MADISON — One of the most legendary professional wrestlers of all time will be
returning to southern West Virginia this month. The most celebrated
Intercontinental Champion in WWF/WWE history 'The Honky Tonk Man' will be
making an in ring appearance at 'Rage In The Cage' an All Star Wrestling
event June 29at Madison Civic Center. 'I have not been in West Virginia
in probably 15 years,' said wrestling icon 'The Honky Tonk Man' on
Thursday. 'But I am coming to Madison and I am booked in a match with
another Wrestling Legend Beautiful Bobby Eaton of the legendary Midnight
Express. 'He is kind of the same style I am so it will be a great battle'
The Honkytonk Man said. The legendary wrestler who was known for his
colorful Elvis style jumpsuits (and for busting a guitar over his
opponents skull when a referee was not looking) told The Coal Valley News
that he has continued to work in the wrestling industry doing appearances
at independent shows, and that he feels that by working with young people
it gives him a more vibrant outlook on life. Unlike other wrestling
legends the Honky Tonk Man has not been sitting around working on a
biography or pondering his place in the wrestling world. 'I am too active,
working as a wrestler to sit down and do a biography or work the'legends'
shows,' he explained. 'If you surround yourself with retired people you
start thinking like a retired person. This business I am in is really a
fountain of youth. On any given weekend I am in a locker room with 15-30
young people who are in their 20s and 30s..If you do what young people do,
you act young and stay young......I am not ready to go out and play
shuffle board and do all that stuff... I have been doing work on the
independent circuit. Many years ago I was a young kids starting in the
business We were called outlaws back then. I have been doing the indy
scene around the world now for about 14 years.... I am not retired at all.
I try to do about 50 shows a year, that is what I peg myself for, to 50
shows. Last year I did 80 shows in six different countries.' The Honky
Tonk Man admits that working the indys today can be a different experience
than doing bumps on the mat with young wrestlers. 'We were all pretty much
well trained,' he said of Ricky 'The Dragon' Steamboat, Randy 'Macho Man'
Savage, Andre 'The Giant' and other wrestling legends he worked with in
the past. 'But when you get on the indy circuit it is sometimes like
starting over again. You don't know these guys and who trained them and
some guys want to try a lot of dangerous nonsense. They will try to jump
off the rafters and things.... We are not stunt men, we are
wrestlers....Some young wrestlers don't know how to work a crowd or pace a
match or tell a story in the ring. They throw all these flips and twists
and acrobatic high spot things into it — and there is nothing wrong with
doing that when you can put it together like a story in a book — and it's
more like watching a ping pong match.' The Honky Tonk Man said many of his
fellow wrestlers who made their mark in the industry did not realize they
were making pro-wrestling history in the 80s and 90s. 'We were doing over
300 matches a year ( in the 1980s) with just a few days off,' he
explained. 'Sometimes it would be 50 days in a row without a day off. The
success was something we did not have a chance to reflect on at the time.
I don't think any of us looked on it at the time and and realized we were
a part of a phenomenon. We had all spent so many years living out of the
trunks of our cars, driving town to town, making 500 mile one way trips to
work one match and get paid $45 ...so that was just an extension of what
we were doing anyway. 'It is more of a television product now as opposed
to an event for fans to go to. We were able to come to places like West
Virginia, Maryland, Baltimore, Detroit and places like that monthly. Back
when I was starting in the business in Nashville, we wrestled every
Wednesday night, four times a month. Even in the WWF back then we were in
Madison Square Garden once a month. Now they are there once a year. They
come to some towns once a year, period. I think many of the young fellows
today are not trained to entertain a live audience on a weekly or monthly
basis. You might see a guy in one of these towns once a year and never see
him again. His whole career may be over before he gets the chance to come
back... The wrestler has made appearances all over the world and admits
there are very few places he has not visited. 'When it comes to the
continental U.S. and Canada I have pretty much been everywhere,' he said.
'I have visited Bosnia and other exotic places overseas with the USO
tours. I have been in about 30 counties. I always enjoyed working in
Canada because the fans are really appreciative of wrestlers there. Fans
in the east coast of the US are also appreciative and turn out more than
they do for events in the south. I don't know what changed it in the
south. At one point it was such a boom and was so big and then it got to
where it was difficult to do anything down south at all. I think he West
Virginia crowd is a bit different. It is on the cutting edge of the Mason
Dixon line so it's on the border, but when you get down into Georgia and
Miss it doesn't work as much anymore. I am looking forward to coming back
to West Virginia again....You have some magnificent scenery that way.'
Tickets are on sale now ($12 in advance or $15 at the door) for the June
29 show at Foodland Fresh in Danville and Tic Toc Tire on Rt 119. Bell
time is 7 p.m. Pre-show autograph session is at 6 p.m.
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