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Post by flairsteamer on Jul 18, 2005 11:45:25 GMT -5
I was born in 1971 so i 33 and 9/10 year old call it 34. I began watching in 1977 and followed it to its death. I am 12 minutes from shelby NC. I saw some Live shows at east Rutherford & Chase high, Cool Springs Gym Forest City, Shelby, Asheville, and Spartanburg, Charlotte, I did not go all the time to larger venues my dad hated wrestling my Great grandfather and step grandfather believed it. i was abble to sit with both of them who truly believed and watch Starrcade 1983 and Starrcade 1984 on the big dish by 85 you could not get starrcade on big dish and both were gone . And i am glad they never seen what it became.
I viewed wrestling as a sport and so did the charlotte observer and WSPA and WLOs as you could get randome updates on the bigger cards in their area . I would stay up till midnifght as a 6 7 8 9 year old and never miss World WIde and always MACWon saturday afternoon. sO MANY MEMORIES Ric Flair and The Andersons The Hammer Wahoo Roddy STeamboat Superstar Blackjack and so many more
By 1981 we had the big dish so i saw alot of wrestling from all over WCCW Flordia Mid south Central states Georgia WWF AWA Some lawler stuff maybe 1 time per month Detroit deep south later on I mean i saw alot of wrestlimng but nothing came close Georgia was next closest but it was still tortuss vs hair in my eyes.
To the point It was made to seem real believable storyline which always invlovled something about the sport of wrestling, if it be A title and turned partner Forineer vs American patriot A broken leg or arm or just the toughtest guys there. It never invloved wifes children girlfriends or anything stupid. Hat vs robe Valantine breaks flairs nose for real Valantine breaks wahoo legs The anderson break hundreds of arms Piper trying to give flair the Tv belt after winning US belt Valantine and Flair VS the Anderson with Wahoo as ref STeamboat beating flair first time out and just being a thorn in his side. Starcade ANd so much that was not even mentioned.
i believe in my heart of hearts if a person had the money and i mean unlimited amounts and if he could secure tv time on most local stations in the carolina and virginia he could run a profitable promotion in 3 or 4 years the first couple would be hard but it could work. You could use many older guys to help build the promotion around the up and comers just think tully dusty steamboat valantine george south superstar windham R&R express Midnights (either version) Armstrongand a few others guys for 1 time appearance such as abby boogie man valiant funk and a few others build up young stars david flair flair and brad anderson and find somemore young guys and let er roll hire cornette as head booker assuming geroge scott would not take the job first
God help me if Any one of on this board ever wins powerball. i am sure we would all go about diffrent but it could work right here in the carolina and virginia
Real wrestling good matches and everything centered around rules and how you work in the ring Tv is squash matches and interviews and maybe a spcial challenge match and run in here or there or some turns once in a while
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Post by bobbyryates on Jul 18, 2005 20:13:12 GMT -5
wonderful first post. glad you are here.
to me, MACW was my life. it was all i cared for. i used to like baseball, football, and boxing. baseball irritated me by the mid-'80's. after not getting to see football for two seasons because i was working, everybody i liked was either retired or on a different team, so i lost interest. and mike tyson cured me of ever caring about boxing again. so, i have no use for sports as i have no use for college football and basketball. but i had MACW.
my love for MACW evolved as i looked at the magazines on the store bookshelf. i learned about other territories. but i lived here, so that's where my childhood was.
MACW was the core of my teenage years once i got a car. i only attended 5 events before i got my license on 11/12/82. after that, i missed only a handful of shows from then until the last one in greensboro. and then MANY shows in charlotte and surrounding high schools around the middle of NC.
i grew up on MACW. i love professional wrestling. and if you can come even close to understanding how i feel about MACW or the other territories i was familiar with, then you can understand why i detest this thing called sports entertainment. comparing real pro wretling to sports entertainment is like comparing Coca Cola to NEW Coke. and fortunately, the populace was smart enough to rebel against NEW Coke. the same can not be said about new stuff in the ring, and what it came out of for the past 21 years.
wrestling is my life. always has been.
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Post by flairsteamer on Jul 19, 2005 17:49:49 GMT -5
yates it isw me flair piper steamboat from km message board. remember the dusty hater. we were gonna get together in lenior and shelby I am from forest city
What happened to km message board
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Post by bobbyryates on Jul 19, 2005 18:48:17 GMT -5
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Post by flairsteamer on Jul 19, 2005 20:51:27 GMT -5
My birthdy is august 18th
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Post by bobbyryates on Jul 19, 2005 21:20:43 GMT -5
now that would be a good way to spend the birthday weekend!!
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Post by phinney on Jul 20, 2005 17:31:40 GMT -5
I have a much different story than any of you since I was born in 1988. I am 16 now and just got my license. I got into older JCP wrestling in about 1999 or 2000. I barrowed some tapes from a friend of mine who had that footage. I loved it when I saw it. It was the JCP from the mid-80s. I then got involved with KM in 2000 and diversed into other time periods. At this point, and only judging from others' stories and vhs/dvd footage, my favorite is MACW from 1976-1986. I cannot pick an exact favorite era because each is different and good in its own way. I now buy dvd and tapes of the internet and older magazines. That seems to satisfy me, but I would give anything to go back in time or get every complete TV episode from JCP of the 70s to the mid 80s. I will say that I am always going to be a Wrestling/SE fan. I still watch every Raw and still buy every PPV (w/friends, I ain't paying for it all lol), but I mainly watch it for the select great. Men like Angle, Benoit, Flair, Jericho, Batista, and Micheals are why I still watch it. Most of it is stupid BS.
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Post by dogthuhoops2k on Aug 25, 2005 11:58:08 GMT -5
Yeah, MACW rocked. It was sorta a way of life for a lot of people. Different parts of the Carolinas viewed it differently. Norfolk could sometimes be a hot or cold town depending on what was going on. Richmond was usually hot. Hampton would get a hot show about once a year...and then be warm to downright chilly sometimes throughout the year.
The TV was consistant Sat 630pm WAVY for MACW, years later CH33 got world wide and NWA Pro.
Keep in mind most places in Virginia didnt have cable until 1982 or so, so those three to five channels on your dial (with no remote control in most places) was it for your television entertainment.
Richmond and Hampton Roads always had some sort of minor league Baseball and had the ABA Squires but neither was or even is, known as a sports town. So wrestling did fill a void. Richmond was the hottest city of the three. Of course the media did and still does thumb its nose up at wrestling, but more people will watch the wwe nationwide than watch their own local tv news... but thats a discussion for another time.
The matches were treated as an event. You werent going to spend a few hours watching wrestling, it was the highlight of the week for a lot of people. You'd arrive at the arena about 6 or 6:30... maybe get a bite to eat before hand (Hampton didnt have anything within walking distance...Norfolk had a McDs and a couple of other places -- more now, Richmond had the ever popular 6th street market area...lol. If you live in Richmond you know what I mean), You get in around 7-7:15... matches started around 8 sometimes 8:15 -- and would run until after 10:30 in Norfolk, Hampton, and Richmond. A lot of times the crowd left exhausted. Not bored mind you, just exhausted from tension and the emotion of the matches. Those were the days!!! lol
I dont know if that could ever really be repeated again. Attention spans arent what they were then, there are many distractions, more entities vying for your entertainment dollar, a lot of things play into the success and failure of an entertainment enterprise. But who knows, maybe someone will come up with just the right formula.
Dogs
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Post by wreslfan724 on Aug 25, 2005 13:35:49 GMT -5
I agree wholeheartedly that MACW and the NWA were and are the best and always will be. I never really cared much for sports entertainment and the WWE/F.
There are two guys great fans of "rasslin" who have started or are working with their own promotions Mike Hicks (Pro Wrestling South) and Bobby R. Yates (Carolina Pro Wrestling) I believe these two individuals are gonna do well, they have great wrestling minds and ideas plus they are using some of the top names in the sport and new guys who are just getting started.
I am proud of them for following their dreams and they have inspired me to shoot for the stars as well.
You can do it!!!
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Post by thefifthhorseman on Oct 8, 2005 12:35:15 GMT -5
I was born in 1984, I'm 21 now. Back in the mid-to-late '80s, when I was about 2, or 3 years old, I would watch World Championship Wrestling on TBS every Saturday night, and every Saturday afternoon, I would watch NWA Pro Wrestling. I don't exactly know what it was about the NWA that I liked when I was that age, but whatever it was, I still like it. I like it ten times better than the WWE.
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Post by dortonarena on Oct 13, 2005 23:58:32 GMT -5
Oh boy. What MACW meant. I'm surprised that more people haven't logged in on this.
I grew up on Mid-Atlantic so it still holds a special place in my heart. That may sound corny to some but those guys were and still are my heroes. I had to sneak out of bed to the other end of the house where the TV was. I'd keep it down low until the interviews came on and listen to Der Baron or the Chief or that dude with blonde hair and a big mouth. Whatever happened to him anyway?
My folks could never understand my fascination with rasslin but my friends did because they were as addicted as I was.
All of those great moments over so many years: Wahoo's broken leg, Mr. Wrestling and Dino Bravo beating the Andersons, the beginning of the feud between Blackjack and the dude with the big mouth, Paul Jones turning on Steamboat and Youngblood, the big mouth's first face turn in 79 and so many others.
My first live card was in the summer of 75 at Rocky Mount Municipal Stadium (the Rocky Mount Ballpark as Elliott Mernick called it). The main event was a six-man tag: Wahoo, P.Jones and Andre against Doug Gilbert, Johnny Valentine and that dude with the big mouth. Doug got trapped in the Indian Death Lock and that was it. I was hooked!!
My first trip to Raleigh was during my freshman year in college. The main event was Kim Duk and the Superstar against Wahoo and the Mighty Igor in a Texas Tornado match. What a brawl.
Later on came the Cadillac tournament, Ric's first appearance after the face turn, so many brawls involving the Chief, Flair, Blackjack and so many others that it's impossible to recall them all. If you remember the two dudes from Rocky Mount who made life miserable for the Horsemen haters, I was one of them.
I went to one of WCW's last Raleigh cards in early 91, I think. All I can recall about it is that Vader was in the main event and he kept yellin 'Who's the man?' And every time, I'd yell back 'Ric Flair that's who!' It just wasn't the same whether it was Raleigh, Greensboro or anywhere else. They were bringing guys nobody cared about into towns where MACW had packed the house and they were losing their shirts big time.
That's what MACW meant to me and why it's still so special. I've been to WCW and WWF cards in some of those same cities and it aint the same. But as long as there are people like us who remember and places like Mid-Atlantic Gateway where we can talk about it, then it won't ever truly be gone. In my heart, it's still Toosday night at 815; Elliott Mernick is introducing the first match and I've got a Coke and two of those huge Dorton Arena hotdogs to consume. We'll be out of there by 10:30 tops but we'll see the guys we cared about and still do care about.
That's what Mid-Atlantic means to me.
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Post by superworker on Nov 25, 2005 0:57:28 GMT -5
Flair is THE MAN and always will be thanks to old schoolers like George Scott and Wahoo and Harley.....Give me Harley, Wahoo, The Funks, The Briscoes, and Dick Slater and will take on the WORLD!!!!!!
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