This Day in Pro Wrestling History (August 20)

60 years ago today in Atlanta, Georgia, June Byers defeated Mildred Burke to win the NWA World Womens Championship. The best two-out-of-three falls match with a one hour time limit ended while the second fall was in progress. Byers had won the first fall and controversially was awarded the title.

51 years ago today, Crusher and Dick the Bruser defeated the Kalmikoffs (Ivan and Karol) in Minneapolis, Minnesota to win the AWA World Tag Team Championship for the first time. Crusher and Dick the Bruiser would go on to win the AWA tag titles five times together.

18 years ago today in Dalton, Georgia at a WCW Saturday Night taping, Lord Steven Regal defeated Lex Luger to win the WCW World Television Championship for the third time.

11 years ago today at an NWA-TNA weekly PPV taping in Nashville, Tennessee, Michael Shane defeated Chris Sabin and Frankie Kazarian in an Ultimate X match to win the TNA X Division Championship.

8 years ago today, WWE presented Summerslam (WWE Network link) from the TD Banknorth Garden in Boston, Massachusetts. 16,168 were in attendance, with 541,000 homes watching on PPV. That's down over 100,000 from the 2005 edition. It featured the final WWE match of Hulk Hogan.

• In a preshow dark match, Carlito defeated Rob Conway
• Chavo Guerrero defeated Rey Mysterio.
• The Big Show defeated Sabu to retain the ECW Heavyweight Championship.
• Hulk Hogan defeated Randy Orton.
• Ric Flair defeated Mick Foley in an I Quit match.
• Batista defeated King Booker via disqualification for the World Heavyweight Championship (King Booker retained the title).
• D-Generation X (Shawn Michaels & Triple H defeated Shane McMahon & Vince McMahon.
• Edge defeated John Cena to retain the WWE Championship. If Edge were disqualified, he would have lost the title.

7 years ago today, WWE announces that Ashley Massaro would participate in the fall 2007 edition of Survivor (Survivor: China). She was the second person eliminated from the competition.

4 years ago today, Alberto Del Rio makes his television debut on Smackdown from Bakersfield, California. In his first act, he interrupted a Rey Mysterio promo at the beginning of the show. In the show's main event, Del Rio's ring announcer Ricardo Rodriguez made his television debut too, and Alberto submitted Mysterio in the main event. Both Del Rio and Rodriguez would be released from WWE less than a month apart this summer under very different circumstances.

6 years ago today, citing financial reasons, Gail Kim left TNA after three years with the company for WWE.

3 years ago today, Matt Hardy was both arrested and released from TNA. Hardy was arrested following a single-car accident where he hit a tree. Hardy, who was alone in the car at the time, was showing "obvious signs of impairment" according to the North Carolina state trooper that arrested him. Hardy, who was not hurt in the accident, was charged with driving while intoxicated. TMZ first reported Hardy's release from TNA through an unnamed spokesperson. Hardy was on indefinite suspension from the company following a video he posted where the Hardys used a taser on Matt's then girlfriend (now wife) Reby Sky. There were plans for the Hardys to reunite at Bound for Glory that October.

Today's the 50^th birthday of Terri Poch, best known as the WWF's Tori. Born in Portland, Oregon, she began her pro wrestling career for Pacific Northwest Wrestling in 1988 as a valet for Scotty the Body under the name Taylor Made. She joined the Ladies Professional Wrestling Association in 1990 as Terri Power and won the LPWA Championship in 1992. She would be the promotion's last champion as the promotion disbanded shortly thereafter. She briefly competed for All-Japan Women's Pro Wrestling in 1992 and 1993 before semi-retiring. She would remain out of the wrestling spotlight until joining the WWF in late 1998 as Tori, an obsessed fan of WWF Womens Champion Sable. Tori tried to get Sable's respect, but Sable kept degrading her, leading to a feud that would culminate at Wrestlemania XV, where she unsuccessfully challenged Sable for the title. She would feud with Jacqueline and Ivory through the spring and summer, highlighted by Ivory vs. Tori in the first ever WWF women's hardcore match in September. She would return in November and become the on-screen girlfriend of Kane, who was embroiled in a feud with X-Pac at the time. In January, Tori would turn heel on Kane and join D-Generation X, and in March helped Stephanie McMahon defeat Jacqueline for the WWF Womens Championship. Her feud with Kane ended at Wrestlemania 2000 when Kane pinned X-Pac and Rikishi gave her a stinkface. She would be a part of a feud with the Dudley Boyz, which ended with her going through a table at King of the Ring in June. After a brief run as The Black Ninja, an assistant for Raven in his hardcore title defenses in early 2001, she became a trainer for Tough Enough before being released. After a one-off comeback in May 2011, she has opened her own yoga studio in Portland.