Waterloo, Iowa 2008 Part Three

The big morning had arrived, and we started with another huge breakfast in the restaurant of the hotel. Almost all of the inductees were present, as well as a lot their brothers of the canvas, along with a big throng of fans who came by for autographs.

Bob Roop and I finished our meal and went straight to our suite to ready ourselves for the morning inductions. Usually, these are short and informal, for the most part, but, this morning, each of the inductees spoke about the terrible floods that had gone through and destroyed a lot of the museum and its artifacts.

Following the one-hour program, the fans, numbering nearly 500, were treated to an autograph session by each of the wrestlers in attendance. Many of the fans were at the matches the evening before and had come to the open inductions as a respect to all the wrestlers.

I returned to my suite and took a power nap and woke at 5 p.m. to shower and ready myself for the evening. The dinner banquet was being held in the Five Sullivan Brothers Center, but in a different wing and closed off to the public.

Bob and I went across the walkway to the auditorium and were soon at the room for the banquet. It was amazing that, at 6 p.m., an hour before the festivities began, there were fans waiting to talk with us. I joined Bp. Jason Sanderson for a diet soda, and we were soon joined by the Races and the Hodges. Before you knew it, the room had filled to almost capacity. It was like the Cauliflower Alley Club reunion in that a lot of talking and fraternizing was going on.

The dinner came to order, and a dinner prayer was given and the lines opened up to the buffet style dinner began. I really enjoyed the salad section with the different types of starters like three bean salad, egg and potato salad, beets and creamed corn, with green peas and tomatoes fresh from the vine. They had mashed and fried potatoes with two different types of gravy. There were shrimp and chicken with sliced beef and a big skewer of bacon to choose from. With full plates, I returned to the table shared by the Races and their family and had a beautiful dinner.

Following that, the program began for the evening with the formal presentations of the awards to the honorees. Mike Chapman began the evening with thanking the CAC for their contribution of $1,000 to the museum. Karl Lauer, VP with the CAC, came forward and also presented the museum with another check for an additional $1,000. It was then revealed that Bp. Sanderson and Tom Drake had also matched the CAC donation to help rebuild what the floods had damaged.

In his own unique way, Karl Lauer did something that he started a few years ago in Las Vegas when he helped to pay off Nick Ackerman's college tuition with donations from the audience. Karl began by taking a $100 bill out of his pocket and challenged the audience to step forth and help the museum rebuild. It was really amazing to see the wrestlers line up with fans, and we put a pile of bills on the podium. Within about\ five minutes, nearly $2,000 in cash was donated. This was truly a room filled with love and lots of feelings for a tragedy that swept thru the community of Waterloo and almost destroyed the wrestling museum.

Mike Chapman was so moved by the outpouring of support from everyone that he told the crowd that he was going to rescind his earlier departure from the museum until it was back on its feet.

Mentions of the award winners from the morning festivities were given, as Ray Gunkel's daughter could not attend, and the team from Slam Sports were given their accolades. The rest of the formal inductions began by inviting Bishop Sanderson to the podium. His acceptance was one of the crowning points of the evening as he spoke about God, country and helping out neighbors that were in need.

Penny Banner's daughter, Wendi Weaver, came up to the podium next and tried her best to hold back the tears for her mom, who had just passed away seven weeks before. She spoke with a lot of emotion about what this had meant for her mom and that she was here in spirit, and then she presented the museum with the buckle encrusted with diamonds and made of 24k Gold that Penny had worn as AWA Women's Champion for many years. I admire Wendi for the tenacity that she has in making the trip to accept for her mom but, most of all, for being a good friend to the business. Both of her parents were wrestlers.

Bret Hart came forward to accept for his dad Stu. Stu had been honored at the CAC a few years back with the Iron Mike Award, the top award that is given. Bret then chose to admonish a couple of writers in attendance and gave them a choice of them leaving or him, and he could not be in the same room with them and feel comfortable. Bret ended up leaving the banquet and was given a huge round of applause for his efforts. The room was in a turmoil, and there was a lot of talk about people following Bret and leaving. As it was an omen for all of us in the wrestling business, the show was saved by a real main eventer.

Mike Chapman turned to Abe Jacobs and said, "How are you gonna follow that?" Being the true professional that he was and is, Abe took over the center stage and began a story about him wrestling Danny Hodge, the World's Junior Heavyweight Champ, in Portland a number of years back. Danny had gone to a park outside of the hotel where the wrestlers were staying. Danny chose to get some sun during the afternoon prior to going to the arena.

As his luck would have it, a guy came along with a monkey on a leash, and the monkey jumped on Danny's shoulder and went to the bathroom all over Dan. The crowd was all laughing so hard they could barely hear the ending of the story until they quieted down a little. Danny jumped up and chased the handler and the monkey for nearly a half a mile and then returned to the park very angered and retching with a stench that could make the cattle yards in Hereford, Texas smell like Brut after shave.

He grabbed a garden hose and tried to wash off but could not get all of the mess off of him and returned to his room to shower. Arriving at the arena, Abe found out that he was wrestling Danny Hodge that night. The crowd began to laugh again when Abe told them that the man of 5,001 different holds came into the ring with blood in his eyes and began a barrage of holds on him that left him with looking for light and oxygen for the first five minutes of the match. Abe also said that the stench was still with Danny all during the match, and, for the second time in his career of nearly five years, he lost a match to a better man. Or did he just give up and run back to the showers. Needless to say, the crowd had tears in their eyes from laughing so hard. Abe showed us why he was a great main eventer wherever he went.

Masanori Saito, who had come all the way from Japan to be honored, gave a short speech in Japanese and had his wife translate for him. He ended the tribute to him by saying he was sorry if he hurt any of the fine American wrestlers he faced here in the states.

Roddy Piper ended the evening by starting his speech by looking at Mike Chapman and saying, "So you had a little water ... get tough and go on, life is too short to just give up." Roddy had just gone thru some health issues and had come in from filming a new movie in Chicago. His speech was from the heart, and he was applauded greatly.

Following the inductions, we went back to the sports bar, where we ended the evening at around 2 in the morning.

Thank you to the fans and friends of wrestling who came out in support, both at the matches and also at the inductions and the banquet. Without fans, there would not be wrestling. Thank you, Mike and Bev Chapman, for holding up despite the losses you have encountered. Thank you, Kile Klingman, for taking care of me and getting me the suite you did at the last minute. Thank you to Baron Von Raschke, Dan Hodge, Dr. Ken Ramey, Brad Rheingans, Fritz Von Goering, Ed Gordienko, Red Bastien, Chief Paul Farber and many others who came to pay respects to the giants of our industry who were honored at the 10th annual Hall of Fame inductions.

Most of all, thank you to Bob Roop, 1968 Olympian in wrestling, for making the trip one of the best 1,100-mile road trips I have taken in a long while. I hope that we will be able to make another trip soon.

Percival A. Friend, Retired
The Epitome of Wrestling Managers

2003 BWC Hall of Fame Inductee
2004 CAC Hall of Fame Inductee
2006 LWA Hall of Fame Inductee
2007 TCCW Hall of Fame Honoree