It’s kind of hard when you’re in wrestling and you see those you have known or whom you have worked with in the past pass away. I guess that comes from me being at Eddie Gilbert’s funeral. And I’m still not ready to really talk about that, but I promise, one month I’ll do my best to recall some of that day even though it will be very hard for me. I’m sure guys like Doug Gilbert and Tommy “Wild Fire” Rich would remember me, but I suspect they may not know about what a profound effect they had on my life. They made me wiser and smartened me up to lots of things. I understand both of them are doing well today; working with a new promotion that might do some pretty big things: MECW. Watching Eddie Gilbert being laid to rest was very difficult for me, and since then, I’ve never attended any wrestlers funeral that I have had a chance to attend. There have only been two: Rodney’s and Dean Malenko’s dad. I still feel terrible about that because Dean’s dad trained me and I should have been there at his funeral to pay my respects. 

I’m sorry, I really get off track sometimes when I start writing about USWA memories. For the past three months, I’ve written these articles, not knowing if I’ll be able to remember enough to put together another one, but when I start writing the memories do come flooding back. 

Besides Jerry “The King” Lawler and Randy Hales, who still does work with local promotions up in Tennessee, there was Eddie Marlin. We didn’t see Eddie that much, mainly at TV tapings, but every now and then he would be running “the office.” I do remember seeing him at a lot of Arkansas, Mississippi and “spot shows,” or as we sometimes called them, “house shows” on Thursday and Friday nights. I’ve got to admit those shows were probably the better shows to run and most enjoyable for the boys. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing like having the experience of working in places like the Mid-South Coliseum or the Louisville Gardens, but those house shows that we would run - in National Guard Armories and at high school gym’s - would pack people in. I remember one National Guard Armory having about 800 people in it, and it was a building that wasn’t really designed to hold that many. It was standing room only. Man, what a rush! 

I still remember walking back to the locker room after a match and turning to Eddie Marlin and saying, “Did you see that? They were throwing ice at me!” He smiled and said, “Yeah, well, they don’t take too kindly to short little fat managers around here!”  I had to laugh at that because I’m not really that short, but they don’t call me “Big Business” for nothing J. 

Another key guy on the road was Frank Morell. Frank was one of the referees and he had some ties back to the office. Frank has a serious history with the business, too. I understand he was a ring veteran himself, but that goes back a little bit before my time. I wish I knew what happened to Frank and what he is doing these days; he was a good man. For those of you who kept up with the USWA back in the 80s and early 90’s, you’ll remember Frank. We usually saw him during the week, but I don’t remember seeing him on too many weekend shows. We only had two weekend shows anyway: Saturday morning TV tapings at WMC studios in Memphis, and Saturday night at the Nashville Sports Arena. 

Then there are the “on-air” personalities with the USWA: Lance Russell, Dave Brown and Corey Macklin.  Corey and I had some really good manager vs. announcer matches. I’ll have to tell you about those, too. These are the guys you’d see on TV calling the matches every week. The pitchmen, they have to get the product over; the boys in the ring are the product but the announcers are just as critical. Similar to Jim Ross and now Paul Heyman, but for a long time it was Jerry “The King” Lawler on WWF TV. 

So that really made up the bulk of the company. I know there were other guys that I’m forgetting. It’s been well over 6 years, though, since I was in the territory so my memory does get a bit fuzzy. 

I can see that I’m running out of space again, so I’ll save some more memories for next month. I still want to tell you a bunch of things: the terrible driving in the territory during the winter (that is the “ice fields” story). I want to tell you about Eddie Gilbert and Doug, and how they both loved Cracker Barrel Old Country Stores. Writing the column this month made me remember my “manager vs. announcer” matches with Corey. Those were kind of cool. 

Then there are the fans that have chased me, Tommy Rich and Doug when we were all leaving the Louisville Gardens. And, oh yeah, I GOTTA tell you about the rib Tommy Rich pulled on me the first time we were pulling into Louisville, KY. So I’ll call that article, “Look At All Those People!” 

So, I guess I do have lots of stories still left; at least enough to go maybe 6 – 8 more months. I do have something already in mind for my last column, which will probably be sometime during the summer of 2002. It’s going to be about the final days of the USWA. I was not there for their final days, but I do remember seeing the start of “things to come” and that all kind of started when a guy by the name of Larry (from California) really started to mess things up. Hopefully, you’re enjoying the memories. If you want to read more and know about how life was on the road back then, stay tuned for next month.