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A wonderful collection at History San Jose

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SUMMARY KEYWORDS san jose, major, cow palace, wrestling, professional wrestling, territory, localized, call, ray stevens, location, cogan, draw, stars, legend, locally, matches, san francisco, milpitas, gomez, mid atlantic SPEAKERS Christopher Garcia Christopher Garcia  Come with me, we're going to Silicon Valley Christopher Garcia  there used to be wrestling in San Jose. Yes, I know people still they do have wrestling at the shark tank or whatever they're calling it now. And there's occasional small time. Bits going on things like All Pro Wrestling locally, could slam up in Oakland. But San Jose used to be, I believe it was Wednesday nights as a part of the Shire territory, and that was Roy Shire, up in San Francisco, usually around the Cow Palace, his most famous thing had TV on KTVU in San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose. It was a territory and how the territories worked at that point was you would have a main location in this case was San Francisco's Cow Palace, where the big shows happened. But then there were smaller shows every week or every other week, sometimes once a month, all around the same area. There's still a few of these in existence today. But they've really gone away. But every major metropolitan area had one back in the day. Famously, Dallas had world class Championship Wrestling. You had Chicago back in the day, you had all sorts of them up in the Northeast, the South, Raleigh, North Carolina, there was a thing called Mid Atlantic, which major tour Memphis is also an incredibly famous one that's long lasting, there's still sort of a version of it left. But San Jose was a very important stop on the path. And usually the shows that happen, that aren't the big ones. They're not super notable. But they were a way for the companies to make money. This is really key. Because at that point, you weren't getting major rights deals and such. And, you know, there wasn't an overall thing. You had a small area where you were getting all of your money. So every time every different city you go to had to bring in money. But the stars who came through those things were the same stars you would see on TV. And locally, that was Pat Patterson, Ray Stevens pepper Gomez. Rocky. So man Johnson, I love I loved Rocky Johnson, very nice guy like my dad. But all the stars would do the tour. And that was key. Because to bring the people to the smaller locations where you don't have the major production values, it's not a superstar show. And in a lot of places, they were just in national armory building sometimes they were in high school gyms most often they were usually in gyms like high school or something. And it would just be a way to bring in little extra money for the company, but also to give a personal connection because at that point, TV was seen as one thing and you usually didn't give away your big matches on TV. And you usually didn't give away your big your initial big matches in the smaller cities. So for example, you might have pepper Gomez versus Ray Stevens. The classic feud, would their first match would be in San Francisco in the Cow Palace drawing 10s of 1000s of people. But then the rematches might happen in each of those little cities again. San Jose is top draw ever I asked us if Dave Meltzer who is the leader, San Jose boy, a legend in professional wrestling journalism. asked him who the biggest draw in the history of San Jose was in his simple answer and I hate to admit I agree with him his whole Cogan II, there's a lot of ways you could look at that he was never a regular in the territory. And I didn't quite get an answer of who was the biggest actually in San Jose when San Jose was a part of the territory realm. But the sort of demonstrates a change in professional wrestling. It went from being something that is very localized something that is I don't want to say personal but you identify with the wrestlers of your location because you don't have any other choice to something national. And the National names drop bigger, even if they draw less often. Those also has a history of producing professional wrestlers many writing Bo Fernandez a legend absolutely fantastic worker back in the day. Currently you have two local folk. First Bailey San Jose zone as I always refer to her major star injured right now. One of the best women Wrestler of the past ever. She's fantastic. And her current run as a bad guy. He'll as we call them, is fantastic. Another one is Shotzi Blackheart. got her start out here up in hood slam. She's from the beautiful city of Milpitas. So yet, localized wrestling has made its way to Silicon Valley. There's no question Christopher Garcia  but it's still here with us. And we're still a major stop for at least WWE until aw decides to get their butt over here.

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