RIP The Fabulous Moolah

[wrestlingguy]

While I know that many of you are not pro wrestling fans, but even the casual fan knows the name The Fabulous Moolah. She was around during pro wrestling's "golden era" (the 1950's, when it came into its own courtesy of television), and again attained noteriety in the 80's during Wrestlemania. Moolah passed away yesterday, according to the WWE. No details are available on cause of death yet.

Here's her bio, from Wikipedia:

Lillian Ellison was born on July 22, 1923 passed away Nov 2,2007. and grew up in South Carolina, the youngest of 13 siblings and the sole girl. She was 8 when her mother died of cancer, and by age 10, she was already working at her cousin’s cotton farm. Ellison was deeply distraught over her mother’s death, so to cheer her up, her father would take her to the local Tuesday night wrestling matches. Ellison immediately began idolizing the dominant women’s wrestler of the era, Mildred Burke, who had given the female division added attention and popularity. At just age 14, Ellison married 21-year old Walter Carroll, and though the marriage lasted just two years, Ellison gave birth to a daughter, Mary. Ellison then ignored her dad’s pleas to stay home with the baby and set out for a wrestling career of her own.


Wrestling career

1940s-1950s
In the late 1940s, she began wrestling for Mildred Burke’s husband Billy Wolfe, the dominant women’s promoter of the time. Wolfe was notorious for advising his wrestlers to sleep with competing promoters to ensure additional bookings, a practice Ellison refused to go along with. However, she soon began a romance with wrestler Johnny Long, whom she eventually married. Long trained her and hooked her up with various promoters, who began using her as a valet for male stars. Ellison debuted as “Slave Girl Moolah” in 1949, serving as the valet for the Elephant Boy (Tony Olivas). By the early 1950s, Moolah was a valet for the legendary “Nature Boy” Buddy Rogers, providing eye candy for the male audiences while assisting Rogers against his babyface opponents. Following her divorce from Long, she dated country singer Hank Williams for a year.

Within a few years, she began wrestling under the name Fabulous Moolah, just as Burke was reaching the end of her long career. On September 18, 1956, Moolah defeated Judy Grable in a 13-woman battle royale to win the vacant Women’s World Title (although June Byers still held claim to the NWA Women’s Championship after beating Burke three years earlier).


1960s-1970s dominance
Upon winning the championship, the Fabulous Moolah quickly established herself as the heir to Mildred Burke’s throne, as her first World Title reign lasted over ten years. Moolah successfully defended the belt against the top female wrestlers in the world, while also continuing to befriend some of the biggest celebrities of the day, including Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis. In addition, she also opened a women’s wrestling school where she trained and promoted a variety of new female wrestlers, most notably the Lady Angel. After June Byers retired in 1964, Moolah was subsequently recognized as the NWA Champion, thus making her the undisputed Women’s World Champion. Defending the title across the world, Moolah was never averse to using heel tactics to retain her title. Nevertheless, Moolah finally dropped the belt on September 17, 1966 to Betty Boucher, although she regained the title just weeks later. After trading the belt with Yukiko Tomoe during a tour of Japan in 1968, Moolah began an uninterrupted 8-year reign before losing to Sue Green at New York’s Madison Square Garden in 1976. However, any defeats were mere bumps in the road for the Fabulous Moolah, who would always regain her title a short time later; and eventually, she would purchase the legal rights to the belt, making her the virtual owner of the women’s wrestling division! After losing the championship for two days to Evelyn Stevens in 1978, Moolah began another long reign, defending the title for another 6 years before a revolutionary storyline would bring women’s wrestling to its zenith in the mid 1980s.


1980s Rock n Wrestling Connection
In 1983, Vincent K. McMahon began expanding the WWF nationally, and he offered Moolah a lucrative deal for the rights to her Women’s World Title. Moolah agreed to appear exclusively for the WWF and thus became the WWF Women’s Champion. The following year, pop music superstar Cyndi Lauper began a verbal feud with heel manager "Captain" Lou Albano that brought pro wrestling into the mainstream culture in an angle that became known as the Rock ‘n Wrestling Connection. When it was finally time for Lauper and Albano to settle their differences in the ring, a big matchup was scheduled with Albano representing Moolah against the challenge of Lauper’s young protégé, a beautiful challenger named Wendi Richter. In vintage WWF fashion, history was rewritten as Moolah was portrayed as having held the Women’s Title uninterrupted for the previous thirty years (which was nearly true since all of Moolah’s past title losses totaled to just a few weeks of not holding the belt since 1956). After much buildup and a tremendous amount of hype, the Fabulous Moolah finally lost the championship in the most anticipated women’s matchup in history when she was defeated by Wendi Richter on July 23, 1984 in the main event at “the Brawl to End it All,” which was broadcast live on MTV.

After losing the title to Richter, Moolah's glorious career seemed to have come to a close, and she then trained Leilani Kai, who beat Richter for the title in February 1985. Richter won it back at Wrestlemania I, but when Richter’s relationship quickly soured with the WWF, Moolah donned a mask as the Spider Lady, and regained the belt on November 25, 1985 in a controversial decision (Richter was never told she would be losing the title, and fell victim to a real-life "screwjob" finish). Moolah was unmasked by Richter after the match. Richter promptly quit the WWF after this match, while Moolah continued to dominate the promotion’s lady’s division for another 2 years (excluding a 6-day reign by Velvet McIntyre during a tour of Australia in 1986) before finally losing the belt to Sherri Martel on July 24, 1987. She would retire from full-time competition shortly after the loss to Sherri, though she would captain a team at the inaugural Survivor Series 1987. Her team (Moolah, Velvet McIntyre, Rockin' Robin, and the Jumping Bomb Angels) defeated champion Martel and her team (Leilani Kai, Judy Martin, Donna Christanello, and Dawn Marie).


Semi-Retirement
As women’s wrestling rose to new prominence in Japan during the 1980s and 90s, the division slowly faded into oblivion in the U.S. as the Fabulous Moolah disappeared into retirement. On June 24, 1995, she was inducted into the WWF Hall of Fame, becoming the first female wrestler to enter the Hall of Fame. But when the industry hit another popularity boom in the late 1990s, Moolah and fellow lady legend Mae Young re-emerged on the September 9, 1999 episode of SmackDown! when Jeff Jarrett invited Moolah into the ring. He then proceeded to crack a guitar over Moolah's head. Moolah and Young began appearing regularly in comedic roles as the women’s division made a comeback with new stars like Chyna, Lita, Ivory and later Trish Stratus. On the September 27, 1999 edition of Monday Night Raw, Moolah and Young defeated Ivory in a "Handicapped Evening Gown Match". This led to a title match at the No Mercy 1999 on October 17, 1999, and the 76-year old Moolah defeated Ivory to regain the Women's Title, thus becoming the oldest WWE Women's Champion ever (though she lost the title back to Ivory 8 days later). Also in 1999, Moolah and Young appeared on the 10th annual Billboard Music Awards. Moolah made a brief heel turn in 2000. Since then, Moolah and Young have made several cameo appearances on WWE programming.


2001-2006
On the September 15, 2003 edition of RAW Moolah was scheduled to be in a match against Victoria. Moolah had been promised a match for her 80th birthday. After Moolah's victory the "Legend Killer" Randy Orton came out and gave Moolah an RKO. Moolah and Mae Young made another appearance at New Years Revolution 2006, during a Bra and Panties Gauntlet Match attacking Victoria and stripping her of her top.

Moolah and Young, along with several other lady wrestlers, starred in the 2004 film "Lipstick and Dynamite" which is a documentary about the women wrestlers from the 1950s era. They appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno to promote the film.


2007
In the follow up to WrestleMania 23, Moolah and Mae Young were featured in a segment involving King Booker & Queen Sharmell who walked along the corridor of 'freaks.' On March 31, 2007, The Fabulous Moolah, along with Mae Young, attended the WWE Hall of Fame 2007 Ceremonies on the eve of WrestleMania 23. At WrestleMania 23, she appeared along with Slick, Ricky Steamboat, Jimmy Hart, Irwin R. Schyster, Dusty Rhodes, Sgt. Slaughter, Gene Okerlund, Pat Patterson and Gerald Brisco dancing backstage with Eugene, Cryme Tyme, Kelly Kelly, Layla El, and Brooke Adams. Moolah, along with Mae Young, made another appearance at the 2007 Draft Lottery on June 11, 2007. Moolah was booked to make an appearance on Friday Night Smackdown on August 24, 2007 but she couldn't make it due to her brother's death, so Mae Young had to do it without her. Moolah and Mae both made an appearance at SummerSlam 2007 in a backstage segment with Vince McMahon and William Regal.

 

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