8 Times Disrespected Wrestlers Went Nuts On Reporters
5. Wrestler Goes Nuts On A Reporter, In 1880
Proof, if proof be needed, that wrestlers have always been slightly on edge when it comes to their business, the following is an account from theReno Weekly Gazette, on March 11th 1880:
"A man stopped the editor of this paper on the street corner last Saturday evening and asked why the GAZETTE cast slurs upon him. It appeared from his conversation, which was somewhat profane and angry, that he did not like the GAZETTES account of the recent wrestling hippodrome. He probably expected the principals to be described as models of symmetry and manly grace, and their elephantine pullings and tumblings as herculean exhibitions of strength."
Much like Michael Moody over 100 years later, the editor had been casting the wrestling industry in a crude and negative light and the wrestler in question, unnamed out of the generosity of the editor's heart ("because the man is probably heartily ashamed of himself by this time, as he certainly should be"), decided to prove how crude he wasn't by attacking his accuser on a public street.
This was not an isolated incident and, in 1895, Bert Walker, a wrestler who had been disrespected and called 'fake' by an Ohio sports editor, sent an open letter into the Portsmouth Times, challenging the editor to "get a man at 145 pounds (no matter who he is) and back him against me" offering $150 (thousands of dollars in today's money) to whoever had the stones to get in the ring with him and prove him to be a 'fakir'.