I'm Sorry, I Love You: A History of Professional Wrestling: A must-read' - Mick Foley

For those that don’t know Wigan, it’s a town in Greater Manchester. I live about 40 miles away. If you’re British, you probably know of it because of the football team, Wigan Athletic, or the all-conquering rugby league team of the 1990s, or maybe the Heinz factory or the legendary Northern Soul club at Wigan Casino.

Everything was not just going to plan for Vince, it was shattering what he originally had planned and snowballing into some kind of make-it-up-as-you-go-along super-plan.

Every kid would soon know his three rules: train hard, say your prayers, eat your vitamins (how you choose to interpret ‘vitamins’ is up to you).

He died on Boxing Day 1963, penniless following his recent divorce and unsuccessful investments.

the now one-eared Yukon Eric.

Wrestling may have been fully pre-determined since the 1920s, but the culture of protecting it behind the scenes and presenting it as real was still in full force.

everybody has been bothered by somebody bigger than them in their lifetime.

In 1947, a bunch of tweed-wearing wrestling luminaries drew up a set of rules to govern wrestling. Named after the chair of the panel, they were dubbed the Admiral-Lord Mountevans rules, defining what holds were legal and how falls within matches could be won: by pinfall, submission, knockout, TKO or disqualification.

In short order, The Renegade was just a jobber. He was let go at the end of 1998 and, depressed at how things had turned out, shot himself in the head in February 1999. He was only 33 years old.