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Drop kicks, eye-gouges and the hammer lock

Posted: May 3rd 2015 By: Terry Woster

Seriously, if Verne Gagne has gone to the Big Ring in the sky, the golden age of televised professional wrestling, or should I write "wrassling,'' is finally over.

Well, it's been over for decades, I suppose. There is a thing called "WWE Raw'' that runs on Monday evenings in what used to be called prime time. I sometimes watch an old television rerun that airs ahead of "WWE Raw,'' so I see some promo clips for "RAW. ''Mostly it looks like people hollering and pounding their chests and performing all sorts of other "raw'' antics that don't make me feel even a tiny bit like staying tuned to see what the actual "WWE Raw'' program is all about ? beyond hollering and chest pounding, that is.

That isn't a critique of "WWE Raw.'' It might be a great show for you, and I'm good with that, as long as you don't' mind me not being excited about it. And as long as you don't mind that, for me, the golden age of televised wrassling was when Vern Gagne was king of the ring ? and king of the sleeper hold.

Gagne was 89 when he died. He played football for Minnesota's Golden Gophers, won a couple of NCAA wrestling titles in college and served in the Marines before he became one of the original stars of wrestling in televisions early years. He was of an age with The Crusher, Gorgeous George and Baron Von Raschke, and Mad Dog Vachon and Dick the Bruiser. And who can forget Antonino "Argentina'' Rocca, a wrestler who, in the way early days of the sport, stood out with his technique of sailing across the ring to flatten an opponent with one of his patented flying drop-kicks.

I'll admit Gagne's death made me sad for a moment. He was a key player in bringing the early professional wrestling shows to television, and the early shows were fun television ? good black-and-white, kind-of-grainy, sometimes-disappearing-in-blizzards-of-electronic-show television. Even as a kid, I kind of knew some of the moves were fake ? only a few, I was sure. Still, I watched. I cheered for the good guys. I booed the bad guys. And when it was over, I looked forward eagerly to the next show.

It was a time of straight-forward good guys and bad guys ? not many shades of gray in old-time TV wrassling. Gagne was one of the good guys, a heroic wrestler who spent most of a bout getting the stuffing knocked out of him by a villain (they call them "heels'' in the literature about early wrestling) who used all sorts of dirty tricks ? the eye gouge, the hammer lock, you know the sort of cheap-shot stuff wrestling villains use. Somehow the referee was always distracted by something in the crowd while Crusher Lisowski was gouging away at Gagne's eyes and immobilizing him in a hammer lock. (Why do pro wrassling refs always care more about a spectator in the first row than the wrestlers on the mat?) But just when it seemed the good guy was down for the count, his title and championship belt lost, Pow! (shades of Batman) and Gagne would break free, turn the tables and lock his foe in the dreaded sleeper hold until the guy passed out and slumped to the mat.

Ah, man, the crowd goes wild.

In college, a bunch of us followed the wrestling circuit when we could commandeer the only television set in the dormitory long enough to dial in a match. A group of my buddies were from Minnesota, and Vern Gagne was their guy, too. My standing among that group shot up like a skyrocket when somebody handed me a guitar at a keg party in Mankato (only one I ever attended, I swear) and I played a quirky little ditty called "The Crusher.''

The lyrics kind of went like this: "Do the crusher, you turkey necks,'' and "do the eye gouge'' and "do the hammer lock.'' Not great music, but a catchy hit for the Novas. My mother would have been so proud.

Gagne's death brought back good memories. Maybe that wrestling wasn't real, but then, neither is today's reality TV.