Embedded Files
American Wrestling Alliance - San Francisco (1960-1968)
In the 1950s, the Shire Brothers were a successful tag team in middle America. In the 1960s, these same "brothers" were behind building one of the most significant territories of the day. Roy Shire was had one of pro-wrestling's best minds and after years of bumping around, he wanted to make some real money running a promotion. He settled in San Francisco in 1960. The region was nearly dead from years of a weak product and Shire wanted to take over the city. His main star was none other than his "brother" Ray, who became Ray Stevens, the best worker of the day. The "American Wrestling Alliance" (not to be confused with Verne Gagne's promotion), also called "Big Time Wrestling" was born. Shire roster grew steadily with the exciting babyface Pepper Gomez, the sinister Kinji Shibuya as well as top stars of the day like Don Leo Jonathan, Wilbur Snyder, Bob Ellis, Bearcat Wright and many others. The NWA tried to counter Shire by sending stars to Malcewicz's promotion, but they just could not save the pathetic product it had become. Shire easily won this promotional war and the NWA's influence in California was very limited for several years. Ray Stevens was a reckless character who got over huge, but was prone to problems that prevented him from being the top star of the 1960s and 1970s. He was money player for Shire though and as long as he could wrestle, he was able to be a significant personality. Cut from that same cloth was Pat Patterson, who became Shire right-hand man. Shire was a visionary, who carefully scripted his shows and it worked. He knew how to get talent over and did so with his formulas time and time again. Shire also had one of the premier TV arrangements of the day as he was able to get his product out to his Bay Area fans as well as fans in other Northern California cities: Fresno, Bakersfield and Sacramento. Even more significant was his markets in Hawaii (through promoter Ed Francis); Salt Lake City, Utah; Las Vegas, Nevada; Phoenix, Arizona; and Anchorage, Alaska. He did specialized interviews for each market and was really becoming a big player in the pro-wrestling world.
Mitsu Arakawa
Red Bastien
Lord Blears
Hercules Cortez
Emile Dupree
Verne Gagne
Jack Lanza (Blackjack Lanza)
Luis Martinez
Angelo Poffo
Art Thomas
Tarzan Tyler
Bearcat Wright
NWA - San Francisco (1968-1981)
In 1968, Ray Shire joined the NWA and began featuring their champion sometimes, but he mainly focused on his own stars and building them and their programs. In 1970, Shire lost his TV deal, which was the beginning of a slow decline for the once mighty promotion. Throughout that decade, the San Francisco office tried to stagger their fall by aligning with other companies. First was Don Owens' Portland-based PNW, but the deal quickly fell apart. Next was returning to alliances with the Midwestern promoters that had helped him climb to the top originally. By this time, they were not as strong or not willing to invest in Shire and it also failed. The last hope was Eddie Graham's Championship Wrestling from Florida, which was in the middle of its peak years. This arrangement proved to expensive and stopped after a few shows. Shire had simply lost his television, some of his key stars and was not able to hold his promotion together. He continually tried to build something, but by the early 1980s, Roy Shire held his final Battle Royal and called it quits.
Spiros Arion
Red Bastien
Porkchop Cash
Keith Franks (Adrian Adonis)
Great Fuji (Mr. Fuji)
Leo Garibaldi
Bill Miller
Tenryu Shimata (Genichiro Tenryu)
Alexis Smirnoff
John L. Sullivan (Johnny Valiant)
"Sailor" Art Thomas
Les Thornton
Valiant Brothers (Jimmy & Johnny)
Bearcat Wright
I'd like to thank Wes Mulholland, Vik Berry, Bill Balch, Kurt Brown, from kayfabememories.com for their articles. And, of course Royal Duncun and Gary Will's contributions to wrestling-titles.com
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