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Cornette, James team up for book on Louisville wrestling

Posted: Dec 14th 2015 By: Mike Mooneyham

Jim Cornette has always been one of my favorite people in the wrestling business. And believe me, that covers a lot of ground.

Maybe it?s because he?s an exceptional talent whose decades in the profession are a testament to his many skills and durability. It could also be because he?s one of the funniest guys around who never fails to make those around him laugh. Or perhaps it?s just the fact that Jim Cornette is a hardcore, diehard fan of professional wrestling and, most importantly, its storied history.

All of those reasons make Cornette?s new book, which he co- authored with Tennessee wrestling historian Mark James, a highly enjoyable read. ?Tuesday Night at the Gardens? is a history of wrestling in Louisville ? from the debut of Ed ?Strangler? Lewis to the rise of Jerry ?The King? Lawler.

More than 100 illustrations ? rare photos, programs and newspaper clippings ? adorn the nearly 300-page volume.

The book is full of gems, including an inside look at the Nashville-based booking office run by Nick Gulas and Roy Welch, the expansion of the Memphis territory by Jerry Jarrett, and the complete 100-year history of the Louisville Gardens arena.

To make the package even more appealing, each book comes personally autographed by Cornette, with custom inscriptions available at no extra charge, along with a two-hour souvenir DVD featuring the only match films from the Louisville Gardens from 1970-75 still in existence. Included is the
infamous 1971 first-ever scaffold match between Jerry Jarrett and Don Greene.

For more information or to order the book, visit jimcornette.com.

The two-year project has been a labor of love for both James and Cornette, who found national acclaim back in the ?80s as a loud-mouthed, tennis racket-wielding heel manager for The Midnight Express and later for being a highly regarded creative voice in the business.

?For years Jimmy and I talked about doing books together, but his crazy schedules with TNA and the ROH prevented that,? says James, who has written a number of books dedicated to preserving the history of Memphis wrestling. ?About three years ago I was trying to put out a trade paperback collection of a Memphis wrestling magazine he originally released in the early 1980s. Well, after Jim quit ROH, that book morphed almost overnight into ?Rags, Paper & Pens,?? a book that looked back at the origins of pro wrestling?s gimmick tables and merchandising in the Tennessee territories of the ?60s and ?70s, during the days before merchandising was a multimillion-dollar business.

From there, says James, the two stepped back and looked at a future project. The obvious choices were two places closest to Cornette?s heart ? Louisville and Smoky Mountain Wrestling.

?We decided to go with Louisville first,? says James. ?We then worked two years on ?Tuesday Night at the Gardens.??

Eventually, he says, the two plan to release two Louisville books and two SMW books.

?The great thing is Jimmy?s meticulous record-keeping,? adds James. ?With the Louisville book as an example, he referred to his notes, and 40-plus years after the fact expounded upon them. His descriptions take the reader back to the early 1970s in the Louisville Garden.

?Another advantage we have with these books is Jimmy collected everything wrestling-related back in the day. Now his amazing collection, which resides at ?Castle Cornette? in Louisville (packed with wrestling memorabilia going all the way back to the 1930s), pays dividends more and more
with every book we put together. We both believe that when you do a book on pro wrestling, the words are great, but when you can add photos, programs, etc., it helps the reader be transformed back to those matches.?

The book is written from a fan and a performer?s perspective. Cornette spent a good portion of his teenage years at the Louisville Garden, where he eventually graduated from a weekly third-row seat taking photos from a Kodak Instamatic, to the front row where he used a new and more versatile 35mm Canon. Many of his early shots are included in the book.

?Unknowingly to me, I was practicing for a career, both in photography and wrestling,? says Cornette. ?And ? in watching the talent and their moves so carefully to frame shots ? later as a performer myself.?

?When people tell me I?m the biggest Memphis wrestling fan, I quickly correct them and tell then Jim Cornette is the biggest Memphis wrestling fan I know,? says James. ?To be completely honest, Jim Cornette is the biggest old school wrestling fan I have ever known.?

While the book revolves around the Louisville Garden, the scope is actually much larger, explains James.

?When you say Memphis Wrestling, it really encompasses the entire promotion (Memphis Louisville, Evansville, etc).?

There?s also, of course, a personal look at the Gardens itself, which until 1975 was called The Armory, shedding any high-tech, corporate logo that might have diminished its image.

?It scoffs at today?s mollycoddling arenas with their well-appointed seats, luxury boxes, gourmet coffee and microbrew stands. It knew its beer was always a tad flat, the soft drinks too syrupy, the popcorn spongy and pretzels a hazard to oncoming molars. It made no apologies,? it was once written in the Louisville Courier-Journal.

One of my favorite sidebars in the book is the amazing story of ?Roughhouse? Fargo, also known as ?Nuthouse? Fargo, Jackie Fargo?s older brother. As the maniacal Roughhouse Fargo, the unorthodox grappler was one of the biggest box office attractions in the Tennessee territory.

Labeled the black sheep of the family and ?not right in the head,? Fargo would be used on special occasions after reportedly being checked out of a state mental hospital, wreaking havoc on the Fargos? opponents in spite of his wiry, bony 190-pound frame. As Sonny Fargo in the Jim Crockett-run Carolinas territory, however, he was known as a mild-mannered, low-key referee and sometimes prelim wrestler who was the polar opposite of his wildman character in Tennessee.

?The legend of Roughhouse Fargo was timeless,? writes Cornette.

Like the introduction says, the book is a return to those thrilling days of yesteryear, when fans religiously watched the weekly TV matches that whet their appetites for weekly or monthly live shows at their hometown arenas.

?They came by the hundreds of thousands,? write the authors, ?to experience a unique American art form live and in person ... They came in the rain, the snow and the storms.?

Those days of true believers and weekly hometown shows, though, are long gone.

But there is a lot to be learned from this book by old school and current fans.

?Old school fans are going to be shocked at just how much of the pro wrestling they grew up watching was, indeed, contrived, manipulated or, as it?s called in the business, ?worked,? says Cornette. ?Current fans are going to be absolutely gobsmacked at just how little it was.?

Scientific classics, epic blood feuds, there?s a little bit of everything in this fun journey back in time to an era in wrestling that no longer exists.

But as long as passionate historians like Cornette and James are around, those memories will never die.