2. The McMahons
While Vince McMahon may be the most famous name in wrestling history, he can thank the genes that his grandfather and father gave him for turning him into a world famous promoter. Jess McMahon was the patriarch of the McMahon family and began to promote boxing in the New York City area. He became the first McMahon to promote professional wrestling 1915 and formed the Capitol Wrestling Corporation alongside Toots Mondt. Jess began to book shows at Madison Square Garden, setting the stage for WWE's domination of that building. Upon his death, his son Vincent James McMahon took over his father's company. Vince Sr. saw the market that television was opening for professional wrestling and realized that his product could be filmed cheaply and sold for high profit. Vince Sr. renamed the company the World Wide Wrestling Federation and began airing weekly shows on the DuMont Network. Vince Sr. dominated the northeastern territory, claiming Madison Square Garden and thus controlling a large percentage of the wrestling world. In 1982, Vince Jr. purchased the company from his father and renamed it the World Wrestling Federation. Vince Jr. had been promoting concerts and wrestling for a number of years while also helping his father in TV syndication. He set about making his company national, crossing lines into territories and breaking all of the established rules of the Old Guard. He signed away all the talent he possibly could and offered his programming at lower prices than the territories, effectively stealing their TV time away and causing smaller promotions to close their doors. McMahon mortgaged his entire future on a show called Wrestlemania. In fact, leading up to the event, it was well-known that there would have to be a huge walk-up at the gate on the day of the show to prevent McMahon from going bankrupt. The walk-up indeed happened and, by 2001, McMahon was the only game in town. With Vince escalating in age and his son Shane choosing to pursue interests outside of wrestling, control of the world's largest wrestling promotion will fall to his daughter Stephanie and her husband, Triple H. God help us all.