WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.799 You know, usually when we go to see a show, whether 00:00:02.799 --> 00:00:04.980 it's like a movie or a play or a sporting event, 00:00:05.240 --> 00:00:09.019 there's this unwritten contract between us and 00:00:09.019 --> 00:00:11.039 the performers. Quite like a boundary. Exactly. 00:00:11.140 --> 00:00:13.919 We sit in our seats, we suspend our disbelief, 00:00:14.240 --> 00:00:16.379 and we basically just agree to pretend that what 00:00:16.379 --> 00:00:18.679 we're watching is real. Yeah, it's a safe illusion. 00:00:18.820 --> 00:00:20.960 I mean, you buy a ticket, knowing the villain 00:00:20.960 --> 00:00:24.179 on the stage isn't going to leap into the front 00:00:24.179 --> 00:00:26.120 row and actually attack you. Yeah. The danger 00:00:26.120 --> 00:00:28.219 is entirely contained within the frame of the 00:00:28.219 --> 00:00:31.039 stage. or the screen. But what happens when a 00:00:31.039 --> 00:00:34.479 performer is legitimately dangerous? Like, what 00:00:34.479 --> 00:00:37.460 happens when they are so terrifyingly authentic 00:00:37.460 --> 00:00:40.259 that the audience just completely forgets it's 00:00:40.259 --> 00:00:42.979 a show? It's a scary thought. It really is. And 00:00:42.979 --> 00:00:45.020 the story we're diving into today completely 00:00:45.020 --> 00:00:47.759 obliterates that boundary. It really does. We're 00:00:47.759 --> 00:00:51.020 taking a deep dive into a single, incredibly 00:00:51.020 --> 00:00:54.579 detailed Wikipedia article covering the life 00:00:54.579 --> 00:00:59.119 and career of Fred Thomas Corey Sr., who is much 00:00:59.119 --> 00:01:01.899 better known to the world as Wild Bull Curry. 00:01:02.100 --> 00:01:04.739 A legendary name. Right. So our mission today 00:01:04.739 --> 00:01:07.599 is to uncover the fascinating origins of hardcore 00:01:07.599 --> 00:01:10.500 professional wrestling and to explore how this 00:01:10.500 --> 00:01:13.159 one man blurred the lines between real world 00:01:13.159 --> 00:01:16.340 survival, theatrical villainy, and genuine danger. 00:01:17.500 --> 00:01:20.079 So, okay, let's unpack this. Yeah, to really 00:01:20.079 --> 00:01:22.560 understand the mechanics of how Bull Curry forced 00:01:22.560 --> 00:01:25.840 an entire industry to rewrite its rules, we have 00:01:25.840 --> 00:01:28.120 to look at the environment that forged him. Right, 00:01:28.159 --> 00:01:29.799 because it didn't start in the wrestling ring. 00:01:29.959 --> 00:01:32.519 Not at all. We have to rewind to well before 00:01:32.519 --> 00:01:34.439 he ever stepped foot in a professional wrestling 00:01:34.439 --> 00:01:37.799 ring. He was born in 1913 in the East End of 00:01:37.799 --> 00:01:40.480 Hartford, Connecticut. OK. And he was of Lebanese 00:01:40.480 --> 00:01:42.739 descent, growing up in a crowded house with five 00:01:42.739 --> 00:01:46.040 siblings. And if you look at the timeline there, 00:01:46.120 --> 00:01:48.680 he's hitting his teenage years just as the Great 00:01:48.680 --> 00:01:50.859 Depression is taking a stranglehold on the country. 00:01:51.200 --> 00:01:53.519 Man, the desperation of that era is just hard 00:01:53.519 --> 00:01:55.719 to overstate. The article notes that at just 00:01:55.719 --> 00:01:58.609 16 years old, he left high school. And he didn't 00:01:58.609 --> 00:02:00.989 just go get a job like sweeping floors at a local 00:02:00.989 --> 00:02:04.010 factory. He joined the circus. Right, which is 00:02:04.010 --> 00:02:06.609 wild. And he did it specifically to help provide 00:02:06.609 --> 00:02:09.669 for his four brothers and sisters. And his job 00:02:09.669 --> 00:02:12.849 in that circus is really the skeleton key to 00:02:12.849 --> 00:02:15.530 his entire future career. Because he wasn't, 00:02:15.530 --> 00:02:18.069 you know, setting up tents. He was employed as 00:02:18.069 --> 00:02:21.090 the Tough Man. Which, on its face, sounds like 00:02:21.090 --> 00:02:23.469 an incredible job title. It really does. But 00:02:23.469 --> 00:02:25.509 how did that actually work in practice? Like, 00:02:25.509 --> 00:02:27.830 was he just flexing for the crowd? Oh, no, it 00:02:27.830 --> 00:02:31.650 was a brutal physical grind. I mean, in a 1930s 00:02:31.650 --> 00:02:34.069 traveling circus, the Tough Man attraction was 00:02:34.069 --> 00:02:37.189 a staple. The Carnys would set up a ring, and 00:02:37.189 --> 00:02:39.430 Curry's entire role was to stand in the center 00:02:39.430 --> 00:02:41.909 and take on all comers from the audience. Wait, 00:02:42.050 --> 00:02:45.759 like a legitimate... Unscripted fight? Yes. Entirely 00:02:45.759 --> 00:02:48.300 legitimate. The circus would offer a cash prize 00:02:48.300 --> 00:02:50.479 to any local guy who could last a certain amount 00:02:50.479 --> 00:02:52.900 of time or, you know, knock the tough man down. 00:02:53.000 --> 00:02:55.259 Wow. And keep in mind, this is the depression. 00:02:55.840 --> 00:02:58.300 Five or $10 was an absolute fortune. Right. So 00:02:58.300 --> 00:03:00.960 you had the biggest, most desperate local men 00:03:00.960 --> 00:03:03.319 stepping up to try their luck against a 16 -year 00:03:03.319 --> 00:03:05.900 -old kid. Exactly. And here's the statistic from 00:03:05.900 --> 00:03:08.439 the source that absolutely blew my mind. He had 00:03:08.439 --> 00:03:12.719 65 straight wins. 65. It's unreal. And not a 00:03:12.719 --> 00:03:14.719 single one of those challengers made it past 00:03:14.719 --> 00:03:18.439 a single five minute round. Like he was dismantling 00:03:18.439 --> 00:03:21.400 grown men, tough guys fighting for meal money 00:03:21.400 --> 00:03:24.689 in. under five minutes, night after night. Which 00:03:24.689 --> 00:03:28.530 gives you a staggering level of real world trial 00:03:28.530 --> 00:03:31.129 by fire experience. Seriously, it's like a comic 00:03:31.129 --> 00:03:34.430 book origin story. But instead of falling into 00:03:34.430 --> 00:03:37.409 a vat of chemicals, his superpowers were forged 00:03:37.409 --> 00:03:40.729 by extreme poverty and circus brawls. Yeah, he 00:03:40.729 --> 00:03:42.349 learned how to read an opponent's body language, 00:03:42.509 --> 00:03:44.990 how to absorb an actual punch, and how to end 00:03:44.990 --> 00:03:48.219 a conflict immediately. But the circus life isn't 00:03:48.219 --> 00:03:51.580 exactly stable. Right. So in 1939, he took that 00:03:51.580 --> 00:03:54.659 raw survival instinct and channeled it into a 00:03:54.659 --> 00:03:56.979 formal career. He joined the Hartford Police 00:03:56.979 --> 00:03:59.080 Department. Talk about a pivot. And he brought 00:03:59.080 --> 00:04:01.340 that circus tough man background straight to 00:04:01.340 --> 00:04:03.500 the streets of Hartford. Oh, absolutely. He quickly 00:04:03.500 --> 00:04:05.439 earned a massive reputation for his physical 00:04:05.439 --> 00:04:07.699 toughness as a cop, which kind of brings us to 00:04:07.699 --> 00:04:10.080 the first great piece of professional wrestling 00:04:10.080 --> 00:04:12.800 mythology in our deep dive today. The wild steer. 00:04:12.990 --> 00:04:16.689 Yes. So the lore is that he got the nickname 00:04:16.689 --> 00:04:20.589 Bull because a wild steer broke out of the Hartford 00:04:20.589 --> 00:04:23.449 stockyards, ran wild through the streets, and 00:04:23.449 --> 00:04:25.970 he literally wrestled the animal to the ground. 00:04:26.329 --> 00:04:29.050 It's a great story. But I have to ask, how much 00:04:29.050 --> 00:04:32.069 of this early tough guy lore was just marketing 00:04:32.069 --> 00:04:35.829 versus actual reality? Well, the wild steer story 00:04:35.829 --> 00:04:38.250 is almost certainly a promoter's lie. I mean, 00:04:38.250 --> 00:04:40.410 it's an apocryphal tale devised to sell tickets. 00:04:40.569 --> 00:04:43.100 Right. That makes sense. But. The crucial mechanism 00:04:43.100 --> 00:04:46.019 behind why that lie worked is that it was anchored 00:04:46.019 --> 00:04:49.120 in the absolute truth of his 65 circus wins and 00:04:49.120 --> 00:04:51.199 his legitimate reputation on the police force. 00:04:51.759 --> 00:04:54.740 Ah, I see. The promoters exaggerated the details, 00:04:54.740 --> 00:04:57.480 but they didn't have to invent the aura of danger. 00:04:57.740 --> 00:04:59.360 Right, because you look at the guy, you hear 00:04:59.360 --> 00:05:02.279 he's a street tough cop who knocked out 65 desperate 00:05:02.279 --> 00:05:04.480 men in a circus tent and suddenly wrestling a 00:05:04.480 --> 00:05:06.560 runaway steer doesn't sound entirely impossible. 00:05:06.759 --> 00:05:09.319 Exactly. The public bought it because Curry physically 00:05:09.319 --> 00:05:13.060 looked and acted the part. But applying that 00:05:13.060 --> 00:05:15.860 raw, uncooperative brutality into the highly 00:05:15.860 --> 00:05:17.839 choreographed world of professional wrestling 00:05:17.839 --> 00:05:20.579 proved to be a massive shock to the system. They 00:05:20.579 --> 00:05:22.519 just weren't ready for him. The industry simply 00:05:22.519 --> 00:05:24.779 didn't know what to do with him. And that transition 00:05:24.779 --> 00:05:27.939 happens in the 1940s, right? Right. Curry leaves 00:05:27.939 --> 00:05:30.259 the police force and starts wrestling in Detroit 00:05:30.259 --> 00:05:33.199 under a promoter named Adam Weissmuller. And 00:05:33.199 --> 00:05:35.980 Detroit is where Curry really begins to develop 00:05:35.980 --> 00:05:38.699 his signature style. because standard wrestling 00:05:38.699 --> 00:05:41.600 at the time was heavily reliant on technical 00:05:41.600 --> 00:05:46.660 grappling, amateur wrestling holds, and a clear 00:05:46.660 --> 00:05:48.839 cooperative rhythm between the performers. Which 00:05:48.839 --> 00:05:51.990 is not what he was doing. Not at all. Uh. Curry's 00:05:51.990 --> 00:05:54.129 style was the complete opposite. It was a street 00:05:54.129 --> 00:05:56.790 fight. It was the genesis of what we now call 00:05:56.790 --> 00:06:00.170 hardcore wrestling, relying on closed fists, 00:06:00.649 --> 00:06:03.290 brawling outside the ring, and just a chaotic 00:06:03.290 --> 00:06:06.129 energy that felt legitimately dangerous. It felt 00:06:06.129 --> 00:06:08.009 real because he learned how to fight for real. 00:06:08.170 --> 00:06:10.709 Exactly. He even faced the legendary retired 00:06:10.709 --> 00:06:14.490 boxer Jack Dempsey in a July 1940 exhibition 00:06:14.490 --> 00:06:17.769 match. And true to form, Curry spent years later 00:06:17.769 --> 00:06:20.110 claiming he knocked Dempsey out. Well, according 00:06:20.110 --> 00:06:22.310 to the historical records, Dempsey actually stopped 00:06:22.310 --> 00:06:24.250 Curry in the second round. Right, of course. 00:06:24.569 --> 00:06:27.029 But the fact that Curry was even in the ring 00:06:27.029 --> 00:06:30.310 with a heavyweight boxing champion and successfully 00:06:30.310 --> 00:06:33.389 blurred the lines of the outcome afterward shows 00:06:33.389 --> 00:06:36.319 you how his mind worked. He was building an undeniable 00:06:36.319 --> 00:06:40.060 mystique. And that mystique explodes when he 00:06:40.060 --> 00:06:42.899 relocates to Texas in the early 1950s. Like he 00:06:42.899 --> 00:06:47.699 arrives and almost overnight he becomes the territory's 00:06:47.699 --> 00:06:50.790 absolute biggest draw. It was immediate. The 00:06:50.790 --> 00:06:53.310 fans are just pouring into the arena specifically 00:06:53.310 --> 00:06:55.529 to see him. And we should clarify what that means 00:06:55.529 --> 00:06:58.750 for the era. In the 1950s, wrestling wasn't one 00:06:58.750 --> 00:07:01.269 massive national television company. Right. It 00:07:01.269 --> 00:07:04.110 was broken up into regional fiefdoms called territories 00:07:04.110 --> 00:07:06.089 operating under the umbrella of the National 00:07:06.089 --> 00:07:09.529 Wrestling Alliance or NWA. And Texas was one 00:07:09.529 --> 00:07:11.529 of the hottest territories in the country. Whoa, 00:07:11.649 --> 00:07:13.629 wow. To be the biggest draw meant you were the 00:07:13.629 --> 00:07:15.569 person single handedly responsible for selling 00:07:15.569 --> 00:07:17.550 the most tickets. People were paying their hard 00:07:17.550 --> 00:07:20.209 earned money just to see the uncontrollable violence 00:07:20.209 --> 00:07:22.290 Bullcurry blow into the ring. Okay, wait, I'm 00:07:22.290 --> 00:07:24.750 stuck on this. If he's their biggest star and 00:07:24.750 --> 00:07:26.810 making them the most money, why wouldn't the 00:07:26.810 --> 00:07:29.149 promoters just make him the main champion? That's 00:07:29.149 --> 00:07:31.290 a great question. Because it feels like terrible 00:07:31.290 --> 00:07:34.329 business to isolate your most popular guy. It 00:07:34.329 --> 00:07:36.910 comes down to protecting the credibility of the 00:07:36.910 --> 00:07:39.850 entire product. What do you mean? Well, the promoters 00:07:39.850 --> 00:07:42.050 and the bookers, the guys behind the scenes writing 00:07:42.050 --> 00:07:44.069 the storylines and deciding the match outcomes, 00:07:44.709 --> 00:07:48.610 they had a major problem. The Maine -Texas Heavyweight 00:07:48.610 --> 00:07:51.149 Championship was supposed to represent the pinnacle 00:07:51.149 --> 00:07:53.889 of traditional technical wrestling. Ah, I see 00:07:53.889 --> 00:07:56.730 where this is going. Right. If you put that prestigious 00:07:56.730 --> 00:08:00.389 belt on a chaotic brawler who throws chairs and 00:08:00.389 --> 00:08:02.750 refuses to follow the traditional rules of a 00:08:02.750 --> 00:08:05.930 match, you devalue the championship and you insult 00:08:05.930 --> 00:08:08.220 the traditional wrestlers on your roster. So 00:08:08.220 --> 00:08:10.300 here's where it gets really interesting. Because 00:08:10.300 --> 00:08:13.439 they couldn't ignore his massive box office appeal, 00:08:14.160 --> 00:08:17.699 the Bookers literally invented a brand new championship 00:08:17.699 --> 00:08:20.439 just to match his style. They had to. On March 00:08:20.439 --> 00:08:24.879 6th, 1953, he won the inaugural NWA Texas Brass 00:08:24.879 --> 00:08:27.699 Knuckles Championship in a tournament final over 00:08:27.699 --> 00:08:30.079 a wrestler named Danny McShane. The Texas Brass 00:08:30.079 --> 00:08:31.819 Knuckles Championship. I mean, the mechanism 00:08:31.819 --> 00:08:33.659 of that title is right in the name. Yeah, it 00:08:33.659 --> 00:08:35.980 is. It signaled to the audience that the normal 00:08:35.980 --> 00:08:38.820 rules were suspended. closed fists were allowed, 00:08:39.200 --> 00:08:41.519 brawling was expected. It makes me think of a 00:08:41.519 --> 00:08:44.820 video game developer having to create a custom, 00:08:45.120 --> 00:08:48.519 ultra -violent difficulty level just to contain 00:08:48.519 --> 00:08:51.580 one overpowered boss character. That's a perfect 00:08:51.580 --> 00:08:54.139 analogy. And what's fascinating here is that 00:08:54.139 --> 00:08:57.080 Curry completely predated the famous hardcore 00:08:57.080 --> 00:08:59.600 legends we usually think of when we hear about 00:08:59.600 --> 00:09:01.399 weapon -filled wrestling matches. Oh, really? 00:09:01.580 --> 00:09:04.240 Yeah, guys like the Sheik, Abdul the Butcher, 00:09:04.659 --> 00:09:07.639 Bruiser Brody, they all came years later. Curry 00:09:07.639 --> 00:09:10.679 was doing this in the 1950s. He forced an entire 00:09:10.679 --> 00:09:13.159 industry to adapt to his limitations rather than 00:09:13.159 --> 00:09:15.399 conforming to theirs. And he absolutely owned 00:09:15.399 --> 00:09:18.919 that championship. From 1953 until 1967, he held 00:09:18.919 --> 00:09:21.779 the Texas Brass Knuckles Championship an astounding 00:09:21.779 --> 00:09:24.840 20 times. 20 times. He was defeating massive 00:09:24.840 --> 00:09:27.080 names in the industry. Pritz von Erich, Tony 00:09:27.080 --> 00:09:29.519 Bourne, Waldo von Erich, Killer Carl Cox, Brute 00:09:29.519 --> 00:09:32.350 Bernhardt. I mean, he did briefly hold the Texas 00:09:32.350 --> 00:09:34.710 version of the NWA World Tag Team Championship 00:09:34.710 --> 00:09:38.190 with Lucas Pertano in 53. And he even won the 00:09:38.190 --> 00:09:41.950 main NWA Texas heavyweight championship, but 00:09:41.950 --> 00:09:44.450 he only held that traditional belt for three 00:09:44.450 --> 00:09:48.549 weeks. His true domain was always the brass knuckles 00:09:48.549 --> 00:09:51.419 title. because that title gave him permission 00:09:51.419 --> 00:09:54.940 to be exactly what he was. And that terrifying 00:09:54.940 --> 00:09:58.100 persona was heavily amplified by his physical 00:09:58.100 --> 00:10:00.399 appearance. We have to talk about the look because 00:10:00.399 --> 00:10:03.200 the source describes it so vividly. It really 00:10:03.200 --> 00:10:06.440 does. He had these massive bushy eyebrows and 00:10:06.440 --> 00:10:09.059 he would make these maniacal facial expressions. 00:10:09.600 --> 00:10:12.360 But it was his eyes. Yeah the eyes. The article 00:10:12.360 --> 00:10:14.980 specifically notes his insane eyes that could 00:10:14.980 --> 00:10:17.480 terrify a crowd just by scanning the front row. 00:10:17.679 --> 00:10:19.919 And it wasn't just theatrical posturing. There's 00:10:19.919 --> 00:10:22.019 a documented incident where he stared down a 00:10:22.019 --> 00:10:24.700 girl at ringside and he frightened her so deeply 00:10:24.700 --> 00:10:26.759 that she literally had to be carried away from 00:10:26.759 --> 00:10:28.740 the ring in terror. Oh my god, and it wasn't 00:10:28.740 --> 00:10:30.860 just the fans who were terrified either. Other 00:10:30.860 --> 00:10:33.320 professional wrestlers actively hated working 00:10:33.320 --> 00:10:35.840 with him. Which, in the mechanics of professional 00:10:35.840 --> 00:10:38.559 wrestling, tells you everything. The entire art 00:10:38.559 --> 00:10:42.070 form relies on cooperation. When one wrestler 00:10:42.070 --> 00:10:44.590 performs a move, the other has to sell it. They 00:10:44.590 --> 00:10:46.929 have to react physically to show the audience 00:10:46.929 --> 00:10:50.090 that the move caused pain. It requires absolute 00:10:50.090 --> 00:10:54.210 trust. But Curry routinely broke that fundamental 00:10:54.210 --> 00:10:56.929 rule. He seldom showed the effects of his opponent's 00:10:56.929 --> 00:10:59.350 offense. It's like an improv comedy scene where 00:10:59.350 --> 00:11:02.450 one actor... completely refuses to accept the 00:11:02.450 --> 00:11:05.070 premise. Exactly. If you pretend to hit a guy 00:11:05.070 --> 00:11:07.289 with your most devastating maneuver and he just 00:11:07.289 --> 00:11:10.110 glares at you without blinking, the entire illusion 00:11:10.110 --> 00:11:12.250 shatters. Yep. It makes you look weak and it 00:11:12.250 --> 00:11:14.350 makes him look like an unstoppable monster. Which 00:11:14.350 --> 00:11:16.889 is exactly why he became one of the most disliked 00:11:16.889 --> 00:11:20.110 heels, the industry term for the villains. in 00:11:20.110 --> 00:11:22.090 the history of the business. I can imagine. He 00:11:22.090 --> 00:11:25.429 was so hated, so viscerally despised, that the 00:11:25.429 --> 00:11:27.769 anger of the crowd frequently spilled over the 00:11:27.769 --> 00:11:30.149 barricades. And this is where the story shifts 00:11:30.149 --> 00:11:32.809 from a fascinating look at early sports entertainment 00:11:32.809 --> 00:11:35.590 into something genuinely alarming. The audience 00:11:35.590 --> 00:11:38.649 riots. Yes, we aren't talking about people throwing 00:11:38.649 --> 00:11:40.909 popcorn and booing loudly, we are talking about 00:11:40.909 --> 00:11:44.350 terrifying, uncontained chaos. The list of altercations 00:11:44.350 --> 00:11:46.870 detailed in the source is staggering. Let's run 00:11:46.870 --> 00:11:49.210 through the specific incidents, because there 00:11:49.210 --> 00:11:52.740 are Go for it. In 1955, during a match against 00:11:52.740 --> 00:11:55.779 Ray McIntyre, a riot broke out in the arena that 00:11:55.779 --> 00:11:59.419 was so severe, over 140 fans had to be sent to 00:11:59.419 --> 00:12:01.840 the hospital. It's hard to even picture. Wait, 00:12:02.299 --> 00:12:05.840 140 people from a crowd watching a staged fight. 00:12:05.960 --> 00:12:07.600 Were they fighting each other or were they trying 00:12:07.600 --> 00:12:10.580 to kill him? That is the terrifying reality of 00:12:10.580 --> 00:12:13.950 mob mentality in a confined space. Wow. When 00:12:13.950 --> 00:12:17.090 an audience of thousands completely buys into 00:12:17.090 --> 00:12:20.169 the illusion that a villain is legitimately maiming 00:12:20.169 --> 00:12:23.610 their local hero, the civic outrage just takes 00:12:23.610 --> 00:12:25.789 over. Right. You have people throwing wooden 00:12:25.789 --> 00:12:28.629 folding chairs, fans rushing the ring to attack 00:12:28.629 --> 00:12:31.169 the wrestler, the police stepping in with billy 00:12:31.169 --> 00:12:33.730 clubs to protect the performer, and then the 00:12:33.730 --> 00:12:35.570 inevitable stampede of people trying to escape 00:12:35.570 --> 00:12:37.730 the violence. Yeah, it's like a war zone. 140 00:12:37.730 --> 00:12:40.490 people hospitalized means total structural breakdown 00:12:40.490 --> 00:12:44.019 of the event. And it didn't stop there. In 1956, 00:12:44.360 --> 00:12:47.179 a fan was so furious over Curry's brutal treatment 00:12:47.179 --> 00:12:50.019 of a local star named George Becker that the 00:12:50.019 --> 00:12:53.399 fan physically jumped Curry. Bad idea. Yeah, 00:12:53.580 --> 00:12:55.700 Curry responded by breaking the fan's jaw with 00:12:55.700 --> 00:12:58.679 a single punch. And then in 1958, he was wrestling 00:12:58.679 --> 00:13:03.049 Pepper Gomez in Galveston, Texas. A fan actually 00:13:03.049 --> 00:13:05.549 struck Curry with an iron pipe. An iron pipe? 00:13:05.710 --> 00:13:08.009 Yeah. And Curry didn't wait for arena security 00:13:08.009 --> 00:13:10.289 to handle it. He chased the fan out of the ring 00:13:10.289 --> 00:13:12.230 all the way up into the balcony and beat him 00:13:12.230 --> 00:13:14.309 up right there in the stands. It's absolute chaos. 00:13:14.470 --> 00:13:17.149 And then in 1968, in Worcester, Massachusetts, 00:13:17.509 --> 00:13:20.389 wrestling Emile Dupree, a fan jumped into the 00:13:20.389 --> 00:13:22.950 ring and onto Curry's back. Right. Curry punched 00:13:22.950 --> 00:13:25.289 the fan so hard he was reportedly unconscious 00:13:25.289 --> 00:13:28.110 for two days. Two days. And in another unknown 00:13:28.110 --> 00:13:30.929 year in Texas, a fan literally dumped a bucket 00:13:30.929 --> 00:13:34.090 of yellow paint over his head. Which is just 00:13:34.090 --> 00:13:36.289 bizarre. At what point does being a successful 00:13:36.289 --> 00:13:39.269 villain become a liability? I mean, putting 140 00:13:39.269 --> 00:13:41.429 people in the hospital sounds like a catastrophic 00:13:41.429 --> 00:13:43.649 disaster, not a successful night of entertainment. 00:13:44.110 --> 00:13:45.950 Well, this raises an important question about 00:13:45.950 --> 00:13:49.049 the psychology of the wrestling heel. The primary 00:13:49.049 --> 00:13:51.610 goal of the villain is to generate what the industry 00:13:51.610 --> 00:13:55.409 calls heat. To make the audience so angry, they 00:13:55.409 --> 00:13:57.570 buy tickets hoping to see you finally get beaten 00:13:57.570 --> 00:13:59.690 up by the hero. Right. That's the whole business 00:13:59.690 --> 00:14:02.940 model. Exactly. But there is a razor -thin line. 00:14:03.980 --> 00:14:06.720 If you are too effective at your job, you tap 00:14:06.720 --> 00:14:09.580 into a primal space where the audience completely 00:14:09.580 --> 00:14:12.440 forgets it's a show. They lose their minds. They 00:14:12.440 --> 00:14:14.639 no longer see a performer playing a bad guy. 00:14:15.080 --> 00:14:17.120 They see a genuine threat to their community 00:14:17.120 --> 00:14:20.120 that needs to be destroyed. And Curry lived his 00:14:20.120 --> 00:14:22.779 entire career on the wrong side of that razor 00:14:22.779 --> 00:14:25.220 -thin line. He didn't just cross the line. He 00:14:25.220 --> 00:14:28.490 obliterated it. He really did. But as terrifying 00:14:28.490 --> 00:14:31.350 as his professional life was, there is a stark, 00:14:31.809 --> 00:14:34.090 almost unbelievable contrast waiting for us when 00:14:34.090 --> 00:14:36.710 we look at his personal life and legacy. Oh, 00:14:37.070 --> 00:14:39.009 it changes your entire perspective on the man 00:14:39.009 --> 00:14:41.350 behind the bushy eyebrows. Right. So what does 00:14:41.350 --> 00:14:43.309 this all mean? Let's look at his family. Bull 00:14:43.309 --> 00:14:45.970 Curry had a son, Fred Thomas Corey, Jr., and 00:14:45.970 --> 00:14:48.490 his son decided to follow his father into the 00:14:48.490 --> 00:14:51.620 family business. wrestling under the name Flying 00:14:51.620 --> 00:14:54.919 Fred Curry. A great wrestling name. Now logic 00:14:54.919 --> 00:14:57.700 dictates that the son of the originator of hardcore 00:14:57.700 --> 00:15:01.279 wrestling would be a brawling bloodthirsty monster, 00:15:01.440 --> 00:15:03.659 right? You would think so. But the reality is 00:15:03.659 --> 00:15:06.419 the exact opposite. Really? Yeah. Flying Fred 00:15:06.419 --> 00:15:09.519 was a clean cut, high flying face. The industry 00:15:09.519 --> 00:15:12.340 term for good guy. He was a technical, athletic 00:15:12.340 --> 00:15:14.399 fan favorite who played strictly by the rules. 00:15:14.740 --> 00:15:16.779 He was the polar opposite of everything his father 00:15:16.779 --> 00:15:18.980 represented in the ring. Yet despite this massive 00:15:18.980 --> 00:15:21.840 clash in styles, they teamed up regularly. They 00:15:21.840 --> 00:15:24.259 did. And they were incredibly successful together. 00:15:24.580 --> 00:15:28.419 Between 1964 and 1966, the father son duo won 00:15:28.419 --> 00:15:31.139 the NWA International Tag Team Championship. 00:15:31.320 --> 00:15:34.340 Amazing. They also beat Nikolai and Boris Volkov 00:15:34.340 --> 00:15:37.799 to win the Ohio version of the NWA World Tag 00:15:37.799 --> 00:15:40.139 Team Championship. And what's truly remarkable 00:15:40.139 --> 00:15:43.059 here is the interpersonal dynamic. Well. In an 00:15:43.059 --> 00:15:46.139 industry famous for massive egos, backstage politics, 00:15:46.279 --> 00:15:49.120 and intense jealousy, Fred's eventual attempt 00:15:49.120 --> 00:15:51.379 to step out of his father's shadow and forge 00:15:51.379 --> 00:15:54.080 his own path never caused any tension between 00:15:54.080 --> 00:15:56.879 them. That's actually really sweet. It is. Bull 00:15:56.879 --> 00:15:59.139 was incredibly supportive of his clean cut son. 00:15:59.360 --> 00:16:02.559 Which brings us to the end of his career. Bull 00:16:02.559 --> 00:16:05.840 finally retired from the ring in 1979. Yeah. 00:16:06.029 --> 00:16:09.250 and the man famous for inciting mass public riots, 00:16:09.870 --> 00:16:13.070 breaking jaws, and terrorizing thousands of people. 00:16:14.210 --> 00:16:16.409 He takes a job as a corrections officer. The 00:16:16.409 --> 00:16:18.830 irony is just staggering. On a prison guard. 00:16:18.990 --> 00:16:21.470 But if we connect this to the bigger picture... 00:16:21.309 --> 00:16:24.129 It reveals something deeply profound about human 00:16:24.129 --> 00:16:26.330 nature and performance. What do you mean? The 00:16:26.330 --> 00:16:28.549 teenager who dropped out of high school at 16 00:16:28.549 --> 00:16:31.129 to fight grown men in a circus tent so his brothers 00:16:31.129 --> 00:16:33.990 and sisters wouldn't starve. That is the exact 00:16:33.990 --> 00:16:36.409 same man who happily shared the spotlight with 00:16:36.409 --> 00:16:39.309 his polar opposite son. Right. And he's the exact 00:16:39.309 --> 00:16:41.750 same man who calmly walked the halls of a prison 00:16:41.750 --> 00:16:44.389 -keeping order. It tells us that Bull Curry viewed 00:16:44.389 --> 00:16:47.049 the chaos entirely as a profession. It was just 00:16:47.049 --> 00:16:49.960 a job. He understood exactly what the audience 00:16:49.960 --> 00:16:52.200 needed him to be in order to feed his family, 00:16:52.580 --> 00:16:54.700 and he delivered it with a chilling level of 00:16:54.700 --> 00:16:57.480 commitment. You really did. He passed away from 00:16:57.480 --> 00:17:00.639 liver disease on Mama 8th, 1985, at the age of 00:17:00.639 --> 00:17:04.180 71. And the legacy continues to this day with 00:17:04.180 --> 00:17:06.960 his grandson, Fred Curry Jr., also taking up 00:17:06.960 --> 00:17:09.900 the wrestling mantle. He utilized his real -world 00:17:09.900 --> 00:17:13.519 survival skills to accidentally invent a massively 00:17:13.519 --> 00:17:17.140 influential, violently chaotic genre of entertainment. 00:17:17.259 --> 00:17:19.779 He really changed the game. He took the desperation 00:17:19.779 --> 00:17:22.059 of his youth and weaponized it into a character 00:17:22.059 --> 00:17:25.839 so authentic it caused literal riots. It's a 00:17:25.839 --> 00:17:28.720 masterclass in how authenticity can erase the 00:17:28.720 --> 00:17:31.480 line between fiction and reality. Which leaves 00:17:31.480 --> 00:17:33.799 us with a fascinating final thought to chew on. 00:17:34.000 --> 00:17:36.619 We look back at those audiences in the 1950s 00:17:36.619 --> 00:17:39.359 rioting over a staged wrestling match, sending 00:17:39.359 --> 00:17:41.640 140 people to the hospital, and it's easy to 00:17:41.640 --> 00:17:43.500 think they were just incredibly gullible. Right, 00:17:43.500 --> 00:17:45.599 like they just didn't know better. Exactly. But 00:17:45.599 --> 00:17:47.819 look at our modern parasocial relationships. 00:17:48.220 --> 00:17:50.180 Look at how we treat celebrities, influencers, 00:17:50.359 --> 00:17:52.740 and reality TV stars today on the internet. Oh, 00:17:52.779 --> 00:17:55.819 absolutely. When someone plays the villain online, 00:17:56.160 --> 00:17:59.039 the death threats and the mob mentality are immediate. 00:17:59.759 --> 00:18:01.500 Have we really gotten any better at separating 00:18:01.500 --> 00:18:04.319 the character from the actual human being? Or 00:18:04.319 --> 00:18:06.559 did we just move the riots from the arena floor 00:18:06.559 --> 00:18:08.700 to the comment sections? That's a great point. 00:18:09.000 --> 00:18:10.799 Something to think about the next time you find 00:18:10.799 --> 00:18:12.559 yourself getting furious at a screen.