bet it was. I mean, Jesus, that's that's fucking wild. So Van Eric Vibes even further contelled that I'm starting to think that Fritz basically saw what Dory was doing with his kids and just copied it. Honestly, my sons are much better looking. These guys looked like like fucking

wide ships. I got my boys, my boys are good looking Texas pure bread. My boys are good looking in Texas. That's good. Remember when he said Christmas best, it'll be your Christmas best. That you be wearing your Christmas best. Yes you are. So we can all throw the football after a turkey dinner, after we've we gotta go outside of the yard throw around like we're like, we're a family. So what meanwhile, dorries like, but the same exact menacing look. But he said, and you did,

you wouldn't. I want to what do the friends do? Get the fucking ball. Get the goddamn ball. Get the fucking ball outside so you can throw it around. I can throw to your fucking faces. Nice guy, stands still right now, Terry, you stand there, Dunk, you stand the fuck over there, Phil, thanks the fucking bee. Dorry, you fucking grab this ball, or if you grab this ball, I'm gonna beat the ship out of you. Now. I'm gonna hit you in the face and you're gonna take it like a fucking man. Okay, Dad spot

Nick does this to you. However, you don't take it, you fight back and dunk, you piece of ship. I'll see you over there. I'll see what you're doing. You get touch the fucking beehive right now. Put your hand on the goddamn bee hive, and Terry and here comes a gander. Oh no, wait, that's sorry, that's the Chikh. I meant a Michigan. There we go. So, like I said, it's it's remarkable how quickly Dorry Senior dispatches his sons to work in other territories.

It's instantaneous. We sort of remember this playbook from the Fritz van Eric days. The Van Eric boys as big as they were in Dallas, and they were big, and they had to make the town every week. Fritz made damn sure to get those boys out the Saint Louis. Remember, Yeah, some of those earliest breakthrough matches are the van Erics accounting extremely well for themselves against the likes of Harley Race and other standouts and institutions in the Saint Louis

rings. And that is certainly the playbook here for Dorri Senior. As soon as December sixteenth and sixty five, so just weeks after his debut, Terry Funk is already in Kansas City at Memorial Hall wrestling against Chris Belchis. According to Wrestling Data Wow. He then shoots up to Minneapolis for the first time December eighteenth, sixty five to wrestle Guy Taylor at the Convention Hall in Minneapolis for the AWA. So Terry is already getting his miles in early and often,

damn right. But it's not accurate to say that professional football was completely in Terry Funk's rear view mirror or completely out of his zone of consideration. He's still very much a kid wrestling after the football season is over. Wow, he's getting seasoned, but yeah, still entertaining football offers. As he writes in this book, I had a few matches under my belt when I had some talks with Bud Grant about playing pro ball in Winnipeg for the Canadian

League. They offered me a contract paying twelve thousand dollars a year. I also went to work with vern Gania and the AWA up there. I got an AWA television and in my first match there had Dennis Stamp as a partner against Larry Henning and Hartley Race. Well, they knew my father and liked us. We went out there and those guys made me look like a million

dollars. He was booked for once. Absolutely, he was booked. He learned all about Dennis Stamp and the remarkable Beyond the Cinemat episode of Under the Beyond the Sign, Under the Cinemata Beyond the Match, Thank you very much. I knew that was destined to happen. And this is where Terry Funk

meets Dennis Stamp, because it's always weird. It's like, Dennis Stamp is associated as a Texas guy, but he's clearly from the Midwest, right, Oh yeah, it's from Minnesota, we know, as we as we know, And it's like, how does he get how does he get to Amarillo? Terry go to him and that that's exactly what happened. And his first month in the business, Terry goes up to the AWA to work some shots and meets meets Dennis Stamp and gets to work with the likes of Larry Heading

and Harley Race. So he's already wrestled Sputneckunroe, Harley Race, and Larry Hendig in his first like two weeks in the business. Wait is yeah, just not you know, your typical low rent affair. Indeed, wow problem this from Dennis Stamp's book, which you turned me on to boss. Thank you for that. Yeah, the Stamp collection. That's what he called this book. I don't know what to say about it, but that's what he called this book. I was trained as a pro by Verne Gania and Billy

Robinson. Dennis writes Billy was considered the toughest man in the world. He was. He literally beat me up every day. After a few weeks, I realized with fear of a beating was worse than the beating itself, so he beat most of the fear out of me. I soon found out that everyone is afraid. By not being afraid, I got a reputation for being a tough guy. And since I didn't believe the songs the bosses would sing to me, I got tagged with a bad attitude. Everything I said was

magnified and misquoted. I love how fucking saucy this guy is. Oh yeah, I mean he's so fucking pissy. Yeah he and he jumps up and down at a trampoline and beyond the mat in underwear, right like a normal person. Yes, you're sixty years old, speedos. But he's waiting for a call with many weights in his hand. Yeah, he's waiting for the

call. I mean, this is the guy. This is He's kind of like the last vestige of what would become the Amarillo territory as far as I still living in the city, still associated with that era of the city, didn't move on or pass away. And here he is becoming acquainted with Terry Funk. So there he is getting trained by obviously stalwarts. And I've always had a lot to say. At that time, I'd had between twelve hundred and fifteen hundred matches. I was really at home in the ring. He

wrote. My ring character was an arrogant heel, a vicious, violent villain. I was a slow walking, slect talking, cocky bad guy. I was trying to make a name for myself in West Texas. It was the backyard of the Funk Brothers, both world champions. When I was asked to do the match, I didn't hesitate, absolutely, I said. Then Verne sent me to Denver to wrestle Butch Levy Okay. I came to Ambarillo over thirty years ago as a professional wrestler when I was no longer booked. He

definitely owns that phrase. Oh he loves that, Yeah, leans into it. I started my own business. I owned and ran a pest control company which he still does to this day. I think or a tree company something like that, out of Darth anymore he's dead. But oh well, yeah he did until in peace, Dennis, that's true. One day, while spraying a house, I noticed a young boy about eight years old, lying on the couch. I knew he was a school day for conversation, I

asked his mother, is he sick? Yes? His mother told me Breck has malignant brain tumors and the doctors have given him thirty days. Wow, I thought to myself, I've always got to open my big mouth. As I walked through the boys bedroom, I saw a wrestling poster on the wall. Okay, I thought, I can talk about wrestling. After I finished spraying, I went back to the mother. I see your son as a wrestling fan, wanting to change the subject, Yes, she answered, he

loves wrestling. Terry Funk is his favorite. In fact, meeting Terry is on the top of his make a wish list. Do you know Terry? She asked? Sure, I came back. I wrestled Terry five times when he was world champion. I never missed a chance to brag about that. Well, she tells me. As I'm leaving I have a friend who has Terry's phone number. Okay, I replied, if you can get a hold of him, give me. If you can't get a hold of him, give me a call. I hadn't talked to Terry for a few months,

but we've always had each other's phone number. I wouldn't give it out, but I would call him sure enough. Beck's Rerex's mother called the next day. The doctors had downgraded her son from thirty days to day to day and she couldn't get Terry's phone number. I called Terry and he answered the phone. I explained the situation and how much this boy Breck wanted to meet him. Yes, I will, Terry said, can you go tomorrow? I

asked yes. He said, if you go with me? Since I don't know those people, I don't want to get rolled up, Dennis, Aha, brother, what what? No Terry wants to get rolled up? I called the mother to let her know Breck is so weak he'd hardly hold his head up off the pillow, was all she said. Brecked, yeah, he's so weak, like figuratively in a literary sense postmodern sense, is weak in a postmodern sense, he's weak to weak we'll be there tomorrow, I

assured her. Terry and I met and went to Breck's house. I went up to the door first, I knocked, and the mother came to the door. It's Terry, she said loudly. Now I could see Breck. Terry funk. He screamed, and he jumped off the couch. Our visit lasted about an hour. We talked and laughed. At one point we moved the coffee table and got down on the floor to demonstrate a few holds. There's one thing you need to know about the Funks is they will move the

furniture and they will demonstrate holds on the carpet. Why not. I would do the same thing every single time, without exception, and it would cost them. As we'll get to Brec balled up a fist to show us how he would do it. Terry showed more character. He hasked Breck if he would be his tag team partner. What does that mean? Breck asked, It means I'll have your back, Terry told him. Breck paused and got a strange smile on his face. Does that mean I'll have your back too?

He asked? Sure does? Terry replied, Now, Terry didn't go there empty handed. He had a poster of himself and a T shirt. He signed them to Breck. As we were leaving the house, Terry said to Brek. Remember now we're tag team partners. I know, said Breck, and I've got your back. As we drove away from the house, we were both quiet. I can't believe how tough that boy is. Terry finally said, yeah, was all I could say. We didn't talk about

the visit anymore. About a year later, I ran into Breck's mother. We almost did a double knockout. We recognized each other immediately and hugged Dennis. She said, I want to thank you so much for all you did for my son. It was Terry, I said, yes. She said, but you brought him to us. Well, how do things turn out? I asked. Breck lived for two weeks after your visit. He wore the T shirt every day. He only took it off to wash it, and then he would lay in the dryer until it was dry. He had

to go to hospice for his last two days. Uh me the only way Breck would agree to go, as if he could take it the poster with him of Terry Funk. We buried him with Terry's poster, she said, starting to tear up. God bless you and Terry, she said, and she walked away. Some years later, I was diagnosed with cancer. I had gone to the hospital with heart failure. My heart actually stopped twice. In the emergency room, the doctors discovered cancer. I had fourth stage,

fast growing lymphoma. There was no fifth stage. I even heard the word hospice used in one of their discussions. It was like being blocked in a corner. My heart didn't get me, then the cancer would. The next day was hectic, nurses, doctors, aides, specialists in and out of my room, and a long list of family and friends, many coming by to say goodbye. I didn't have time to think, let alone worry. By eleven o'clock that night, they were all gone. Now I was alone.

There was a soft knock on my door. Who could that be, I wondered. He stepped inside the door. It was Terry. It was Terry Funk. I was blown away with him. He brought forty years of friendship as professional wrestlers. That's at least two lifetimes. That visit was the best medicine I could have gotten. We were after all right, say that part againrofessional wrestlers. That's at least two lifetimes before that. The whole thing

there with him, he brought forty years of friendship as professional wrestlers. That's at least two lifetimes. That visit sounds like Fritz von Eric speaking. I mean, did you, Dennis, did you live two thousand years in those forty It's Texas time, right, Ah, that's what it means to live on Texas time. Everyone fucking lives, and they lived for fucking dog years there. Basically what there's essentially Yeah, all right, I had thought of

it that way, but that's basically what it is. That visit was the best medicine I could have gotten. We laughed for three solid hours. Terry hadn't come to say goodbye. He'd come to let me know he had my back and reminded me who I was a wrestler. As Terry was leaving, I saw him. I saw Brec. He was sitting on Terry's shoulder. He was smiling, he seemed so happy. Then it hit me. I got chills, goosebumps all over my body. It was Breck. I had

taken Terry to Breck when he needed him the most. So Breck brought Terry to me when I needed him so badly. I finished the story where I started Terry and Brack tag team partners forever. I know. I'm living proof. So Terry Funk crosses paths in the first month of his career with Dennis Stamp, and as a result, we get stories like that, and we get him bouncing in underwear on the trampoline and beyond the man. I need you to be there, Dennis. I need you to be there, Dennis.

I want you to be there. I want you to referee the match. I want you to referee. I need you to be there. I'm not booked. I'm not booked, but Terry, I'm not booked, Terry, I can't referee if I'm not booked in a polo. Such a bitch, Such a fucking He drove down there, like in between like jobs to argue with Terry outside of the sports arena. Like the fucking fact that the reason that he can't like Dennis, he's trying to book you. Now,

do you see? Yes, it doesn't count. You weren't booked five minutes ago, but now he wants to book you. So can't you. He's trying to pretend that he since made other commitments, right, which is total bullshit. He basically wants Terry to bang him to do the show, and Terry, being the guy he is, does yeah. Yeah, but some tender moments shared between Dennis Stamp and Terry Funk, so that wasn't all just

a put on for the cameras on beyond the mat there is demonstrated. And so even though the press covered his first match against Sputnick Monroe as you know, sort of like a quick triumph and then some underhanded moves from Sputnet causing Dory Senior to seek revenge, according to Terry in his book, he did

not bounce back seamlessly from that first outing before the Moilla Faithful. He writes, I got so depressed about the match that I went right up to the hotel and went to bed after having a couple of beers with another wrestler, Salento what Rodriguez. When I left Dan Maillo, my father told me, now, Terry, I don't want you going and getting goofy ass drunk up there. I want you to mind your p's and q's. You're working for

vern and I want you to act like a businessman. Well, this was the night he decided to check up on me and he called my room. Unfortunately, Cilento and I got our rooms mixed up. I ended up sleeping in his room and he ended up sleeping in my room even more Unfortunately, Selina Rodriguez couldn't talk. He was deaf. He could feel the phone vibrate though. He reached for the phone and finally got it, and he said, hey, hey, my father said, Terry, run mom bah Terry.

Cilento hung up brother and old on the nose to call this mock guys. Solento, by the way, and my old man was hot at me the next time he saw me. The first thing he said, but it's god, damn it. I told you not to get drunk. You act like a nut, and then you hang up on me. I explained it, and he finally believed it wasn't me who hung up on him. The football deal didn't work out, though, I don't believe. I don't believe. I want to tell you that I believe, but I don't believe you.

You're a piece of shit. I regret hal and use a son wow time. I you know, I regret at having you as a son, when you were bored the day you were born. I said, this is a mistake, and I meant it, and I mean it now. I'm gonna get you. Terry Funk. He calls him Terry Funk, and he says, by the way, just to be specific, I'm going to get

you like he's four years old. So yeah, that's the reason he's up there, not only just to get that experience this season, but because this guy in Winnipeg wanted to give Terry Funk a look for the CFL team Winnipeg, of course part of the a WA territory. Two birds with one stone, that's right. Funk gets up there, make some connections, works of experienced opponents, get to meet Dennis Stamp, tries to go out for the team, and as he says here, the football deal didn't work out,

and I assume came back home. So by the end of nineteen sixty five, Terry Funk's football ambitions are now extinguished. He just wasn't going to be able to make a run for it in Winnipeg and it's now full time to the wrastling business comes back. In the December twenty first of nineteen sixty five. He's in Odessa and it's him and Bob Geigel against pardon me, it's Terry Funk and Ricky Romero against Doug Gilbert, the aforementioned professional Doug Gilbert and

Bob Geigel. There's a show in Lubbock where Dory and Terry team up for I think the very first time to defeat Renegoule and Doug Gilbert. There's a December twenty third show at the Sports Arena and Amilla where Wahoo and Terry Funk team up to beat Mike Dibiasei and Jack Caine. And a show the day after Christmas of nineteen sixty five and Albuquerque where Funk defeats a wrestler by the

name of the Shadow. So I do invite you to just consider Christmas time in the territory, right, I mean, indeed, I don't know about you, but that's not a small thing, not a small thing at all. To go to the matches for tickets you got for Christmas under your heap's this Christmas tree, and to see Terry and Dorry team up for the first time these new young Actually, Daddy, we only go see Terry Funk. Daddy, We're gonna go see Terry Funk. Yay, this is the best

Christmas I ever had? Uh? Brother, what do you mean this is the best? What? Why would he be involved? Why would he be involved? But it's a good is it? What do you did, Brent get those tickets? Due if Dennis Brent get those tickets? But did you get God? Listen, I don't mean to I'm gonna try to try. I'm not trying to, you know, take away from you know, your holiday magic, dude, But I want to where'd you get those tickets? Brother? Yeah? You did you call cal far least? Dude? You

brother? He doesn't like Caliley at cal Farley makes them nervous. So so Terry's now, you know, something akin to a local celebrity, you know, the the college football stand out and a crazy football crazed part of the country like West Texas. It's definitely gonna work out for him. Got those handsome football pictures you probably have seen him. I think they showed a couple

of them, and WW did the tribute video to Terry Funk. They put a few of those in there and apropos of his you know, local stardom. Is this article that I just sent to you if you could convey it to the solar system Boss. This ran December twenty seventh, nineteen sixty five. So after Funk had certainly had his go in the rings of the Amberilla

Territory, he's already getting endorsements with this bit of advertorial. Here. Yeah, our fine, our fine friends at Natural Food Center interviewed Terry Funk in the pages of the Ambie Little Clock Times. That face it was like a cartoon character, babyface. He's not he's He's as all American looking as it gets. In a recent interview, young athlete Terry Funk told of the marvelous benefits he received while taking Hoffman's Enerjall or Energy Enerjall, straight out of the

Dina powder category. Seriously, I'll take ener jall to improve my wind and especially when I break it in my stamina, said Darry, who made quite a record for himself. I had left tackle for the West Texas State University football team. I simply could not have done it done as well in either football or wrestling if I had not taken ergall. There's always there's always some fucking guy with like two hundred thousand containers of product inventory at his garage.

Looking to sign like a wrestler to push the sucking powder. I gotta get it out of my fucking garage. The winner's coming, and I think this is probably as appropriate place as any on the lapsed funk to remind you that definitely not in that category. Our fucking friends at Titan Nutrition, thank you right. You're very proud to bringing the lapsed funk and everything we do here at TLF. Very excited to announce that Tight Nutrition offers a full line of

expertly formulated nutritional products to help you achieve your health and fitness goals. Around this time of year, many people plan to get moving and work off some of the inches that they may be accumulating. You don't want to go into the holiday season too, and gorged one product that can not only help you burn off those success calories, but give you the metal boost you need to move your body as Titans powdered White Loss Formula end Light. Okay, we're

talking a great tasting drink. Increases your atabolic rate so you burn more calories and the gym in at rest and it contains healthy fiber great for gut health, helps keep cravings away between meals. Plenty of caffeine to substitute your coffee and light is also designed to help you focus, lifting your mood and productivity. Comes in six amazing flavors that can be easily mixed and taken on the

go. So get right heading into the holidays. Find it at tight nutrition dot net and you got to use the promo code lapsed, not just to let them know we sent you and that it pays to smile upon TLF, but also to get yourself ten percent off your purchase and free shipping as well. So that's Titan Nutrition. Yes, in fact, a company called Titan Nutrition fell into our lapse. That's just the way things go around here. But I believe that the way to be Titan is to do Titan, and

so do Tighten at tightnutrition dot net. Tons of different products to choose from, pre workouts and the like. Make sure again to use the promo code lapsed check out to receive ten percent off your purchase and free shipping. Again tight nutrition dot Net promo code let them know we sent you. But again get back to energol, which is definitely not in this category, not at all. What is energol? It is a what is it? In sixty five idiot. It is a germ oil concentrate taken from wheat germ oil,

soy oil, and rice germ oil. Each table spoonful contains four thousand units of vitamin A, four hundred units of vitamin D, three hundred units of affordable housing, and sixty milligrams of vitamin E. If you are lacking in physical vigor, it is evident. If you are lacking in physical vigor, it is evident that something that is wrong. What there's something could be a nutritional factor. Hoffman's Enerjawl is rich and the nutrients essential to increase in strength

and endurance. Terry Funk suggests, why don't you try ergall whether you whether you be a high school student, a plumber, or a grandmother, I believe you lock it. Keeping fit does not apply to just just to athletes. It applies to everybody. Ergall no listall Energawl comes in either liquid or capsule form. Come by Natural Food Center one nineteen with tenth today and see missus w a riddle what gene lay or Mickey russells this is w a riddle

for the ass. So if I buy a nutritional product from Wa riddle, I think it's it's kind of my fault if it's a if it's a bullshit product. Yeah, yeah, I think it's your fault if you wake up dead the next morning. So Terry Funk at big enough deal to get local health changed to want to put words in his mouth. That's saying something. You know what also happened in nineteen sixty five that will prove to be very

important to our journey here in the Lapsed Funk. What out in Bloomington, Indiana, only two hundred miles south of Hammond, where Terry Funk was born and where his family was rooted before going to Texas June seventh, to be particular, in nineteen sixty five, as Terry Funk was wrapping up his college football career and eyeing in the Ring, a gentleman was born by the name of Michael Francis Foley. Mmmm, I mean to Indiana. Of course,

he would be reared in Long Island. But let's just say, folks here, Lapsed Funk filed that one away as a bit of poetry that as Terry Funk enters the Ring for the first time, that very same year mcfoley comes into the world. That's interesting, I would suggest that these two narratives will unfold in parallel and then once they intersect, they will never unintersect. Between Funk and Foley. Also born are his daughters around this point in time.

In nineteen sixty seven, Vicky Funk, Terry's wife, gives birth to Stacy Funk, recalling in his book, I took one look at this little thing and knew my life was never going to be the same again. Four years later, my life changed again when my daughter Brandy was born. And further illustrative of the Funk's standing in the community, the birthday party of Stacy Funk in nineteen seventy What actually warranted news coverage in the local paper? Did it?

Really? Stacy Funk, daughter of mister and Missus Terry Funk, was honored recently on her third birthday. A party with a ballerina theme was held in the Funk home September tenth. Those attending were Shannon and sk gilland Tude and David Manley, Patrick Tinsley, Denise Hood, Gina Uzzolino. Hey, that must be the Zellino's from the West Texas team. I guess, yeah, it must be Laura and Alena cosib Dink Penny and Dirk Funk and their

parents. Also attending were mister and missus Harry Lee of Amarilla and mister missus brother d R. Weaver of Canyon. Wait. Wait, they didn't say They said Dink Funk, but they didn't say Dory Funk Junior. They said Dink. They called him his and his parents. Yes, Wow, Dink. That's of Stacey Funk's third birthday party Warren's news coverage, and so does

her fourth. Wow. It's Stacy Funk, the daughter of mister and Missus Terry Funk, celebrated her fourth birthday Saturday with a birthday party at her home near Canyon. Guests included Missus Vernon cossib Lena and Laura, Tony and Jeff James, Missus Virgil Dotson and Willie Weaver, all of Herford attending from Mamilla, where Missus Bill Uzzollino and Gina, Missus Larry Patterson and Page Missus Dorry Funk. There it is Dink, Penny and Dirk. So I guess Dink

is somebody else? I can't No, Dink is the sun? Think is the sun? Mister and Missus v A. I mean, like that's what I'm like, I don't understand why they don't mention. I mean, I know they mentioned Dorry Funk this time, but why didn't they mention do they said in his parents? I don't know dink Funk and his parents like Dory Funk's notable, and thenk Kenyon guests as well. I mean, I just I could now, I cannot conceive living in a world where a child's third

and fourth birthday party is notable enough to be carried in the press. I've never seen that before. No, I've seen, you know, small weddings, you know, like times and occasions people will have, like you know, fancy parties be covered in the society pages of old ass newspapers, and you know, things like that being made to be news, or that somebody went on vacation for two weeks can be in the newspaper if you go back far enough. But I've never seen a kid's third and fourth birthday party warn't

ink before. That's a new one to me. We were driving around and realized that the Smiths weren't home for two weeks. Apparently they went on vacation. That's right, the Smiths are not home at their address. Now you run the article after they come back. Oh to be clear, but yes, you can make a good point. Stacy Funk goes on to remain well covered in the pages of Amberilla era newspapers. Area newspapers, I should say, is the eighties dawn here In nineteen eighty one, she goes ahead and

wins the State Fourah All State Horse Show in Waco. Stacy Funk, the daughter of Terry and Vicki Funk, won All State pole bender excuse me at the four Age All State Horse Show and Waco last weekend. I think this is the one. This is I think this is the one, not the one who gets married and beyond the map, but the other one. I think, oh, Stacey. Of course Terry attends his daughter's wedding is part

of that movie. She competed in a field of eighty contestants. Winning the first place position qualified her to compete at the next four h race show and Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Stacy's sister Brandy, also attended the show in Waco. Funk says in his book, one thing that didn't happen too often except then Maillo, but was always a thrill for me, was when all three wrestling funks. Senior, Junior, and me would wrestle together. Dad still

wrestled periodically, and when he did it was automatic box office. It was tough working with my father because you always knew who was in charge. Still, it was a real pleasure, not just because he was my father, but because I got to be in there with someone who had such a great sense of the people in the audience. He had great ring psychology. I can't remember him ever having the same match twice, and my brother and I

both learned from him. As many times as Junior and Jack Briscow wrestled for the world title, I don't think they ever had the same match twice, and I have never had the same match twice. I think that's because of Dad Boss. We're going to fire up kind of our first bit of match

footage. Now, okay, that's part of the lapsed funk. Now, this is kind of curious case because this is footage included in a documentary we referenced last time we were with you on Houston Wrestling, featuring extensive interviews with Paul Bosch, and we sampled that to give a taste of how Paul bosh rather well phrase what it meant to be Texas wrestling, what the Texas style

was about? Oh God, why does this do this? And so I'd ask you to turn your attention to nine thirty three of the file and you can find it too out there on YouTube. It's called Friday Night in the Coliseum. It came out in nineteen seventy two. Now, what I don't know is precisely when the matches that are shown in the documentary happened. I like to think. I like to tell myself that this is one the one example we're going to find of Terry working both with his dad on video and

also in black and white. I'd like to think this is a glimpse at how Terry worked in the sixties. I'm not sure of this, but I think it's a fair assessment. I see a guy who looks like Coach from Cheers. That would be Paul Bosch, sitting in his office, the Houston Wrestling office, talking to the documentarian. But we're about to quickly shift over to match footage here in a moment. So if we hit a play on one, here we go, yep, and you two at home. Nine

minutes thirty three seconds is the queue three two one there's Story Senior. Look at him phone, look at him. God, oh, she is not happy getting scream down. Look at her. So that's that's Fred Curry. That's wild bull Curry rather slugging. And there's Terry. Look at him. Look at him. He's dressed like a goof like he does, takes a right hand, falls to his knees of convulsist. Dory. Funk Senior has Dory on the back of his jacket. That's Paul Bosh pulling him. This

is the Houston Coliseum. And look at Terry. Look at Terry, raise hat, look at his look at him his look at him. He's fucking He gets hit with one shot and he's like doing he's sounding like Sean Michael's his whole COVID and get him go in the chaps in the leather vest. Getting right here. Paul Bosh kicks his leg from behind. The body language is already there for the Funker. Look at him get choked across the ropes. This is tremendous. He's getting hung over the end of the ropes by

Bosh and then Dorry Senior clubs Bosh from behind lateral press. That's enough. In the sixties, you kidding me. Yeah, Well, Terry Funk lays dead on the ring apron like he just got shot. And when Dory function you went to Houston, that son of a bitch, okay, looks happy. How long have been coming to the wrestling matches? Three years? I've been coming. I just got finished shooting Oz, shooting JFK. Well, I'm at Wahoo. I don't know someone gonna like to eat a salad?

Someone love to go see restid instead. What do you like about it? Oh? All right? Pause? What do you like about it? Gives you something to holler about? So, boss, you've seen it? What did you see there? With with Funk? I saw something I'd never really

seen before. I saw it just you know, my experience with with Terry Funk is so later in his career, you know, even even the eighties, But there I saw someone who just like so young and so fresh, and he just you know, he made you he just he made you believe he just the the the amount of passion he had in it. He just

looked like a phenomenon there. Yeah, he's already got that kind of like the knock kneed thing he goes into when it gets punched in the head yep, and he sells with like his whole body, with like his torso kind of like gyrating, while his legs kind of like shake underneath him and he's

it's like you know, but he's also doing it in a way. But here it's interesting because there is a distinction from later on when he would do it and he was older and he was you know, playing the crazy guy, whereas here it's like watching him as a youth do it is really something special. Yeah, you realize how far back he had the command of the psychology. It wasn't something that he didn't develop until twenty years into the game.

So he's under the learning tree, and there you've got a sense of how menacing Dory Funk Senior could appear when he was not in front of his hometown Faithful but just over in Houston Uber heel against of course Paul Bosh, who's the local hero and promoter for Houston Wrestling, and they did big business going out there as brothers, as father's son. It wasn't just a you

know, the sons and father teaming and Amarillo to please the locals. It was to go to other territories in Texas and raise hell Yeah, that's something the vine Arch Boys never had. The Monoic Boys never had the experience of leaving Dallas as heels going into other parts of Texas. They were beloved everywhere they went, Houston included. It's really fascinating. I was really blown away by how Terry Funk he already is if you catch my drift and just that

brief glimpse we caught in black and white in Houston. So the first tag team title one but the Funk Brothers, was over Don Jardine in Dutch Savage April twenty eighth, nineteen sixty six in Amarillo, So Dory and Terry winning championship gold with Funk really only in the ring for about eight months, and then they lost it to Rocky Romero and Dan Miller May eighteenth, nineteen sixty six in Lubbock, Texas. So we see the working style and we start

to see what Funk looks like carrying himself around the ring. Where did the promo style come from? Mmmm? You know, because that would become just as much of a calling card of Terry Funk's game later when he gets extended time on the microphone to the seventies, eighties and nineties as the in ring signatures that he and he draws inspiration from an interesting place. Do you know what Dean Malinko's dad was, no or a professor Boris Malinko? Uh yeah yeah I do, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I do know.

So here is Terry talking about where the promo games started to develop that would lead to such memorable lines as egg sucking dog and looking into the camera and basically, you know, salivating with angst and bad will towards his opposition. I think, you know that is interviews are the most important thing. I think Pauly does the best job on him. I don't think it's necessary to have the interaction with the crowd. Maybe some people do. I think

that you're having the interaction with the people at home. I think that there should be more attention paid to interviews. I think the interviews should be done. Whether I'm in the very serious ones, it doesn't necessarily matter if the people. If you want people to laugh or you want them to boo uh, they will bow at home in their own minds. Yeah. And I think that you need to shoot those interviews and shoot'em and shoot'em.

And he's he been do'em more and more and more then yeah, and you need to get what is what is proper is is One of the first guys that I've learned from was Boris Malinkoka. You know. Uh, he was down in Florida and I I was and interviews weren't so much thought of was that important at that time? And uh, he would sit there and I would see him in a corner and he'd have these notes and everything else and studying'em. And then I'd go ahead and once I mean he'd study.

It's one of the first guys that I knew that would just take a five minute interview would just blossom it into business. And he would do that and he would spend the time and the effort at it, you know. Yeah. Uh, he's one guy that taught me that interviews are everything. And so you've got a you've got a minute to put you know, assholes and the bleachers, and when every eighteen inches you've got a seat, well, you want to fill those seats. And that's what interviews can do for

you. That's what you're for. That's that's one of the sole purposes. Now I should say that was one of the sole purposes. Now, the sole purposes of rating, So you don't even have time for the interviews. You don't have time to sit there and talk to somebody, and people and attention spans change, fans. Attention spans now are so short compared to what they used to be, because of the society that we lived in, because of the computer, because of the Nintendos, because of the one hundred and

thirty TV station, Pat Pat bat bat. It's all change, definitely because then of the Nintendo's right, yeah plural, Well give fun credit. He's making those remarks before smartphones even existed. Yeah, and he sees it coming. He knows that it's going to be basically a game divided attention. But

the point there is that used to have people's undivided attention. For that minute you looked into the camera and you knew you could faithfully relay, which you know, if you were Boris Malinko, you would rehearsed or at least thought through ahead of time, and you could just have that one to one connection and you weren't worried about getting pops or booze at the right moment. You

weren't worried about right pausing for reaction. You knew the person at home was reacting in the way that you were desiring, and that was enough, and you were looking into that camera and you were giving them a glimpse into your soul. When you cut a promo, you were allowed to do that.

In the business that Terry Funk came up in. Boris Malinko was famous for doing, in particular an angle down in Florida in sixty six where he was wrestling Sammy's steamboat and begin biting his ear to draw blood, at which point Eddie Graham, the promoter in Florida, comes out to stop the attack, punches Malinko in the mouth and that causes the Great Malnko's false teeth to fall out of his face. Point Eddie Graham stomps and smashes the false teeth into

pieces. This is an absolutely legendary angle for true vintage fans of Florida Championship Wrestling. Not really something that I've ever seen documented. I'm not even sure there's still images of it, let alone video that survived. But that's the kind of angle that Boris Malinka would pull off, and the promo style was cerebral. He was one of those guys and you can start to see when there's not a lot of stuff surviving of Boris Malinko doing the kind of promos

that Terry Funk would have been talking about there in that clip. But you can see here as he voices over on Florida Champions Wrestling Television or I think it was Houston, actually a Houston television, a Matt that he'd had with Paul Bosch, who's now for some reason becoming a recurring character here on the lapsed Funk interest Yer and plenty of laps Funk and plenty of lessons of Funk

too. In that little clip there that he was talking about promos, I mean, the Nintendo's remark is one thing, but overall, I think he's he's making a hell of a point. He's talking about a component of the business that promos. I'm not sure they filled that role anymore. I Mean, sometimes I see a promo that I feel like seals a ticket or a pay per view, but there's not like that dedicated part of the show where you sit there expressly to be sold to, and I feel like that's I

feel like there's no more promos that mean anything. Backstage. What Terry's talking about are exclusively backstage, exclusively you and the camera yep, yep, or you know, ringside in an empty building with Vince holding the stick. That is the art that's that's gone where It's like you got a minu and a half. Maybe people give a shit about you, and if you prove you

can do it, you'll keep making money in this territory. We'll keep booking you because we know as simple as hell, we just point the camera out, you tell you who your opponent is, the date and the building, and you'll figure out the fucking storyline yourself. Or you'll ride what the seeds we've planted off to a new place and let your creativity flow. Just do it. And it's not like this, it's not this skill that like everyone tries to develop. You can either do it or you can't. You come

with it or you don't. We're not gonna fucking you know, make it. It's such a crazy thing to think about that that that there was, that there are people who who have to like that, they have to learn how to fucking do it, you know, Like that's just crazy to me. Excuse I don't know, I don't think I'm sure you can learn to cut a promo, but if you have to learn to cut a promo.

You'll never be a good or great promo, agreed. You know you have to come in being like, Okay, I know how someone got me excited about a wrestling match. I know where to go and myself to find something. Not that's a copy, but I can draw inspiration in a similar way that I think that wrestler would have to come up with those words and that order and that facial expression and that pregnant pause, and this is the kind of match we're going to have, and this is the match we're coming off

of, and this is the angle we did. And it's similar to the energy that was created by this angle that I once saw. And I remember this wrestler said this when that happened to him in that scenario. Let me channel at least the spirit of that, if not the exact wording of it. Yep, And let me cut a fucking promo. And Funk comes up at a time where he had the luxury of picking up styles and tricks before people across the industry had realized the true value of the promo. He said

it there in the clip. It was something that you know, the real pros knew could be used to fill seats and keep your name relevant and keep you paid in the business. But it's not like it was held against other guys if they couldn't do that. It wasn't like the table stakes skills. Still you can still fucking you know, work a match, right, that

could be enough for most promoters. The fact that you could fill seats with your voice was still novel enough in the sixties that it was it was exclusive company that you could find yourself in if you learned how to do that, or if you could do that. It certainly wasn't everyone has to cut promos before they can get on tving. That was like, no, we don't. Why does everyone have to cut a promo? If if you're good at them, you'll cut them anyway, right, they don't have to command on

the front end that you do. So so here's the sample. So this is Boris Malenko, just very calmly and cerebrally, but in a way that really gets a heel across in a very sneaky way. And I can hear echoes of the early promo style of Terry Funk, not so much the screaming crazy promo style that he would do in the nineties, but sort of like that seventies NBA World Champion kind of. You know, it's like a formal setting with like a Gordon Soli or somebody holding the microphone. But he's kind

of pushing the limits in what he's saying. He's kind of being a little nutty, and some of the things he's saying even though he's had a suit, you know what I mean. That's that early on set, Terry Funk. And here is Malenko commenting on how he basically got screwed in a match with Paul Bosch, making a ton of great qualifications and excuses for why he

was the one that was actually wronged and not Paul Bosch. And just think about a Terry Funk watching this and absorbing the cadence, absorbing just the overall style. A couple of weeks ago, you've seen the same match on television and it was narrated by mister TV announcer. I watched announcer. By the way, this is Professor Boris Malenko talking to a wonderful state of public people that love him so well, and the people that he loves so much.

I'm going off the track once again, but I watched this match and I watched TV and mister TV announcer narraed it, and I never heard such a partial, prejudiced individual in all my life. Well, I ask for equal time, and I ask for the privilege of announcing the same match and telling you people the true facts of the match and the way it should be announced.

You heard a man that had shown nothing but prejudice announced this match, and you heard the man that shows partiality tought everybody except Professor Malenko and Lord Charles Montague. Now you have a right to listen to a man who's going to state fact in fact only because he bleas in the truth, and that

is me. Professor boris my I say, the truth is the main thing, and it always prevails over any type life that mister TV announcer has put forth time and time again again, What did I say A cherry hit me with? She can't put the professor out. There is no way man has

intestinal fortity like no other man in the world. And I'm talking about myself because the praise can never be high enough for me, because I am yours Texas and Texas is mine and every person, each and every one of us know that when I get in the ring, I get in there for the sole propic of winning. And who am I doing it for? For the great state of texts, for all my friends, for all my fans. Look at I got them under run now, I got them under run.

Now, I got them, I got them now. There is no way out for you, mister TV announcwer, I got them now without many kind of instruments in the hand. How far can he go now? With the referee helping him once again? Once again he's helping once no gun he gets in his way. There's no way without holding his hand. So he left, not as a winner, just that he's able to hold up for the

ten minute period. And the only way he was able to do that only wait by using all types of instruments, all types of you said, ten minutes of foreign object. He could never never dream. You know what I'm doing here? I am asking for five more minutes, five more minutes. Remember the words that mister TV announcers said when I asked for this. Listens, ladies and gentlemen, I haven't got I haven't even got another minute. Boris Molenko has just retired me from wrestling. He will never step into the

ring again. At the heart breathing. This man is going through right now. His bless is coming in short. Fans, I'm saying you could back and go with me. I'm praining with him, and they're holding his hand up, but not as a victor, just that he's able to stood in there ten minutes with me. I am the man that retired Paul TV announcer

Bash. Hear the intensity kind of oh the he starts out trying to pretend he's got everything under control, and he's gonna calmly and coolly explain to you why he was taking advantage of and giving a raw deal in this match. He said, he said, the crescendo build, He's justifying everything he did. He's calling himself the hero of Texas, even though he's the uberheel.

I mean, I'm not saying that that's a great promo, but I'm saying you can see the raw material of like that really cerebral yet kind of wild promo style that Terry Funk would come to develop. I'm saying it's a great promo. What did you think of that? I'm sure you haven't heard it. I fucking I've never heard him before. I loved it. That was so fascinating, right, I liked I liked him commenting on a match.

I liked that he was I don't know, like again, yeah, listening to him get riled up over the course of it and then excited that he ended a man's career. Yes, it's tremendous, and he didn't end his career because it was funny. Is Paul bosh Is in the ring saying, I don't know if I got five minutes left in me. I'm exhausted. And it's Boris who layers on top of that that I amended the man's career. He didn't say that, right, He's probably sitting to wrestle. He

keeps calling him mister TV announcer even though his name is Paul Bosch. Just tremendous stuff. And so I don't know when when, of all the people to cite his inspiration, Terry Funk in that shoot interview, mentioned Boris Malenko. I was like, no, that's a deep cut. That's somebody that

nobody talks about. I mean, he's talked about, but you know, so little of his promo survives on tape that it's hard to appreciate how much of an influence his promo style had and how early he was and that to barp it and I mean, I had no fucking idea that he was that he was, that that he was so good at it, which is amazing because his son was notoriously the absolute worst promo you could ever imagine. You

know, Dean couldn't say anything on the microphone that would carry it. You know, that would be the equivalent of carrying a tune in a wrestling context. Yeah, not at all. So so that's that, that's the inspiration starting a bubble in Now he takes a little bit of that cerebral speaking style and that sort of like erudite way of talking and taking exception and just being a completely kind of maniacal heel who's got like this veneer of sophistication to him,

this veneer of like careful word choice. There's the thing about Funk's promos too, It's like, even though he's a Texas boy, he's always looking down on his opponents as being more of a hick than him. Don't think of him as like a down on his luck cowboy or like some like old what Old West's gunslinger. His his character kind of over the years was more like a rich cowboy, almost like a cowboy came into your town and looked

down on you. That's wild too, yep, because you know Funk's royalty, you know, and he did not hesitate to play it up that way. His family ties when he would do promos in a new area or a new promotion, and so there's like this kind of like veneer of like arrogance to the Funks that I think people don't realize when they just think of them as you know, wild bucking broncos, not at all. I mean, I always think of them as a bronco type like you just said, and

Dorry very much embodying that, even more so than Terry. But so we see the promo style now, the working style, and the en ring antics and the physicality that we just saw on display there in Houston from Terry Funk that can be choked up in equal amounts to Dick Murdoch, who someone has come up already a bit because of course, sure one of Dorry's signature opponents was Frankie Hill Murdock, and Dick was his step son and got into the

business. And we talked about, you know, Dorry's memories of seeing Terry and Dick running around the the m Mailla Sports Arena's little boys causing havoc even though their mother, the Funk's mother did not let Terry apparently run as wild as Dick's family did. But just in the earliest days of Terry Funk's wrestling career, he's starting to get acquainted with this Dick Murdock, who he's of course known since boyhood. And I think there's some formative experiences starting to happen

as they work together and interact on the road. One of them, he tells in his book as follows, there were some real characters in a Mailla when I wrestled there in the early part of my career. I could tell Dick Murdoch stories all day. What was great about Murdock was he was just completely goofy. When I broke into the business, Dick was still in high school, since he was about two years younger than me. He'd referee the matches. We went to Abilene one night, and the wrestlers didn't even want

the fans to know the referees traveled with them. That's how serious they were about keeping appearances to protect the business. That night in Abilene, we did a deal where Dick, as the referee, got involved in the match and he and I went at it in the ring. So later we were getting ready to leave and I said, Dick, we can't go out together. People will see us. You get in the trunk and I'll let you go. Oh my god, what happened to this business? Boss? Where'd it

go? Stories like this anymore? They put fucking cameras in the car and Nike a reacita the show about it exactly. Oh well, I don't know what's going on. We're gonna hide somebody in the car. Fine, but you gotta talk about it and do do do you know interviews about it. I shut the trunk and let him stay inside for the entire one hundred and sixty five miles to Odessa, And was he ever pissing and moaning, God, damn you funk let me out of here. Finally he just came up

and ranked this. I fucking love it. It's just, you know, just tremendous. Another story he has about uh, yes, so he has that one rere stuck in the trunk. He also started to work him for the first time two years into his career. According to the Wrestling Data Database, on Funk's career. The first time he shares a ring with Dick Murdock is September twenty sixth, nineteen sixty seven, so about two years into his career, where he and Funk that is in the Lithario team up against Kowatiki

and Dick Murdoch in Odessa. There's also a match in Herford where Dick Murdock wrestles Terry Funk. I think to the time limit September thirtieth of nineteen sixty seven, so apparently that being the first instance of Terry Funk and Dick Murdock facing off one on one. And as we mentioned, he gets to team

with Wahoo McDaniel early on, and the comparisons to Wahoo were clear. I want to share with you as we turned back around to this early stage part of Funk's career, the clip that speaks to and working with Wahoo, if he can just bear with me for a moment, do you think this is funny? Because Wahoo put his dad on blast in the book and remember that I don't remember that. Yeah, he was talking about how his dad was like a shitty payoff guy and how he basically said, like you're gonna take

less money or leave any left. That makes sense, I guess I'll have to fire you. So if you could take a gander at the clipping that I just shared with you, This one's from the Amberillo Globe Times from October of nineteen sixty five. So we're turning back the clock a bit to where

Terry Funk was still playing football at West Texas State. But as we talk about Wahoo, this is an article that sort of frames up what we were talking about earlier and makes it pretty clear that they wanted the public in Amarilla to think about Terry as sort of a new incarnation of Wahoo McDaniel. That's wild we Go Funk of football. Terry Funk wants Wawhoo type career. Nobody ever gets anywhere in this world without ambition. West Texas State's outstanding senior offensive

tackle, Tera Funk can't be faulted on that score. Terry would like to be another Wahoo McDaniel after he finishes at WT. By that, he means he'd like to play professional football. It's the goal of every football player. It's the goal of every football player, the good nurtured youngster explained, and be a professional wrestler in the offseason. McDaniel former Oklahoma football players doing just

that. He plays for the New York Jets as a linebacker, then hits the mat when the season ends for Terry to wrestle, and is natural enough since his father and brother have both made good on the Matt's sport. Both played football too. Dorriy Junior was a West Texas line star a few seasons back. This season, Terry has been the outstanding wtker. Wait is that WT? Is it that? I'm not sure? That's a hard one to read. Some of these articles aren't reproduced beautifully. Yeah, the scans are

almost like bad faxes. Ummm. In just about every game, he's averaged carrying out close to ninety percent of his assignments, but admits to some concern about this week's chore. Terry will be called upon from time to time and take out Colorado State star linebacker Jim Foster. Foster at two and two hundred and ninety three, Yeah, let's go with that. Who gives a fight?

Two hundred and ninety three pound Pottstown, Pennsylvania native is being boomed for All American designation from the respect for Funk and the other the other bulls buffs. They're buffaloes, right, there's buffaloes. I said bulls that last time. I think it's buffs, he accord him. Foster just might raise such a lofty designation to carry. Presently, a two hundred and thirty pounder will

have some weight on Foster. I guess these two hundred and three pounds not two hundred ninety three pounds, but may have trouble making contact with the cat quick csuas after the seven to thirty pm kickoff Saturday in Buffalo Bowl, when his college day's and young Funk hopes to play offensive guard for some pro team. He was a guard on the Buffs until this season. I'm almost sixty two, and I think I could carry about two hundred and forty five pounds

without any trouble. There you go. When it comes to putting on weight, Terry is an expert. I only weighed about one hundred and five pounds when I was in high school. But I've been working hard, lifting weights and making sure of the proper diet, and I've gone up steadily since then.

Funk and bench press three hundred and fifteen pounds now. He played at one hundred and ninety hundred and ninety fives last season, though he reported at two fourteen nineteen sixty fourteen a day, practice paired off, so some of that carefully nurtured poundage. I was up to about two twenty by the time we started training last spring, and I got up as high as two forty

this summer. Funk said he believes proper diet and getting the proper amount of sleep at least eight hours a day, are the most important considerations for a person who wants to put on pounds. Terry takes little stock in miracle pills. In this connection, Terry denies bribing the Greater for his excellent gridiron Marxist

fall. I guess I've just been lucky, is his explanation. With a few more players like Terry, coach Kerbal wouldn't worry about Colorado State or any other opponent, and luck wouldn't enter into the situation anyway in any manner. That's it there, It is. The rest is kind of yeah, so he wants a Wahoo like career, and that, of course didn't happen. But that's just a glimpse at how another glimpse rather at how long. Well, not necessarily true, because at the end of the day, it did

become a Wah who like career, because why who quit playing football? Yeah, if you play it out, Yeah, not at the time that this was written. But yeah, that's a good point, I guess in the final analysis, you could say that Wahoo, though, became a national celebrity as a football player, just as much as they love to write about that

guy right as a football player as much as a wrestler. But he talks about well, the book that's done about him by his family, the posthumous book that came out on Wahoo, talks about sort of where he was at when he came down to team with Terry. It reads a number of Who's teammates weren't happy about the Jets letting the Dolphins take their teammate, but both

Waho and the Jets for an office, were pleased by the move. This is some team of investors led by comedian actor Danny Thomas in a turn, granted the expansion franchise and then Dolphins made him one of their top picks. Not sure this is about his transition to the Dolphins and Jets, but anyway, the Jets no longer had to worry about the contentious situation between Wahoo and

Nameth Joe Namath, and Wahoo was grateful for the start. In later years, he did admit to being a little gretfully he wasn't around with the Jets won Super Bowl three. So this is when Wyho leaves the Jets for the Dolphins. Apparently, as the Dolphins organization began preparations for the nineteen sixty six season, Wyhoo was busy staying in shape the best way he knew how. He went back to West Texas and started wrestling again. Just four days before

the draft. He had won Themilla version of the North American Tag Team Championship with Terry Funk Wow, defeating Dory Funk Junior and Ricky Romero and Amrello. When he wasn't tagging with Funk, Waho was working in singles matches with foes like Tokyo, Tom Iron, Mike Dibiasi, Don Jardine, and Dutch Savage. That Savage later spoke about facing young Wahoo in the ring, Wyho hit me with a chair and potatoes, living crap out of me. I didn't

need to use my blade. I had blood running all over me. And there's a sheriff stay me while I was behind me with the chair arguing with another sheriff. He was a pretty hot tempered kid. Funk and Wahoo lost the titles March tenth and Amarillo to Don Jardine and Dutch Savage. These are

matches we've already referenced. He continued to work the West Texas loop, including TV tapings as well as spot shows and places like Odessa, Lubbock, Abilene, and Amarilla, as well as North Mexican New Mexico Town's Clovis and Albuquerque. So when he comes down there to team with Terry, as we talked about earlier, that's that's him making preparations for a new team and a new

season in the NFL. With all the spotlight on him. He comes and wins the tag belts with young Terry Funk, who just started in wrestling. So hm, he's getting quite the introduction and what appears to be Terry's first jaunt to Saint Louis, which of course is the heart of the National Wrestling Alliance, the base of operations for NWA President Sam Muchnick and his his his core group of guys. Pat O'Connor as the booker and some others, Geigel

sort of Kansas City proximate to them. That's where you went when you wanted to establish yourself in American wrestling as somebody that, no matter what you had to do to get over in the more violent and sort of like promo and colorful character based promotions, that when it came down to getting in the ring in trunks and boots and not having any shortcuts at your disposal and being able to go hold for hold, which is what the Saint Louis wrestling crowds expected

that you could be that and that you, in fact could one day be the NWA World's Heavyweight Champion, because you had to be that kind of worker to ever have a shot at the belt, of course, particularly in the seventies, and that, of course, at the time in which Terry funk Is is maturing as a pro wrestler, his first jaunt to Saint Louis is February of nineteen sixty six, so he's only in the business four or five months now, pardon me, two months? Fucked that two months unless this

is unless the date is inverse that it's referring to April second. Suffice to say, as he turns the calendar for the first time in his life as a professional wrestler. He's on his way to the Keel Auditorium, Oh boy, one of the famed wrestling venues of course, in Saint Louis, where he and Dorry take on Dick the Bruiser and Lee Hennig which I think is Larry Hennick and a two out of three falls thirty minute draw. I believe

it was. I know it. It was a win. Dori and Terry defeat Dick the Bruiser and Lee Hennig in Saint Louis in nineteen sixty six, and we talk about the Saint Louis style of course. Unfortunately, this is another territory where not a ton of tape survives, or at least tape that I've seen or been able to easily call up. But here is Terry Boss. If we can turn to some more video here, I'll send you the link, and this is on YouTube as well for you folks out there.

Here's Terry getting in the ring in Saint Louis in a one on one situation, so you can kind of just see him and as his unalloyed self have also seen footage from his early as seventy three of him in multiple person tag matches. Wow, some of the studio tapings, but this is seventy five, So this is one who it was like six years after he first comes to Saint Louis. So this is a much more developed Terry Funk. This is a Funk on the cusp of winning the world title and being that guy.

But you just get a sense by watching this four minute, forty minute clip here of the contrast between this and the wild brawling scene we just saw with him and his dad in Houston, yep, yep, And how versatile of a performer already Terry Funk is because he's still able to project that cowboy aura, but he goes into the ring and doesn't do any of the things that you know, typify the Texas Deathmatch or the wild and wooly crazy sneak

attack style that we know Dory Funk specialized in his father, and that was on display in that clip from Houston. So if we can hit the play and there's no audio on this, it's just it's a silent clip, So I don't worry about that. Sure, got to hit play in three this, by the way, for folks who want to find it is on YouTube. Just look for Terry Funk and Saint Louis seventy five Wrestling three two one, and there he is, Yeah, jaw jacking with a cowboy head on

vest. Look at that woman. Wow, they thought it was a little bit a shan for a second. Does she want him dead with that bouffond on her head? Yep? She You know, she's got so many secrets in her boufond that that you know, you could probably she could probably kill him. I think that's Joe Groggiola, the Saint Louis Wrestling announcer. Parents. It kind of looks like the guy who did who was in the wrestler Oh yeah, sure, Sam Nicer. Yeah, I think Sam Nicer just

did in Indiana, But I could be wrong. Col her elbow, look at look at Terry in the blue trunk. Look at him working the work in the hold against the ropes, looking for a clean break. He had weights, So I said he did weights. Huh didn't show what do you mean by waights? Well, in that article it says he and that I read it about his football career, and so I was talking about how he did weights, lifted weights and put on pounds and doesn't look like he used

weights to put on pounds in this match. Yeah, this is probably pre Royd usage. He did talk a little bit about using them in college because it was like, you know, nobody knew really what it was doing. It was just something that worked, so you took it just like anything else. But I don't think he really made it a point to do things for cosmetic purposes early in his career. The business wasn't really like that when he broke in. But look at look at the look at the essence of funk.

That should have been the name of the fun, the essence of Funk. I mean, he's just controlling the leg on the mat, driving his knee into it. Very technical, not not something I would be fully expecting from Terry Funk. Yeah, this is what they wanted in Saint Louis. They wanted a collery element work in the arms. He's picking him up, you know, and then he drops the guy down in his fucking back hooking

the leg. When we started the lapsed funk and we know, you know Terry Funk of the nineties, like, this is not what you picture. No, that's what one thing I was excited about is really getting acquainted with this part of Funk's career. Yep. Yeah, totally solid finals on the scoop and slam. He's got a great intensity too, Like it's not just it's not just doing the you know, technical moves and having that catch base. It's like he's actually really really intense with it and it looks like it

hurts. Yeah, and you can tell these people are extra animated in this small studio setting. This isn't the wrestling at the Chase or anything. This is just the studio wrestling show. Yeah, but he's doing these holes, these exchanges with so much body language. Yep. He's getting a lot more out of a standard iriship to the corner. See way flew out of that corner. Also, also he's got incredible speed too. Yeah, this is before those knees gave out on him. You don't get a lot of what

you do. But the matches of Terry Funks where his knees are in working shape and he's able to get a lot of spring are not the ones that are most frequently watched. I drop kick and I snap mare. I drop kick from Terry Funk. I mean that's perfect. Who knew so that that's the vaunted spinning toe hold. Yep, affected by his dad. That's a stupid move. Supposed to twist that ankle right at the top there, and you go over and over, round, then round, twist it over and

over and and you trap. It keeps going even after the bell is called for, and he drops that knee on the leg after the wind. It's all grappling baby. Yep. That's great. We see him getting heat, which would come to be a problem, as we'll talk about, because I mean, they like you to be, you know, they don't mind you being a heel in Saint Louis. It's not like everyone has to be a

pure babyface versus pure baby face match. But you cannot go as far in Saint Louis as you could in all the other areas of the country that Terry Funk made money in to get the people to hate you and get them riled up. That's not what Sam Muchnick was looking for. But of course he's been Saint Louis two or three falls, of course, as a funk with a low ankle. Pick there and goes right back to driving the knee like a fucking savage in the damaged wheel of his opponent. Damn, look at

him. Go let him go with that knee over and over again. He's just getting over such a killer instinct, even though he's not doing anything cheating. Yep, all he has to do is slap on one twist of the spinning toe hold to take the second fall his hand raised. This fucking goof is done. Even sure who this is he's beating up on it. J A broni X Yep, that's that. Wow, of course, that's wild,

just just such a glimpse of a different funk. So the thing about Saint Louis, of course, is that it's not like other territories, and that it doesn't have a core group of wrestlers that define the Saint Louis territory. There's always transience. Saint Louis is sort of a lead and that the best come through, spend some time, and then go back to their home base. But there's really no wrestler you could call a Saint Louis wrestler.

Mm hmm. It kind of called hardly that because he was from Kansas City and that was his base of operations, but he was touring the country's world champion. It wasn't like there was a crop of guys related to, you know, a wrestler like a Fritz or a Dory or a Bosh or a Joe Blanchard or a Don Owen or it wasn't wrestler, but who took over

the territory and ran it with his crew of guys. So when you went to Saint Louis, you were sort of like showcasing yourself in a way that you weren't in other territories where you were going just to sort of make money and to draw house. And that's happening here for Terry Funk very very early

on, and he was pushed as a star early. Meltzer wrote that much Negle liked the brother tag team where they had matches in sixty six against Fritz van Erk and the Crusher, which they won via dequ There are some really big wins on the records of Dory and Terry Funk in the earliest days of them coming to Saint Louis that really indicate that Sam much Neck liked what he

saw and Dorry Funk Senior was a power player in the NWA. We talked about this, Yeah, yeah, that territory, even though it would wane tremendously and in fluence after Dory Funk Senior's departure was a huge center of power

in the National Wrestling Alliance in the sixties and seventies. The Dory Denton story we talked about dark Soar Paulus, the promoter that Dorry Senior bought out to take over Amilla, was a big power player in the NWA, very former NWA president and close to the sun as it regards the national influence of the wrestling industry. So this is big and certainly that's gonna that's going to weigh on Sam Mutchnick in terms of, you know, influence and sort of bringing

them into Saint Louis and casting them in a favorable light. It's happening very early, but there became a problem. You see, Terry's learning how to really get heat yeap, Like the kind of heat where people want a knife a motherfucker yep. Like they come to the arena literally hoping that you really want the kind of heat that ar wrestler should want. I mean, I think so, but he takes it too far in the eyes of Sam Muchnik

And this is just a wonderful illustration. I think this story is a wonderful illustration of how sneakily complex the wrestling business was in the sixties and seventies as it regards how the different territories regarded the rules and how important they thought it was to their business that the rules be respected or totally disregarded. It was one of the two. You know, ECW would have never been ECW if the referees were disqualifying people. Yeah, you couldn't have the promotion that way.

Conversely, you could not have Saint Louis Wrestling for forty to fifty sixty years running as strongly as it did without referees that were deputized to step in take control of matches as any real referee would sam Muchnick, of course, was a sportswriter before he became the most influential promoter in professional wrestling, and he took sort of a cue from the fact that sports writers would constantly be making fun about the fact that in professional wrestling there were six, seven,

eight, nine world champions, and what kind of a sport doesn't have one solid champion, thus THEW and so he's also very attentive to the fact that in real sports, referees decisions have sway they cannot be ignored. You cannot have a referee make a call and then just not take the ten yard penalty to say fuck you dare me. You know, you certainly can't waffle him

in the middle of the field and ever expect to play football again. And the way Sam much Nick thought about what his fans wanted from professional wrestling, and he was right in that part of the country. You had to be

protective of that. But with a fucking Texas cyclone like Terry Funk coming through and the lessons he's learning about how to get attention on himself and how to get heat and how to get people coming back, it was just oil and water, which is fascinating because he does eventually win over the NWA and become

world champion and represent the organization well far and wide. But there was a period where that was not so obvious that these two would find a way to that these two styles we should say, would find a way to coexist. Yeah, and it comes in the form of Johnny Valentine, who of course

is an all time legend in the business. Came up a ton in the Lamental tragedy, huge star in Texas across all Dallas Houston, Amarillo, everywhere really he ever worked and the father of course of Greg the Hammer Valentine. And we turned to Greg Valentine in a shoot interview that he did with Title Match and It's Okimetube where he talks about Terry Funk and the role he played in his family's history in the business. Did your fathers know each other?

Oh? Well, of the first matches. Oh yeah, so Dorry Funx Senior. I when I wrestled in the early seventies in Amarillo, Dorry Funx he was fantastic and he always get the young guys and talked to us, got us gone, and there was Dory Junior. He used to watch before I got in the in the wrestling. Uh. I sit on the front room in Fort Worth, Texas, watched a couple of matches with Johnny Valentine against Dorry Funk Junior when he was a world champion, and uh, great

matches. I said, Wow, you know, my dad would hang his tongue out and going like this over by me, I said, ringside watching this, you know, great matches. So they they had to be real. They were so so awesome. So reflections on his father tangling with the Funks now when they bring the few to say they were so awesome. Greg Mama, for Kelly's such an ugly man and his name is Don Fargo.

In the very beginning, he wasn't even a Valentine. Wow. Like that magazine we were reading from that chronicled, you know, Dorry's story and him bringing his boys into the business from sixty three. There's an article in there that shows Greg Valentine and a picture of him and it says Don Fargo underneath his face. So they bring the Johnny Valentine Terry Funk dynamic to Saint Louis,

and here's the problem. We turned first to Terry Funk's book. Johnny Valentine was one of the later challengers who battled me on his way to junior. We had a short feud February nineteen seventy three in Saint Louis over the Missouri title. We wrestled thirty minutes for TV. It was so damn good because of Johnny, not because of me. At the end of the match, we had a deal where I clipped his leg with a chair. Johnny

sold it so well that the people were coming unglued. I mean, the whole arena was ready to jump in the ring and believe me, I've had them do it. So I was watching it was chaotic. Later on Sam Muchnick, the Saint Louis promoter, came and told us he wasn't running it on the TV show because it was too hot. Wow, Terry, he was the first wrestler who was too hot for TV. That's one thing people fail to realize when they talk about a fluke finish where there is no finality.

It's what you do going into those finishes that's so important. A screwy finish can be just me hitting you and you being laid out if the match is popping and the people are being set for it. That Saint Louis crowd was hot because of the way we set it up in that long match, and because of the way Johnny Valentine sold the pain of his leg. I'm not trying to put myself on a level with Johnny Valentine, but I truly think he and I took the same approach when he was selling that cheer.

He was really hurting. To be able to totally do that is rare, but he had that power not just to portray it, but to deliver the truth of what he was doing to the people in those stands and have them feel that Sam was a smart man. Though to this day, I think part of the heat for my issue with Valentine was Sam showing part of the angle but not all of it. But at the same time, cutting that angle short was caused by Sam not wanting to put so much power in our

hands. If he'd shown that whole thing, Johnny and I would have been locked in for a long run there, and Sam had other plans. I love it throwing shade on Sam Muchnick. That's great. Those plans included not letting anyone get so hot that Saint Louis was to reliant on one piece of talent. Remember I said there were no Saint Louis guys. Perhaps that boss was by design. Sam always kept control of his own and wisely so, Funk concludes. Larry Mattisick, of course, was Sam much Nick's right hand

man and took the territory over after Sam Muchnick gave up. Later went to work for Has McMahon and allowed WWF to push strongly into Saint Louis right as the national expansion began in eighty three late eighty three, And here's his recollection of this infamous angle from his book Wrestling of the Chase, The Inside Story of Sam Muchnick and the Legends of Professional Wrestling. Terry Funk was one grappler who found out how serious Sam was about his keep it in the ring guidelines.

That is to say, right, Sam didn't want matches spilling out into the floor. He certainly didn't want them spilling out into the stands like the Texas Death matches did, or out to the the fucking you know, popcorn booth and all that. The Every Tenth nineteen seven twenty three broadcast, Funk defeated Johnny Valentine. Sam was at a charity luncheon and had to miss part of the taping, but he'd already decided that Terry would take the Missouri state

championship. With only the details remaining to be worked out. He left Pad O'Connor, his booker, in charge of the show. Lo and behold, Funk used a chair to batter Valentine's leg right in front of referee Joe Schoenberger. That's something Terry doesn't mention, MM think. Then Funk clamped on a spinning toe hold for the victory. When Sam got back to the Channel eleven studio with the programs being taped. Fans were enraged. Sam viewed the footage,

and I can vouch for his reaction. It was one of the few times I ever saw him truly angry. O'Connor nearly lost his job. The booker Wow Funk caught a serious dose of hell. The entire booking sequence was re arranged so a rematch could take place on March sixteenth at Kiel. Without question, the belt was going back to Valentine. Fate got in the way, though, as Valentine was hospitalized with heart trouble in Houston the night before the rematch was to take place. Sam got the call at one thirty.

I was handling the publicity by then, so Sam instructed me to notify everyone about what had happened. That still left him with the problem, how would he feel the main event slot an almost impossible notice. Fritz van Eric had a show in Dallas, so he was out. My wife Pat hurt us talking read the situation, and, in her debut as a booker, whispered,

what about Kinisky Wow? Dutifully I repeated her words to Sam. He loved the idea, and while I notified everyone from the keel manager in the box office folks, to the Globe Democrat in the Post dispatch, and every radio station I could find. Sam called Big Thunder Kinisky, drove from his home outside Vancouver to Seattle, caught a flight at three fifteen am, arrived in a big thunder. That's funny was that his nickname like his gimmick name

thunder Yep, big Thunder, Big Thunder, Big Thunder Gene Kiniski. Samrant I had no clue and arrived in Saint Louis round seven thirty am. The Warri Hotel manager let Geen in our office where he was doing dozing in my chair when Sam and I came in around ten am. Where have you guys been for crowning out loud? Kiniski roared By the way Kiniski won funk relinquished

the Missouri crown. I learned so much from that sequence of events. First, Sam made it clear what could and could not be done in Saint Louis and that no matter what, he was the boss. Second, we only had to refund sixty dollars worth of tickets that night, testimony to the fact that Sam's honesty and dealing with the substitution was recognized. Third, Sam had earned a loyalty with a talent that few others in the business could claim.

So you do not make the referee look like he doesn't know what he's doing in Saint Louis, and by smashing Johnny Valentine's leg of a chair and plain view of the referee despite the fact that the referee's hands were tied, not

being able to call for disqualification. Knowing Funk was to go over without Sam much Nick in the building, but everyone in an impossible position, and Sam took action, and so Funks all pissed because he thinks he did what it took to make the splash and draw business as he'd learned to in other parts of the country. But it just wasn't going to be a fit that. That's just what a business in seventy three. Yeah, for all those myriad

considered into it the absolute glory. Years now, Terry Funk meets another very notable and high profile challenger for the first time on June second of nineteen sixty six, in the form of Fritz van Eric. Fritz von Eric comes to the Sports Arena and Amarilla to wrestle a two out of three falls match against Terry, who's only a few months into the business, and the history between the Funks and Von Eric is kind of undertold. I think in some ways

we didn't barely even touched on Dori Funk when we did Lamental Tragedy. But there's a lot to be said, and I think we're going to turn to Ron Mullenac's book Fritz Van Eric, Master of the Iron Claw. Okay, and I ask you to share this with the Solar System boss. They just popped it in the window there already. This will give a I think, a really nice sketch for how the Von Eric and Funk stories intersect. Okay, is this told in who Who's Who? Says? Who's Who's? His

voice? Is Fritz talking? It is? I've known Old Dorry for a few years because my old Dory. When we first met, he was a superintendent and uh superintendent of cal Farley's Boys Range outside Amarilla, you know when he uh where he started at, where he'd started a wrestling program for the kids. Shortly afterwards, Dorry would become the wrestling promoter in Amarilla, Texas,

where he and I got to know each other very well. I once heard that when attendance was down at the local wrestling matches there in Amarilla, Dory Senior would jump in his truck and drive old to all the bars around town, talk taking on all covers and telling everyone they had better get their butts to the arena. Our tenants would climb for a few weeks and then start dropping and get back again, so after the bars he would go. Dori Senior was not a physically large man, but he was a mean one.

He and I had some bloody matches back in the late sixties and early seventies before he passed away, drawing record crowds and the local arenas. Ye, we once had a hell of a match there at Amarilla. It was our first time wrestling together and my first match in Amarilla. When I arrived at the arena that evening, the promoter told me the match that and I would be a special match, a one fall, a no time limit, no disqualification match, and falls would count outside the ring. This was something

new to me. I had never heard of anything remotely like this at the time and was very skeptical. I looked at the promoter in disbelief. No time limit, no disqualification. I exclaimed, Do you mean we could be rear wrestling all night until one of you pins the other? He replied calmly. Now I began to wonder what I had gotten myself into and who who had thought this kind of match. I did not like the sound of this because at all, because of the chance Door and I would be taking.

This kind of match could leave of one of us or both of us injured and unable to wrestle for months. Now I knew deep down inside that it was going to be one hell of a match. That night, before the match started, I walked out of my dressing room to see how large a crowd was. When I opened the door, I could not be leave my eyes. The arena was packed and fans were standing against the walls, creating waiting for the main event to start. As I scanned the arena, there

was not one place in that building that another fan could squeeze into. As I walked to the ring that night, the Amarella fans booed and threw ice and wads of paper at me, something I was not used to and returning home to Texas, Dory made his appearance next, and the fans screamed and cheered so loudly I thought my ear drums would explode. When the match did start, Dory and I were fighting in the ring. Outside the ring and men in the crowd where some of the fans got carried away and tried to

kick me. Security had surrounded us, trying to keep the fans out of the action the best they could. We were hitting each other with the metal ring, side chairs, or anything else we could get our hands on, trying to pit each other on the floor and on top of tables or anything

else. Together, they get the match over with now. Later in the match, when we even broke through the side door, the side eggs of door that let outside behind the arena where the VIP parking lot was now, Dory and I were just outside the eggs of door, standing toe to toe going at it when Dorry picked me up and bought a sami on the hood of Mayor's car, shattering in the windshield and putting a large det in the

hood. That man did not know the meaning of the word quit. All the fans were pushing and shoving each other, trying to get a peek out the door to see who was winning. Security had their hands full of trying to hold the crowd back and screaming at the referee to just to get us back in the building. After about five minutes of fighting outside, under and on top almost every car in that parking lot, the referee finally managed to

get us back inside the building. The lash continued for another forty minutes before I was able to get my hands on one of the metal ring side chairs and hit Dory Senior in the back of the head, knocking them down long enough to get to get the iron claw on him and get a three count from the referee. You know that no time limit. That no time limit match lasted about two hours and not one fan left the arena before the end of the match. When that match did end that night, Dory Senior and

I were both covered blood. The skin in our on our backs and knees had been torn off from wrestling on the ground outside the arena. The security guards, who were off duty Amarilla police officers, had to escort me back to my dressing room because, uh, because of the drunken Amarilla fans who

could not stand to see their hometown hero losing a wrestling match. Later that night, in my dressing room, when I was trying while I was trying to get dressed as fast as possible and get to my private plane so I could get out of manner. You got to get out of my Amilla. A police officer showed up in my dressing room. A police officer told me I would have to pay for the damage that I had done the Mayor's car before I left Amarilla, or he would have to take me to jail.

Now everyone everyone in the arena were sorry something. Uh. Everyone in the read of that night was a Dory func Senior fan. And for a while there was there, I was thinking this joker was really good to take me to jail. I tried to explain to him that he should be talking to Dorry and not me. I mean, after all, Dorri slammed me down on the hood of the car. It was not as if I had had

a choice in the matter. There are a few minute A few minutes later, in walked old In walked Old Dorry Senior, who as a police officer. What was going on. The police officer explained to Dorry that the mayor was very upset about over his windshield being broken out and had asked him to

find out who was going to pay for the damage to his car. Dorry looked over at me and smiled and told me the officer but the promotions until the officer of the promotions people would take care of any damages to the Mayor's car, and he needed to get his ass out of the wrussel's dressing room and go take care of the traffic. Dorry then turned to me and said he was going to drive me to the Amarilla Airport because of the drunken fans

who were still hanging around outside the arena. After that first match in Amarilla, Dory Senior and I became the best of friends. As it turned out, Dora was a person responsible for putting together that sold out match that night. He and I would lay come up with all kinds of matches with lots of crazy rules and names that sold out arenas all over the world. The

Texas Death Match was one of the most popular these special events. This wrestling match would take place in a steel cage that is lowered down over the ring entire ring itself. The cage only has one door, which was locked at the beginning of the match with a padlock. This match, too, was a no time limit notice qualification match. Texas death match would not end until one man could no longer continue. The fans love them all. The promoters

overseas were begging us to bring them to their arenas. The tap of match became so popular that we later came up with another version called the Texas Barbed Wire Match. Barb Wire was strung around all around the ring in ropes, and the wrestlers would trying to throw each other into the ropes while avoiding the same faith for themselves. The truth was that Bob Weire left many cuts that

bled like crazy, but the scratches were not serious at all. As long as the wrestlers could keep their face away from the barbed wire, it looked a lot worse than it really was. However, for days afterwards, the men would look as though a wild cat had gotten a hold of them. The money they would get for such an event had them all lined up at my door trying to get in on these wild, crazy matches. The crowd loved them, loved all the new events we had started to bringing into the

arenas. Wrestling was starting to change as never before, and all eyes were on Texas and the WCCW. You know, we sold out arenas all over the world, and not one fan ever left the building until that night's main event was over. Those matches marked the beginning of a new era in professional wrestling that is still going strong today. Dorry Senior's oldest son, Dorry Junior, was a great athlete and wrestling like his old man, he was what

some people call a scientific or pure wrestler. He and I had a few good matches ourselves, with Dory Junior taking home a couple of world titles before he retired. I always thought the youngest son, Terry, was the most like his dad, mian as hell and toughest nails. Hadn't I have the opportunity to see son Terry's matches on satellite television in the early nineties when he

was wrestling for an ec W. I'm too it watching Terry perform. I also turned it tuned in to see him in the East W World Championship title, which was some match watching Terry that night, probably back to the old days when Dorry and I would be were packing him in the arenas. Wrestling sure has changed over the years. I was very impressed with the e CWN. These guys hit each other with everything in the house and stored stuff under

the ring they can pull out and use on one another. Terry won that night, but be sure, but he sure took some bad bumps like it. Just like I said before, he was so much like his father, his old man, min as Hell and Toughest Nails. Fritz fan Eric on working Dory Sr. And creating, according to his account, so many of the things we would consider lynch pins of Terry Funk's legacy in the business. Our wire cages, brawling, fighting in all different corners of the arena.

We're starting to see a picture come into relief of the many influences that Terry Funk would pull into his style and where it all came from. Yeah, promos from Malinko, brawling style from his dad, with Texas Death Matches with the likes of Iron Mike Debiassi. What I like about the way Fritz describes the Texas Death Matches, so it gives us a lot more detail about how all over the place these matches were and how they added different accoutrema like barbed

wire. I mean, right, we talk about something totally associated with Terry Funk in his nineties matches with Saboo and in the King of the Death Match tournament in Japan, Barbed Wire all Day, the CW logo for Starters, and it's all from these little pockets of influence of what his dad was doing and what others were doing around him as he came up in the industry in the time period we're talking about this week on the Lapsed Funk and it's starting

to really come together, like where what mosaic he created. Another Fritz book that came out is Don Smith's Fritz on Eric Tribe and Tragedy, and this talks about how Fritz beat Dorey Funk Senior and Terry Wants in a handicap match Wow in nineteen sixty six, number sixteenth, and that has of course echoes of when Fritz and David wrestled Hartley Race and Saint Louis in the handicap match.

And remember that David beats Harley and it's Larry Mattison on the call and they get all animated because holy shit, like it was supposed to be the unfair advantage for Race, but he was so confident that he could beat the old man and the young kid, and the young kid just does it all without any of his dad's help and an instant world title challenger has made. Of course it would never happen for David von Eira, but the pieces were in place. This is sort of like a first version of that in sixty

six in Saint Louis. That's wild. Now Fritz doesn't lose to Funk Senior and Terry, but Terry is, you know, less than a year into the business and has already cast in a similar against Fritz. Don Smith wrote, this is a rather important outcome since Fritz beat the Funk family patriarch in the future NWA World champion in a handygap match. Of course, this was promoter Sam Muchnick's call, but Sam was pushing Fritz as a bigger crowd draw

than the Funks, as he always had. In early March nineteen seventy two, Fritz followed up at Northside Coliseum in Fort Worth and announced that Dorriy Funk Junior was the only Funk he was willing to meet in the ring. Apparently they were offers for Fritz to Facedoory's younger brother Terry, but of course no

championship would be at stake there. Fritz waned the NWA World title so April eleventh, seventy two in Dallas, Fritz lost to Dory Funk Junior, viewed his qualification, and then in early May nineteen seventy two, mister Fuji issued a challenge to Fritz, who had report reputedly defeated the Japanese star for the All Asia Championship. Actually that time it was a Dallas Fort Worth creation that

was not around too long. Yeah, which Sid's a tight bulletin from May seventy two reporting that Dorrifunk Senior, the father of for NWA world champion Dory Junior, had offered a five thousand dollar reward to anyone who could beat Fritz and knock him down in the ratings rankings so his son would not have to face him in the title defense. On May twenty nine, Fritz and Terry Funk engaged in a heated interview in Fort Worth. The stage was set for

an all out war between Fritz and the Funks. Fast forward to June of seventy two and irving Texas, Fritz drew against Stry Funk Junior at Texas Stadium. How about that Texas Stadium? Failing to win the end to be a world title. Several weeks before the match, Fritz announced if he failed to defeat Funk, he would never seriously consider challenging for the NAA World Championship again. Fritz received a standing ovation as he made his way to the ring and

the first fall. Fritz came out as the aggressor, dominating Funk for the first five minutes. Funked then rebounded with some offense, but soon found himself in the grip of the iron claw, first to the head and then to the stomach. The champion saved himself by finally draping his lid. Never seriously. What does that mean? Never seriously can be a contender or whatever? I guess what he means is he's not going to campaign to face like top

contenders and try to, you know, get the shot. It doesn't mean someone won't give him a shot, but this game, she's not going to seek the toughest competition. That's how I read it. I don't fucking know what it means. It means my sons are going to win the belt, not me. Yeah, I don't know about that. After Fritz deck Funk with the dropkick and fail to connect with the second, Funk applied as famous spinning to hold to win the first fall. And in the second fall,

Funk escaped several of Fritz's attempts to win with the iron claw. Finally, however, Fritz dragged Funk into the ropes and cotton, rebounding with the iron claw to win the second fall, and in the third fall, Fritz had Funk with the grip of the iron claw. When the one hour time limit expired, Dory's brother Terry was officially barred from ringside, but briefly showed up to harass Fritz during the intermission before the third fall. Twenty six thousand,

three hundred and thirty nine fans attended. This was the first card that Fritz presented at Texas Stadium. Wow. Uh, that was a big one. And so the von Eriks and the Funks very much important to each other. Big box office draws, both fathers against each other, Fritz against the sons, and interestingly, Fritz kind of the first example of the wrestler who looked past Terry to get to Dory, creating this sort of character that would also

be central to Funk's early identity in wrestling. It's kind of like the scrappy younger brother who was sent in there to do some dirty work against somebody that was nipping at Dorry's heels and trying to get a world title shot, and somebody that was sort of a had a chip on his shoulder because he was the younger brother that wasn't the world champion and had kind of a more wide

open style. Yeah, people didn't take quite as seriously. And I love that little wrinkle there of Dory Funk's senior sending Terry because he's nervous that this guy's coming for his son's title, thus making the funks. You know, world champion baby faces in Amarillo, but everywhere else they went, they were playing all these little fucking political games to keep the belt in the fence wild. Like I said, they're elite cowboys. There's a ring. I mean,

I dig that. I do dig that. So we're talking about all these giants coming through from Wahoo McDaniel. We talked about Tito Santana came through the territory, talked about, of course, Fritz von Eric having formative experiences in and around the funks. We talked about, but Nick Monroe coming through. We talked about Dennis Stamp wasn't a big star, but all these people are becoming, uh what he booked is Johnny Valentine. How about Gary Hart?

I mean you want to cut deep? We're talking Texas July twenty seven, sixty six, Chicago, absolutely in Lubbock, Texas, Gary Hart versus Terry Funk. Wow. Now this is not the Gary Heart that we knew when celebrated in World Class. This is not even the Gary Hert that's got to start in Chicago in the Deumont network days. This boss is someone I'd like to introduce to you at this point. This is gay Gary Hart. Excuse me well? From Halsted Street, we have Dory Funk Senior's interpretation of

the character Gary Hart should play in the wrestling ring. Wow. From Gary her Heart's book. Killer Carl Cox was a major wrestling star and was wrestling for Dorriy Funk Senior in Amarillo. He came up to Detroit, where Gary Hart was wrestling to start his career for a brief tour. Really took a liking to me and asked me if I would be interested in moving to Amarillo. We talked for a bid, and then he put me on the phone with Dorrifunk Senior, who asked if I would be interested in wrestling for him.

I explained that I really enjoyed managing and developing talent, and that I wasn't sure I wanted to make my living solely as a full time wrestler. Dorry Senior was very blunt and told me that he didn't use managers and wasn't interested in me as a manager, but that he would hire me as a wrestler. Even though I wasn't thrilled with the prospect of going into a territory where I was only getting an opportunity to wrestle, it was time to move

on. My experience with Jim Myers that is, the George and the Animal Steel up in Detroit really built my confidence in molding and developing wrestlers, though, and I loved every second of it. I knew that I would eventually concentrate on managing and developing talent, but for now my site were set and continuing my wrestling career in Nemillo, Texas. I arrived in Amillo in early nineteen sixty six just as Funk was debuting Terry that Is, and moved into

the Downeaster Downtowner Hotel rather because that's where Karl Kox suggested I stay. What a culture shockgame Marilla was. I spent my life in cities like Chicago and Detroit where everything was open twenty four hours and where I could go to the movies after I came home from the matches. That is something picture Gary Hart movie in Chicago after Mett wrestling. I can, I can. What do

you see? Well, let's see he comes out, well, probably porn like Jack Nils, yeah right, or some kind of like you know, grindhouse double feature. What does the screen look like on his face? What? What does the projector screen look like reflecting on his face in the darkened Oh? Oh, it's just like just you can, oh, you can see like very muddy colors, you know, like scratches reflected off like just the you know, the screen, you know, like basically blinking off of

his face. Very dirty. So I hope you get the point by now. This is kind of definitely you know, and definitely too definitely the only the only theater showing showing movies this late has got sticky floors. Okay, so very sticky. You gotta that. That is the thing when you like when you when you when you you step, you take a step, and then all of a sudden, you lift your foot up and that every time.

What's the term in TV or in movies where they come out with a movie that happened concurrent to the old story, but you know, it's like now it's being told like this is supposed to have happened at the same time that the last movie happened. Sequel, if there's a term for it. I don't even know if it's a term for it, but usually it's kind of like a spin off of swords or an alternate view on the same time

period. Yeah, and yeah, I hope we're realizing by now that the lapsed funk is that for the lamentable tragedy for sure, because all of these characters that we saw come to life on the history of the Dallas Territory. So many of them not only came through Amarillo, but like Gary Hart, started really in Amarillo for all tax purposes and were shaped and molded and given

their first exposure to wrestling in Texas in Amarillo before Dallas. And Fritz Van Eric himself is defining what it means to be Fritz fan Eric and the Rings of Amarillo as much as he is Rings in his own territory, and it's a remarkable thing to think about where Dory Funk Senior would have stood visa VI these other giants of Texas wrestling had he lasted a little longer. Heart continues. In Amarillo, the movie houses were only open on the weekends, and

everything closed down at eight pm, even the restaurants. That says a lot about you know that That informs a lot about Terry Funk, doesn't it. Oh? Yes, he grew up in a city that closes at eight o'clock at night. I learned quickly that unless I bought food here before I went to the matches, I wasn't going to eat that evening. And before I had time to fully deal with the culture, I was given another shocker.

Dorry Funk Senior wanted to name me gay Gary Hart. Fucking why. I want you to be a gorgeous George type of guy, he told me, as my jaw dropped. I want them to think you're a queer. I'm playboy Gary Hart from Chicago, I explained, and I really don't want to present myself as a gay guy. Dory's Senior wouldn't budge, though, he wanted a gay wrestler and his roster and told me, well, your name is already gay Gary Hart, and I'm not changing it, so you better

come up with something. There we go. I really infuriated the people. It also got my character away from the gay gimmick and just made me more of a creep. However, no matter how hard I tried to steer my character in another direction, all the guys in the dressing room knew that the persona of Gay Gary Hart was supposed to be that of a queer, wanted

nothing to do with me and tried to avoid working with me. Dory Senior's two boys didn't have any choice, though, because they did whatever their father said. Therefore, I was immediately put in a program with Dory Funk Junior, and the first time I ever met his brother, Terry, was one of those day during this Toms your time, get your ash eating out back

to that. Now, Gary, I understand that you've got some concerns with the duck, but take it from me, I've run wrestling in this town for many, many, many years, and i know what draws money. You need to have a garage George type queer character on roster. Now here's what I would suggest if you have reservations about the gimmick. There's a few things we can do. One, you can go in the ring and eat another wrestler's ass, just to kind of understand where you're coming from a character.

Two, another wrestler can go in the ring and eat your ass. What'll it be? Or number three, I can shove a gun up your ash and pull the trigger till it goes click. Welcome to West Texas Sports. Western State sports. Isn't that what it's called? That's right? So he goes into funk Junior. The first time I ever met his brother, Terry, was in wrestling junior at the Immoral Fairgrounds. I knew that at some point of the match, Terry would jump in and attack me, but

I had never met him. Because the Heels and babyfaces had dressing rooms on either side of the building, I was pounding on Junior, so we grew up in the boys ranch. Then I guess, so he's used to this, I guess, And suddenly there was a roar from the crowd. I looked up and there was Terry and the process of jumping over the top what he missed caught his foot and collapsed in the middle of the ring. A junior just looked at me in deadpanned meet my brother Terry. Oh my god,

that's a great moment. That was the opening of the movie. Oh Terry does the run in wet behind the ears and falls on his face trying to get in the ring. I tried Dad. Eventually I started the feud

with Terry and we got into a really hot program. During one of our matches to the Odessa Fairgrounds Coliseum, I busted Terry open pretty bad and we took the match out of the ring and to the front of the building where the concession stands were again the early Jurorf the brawling style that Terry Funk had known for. Yeah, that's fucking crazy. Terry went out the front door. I started back to the dressing room. However, the fans had me

trapped in the concession stand and weren't about to let me go. Thankfully, Professor Tanaka and Art Nelson came out to save me. Tanaka got about forty stitches in his head from people hitting him with chairs, and Art got stabbed in his leg and back during the melee. They got me to the back, but once we were there, Art was Yeah. What he didn't say

is he was the one that stabbed him by the way. Yeah, they got me to the back, but once we were there, Art was really upset with me, screaming, you stupid idiot, you could have gotten us killed. What were you doing fighting in the concession stand. Even though Terry and I were in a program and weren't supposed to travel together, sometimes we had no choice. One time, Terry and I wrestled each other in the opening match in Herford at seven thirty pm, and then we had to get

ourselves to plane View so we could wrestle in the main event. It was dark when we left the arena in Herford and if all the fans were inside the auditorium in plain View, So we threw caution to the wind and traveled together. Most Knightstick and I would secretly meet up with Terry after the matches and we would ride the oil wells. We would bring some beer, crawl up the head of an oil well, settle ourselves on the pump, and ride the oil well while we drank our beer, talked about life and shocked

Jack Rabbits. I don't know what it means to ride an oil well, but it sounds very very texas you sit on it and it just pumps and you go up and do it. It sounds normal. I guess that's amazing. Also sounds like bullshit, but I'm sure it happened. One night, Terry and I drove out to the desert to shoot some jack rabbits. We fell asleep in the car, and when we woke up the next day,

we realized there had been a hillacious rainstorm. Because we were in the desert, we were basically stuck on an island, and it took until four pm until the water ran off and we could drive out of there. Everyone was worried about us because no one knew where we were. I had a lot of great times with Harry. Of course I promised him I would, knowing it can only help me on interviews to brag about how I beat up the Funk Brothers in Ambillo. I was very appreciative of Okay, so he's saying.

He eventually agreed to do the gay character. I was very appreciative of the opportunity dory function your gave me. Even though he wouldn't let me manage and develop guys the way I wanted to, he showed me I was valuable and paid me very well. He was at a dynamic guy, and every wrestler who ever worked for him would have cut their head off for him, and I was no different. We all loved him, yet we were afraid of him too because he was so tough. I may have been a freak

kid who hung out with gangsters, but he was the real deal. I know because I wrestled him. I was unbelievably fortunate because for the third time in my career, in just the third territory i'd been in, I'd found yet another great mentor. Billy Golds, Bert Ruby and Dorrifunk Senior really deserve a lot of credit for getting me ready to be able to handle myself in the business and for my future success. And as grateful as I was to be working for Dorrifunk Senior, I knew it was time for me to move

on. Wow, So put another one in the bank for the funks, Gary Hart on his way. Unbelievable. You know. While in Saint Louis things are changing. Sam Muchnick has stepped down as president of the NWA. Apparently he was insulted at the idea of promoters trying to cut out his two and a half percent of gait On all the championship title, defenses the NBA

World Champion. And so who became president? Do you remember this? Do you remember who steps in and becomes president of the NWA after Sam much Nicks, after Sam Muchnik. We're about to ross currents again, is it? Uh? Is it Carbo Fritz? Fritz? I forgot he was fucking president of the NWA. It brings his sons to Vegas for the convention and get some hookers. Remember that when they were God yep, and they reflessly pound

Vegas hookers. I'm sure I wonder if zac Efron get some of that in the movie, you know, you know, did you watch the trailer? Yeah, of course you did. I What do you think of the trailer? I liked it too. I thought it was pretty good. I'm very there were there were two things like that that well, one thing made me concerned. One thing got me concerned, and that was and about about the

details of the whole thing. Because at one point, the guy playing Fritz lifts off his favorite you know, the the in order his favorite sons or like, you know, and it goes Carrie, Kevin, and David in that order. When was David ever third in that list? That's like it was to me. It made me nervous. To me, it made me think that they think Carrie because w w, it's funny exactly exactly the probably

do for purposes in marketing the movie. I mean, let's face it, that's why we were interested in the von Erics because we remembered Kerry one Eric. Yeah, it does doesn't excuse them fucking with the timeline. But I I also, well, it's not even just fucking with the timeline. It's fucking with the truth. I mean, and there's that, and then I'm just like, you know, I was like, if I get I get nervous because I know this is an approved movie. So well, I saw

Kevin Son say on Twitter that the family was not involved. Oh okay, well but did they but they had to sell their rights or whatever. Well either way, okay, great, I mean that's that's great, that is the case, because I really hope to god, you know, to me, the only way it's going to be a good movie, and like a true movie obviously, is if is if we get uh, you know, Fritz holding the gun to Kevin. Yeah, all right, and then if we want a Best Picture winner, we're going to have a cotton ball moment

with Mike von Eric right where he's start writing traffic at the press conference while the sun is half dead, right right, all right, and then we can talk about it like we always said, it's about Fritz. It's about exactly. You don't have the right view of Fritz, and it's culpability. It's it's not gonna it's not gonna stand up. The project isn't gonna stand

up. It's going to fall apart because it has it has to be anchored to the idea that this guy is pushing everybody in the in the wrong direction all the time. Yes, yes, for the wrong reasons, Like like it should it should almost, it should end. It should begin and end kind of like Citizen Kane. Yes, you know, like it should open with with with you know, Fritz on his deathbed saying to whomever I should have bought the bait and tackle show hoptally Man, you know. And apparently

people have deduced from the trailer. I mean, I didn't watch it closely enough to know where they got this from. But that Chris isn't even going to be part of it. Oh god, you gotta what are you doing? Guys? I mean you got to have moll. I mean, these these are that's the tragedy of it. The tragedy, the tragedy is I mean, first of all, yes, the David death is is is tragic in its own way, but the real tragedy is the three suicides. That Dad pushed them, that that hard, and and and that much. And

if you don't do that, what are you? What do you? What do you? What story are you trying to tell? Right? And that's you know, if you can't be wrestlers, you know, like he'll let them. He would rather let them try and fail till they died to be wrestlers than to just do something else. Or apparently they felt that that's all he would settle for, because look what they put themselves through. Yep. I mean, who am I to say that Chris van Eric was wrong about

what his father wanted from him, so can't wait. But that's so what I'm trying to say. Here's Fritz taking control of the n w A after Sam Muchnick, who is no fan of Terry Funk in terms of that angle, and needed to be sort of sold on Funk more than the typical promoter. Now that's not a concern and what are you knowing about a year?

Is Terry rolling up Jack Briscow to become NWA World's Champion? I think so, but that's all still to come here in the lapsed Funk just note that that happens, and that's a bit of important shifting sands in the NWA as it regards the Funks, and Jim Barnett takes over the duties of booking the champion. What that's really good? Actually? So yeah much Nick President from

sixty three to seventy five. Wow. So after Funks get started wrestling, of course in Amarillo, having that Johnt of the a w A, going over to Saint Louis and Kansas City for Muchnick and really getting acquainted with the key power brokers in the business. What we consider Funk's first real territory abroad, that is to say, a place he went for more than just a couple of weeks without an exact you know date, certain that he would return

to Amarillo was indeed Florida Championship Wrestling. Wow. And second only to Texas, Florida is the place that the Funks truly made their legacy in the business. That's where Dory established his base of operations opened up the Funking Conservatory Wrestling School in Ocala, Florida, that I think still exists to this day. And Dorriy Funk Junior, I mean, in his highest peak of his career and into retirement, was just as much a Floridian as he was a Texan

in terms of living there and being based out of there. And it's where Terry Funk goes to develop his heel persona times one hundred, to draw heat like nobody else, and to begin feuding with the American dream. Dusty Rhodes was of course an absolute sensation in Florida for Ready Graham for about a full

decade there, So that's all going to begin developing. April nineteen sixty seven, the first run of the territory that he would end up being most famous in championship wrestling from Florida Rights. He was there for three and a half months before his father told him to come back home. But it is definitely where he's going to start start really making his bones. So let's see, Terry. Do you have Terry talking about this point in time on an RF

video shoot interview? I believe we do. Fans stand by what was at the time and you broke into the restling business, what was maybe if you can explain to a lot of people watching, what was the business like then as compared to now, which I'm sure was completely different, It really was, you know. I mean, first of all is you'd go to a town and a small town and we'd go through small towns. Well, one

of the big differences was pay. Yeah, we would drive to Ablene, Texas, which is two hundred and fifty miles one way and two hundred and fifty miles back and make our sales twenty five dollars guarantee five hundred mile trip. We'd all file into one car and make it. You know, I'll never forget my father. I was down in Florida in nineteen sixty seven and uh, I was in Florida wrestling for eighty gram at the time, and

my father called me up and he said, doctor Pulice. It was then the promoter in Ambrella had passed away, and he said, Terry, he said, we're gonna take over the promotional business. And uh, not like take it over by overpowering somebody or anything else, but he was buying the business from Lusar Police at the time. Might because she wasn't able to run it being a lady in the business at the time as a man's business. And uh, he said, come on back up here. I said,

I don't know if I can. Dad. He said, well why and I said, well, I'm I'm I'm averaging two hundred and fifty dollars a week. Yeah, you know, and that was big money for me at the time, you know. And he said, well, he says, I think it would do better than that if you come on up here. So I went back to Amberill and we ran a business. Apparent we were

doing big business in Florida. Bit right, wrestling is There's so many guys that I've known through the years that I wish that they were into this era that are good friends of mine and good guys that back then you would you were into wrestling for a different reason. I mean, these guys were in it for a lifetime. They didn't have a second job like you see guys

have today and wrestling in the spots shows. They were wrestlers and a lot of them really didn't make enough to retire or set any money back at all at that time, you know. And after they completed wrestling, they had to get a job in security. Some of them have done well, but most of them, you know, just kind of you know, old wrestlers, they never they used to say, they never died. They just payed away, you know, and they just kind of disappear and find a way

of making a buck some other way back then, you know. And I wish that they could have gotten in the business now, where a guy can wrestle five six years if he gets in with one of the big organizations, set himself for life. A little bit of lessons of Funk there as well. So it's a headfam this first junt of Florida, because Harry goes there and Dorry and Terry win the Florida version of the World tag titles from Kurt

and Carl Browner. Actually that's upon the return. So they go down there and they're setting themselves up and establishing a foothold in Florida, when suddenly things change back in Amarillo and Doxarpoulis, who was the longtime promoter there, had died, and you better believe that Dorry Funk Senior is moving in to take ownership of the territory in full reigns. I think he'd already bought in,

and he's already business partners. We've talked about previously on the lapsed Funk, But this is like when Fritz van Eric closed in and ed maclamore in Dallas and became the sole guy in this oratorium, the sole guy running the wrestling business in that city. And that happens to take place in Amrello because when Funk first gets in, Darksar Paulis is still in the picture for a couple

of years there. When Terry Funk first gets in the ring and he goes to Florida to begin building his career, and suddenly the phone call comes from Dad who says, you know, we just bought the whole place, needs you to come down here. And now, of course he runs the whole thing, so he's got better control of the purse strings apparently such that he can promise his son Terry that he'll make better money back home in a Marilla

than he was making it the time in Florida. I think he said two hundred and fifty dollars a week, which was really good money in nineteen seventy three, I'd imagine, or nineteen sixty eighty seven as it were, or sixty eight, So Dorry and Terry come home, and as mentioned, they beat Kurt and Carl von Browner for the world tag titles in that part of the country on June eighteenth, nineteen sixty eight in sant Angelo, Texas and

would go on to wag straps all over the world. Of course, so pretty much operating is a brother tag team at this point in time are Dorry and Terry Funk. But Dorry, of course, having gotten a several year head start on Terry end of the pros, having wrestled a lot of high

profile people across the country. At that point in time, the seeds were already being planted for young Dorince Junior to be the Funk to win the NWA World Heavyweight Championship and achieve that level of glory that Fritz van Eric himself and his sons, with the exception of that, of course, brief Kerry win in eighty four, never really were able to capture. This was Dorry Funk

Junior being put in position to do it. It was telegraphed as far back as nineteen sixty five in this article on the Emerald Globe War Wow No Shit where jing Kiniski, of course, was the big star in wrestling at the time of the world champion or on his way to becoming. So this article reads in sixty five both big grid names Jing Kiniski and Bob geigeltangle in the first main event Jan played at Arizona and later in the Canadian League under Darryl

Royal. Geigel was a defensive end at Iowa. Promoter Dark Sarpolis says, quote people all over the country think the Kaniski will be the man to win the world championship from Luthez, and he would become the world champion and he

would be the one to drop that strap to Dorry Funk Junior. All rings very familiar a boss like Fritz all the way down to influence at the NWA level, the power brokerage, the taking over territories that you were once a headliner in the dynasty family with the Texas ranch positioning the eldest son to become world's heavyweight champion. But the key difference is the Funks would not truly blossom under their dad's stern demand and watchful like the van Erics did their father yep.

Because the Funk's father, their patriarch, certainly would not outlive them right. Dory Funk Senior died June third, nineteen seventy three, and in this piece from Terry Funk's interview with Jim Cornett for k Fabe Commentaries, reflects upon the day the Funk family patriarch, Dory Senior the Boys Ranch leaves this earth and what it was is last Thornton was there too, and he said that

nobody can hold me down in the front face lock, you know. So my father got down on you know, so my father front face locked him and on a you know, they were in the kitchen, you know, when he got down on top of him and slapped the front face lock on em, and they went all over the kitchen and wels Thornton couldn't get away, you know, and father kind of choked him out, you know. And uh, and he went in and came back over there where I was and sat down by me and my brother. He said it wasn't bad for

an old man, was it? I said, no, it wasn't. And then he walked out on a from port and my wife is out there, and my wife is smoking a cigarette on a front porch at ranch, you know, and he says, go back in there and tell Terry that I think I'm having a heart attack. So my wife came in here and told me that, and I went out there and we got him the canyon right quick. And it was a small town and a very small community at the time. And I had one doctor in town and he was a good

doctor, but he wasn't, you know, a small town doctor. And he said, you need to row with a Dori and we're gonna get you at Ambrilla. So they called an ambulance. It took about thirty minutes get there, which is more time and more time. Yeah. And then so we got in the ambulance with him. Brother was in the front seat, was in the back with my dad, and he said, I'm much further We got to go. Terry, so he is about a mile and a half from the hospital in Amrell and I said about a mile and a half.

Yeah. He says I can't make it. He says, I'm going just like that, and he has gone wow. I mean, Dori Funk, we've talked about it would have Eddie Graham tackle him from behind out of nowhere and an attempt to test his shooting ability. Dorry Funk Senior would never hesitate to, at least in a wrestling term, throw down if you wanted

to challenge his grappling ability. And it was just another day back at the house, as Dory Senior would do throughout Terry Funk's formative youth, invite the boys over for a barbecue, tell stories until two three in the morning, and just sort of make manifest that camaraderie that Terry Funk so vividly recalls and so warmly recalls being around growing up is essentially a gypsy family in the wrestling business, as his father found his way, and it was one such get

together that led to Dorifunk Senior's fatal heart attack in nineteen seventy three. Les Thornton apparently a wrestler we talked about back in the Black Saturday series. He was on TBS a lot back then. Yeah, highly skilled technical junior heavyweight wrestler from England who had a long career in the United States. Basically got to talk in at dorrif Funk Senior at the house and pretty soon the furniture was being cleared out of the way and they were testing each other in a

shoot context. Terry sort of forlornly recalled there. It was all downhill for his father as he realized that he was having a heart attack. This is something that deeply impacted Terry, as you'd imagine what anybody, but the whole dynamic of could I should I right around getting my dad to a hospital faster, perhaps discouraging him at his age from engaging in a pointless amateur wrestling skirmish in the living room. But that's wu Dorifunk Senior was going to be until

his dying day, and that's who he was. And his book, Terry recalls the following. The ambulance took another twenty minutes. The whole thing took us about an hour and a half from the time he told us he was having a heart attack to the time we pulled into the bigger hospital in Amarilla. But by the time he pulled in, he was already gone. The thing that haunts me is wondering if we'd just gone to Amarilla first, would we have been all right? Would my dad have lived through it? My

dad was only fifty four when he passed. On. Hell, I'm past sixty and I've done a lot of living between fifty four and sixty. After my dad died, I had anxiety attacks, thinking I was having heart problems. Six months after his death, I was coming back from a show in New Mexico when I started feeling flush. I went to the next hospital I got to in my blood pressure was sky high. I had just scared myself

into it because of what happened to my father. A little later, we were in El Paso and Junior and I had just finished a tag match. We got to the law room and I sat down as a Junior, I'm having a heart attack. I don't want to move real fast, but get me to a hospital. Junior said, my God, okay, and he got me in the car. We buzzed down to the hospital and I sat down in the emergency room. There must have been twenty people in there, and I sat down while Junior went to talk to a nurse about me.

He came back over and said they would be over in a minute, but someone in the waiting room screamed Terry. Junior kept trying to tell me what was going on, but Terry funk. I looked over and coming my way was a guy who must have been waiting to see a doctor. Obviously he was a wrestling fan. I can't believe it, Terry Funk, how the hell you doing? And I want to shake your hand. How's it going,

Terry, Honey, come over here, it's Terry Funk. You got some paper, honey, just to clean X. She said, Terry, would you sign this for me? I tried to stay calm as I signed the autograph. Well, how are you here? You go? Hope you enjoy it. Thanks for stopping by. All the while I was thinking, please pal, have a little courtesy, Please God. I don't want to die like this. I should have blown my nose on the damn thing. The doctors told me I'd been causing myself anxiety and had been humping up my

own heartbeat. It's pretty amazing. Wow, mind it can do. Dave Meltzer, who was in constant contact with Terry Funk and had a very good relationship with him and talked to him really until he began a cognitive decline, wrote the following upon Terry's death, I don't want to say Terry changed. In nineteen ninety eight, when he turned fifty four. That would be the

same age his father died of a heart attack. That would be too strong, but he referenced many times after that point that he had passed the age that his father died, and it was something often on his mind. Terry relived that so many times. What if his father and Thornton didn't get into that altercation, what if he sped to Amarillo Hospital first before going to Canyon. He would relive that moment, often getting anxiety attacks and was fearful of

getting a heart attack. Once coming back from a show, he worked himself into such a fit he checked himself from the hospital and his blood pressure was through the roof. At another point, he thought he was having a heart attack and told his brother he was having one, and they rushed him to the hospital. So Terry Funk's on his way thanks to the rather brilliant introduction

of his father into the business. But he'd also have a cross to bear as it regards a ticking clock, which is something remarkable for someone who came to be known chiefly for his one of a kind longevity in the business.

That Terry Funk, right in the back of his mind was always counting the days, and it might tell us a lot about why he made seemingly a lot more wiser choices around putting family first at critical junctions in his career where he could have just let that collapse under the weight of becoming a big professional wrestling superstar. Now, it's worth noting that this story, this apocryphal story

of how Dorry Funk Senior died, does have multiple perspectives. You know, Terry was sure to tuck in that his father somehow choked out Less Thornton. That's I don't know if that makes him feel better or whatever, but it's not necessari obviously true. Greg greg Oliver Slam Wrestling talked to several people involved, including Jerry Kozak, who made mentioned of functioniors eat habits. In this case, Yes, you guessed it, Boss Steak. Oh, come on,

like that's a surprise, he tilled Greg Oliver. Dorry Senior was sitting at the head of the table once and I was cutting the fat away from the meat. He said, what are you going to do? All they do, all they do is raise the stacks. Ok. Yeah, literally out the cattle. He said, what do you do with that? I said, well, I'm not going to eat it. He said, well give it here. I said, dad, gum Dory, you eat it. All that fat is going to kill you, and it surely did.

Mmm. There are matches. On June third, seventy three, Funk didn't wrestle, but he wrestled not too long before this. He'd actually, I think, similar to Iron Mike DBIASI had sort of like a late call in as a substitute in a match. So while he had slowed down his in ring career substantially by nineteen seventy three, Funk Junior Senior was still seeing some action, and according to the Greg Oliver piece, on that day, Senior

invites a bunch of wrestlers over at the Flying Mere Ranch. After a few drinks, the challenges started and he talked to Les Thornton did Greg Oliver, who said the following quote. The old man said, tried to get out of this fella. He put a full nelson on me. So I picked him up and ran him into the fridge and all the stuff came flying out. We all got caught. He put a bandage on his head. He

was a tough old bugger. He just laughed about it. That does it's only getting choked out to me that that sounds like Dory Funk getting thrown around the living room and smashed into the refrigerator. But that's fine. Like a bitch. Yeah. Gordon Nelson, a Canadian amateur champion, was also there and also tussled with Dorry Funk. But for some reason when the was it a colossal tussle. That's that's yet to be determined. But for some reason,

when the Funks tell the story, they never mentioned Gord Nelson. They just mentioned Les Thornton as the person that wrestled their dad upon his heart attack. Nelson said he had a short battle with Funk Senior. He said, I'm getting too old, he remembers Funk Senior saying, and Nelson thought that was significant because quote, that's something that he would never say otherwise, and that at about ten thirty pm, Funk suffers the heart attack. The eyes

at SENI it that he's hospital in Amarillo. Jerry Kozak, who promoted some towns for the Funks, was also there that night. They recalled, quote, all of a sudden, it was like, where the hell is Dory? Where's Junior and Terry? They're gone and we couldn't figure it out. That's when they took Doory to the hospital. Of course, we found out the next few days that he passed away. A wrestler named Moose Morowski was there. He recalls quote, I was in another room. They started wrestling,

and I don't know what it was. Next thing I know, I hear that they called the doctor ambulance or something. He died at the hospital. It was terrible, Senior. Every year he threw a thing for the guys that wrestled there. He'd throw a barbecue at his ranch. They'd castraight some bulls. Have a big barbecue, lots of food, lots of drink, big cast straight bulls. So normal activity. That's what I do actually every weekend and have a ranch. You don't know what it's like to be

a rancher. But the cock the cocks off bulls, cockin bowl af cockon bowl story. Oh my god, that's it. That's it. And so unlike Carrie and the David and the Mic, they don't have the shadow over

their shoulders. As the funks make their way in professional wrestling, I'd argue that plays no small part in their ability to have a whole hell of a lot more to show for it. Dorriy Funk Junior, in fact, wrestled Les Thornton, or was scheduled to wrestle Les Thornton three days after he died after his dad died wrestling les Thornton in the living room, according to an ad that I see here for a show at Lubbock Fair Park scheduled for June

and sixth. Not sure that one took place, but some irony there for sure, and returned to Dorry Funk's book forget another account of the passing and Funk Senior. My Lincoln Continental Mark three left Umbarger, Texas, traveling northeast on Highway sixty, headed toward Canyon, Texas. It was just after midnight

and the speedometer was stuck in one hundred miles per hour. It was just minutes earlier that Terry's wife, Vicky, had told me that my father wasn't feeling good, and Terry had left the Flying Mayor Ranch minutes before that to take him to meet his doctor at Kenyon's Neblett Hospital. I was concerned because of the tension in her voice and her comment that Terry thought he might have

had a heart attack. As I sped along the highway, I thought about the last time I had seen him, couldn't have been more than thirty minutes ago. Gordon Elson, les Thornton, and my father were wrestling on the kitchen floor. It was a party. All the wrestlers who had worked so hard to make the Amberilla territorious success were invited to a barbecue at my father's

Flying Mare ranch. It was the spring of nineteen seventy three. Some of the wrestlers at the ranch were King Curtis i Akea, Carl von Steiger, Don Fargo, Danny Miller, Jumbo Shiuda, Jim Dalton, Referee, Ken Farber, Thornton Nelson, Marie la Verne, am Mailla promoter, Jerry Coosak

Lubbock promoter Nick Roberts, and Scott Casey. Only Ricky Rimero of the regular wrestlers, was missing, but that was expected, as Ricky felt it was best for the business not to associ after work hours with the other wrestlers. He was invited and welcome, but his feelings were respected. The subject of the wrestling that took place on the kitchen floor was a hold called the keel lock, a wrestling hole that was extremely painful but generally wouldn't cause serious injury.

It is a type of wrist lock that, when applied properly, is difficult to escape. My father had applied it to Les Thornton and he had tapped out. I remember Gordy's comment that he would never give up in that hold because pain didn't bother him in the hold really wouldn't cause serious injury. I remember being proud of my father. He was mixing it up with two of the toughest wrestlers in the business, and even at the age of fifty

four, he was able to come out on top with these guys. However, just as Gordon Nelson said, he could not make him submit to a keel lock. I hit the brakes as I was now approaching the y in the road where Highway sixty turns from northeast to due east. Now I was just three and a half miles from Canyon, Texas. At one hundred miles an hour, it wouldn't be long. It was nothing unusual to see my

father have a go at it with wrestlers when I was a child. My uncle Herman would wrestle my father in the living room, and my grandmother, Amma Funk, would come in swing in a broom to break them up. Later, at Texas Boys Ranch, my father and Bob Geigel got after it in the gym in front of the whole wrestling team. And then there was the time veran Gania, Joe Scarpello and my father had to go in our garage. I hit the brakes just in time to make the turn at the

underpassing canyon. I would go straight to Fifth Avenue and turn left to Neblood Hospital. My father's blood pressure was always perfect. He had the best blood pressure of all the boys in the dressing room, one twenty over eighty. Maybe it wasn't a heart attack, but if it weren't serious, Terry would never have called doctor Moore at midnight and asked him to meet him here at

Neblod Hospital. Now I remembered earlier Terry had told me Dad was upset that Don Fargo was riding his motorcycle over his pasture land, but Dad felt too tired to say anything about it to him. And I saw Dad one time earlier in the day, almost exhausted after just riding a lawnmower for a few minutes. I should have known something was wrong. I burst through the door and into the emergency room. All was quiet. Doctor Moore and Terry were

there, and my father was sitting up on a hospital bed. They had called the technician who would administer an electrio cardiogram. Comment for my dad was that he just felt a little bit bad and if he could just get home and get some rest, he thought he would feel better in the morning. The technician arrived and began administering that electro cardiogram. He tore off the paper containing the graphical information and gave it to doctor Moore. Doctor Moore left the

room for no more than fifteen seconds. When he returned, he said, Dorry, you have had a massive heart attack. An ambulance is on the way. We were taking you to the emergency room at Northwest Texas Hospital in Amarilla. I want you to relax and go along with everything we are going to do. My father looked at me and Terry. He said, I don't think they are right. You guys had better keep this one quiet. Terry answered, yeah, Dad, I know what you're talking about. A

lot of people would like to have a piece of our territory. All other conversation was directed toward getting him in the ambulance. In on the way to Northwest Texas Hospital and Amarilla. We were in the ambulance and headed toward Amarillo. Northwest Texas Hospital was twenty miles away. Doctor Moore was in the front seat and I was in the back on the right side of my father. Terry was on the left. I was holding my father's hand. I'm sure

Terry was touching him somewhere. The ambulance driver was going sixty five to seventy miles an hour. I heard Terry cuss him out and in no uncertain terms tell him to pick up the speed and get us to the hospital. Now, traveling at eighty and ninety miles an hour, we were passing under Bell Avenue, just five miles and minutes from Northwest Texas Hospital. I heard the

last words from my father as he said, I'm going. There was a last desperate attempt by doctor More to save his life, but nothing was of benefit for all practical purposes. His life ended there on the Canyon Freeway under Bell Avenue. There were attempts to save him when we arrived at Northwest Texas Hospital, but it was all too late. The Amarillo, Japan and the wrestling business had lost a legend. We can't change the past, but there

are some things we can learn from it. With heart disease the number one killer in the United States today, it makes good sense to make yourself aware of the fastest route to the hospital with the best cardiac care union in the area. It makes good sense to learn the early warning signs of heart attack. Makes good sense to take the best care possible of our bodies and start

at an early age. That night, under the overpass at Bell Avenue, Terry and I lost our father, our best friend, and our business partner. My match at fifty years of Funk is dedicated to you, Dad. I will do my best. Thanks for sharing your life and guiding us from the little house in Hammond, Indiana to the party at the Flying Mer Ranch.

We're together. We took our last ride, Boss. If you could pull the second of the two magazine articles I presented to you, Yes, this was the aforementioned wrestling review, pretty much the leading pre after mag Era wrestling publication of the country, and a full ten years after the clip we started this episode of the Lapsed Funk reading as Dory Funk Senior establishes his bona fides, his mystique, and then introduces his boys into the pages of the

leading wrestling magazine. That same magazine cover story the loss of Doroy Funk Senior, and I wish you could share with the soul or system. How it was conveyed in those same pages. Dorry Funk Senior a boy's boy who grew up to be a man's man. Dory Funk Junior is a young man of great intestinal wait intestional that's how it's spelled. There's a type of in intestional fortitude. Brother, what and never has he needed such a quality as he

does now. In recent months, the good looking Taxes tax As athlete lost his World's Wrestling championship to Harley Race, and prior to that dethronement, Funk was seriously injured in an automobile accident in his native state. Yet the most shattering experience of all was the unexpected death of his father, Dory Funk Senior, a victim of a heart attack. All the fucking typos I can tell,

I can tell, because there have been three already. The world of wrestling was both saddened and shocked earlier this year when it learned of the passing of the elder Funk at the comparative young age of fifty three. But how many years did he actually live is the question? In Texas years, Yes, seven, there you go. Although a great amount of the wrestling audiences of North America never had the opportunity of seeing Dory Senior wrestle. He was

one of the top wrestlers in the nation. Feared and I don't understand how could he be a top wrestler of the nation and not be seen by a great amount of wrestling audiences of North America. Good question. Maybe because he never landed in a territory with great television. I see feared and dreaded by his opponents. He was the type of wrestler who loved the the roughhouse style of a match. A grappler, a fighter, a bruiser. He enjoyed

the violent action and gory battles. I first saw Dorry Senior wrestle on Amarilla in nineteen sixty two. He was pitted against another lover of the gory battles, Fritz von Erik, who was busy putting wrestlers out of the profession with his dreaded claw hold. It was a sellout crowd that never did sit in

their seats. Within minutes, both wrestlers were covered with blood and the feared claw dug into Dory senor oh dug Dory Senior time after time and again, and again, Dorry fought back and brought the fans to the very tips of their toes. It was exciting, thrilling, the kind of match that causes intense sensations. It was his type of match. Dorry Funk Senior was born in Hammond, Indiana. To say he was a boy's boy would be an understatement. From the time he could walk, he was a scrapper and loved

all sports, but was partial to contact sports. The heart of the contact, the better. It was just a matter of time until football and wrestling would hold his entire attention. During his high school days, he won the Indiana State wrestling championship on three different occasions while still finding time to be president of the student body. A football and wrestling scholarship brought him to the University of Indiana, where he won the AAU Wrestling Championship and was voted into the

Indiana Wrestling Hall of Fame. Just about this time, another fight was starting with Dorry, and Dorry wanted some of that action, so it was off to serve for Uncle Sam in the Navy. Dory Senior first appeared in the Lone Star State in Between eight in a team forty nine in nineteen forty nine is what it is, and from that the time he hit a Marilla, he knew this was his kind of town, defeating all opponents that promoters could bring into the Panhandle. He was invited out to Boys Ranch by the late

Cal Farley. Cal had founded Boys Ranch in nineteen thirty nine, but when the boys threatened to throw the superintendent in the Canadian River, it was time to bring in some muscle. From the first moment he was on trial, Dorry took the boys down to the gym and on the mat. The situation was soon cleared up, and although he promised cal three months, he stayed

three years, coaching football and wrestling. Many a man today can look back and realize the character that he was building came from the hearts of men like Calan Dorry Senior. His greatest pride was yet to come. With two sons following in his footsteps, it was a question of who would be Dad's team

partner. Long hours, strict training, the job of teaching the experiences of wrestling, the holes, counter holds, what wrestler did, what wrestler's tricks, the knicks, the knacks, even to the taping of a sprain or bad bruise many hours day months, and at last a father's dream come true to be in his son's corner when he would face the world's heavyweight champion.

Big Gene Kiniski, ex pro footballer, X amateur wrestling champion, was champ and beating all comers, and although Senior had chances for the coveted belt, it always seemed to elude him. The pulse was getting quicker, the heart pumping faster, and a lump came to his throat when he heard the announcer say, Dory Funk. Junior Kinisky came on bit fast, big and strong. The Canadian giant was a powerhouse. The fans came out of their seats. Remarks were shouted, quote it. It will be over any second now.

Gene is too big for Funk. Gene has gout him, et cetera. As Kinisky pinched, kicked, slammed, and drove his head into the mat. If there is such a thing as inheriting guts and determination, perseverance, bulldog tenacity, the will to win, the ambition, desire and courage, all attributes of a champion, it was to be seen in that arena that night. My thoughts raced back to the first time I saw Senior with Von Eric, and now he had come back, the blood pouring from his

from two open holes at his temples. If Young Funk was anything like his old man, if he could produce a portion of Senior's courage, If if, if only, And as the words trailed from my mouth, young Funk was coming back, coming up as slowly as first, as he struggled to find himself. God, where was that much needed second wind? And Young Funk was searching and finding Dorry Senior's eyes, And as he came up, the crowd came with him. Pandemonium, the smell of victory, the young

matador finding the ingredients to make the kill. And there was Dorry Junior applying the world famous spinning toe hold, the hold Dorry Senior introduced into the wrestling profession, the hold that had taken years to perfect and longer to teach. The noise was deafening the new world heavyweight champion, Dorry Funk Junior. You could have said Senior, for Junior was the product the older Funk molded. Dorry took turns teaming with Junior and Terry, who had developed, who had

developed into a star in his own right. I ran into Dory Senior again two years ago at the Madison Square Garden in New York. Oh, sorry, at the Madison Square Gardens in New York. He was teamed with son Terry that night, and I had a long talk with him, as Dorry Senior never lived a dull day and was always good for an interesting story. I asked why he did most of his wrestling around Texas and never gave the fans in other parts of the country much of a chance to see him in

action. Well, I love Texas and it's kind of hard to stay away from a beloved one for long. He kind of chuckled, and it was hard to think of this man being capable of the many things he had done to wrestlers or thought they or thought they had who thought they had his number. Dorrifunk Senior rough, tough, feared, hated, loved, yes. A man who could weep over a dying neighbor's child, a man who loved dogs and would and would doctor sick animals. A boy's boy who grew up

to be a man's man. Dorry Senior never had to be pointed out for his colorful appearance and casual Swagger for his trademark. This story is ending as your life did, Dory, But for those of us who knew you, we were all touched with a little greatness. W. L. Putt Powell, who was a key sportswriter in the Amorlo Globe News and in the area and one of the originators of the Texas High School Football Hall of Fame, took to the pages of his newspaper upon the passing of Dorriyfunk Senior. The

Amoralo Globe Times, June fourth, nineteen seventy three. The life of Dorriy Funk Senior ended at age fifty four Sunday. I doubt if anyone ever lived a more exciting or enjoyable life. He never knew a dull day. He was always the center of attention. He grew up in Hammond, Indiana, and was an all around athlete. He learned to professional He learned professional wrestling. Following World War Two. Funk received his greatest satisfaction while serving at Boys

Ranch. The late Cal Farley founded Boys Ranch in nineteen thirty nine. Farley also had come to Emmarillo as a wrestler. Story was told in a book entitled to shirttail to hang to. Farley gave Dorry credit for saving Boys ranch. In nineteen fifty, a bunch of the older boys were in a state of revolt and had threatened to throw the superintendent into the Canadian River. Farley begged Dorry to take over for a few months. Bunk was on trial.

The first day, he insisted some of the tough boys to work out with him on the mat. The boys were not in a hurry so that Dorry could handle the situation. Dorry also coached the football team and all other sports. He planned to stay there months but stayed three years. Another great tribute to Dory Funk Senior as his two sons, Dorry Junior and Terry. I'm sure Dorry Senior was a stern father, but no one ever raised two finer young men. It was the dream of Dorry Senior for one of his boys

to win the World wrestling championship. Dory Junior. He won the World championship but finished gen Kiniski with a spinning toe hold, which was introduced by Dory Senior. Terry also has been a successful wrestler. Both boys were standout football players at West Texas State. Some of my most pleasant memories are of the times Dorry Funk Senior would drop by this newspaper office for visits late at night.

He was sharp on many subjects. I'll never forget the TV shows Dorry Senor used to have on Sundays. He ribbed himself about receiving an award from Interstate Theaters. Doriy Senior said he received the award because his TV show put more people back in the theaters. Wow. Dorry Senor used to belittle my football guesses on his TV show. Doriy Senior used to make his picks after the games had been played and say that is just the way he selected.

I didn't have a chance. Dorry Senior held many people and many organizations that few people knew anything about. There's there's no telling. This is another bad scan to your point, Yeah, there's no telling. How much he contributed to Boys Ranch. He bought toys and things like that for children in hospitals and homes. Dorriy Funk Senior was a familiar figure walking down the streets in

his colorful clothes. He had a swagger in his walk. Most everyone was saying, there's Dory Funk Senior. Many people are saying today Dory Funk Senior was a great guy. And when it's all said and done, on a later tribute, what better tribute can you receive from your fellow man. That's how Doriy Funk Senior was remembered in Amillo. His obituary noted two sons,

Dorry Junior and Terry, have followed their father inner wrestling. Dorry Junior held the National Wrestling Alliance World Championship until he lost it to Harley Race recently. He the belt. Survivors include his wife Betty, two older sons, two other sons. He had two other sons which you didn't talk about. Almost nothing is known about these guys, Bobby Funk and Donnie Funk. Bobby and Donnie. The Funks now a daughter, Dorry, So apparently he had a

daughter too, So the Terry and Dorry have a sister, Dorry. Wow b O R E E. Does it really there's another Dory a brother Herman of Amarello a sister. Doctor Dorothy Webb of Hammond, Indiana and his parents outlived him. Mister and Missus Adam Funk and acknowledgment of the passing of Dorriy Funk Senior. Ordessa Wrestling promoter Pado Dowdy announced the program schedule for Tuesday at Ector County Coliseum has been canceled because of the death of Doriy Funk Senior.

Funeral services for Dorri Funk Senior were held on June fifth, nineteen seventy three, at the First Methodist Church of Canyon, Texas, and he was buried in the City of Canyon Cemetery and the family asked that all remembrances beside and naturally to cal Farley's Boys Ranch Amarillo. Of course, the patriarch is gone, but as the king dead, m we will find out because fortunately for the Funks, the legacy of their father won't be one of overbearing but one

of kind of a wistful, distant memory of inspiration. It's really the flip side of the coin in so many ways, and it's something that Terry Funk

never let go of, never stop referencing, never stopped thinking about. Despite his mention in that article you read, Dorry Funk scene, you're never really having much of an exposure from a national television point of view, not being somebody who's greatness in the ring and innovations in the ring were really felt much beyond the bounds of West Texas as Terry Funk embarked on a career that would take him to the brightest of spotlights in the rings of Japan and in the

rings of the most prominent wrestling territories in the United States, to Puerto Rico, to Germany, to many other far flung places. He would remember Dorry Senior and do what he could to keep him alive. And thanks to this digest today we know the many little pieces that went into the mosaic that would become Terry Funk. As He's about to embark on Japan and bark on the feud with Dusty Rhoads, embark on the program with Jerry the King Lawler and

the Mpty Arena match, and bark on the death matches in Japan. Embark on a remarkable run through all Japan Pro wrestling with his brother and some of the most legendary tag team matches in the history of the business. Embark on many false retirements, and bark of being a central figure at the heart of

the attitude that was Extreme Championship Wrestling. To runs against Hulk Cogan and Mick Foley in the WWF, to a run in WCW that he would probably prefer to forget to the wonderful program with the Rick Flair and nineteen eighty nine the reminded the world that all these years Terry Funk was developing into one of the

most complete and excellent professional wrestlers there ever was. And among the many promos he cut and that Rick Flair program in nineteen eighty nine, which of course we'll get to here on the lapsed Funk, he called back on his dad one more time. I am from a professional wrestling family, and many years ago my father was a wrestler too, and my father died in my arms

after a professional wrestling match. They had his funeral and thousands of people came to his funeral, and they brought every kind and color of flower imaginable. That's like I said, was many years ago. Then the years went by and I went back to the gravesite and all it was there was me and

a West Texas win. And I looked down down at that headtone of heav and had that thone hel you in CA and iWar to the heavens of Bob that I would make that name snonymous with Ruth Wayne forever, forever you know good for nothing eggs second, dumb as a music man. We did it our way because we love it that way. We love it that way. I have this wonderful gut feeling and I've had it all my life. When it's time to go, I think it's now there's time to go. Holler, h