Texas is a huge state with amazing diversity and numerous large cities that have made the pro-wrestling scene in that state one of the country’s best. There has long been a love affair between Southerners and rasslin’ and it has been no different in Texas. Looking at the cultural makeup of the state, East Texas and North Texas are much more like their neighbors in the Deep South than they are like the rest of the state. Houston (in East Texas) and Dallas (in North Texas) were growing cities and Texas pro-wrestling first came to them. While there were many cities that could have been next, it was an unlikely one nestled up in the Texas Panhandle, Amarillo, which would become a hot spot. In the years prior to the NWA, Morris Sigel's Houston office bragged great control in Texas and their were smaller markets throughout the state.

Major changes came during the days of the NWA and the more importantly television. Houston continued to be the major power broker in Texas under Sigel. Dallas, reborn as Southwest Sports under Ed McLemore, began making strides toward becoming a better market as the city itself grew. Amarillo also continued to grow steadily. The growing popularity of pro-wrestling led to groups popping up throughout the Southwest. Mike London built a small empire out of Albuquerque, New Mexico that moved into El Paso, Texas and Denver, Colorado with ties to the Chicago and Amarillo offices. Rod Fenton in Arizona and Dave Reynolds in Utah were NWA affiliated operations into the 1960s.

In Texas, the three major offices - Houston, Dallas and Amarillo - grew throughout the 1950s and 1960s, however in the latter decade great changes came to all three. Sigel and McLemore died and their cities were taken over completely by Paul Boesch and Fritz Von Erich respectively. Houston was dubbed the Gulf Athletic Club and under Boesch remained an island city like St. Louis was a hot bed for the next twenty years. Dallas became Big Time Wrestling and continued to develop as a territory as the Dallas area transformed into the "Metroplex" with a massive population boom. After the Funk's took full control of Amarillo, they expanded South into most of West Texas.

The next great changes for Texas wrestling came as the NWA began to dissolve and priorities changed. In South Texas, San Antonio would break away from Dallas and become a significant market in its region. Houston hooked up with Mid-South and phased out lucha libre influences for Bill Watts' brand of pro-wrestling. The border towns like El Paso continued to play to the Mexican lucha libre fans and spot shows still occur to this day. Amarillo was losing steam, so the Funks sold off their shares and the region dissolved soon after. In the early 1980s, the pro-wrestling landscape began changing radically and Texas was as topsy-turvy as anyplace. Fritz Von Erich began pushing his sons and other young talent very hard and the new company, World Class Championship Wrestling enjoyed enormous success with an impressive young roster and diehard fanbase. After a few years of success as Southwest Championship Wrestling, San Antonio's hometown promotion was broken apart and a less impressive promotion Texas All-Star Wrestling was born. Houston continued to run strongly under Boesch whose ties to other promotions shifted over the years. In the last half of the 1980s, Texas wrestling fell apart. Texas All-Star, renamed "USA All-Star" went belly up. World Class was damaged by the brief departure of booker Ken Mantell, formation of Wild West Wrestling and the departures of talent. Paul Boesch eventually sold his city to the expanding WWF and joined their outfit and gave them a huge market in the state. Fritz Von Erich had tried to work together with other promoters to fend off the WWF's advances, but his company was rapidly disintergrating. Finally he formed a union with Memphis promoter Jerry Jarrett and created the United States Wrestling Association, which ran in both Tennessee and Texas. The alliance fell apart and the remains were used to form the Global Wrestling Federation (usually called "Global"), which lasted for several more years. Since that time, pro-wrestling in Texas has done very well on a grandscale with the WWF running several giant shows there. On a local level, Texas wrestling is nothing special, except in the border towns, where lucha libre continues to draw successfully.

Houston was to become the first major pro-wrestling city in Texas thanks to a pair of brothers from the Lower East Side in New York City. Morris and Julius Sigel had relocated to Houston when they were young. Julius took to boxing and worked his way into promoting small local fights. In the 1920s, the local wrestling promoter passed away and the brothers joined up to promote boxing and wrestling in Houston. During the 1930s, Julius moved out to Shreveport and Nacogdoches and Morris slowly developed an excellent system with promoters throughout the region. Other Texas promotions, El Paso, Amarillo, Lubbock, Galveston, Beaumont, Abilene, San Antonio and even Dallas were always second to Houston. Even Shreveport and New Orleans could not challenge Houston in drawing power. Houston was far enough away from the Northeast and California to avoid competition and he was often able to bring in their talents and further develop the city's strength. During the war years, Houston really emerged and Sigel developed an excellent reputation as a straight promoter. In the years following the war, Houston as a city saw a significant boom in population and subsequent wealth. Sigel brought fellow New Yorker Paul Boesch on board as his health began to decline to help run things. Sigel was a talented promoter with a major market, but Boesch was even better. Astute and inventive, Boesch employed his years of touring the world into transforming Houston into one of the strongest pro-wrestling markets of the day. After Sigel suffered a heart attack in the early 1950s, Boesch's role grew stronger and he continued Sigel's legacy of bringing in the best talent, establishing great local stars and always paying well due to the big houses. Boesch is also credited with innovating some of the premier gimmicks in pro-wrestling, including tag team wrestling (although that is still debated), "mud wrestling" and unique stipulated punishments for the loser in a blowoff match. 

Dallas saw a population and financial boom in the 1930s when oil was discovered in the region at the start of the decade. Houston had opened up and Dallas soon followed with Bertram Willoughby promoting the town. From the start, Dallas produced their own local stars, but were able to secure a few top national stars from time to time. The operation found a regular home when the Sportatorium was erected in 1936. The weekly wrestling shows were a successful attraction and boxing ran regularly there as well. At that time, Ed McLemore began working for Willoughby at the Sportatorium. He slowly climbed the ladder before and took over the promotion in 1940. 

Ed Don George
Everett Marshall
Doc Sarpolis
Frank Sexton
Ray Steele

Southwest Sports (1940-1966) 

In 1940, Ed McLemore took over the Dallas operation and formed "Southwest Sports." He ran the promotion concurrently to Morris Sigel in Houston. Throughout the 1940s, McLemore was a local promoter for the Houston office, which had control over much of Texas. He continued a formula similar his predecessor Bert Willoughby with the pre-NWA stars coming in to battle his local heroes. Late in the decade, Dallas and the Sportatorium saw big changes. The NWA was formed and McLemore became their Dallas affiliate. The Sportatorium grew a national reputation as the home of the "Big D Jamboree" country program. In 1953, McLemore left the NWA and severed his ties with Houston. Soon after the Sportatorium was burned down in a suspicious manner. It was rebuilt, McLemore rejoined the NWA and continued to promote wrestling in the Dallas area. The formation of the National Wrestling Alliance, development of the television and economic stability caused numerous regional markets to change and Dallas was no different. In the early 1960s, Fritz Von Erich came to town. He was one of the premier stars of the 1950s and wanted to settle down in the region. He went to war with McLemore, aligned with Houston promoter Paul Boesch and San Antonio promoter Joe Blanchard to take over the city. 

CLICK HERE for the full Dallas alumni list

Amarillo in Western Texas had been a smaller market since the 1920s. Cal Farley was a local jack-of-all-trades, he ran a tire shop, a department store, hosted a radio show, worked a part-time pro wrestler and had a famous boys ranch. He began promoting pro-wrestling in Amarillo with European grappler Dutch Mantell, but it was only a small deal. There were other small promotions in West Texas during this time: John McIntosh is El Paso, Jim Wakefield in Abilene and Sled Allen in Lubbock. By the 1940s, Dory Detton was running Amarillo, but his operation was minor compared to Houston and even to Dallas. In 1950, Dory Funk, Sr. came to town and established his local fame as a superintendent for Cal Farley's Boys Ranch and he did some pro-wrestling on the side. Funk left with his family in 1953, but Karl "Doc" Sarpolis invited him back to begin seriously promoting Amarillo in the mid-1950s when pro-wrestling was growing from the TV boom. The two took the city to a new level of success in this age of television and NWA affiliates. The territory developed into a solid operation with the towns being run by local promoters and talent flowing around the region. The established cities were passed down: Gory Guerrero in El Paso, Don Slatton in Abilene, Nick Roberts in Lubbock as well as Pat O'Dowdy in Odessa and Jerry Kozak promoted Amarillo itself, where the central booking office was located. They also expanded out into Albuquerque, New Mexico with Mike London and Colorado Springs, Colorado. This region was built with a television show that featured studio wrestling from Amarillo, which featured some rough and tough matches. In 1966, Sarpolis passed away and Funk's two sons, Dory Jr. and Terry, bought his shares. The Funk trio worked hard to improve the territory in the late 1960s and Dory Jr. was eventually made NWA World Heavyweight champion. Though he was not in the territory regularly after that, the win elevated Amarillo and allowed Terry Funk to get himself into a top slot as well. In 1973, Dory Sr. died and his sons continued to run the company through the end of the decade. The company was sold to Blackjack Mulligan and Dick Murdoch and ran for a short time longer before the crush of national wrestling forced its doors to close. 

CLICK HERE for the full Amarillo alumni list

Four Corner States [Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah] 

Pro-wrestling in the Southwestern United States had been met with mixed results. Several operation popped up, often affiliated with a stronger office, but only a handful achieved much success. In the the days before the National Wrestling Alliance, Jack Kanner ran Colorado, the legendary Jim Londos ran Arizona with a partner for many years and Clayton Fisher operated out of Albuquerque, New Mexico for a stretch. Colorado had been a decent market and local boy Everett Marshall became the regional champion, but few notable stars came out of this region during that time. In 1939, a tough middleweight grappler named Mike London came to Albuquerque and eventually opened up shop there. He eventually bought nearby El Paso, Texas from promoter John McIntosh and began building his power base. When the NWA formed in 1948, it took them time to build their membership. London joined in 1950 at the third annual meeting and remained a member until 1983. The following year, Utah promoter Dave Reynolds joined and he maintained his membership for a decade although his operation was small with a limited talent pool. In 1954, Arizona promoter Rod Fenton joined. He brought a nice array of stars and discovered Gene Kiniski at the University of Arizona during his stint there. London expanded his operation into Colorado with the assistance of Chicago's Fred Kohler. They eventually went toe-to-toe with Johnny Doyle and Jim Barnett's American Wrestling Alliance over Denver, but won out in the end. After Dave Reynolds left Utah, the state was targeted by a non-NWA operation involving Guy Brunetti. As for Rod Fenton in Arizona, opportunities in Vancouver, British Columbia pulled him North and the market became the focus of a variety of independent promoters for the next two decades. When Mike London was gone, the major cities in the southwest were picked up by the AWA and WWF with the winning out in the end.