29 years ago today in Kansas City, Missouri, The Sheepherders (Butch Miller & Luke Williams-best known as the Bushwhackers) defeated the Lightning Express (Brad Armstrong & Tim Horner) to win the UWF (Bill Watts version) Tag Team Championship.
They would be the last tag champions before the UWF is bought out by Jim Crockett Promotions. Just over a year after the merger, the Sheepherders left for the WWF and were rechristened the Bushwhackers.
28 years ago today in Providence, Rhode Island, Ted Dibiase defeated WWF Champion "Macho Man" Randy Savage in a non-title match to win the 1988 King of the Ring tournament. Other participants were Brutus Beefcake, Ken Patera, Nikolai Volkoff, Ron Bass, The Barbarian, Shawn Michaels, Danny Davis, Hercules Hernandez, Bad News Brown, Virgil, Iron Mike Sharpe, Boris Zukhov, Terry Taylor, and Marty Jannetty.
19 years ago today in Queens, New York, Bam Bam Bigelow defeated Shane Douglas to win the ECW World Heavyweight Championship. The full episode aired four days later on Hardcore TV is here via WWE Network.
16 years ago today on RAW is WAR from Detroit, Michigan (WWE Network link), William Regal defeated Al Snow to win the WWF European Championship.
13 years ago today in Glen Burnie, Maryland, Special K (Dixie & Izzy) defeated The Backseat Boyz (Johnny Kashmere & Trent Acid) to win the ROH Tag Team Championship.
12 years ago today, Stewart Edward "Stu" Hart passed away from a stroke at Rockyview General Hospital in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. He was 88.
Born May 3, 1915 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, Stu lived in a tent with his family, living off the land and wild game Stu took down with his slingshot. In 1928, Stu and most of his family was forced to move to Edmonton after his father was arrested on failing to pay back taxes. There, he began competing in amateur wrestling, joining the Edmonton YMCA in 1929. Trained by other boys in catch wrestling, in 1937, he would win a gold medal in the welterweight division for the AAU of Canada. In 1940, after two years with the Canadian Football League's Edmonton Eskimos, Hart won the Dominion Amateur Wrestling Championship in the light heavyweight class.
Hart would enlist in the Canadian Navy and serve as their Director of Athletics. During his service, Stu was introduced to professional wrestling. After recovering from a car accident, Stu would entertain the troops with exhibition matches. Hart debuted under the training of Toots Mondt in 1946, and once wrestled a tiger and a grizzly bear. Two years later, Hart formed Stampede Wrestling; three years later, he purchased a mansion in the Patterson Heights area of Calgary.
The basement of that mansion would become the legendary training ground known simply as The Dungeon. There, Hart would train prospects in the shoot style, with the idea that learning these submission moves would lead to a sharper in-ring style. Today, the Hart House is considered a historical site. A short list of those trained in the dungeon include Bret Hart, Owen Hart, "Superstar" Billy Graham, Greg Valentine, Davey Boy Smith, Brian Pillman, Jushin Liger, Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Lance Storm, Edge, Christian, Mark Henry, Natalya Neidhart, and Tyson Kidd, the last person to graduate from the dungeon.
Stu, a longtime supporter and mentor of the Calgary community (he supported more than thirty charities and civic organizations), was married for 53 years to American-born Helen Smith. The couple would have twelve children, many of whom would have some involvement in the business. They also had 36 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. Helen died in November 2001. Stu, suffering from diabetes and arthritis, was admitted to Rockyview General in Calgary on October 3, 2003 with an elbow infection, and then developed pneumonia. He had a stroke and died thirteen days later.
In 2010, Stu was posthumously inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. He was also a member of the inaugural Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame class in 1996.
7 years ago today, Shane McMahon announces via press release that he would resign from his post as Executive Vice President of Global Media effective January 1, 2010, effectively leaving WWE, the company he's been in his entire adult life. Shane making the shocking announcement on WWE.com:
It is with great sadness that I announce my resignation from the WWE, effective January 1, 2010.
I have never even considered a future outside the walls of the WWE. However, sometimes life takes an unexpected turn and while it is the most difficult decision I have ever made, it is time for me to move on.
First and foremost, I would like to thank my father for the incredible education working with him has provided and for giving me the opportunity to play a role in building WWE into the global phenomenon that it is today. I am extremely proud to have been the 4th generation in this business, and I am grateful for everyday I was able to work along side not only my own, but the entire WWE family.
Thank you to all of the WWE Superstars both past and present for your passion, pride and dedication. You are truly the engine of the organization and it has been a pleasure to work with, learn from and get to know all of you. Thank you for the privilege of sharing the stage with you and for allowing me to become but a momentary member of your elite brotherhood. I have so much appreciation for the many sacrifices you endure, both physically and personally, to make this business the success that it is. The respect I have for each of you is immeasurable.
Finally, there are no words to express my gratitude to WWE fans the world over for supporting this company through good times and bad and for your unbridled passion that fuels the Superstars' performances. I am profoundly grateful to have been able to entertain you both in front of the camera and from behind the scenes. You are the greatest fans in the world.
I will always love this business and will remain a fan forever.
Shane
Shane’s WWE on-screen career dated back to the 1989 Survivor Series when he debuted as referee Shane Stevens. In late 1997 and early 1998, Shane had a hand in bringing in then-embattled boxer Mike Tyson to the company for Wrestlemania XIV.
He had a recurring on-screen role beginning 1998 during his father Vince’s feud with Stone Cold Steve Austin. After briefly taking on a commentary role (he was the color analyst for early episodes of Sunday Night Heat), he took on an active (albeit sporadically) wrestling role, winning the WWF European title (and retiring it briefly) in 1999 and the Hardcore Championship in 2000.
In 2001, Shane co-led the Alliance with his sister Stephanie as the kayfabe owner of WCW. Following the end of the Invasion, Shane appeared sporadically (save for a feud with Kane in 2003) until 2006 during his father’s feuds with Shawn Michaels and Bobby Lashley. His final feud was with Randy Orton’s group, Legacy, who took him out in a three-on-one beating in May 2009.
No specific reason was given as to why Shane left the family business. The next year, Shane became the CEO of China Broadband Inc. and YOU on Demand, the first on-demand video and PPV service in China. Shane stepped down from his CEO post in 2013, but remains as Vice-Chairman.
In February 2016, after more than six years away, Shane returned to WWE. After briefly running RAW (and co-running it with Stephanie), Shane is now the on-screen commissioner of Smackdown Live.
5 years ago today, TNA presented Bound for Glory from the Liacoruas Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The show featured the final match of Hulk Hogan's wrestling career.
- In a preshow match, Mexican America (Anarquia and Hernandez) defeated Ink Inc. (Jesse Neal and Shannon Moore) to retain the TNA World Tag Team Championship.
- Austin Aries defeated Brian Kendrick to retain the TNA X Division Championship.
- Rob Van Dam defeated Jerry Lynn in a Full Metal Mayhem match.
- Crimson defeated Samoa Joe and Matt Morgan in a three-way match.
- Mr. Anderson defeated Bully Ray in a falls count anywhere Philadelphia street fight.
- Velvet Sky defeated Mickie James, Winter, and Madison Rayne in a four-way match to win the TNA Knockouts Championship.
- A.J. Styles defeated Christopher Daniels in an I Quit match.
- Sting defeated Hulk Hogan. Per pre-match stipulations, with the win, Sting regained control of TNA for Dixie Carter. Had Sting lost, he would have been forced to retire.
- Kurt Angle defeated Bobby Roode to retain the TNA World Heavyweight Championship.
4 years ago today at a Smackdown taping in Mexico City, Sin Cara Azul defeated Sin Cara Negro in a mask versus mask match.
Ironically, it would be the unmasked Sin Cara that would come out ahead down the road. Azul Sin Cara, Luis Urive, would flounder in WWE (often due to injury) before being released just before Wrestlemania XXX. After a brief run in AAA, Urive made news again when he made his surprising return to CMLL, the promotion that made him famous.
As for Sin Cara Negro, after wrestling as Hunico for about two years (most of it away from the ring due to a torn ACL), Jorge Arias returned to the Sin Cara character, this time wearing the azul outfit. He would team with Kalisto as The Lucha Dragons, winning the NXT Tag Team Championship from the Ascension. The duo made their main roster debut the night after Wrestlemania 31. After Kalisto experienced some success on the singles circuit with a pair of WWE United States Championship reigns, the team split up earlier this year.
It's a happy 53rd birthday for Melissa Ann Hiatt, but wrestling fans know her as Missy Hyatt.
Born in Tallahassee, Florida, Hyatt began her pro wrestling career in 1985 as the manager of John Tatum for World Class Championship Wrestling (the two were dating at the time). After feuding with fellow valet Sunshine, the duo left for the Universal Wrestling Federation to join Eddie Gilbert's Hot Stuff International stable. The group was renamed H&H International Inc. (for Hyatt and Hot Stuff), and eventually the co-leaders of the group would have an affair. Hyatt left Tatum for Gilbert in 1987, and the couple married in 1988.
While under contract to the UWF, Missy was contacted by the WWF to replace Roddy Piper for their interview segments entitled "Missy's Manor". The segments were taped over a four week span in March and April 1987, but the segments flopped. McMahon asked Hyatt to become one of the Federettes, the ring girls that would appear on their PPV shows. Hyatt didn't like the idea, feeling that it was beneath her, and she returned to the UWF...
..which would eventually be bought out by Jim Crockett Promotions. Both Missy and Eddie would be brought over, managing the Steiner Brothers. She was mainly brought in as a commentator for WCW Main Event and feuded with fellow commentator Paul E. Dangerously. The two would have varying conflicts, including an arm wrestling match at a 1991 Clash of the Champions event. Madusa would eventually be brought in the feud, and the ladies fought it out over who was the "first lady of WCW", with Hyatt beating Madusa in a bikini contest at Beach Blast in 1992.
Missy would return to managing in 1993, managing The Barbarian, but most notably The Nasty Boys to the WCW World Tag Team Championship. Later that year, Missy had a wardrobe malfunction as she jumped off the ring apron during a tag title match. The next day, when she went to the WCW office in Atlanta, a picture of the incident was found on a wall. She reported the incident to Eric Bischoff, but when he didn't take any action, Hyatt went to Bischoff's boss. In the end, it was Missy that got released. Missy then sued WCW for sexual harassment and overdue payments. The suit was settled in 1996.
Hyatt had a brief run in ECW as the manager of the Sandman and, in a bit of irony, was on the business end of a (kayfabe) sexual harassment suit after she kissed Stevie Richards against his will. Hyatt spent a few years on the independent circuit, working most notably for Women Superstars Unleashed doing interview segments. In 2001, she wrote an autobiography, Missy Hyatt: First Lady of Wrestling.
In April 2016, Hyatt made what was advertised as her final wrestling appearance at WrestleCon, managing Lance Storm in a losing effort against Matt Hardy.