There
was a time when I collected everything wrestling that there was to
collect. It was my Dad and his side of the family that really started
down the line when my Dad got me a subscription
to WWF Magazine in 1987. He also got me my first ever wrestling
figure, an LJN Hulk Hogan. Eventually I got the ring and a large number
of other figures.
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| April 1988 at Nana's playing with my ring and figures, Hulk Hogan is slamming Greg "The Hammer" Valentine |
My
first ever album that I had was the Wrestling Album cassette that my dad
got me for Christmas. I had the Hulk Hogan Rock’ n’ Wrestling sheet
set (I still use the only pillowcase I have
left to this day on my bed), Hulk Hogan Pajama’s and even the Hulk
Hogan work out set. When I was 10 my Nana & Papa got me the
Complete Book of Wrestling; an oversized hardcover book of full color
photos with biographies of the top and lesser known wrestlers
of the mid-late 80’s.
Once
I got my license though, that’s when I started buying everything and
anything wrestling that I could find. Wrestling hadn’t yet hit its big
boom of the late 90’s so you could find great
stuff cheap at yard sales and flea markets. That’s when my collection
of LJN’s and Hasbro’s really took off.
My
buddy Jay and I would be in competition both separately and together of
finding that item that was better than the other person found, one
upping each other. For the longest time my Terry
Funk LJN with hat and branding iron that I picked up for $6 at the
Montsweag Flea Market in Woolwich was THE find. Other big finds were
the clamshell case Best of the WWF tapes.
We
would buy figures, cups, magazines, commercial tapes, and this guy at
the Lisbon Falls Flea Market we dubbed tape guy that had a huge
collection of bootleg VHS tapes of WCW & WWF events,
usually 2 per tape which were never marked other than “wrestling” so
you never knew what you were going to get.
We
had a standard Flea Market route hitting Woolwich, Brunswick, &
Lisbon Falls. We would occasionally add Saco, Scarborough, and
Searsport. We also frequented Kay-B-Toys so often the staff
knew us. They would give us the promotional material once they were
done with it. I once got this large three foot by four foot ECW video
game sign featuring Sabu on it.
We
both had Wrestling rooms at our homes where our massive collections sat
with no one but each other to admire them. Once we started going to
and participating in wrestling events I started
collecting signed photos and getting pictures taken with wrestlers. My
only regret during this time was not getting more photographs with some
of the greats in wrestling because I didn’t want to seem like a “stupid
mark.” I wish I would have known that everyone
in wrestling is a “stupid mark” and didn’t care what others thought.
In
2007 I moved from Augusta to Pittston and I boxed up my collection. I
was looking forward to my new home where I was going to be able to turn a
section of the basement into my wrestling
man cave. I had the majority of my collection in the basement stacked
in boxes waiting for me to get the work done so I could start to display
my items. A few months later in the Spring a perfect storm of events
resulted in the previous always dry basement
to fill with over four of water. I lost everything.
The
only stuff I didn’t lose was my books both signed and not, DVD’s,
ticket stubs, and binders with my signed photos and trading cards. What
I lost was essentially priceless and to summarize
as I couldn’t possibly list everything, was over 500 VHS tapes, no
exaggeration, a couple hundred magazines that were bagged and boarded,
including every issue of Raw Magazine, and over 100 figures in
packaged. Practically nothing was salvageable and adding
to was the water was disgusting filthy staining the figures and other
things that you would think would be washable.
As
sad as this was it did lead me to one of the greatest experiences of my
entire life. WWE Magazine had written an article that essentially was
an error. I wrote them an email telling them
so and that I had the proof but it was destroyed in a basement flood.
Much to my amazement they wrote back, almost immediately, saying that I
was right and asking about the flood. I had written them letters and
emails since I was a kid and had never gotten
a response or had one of my letter published.
I
wrote them back telling them about it, they asked for pictures, and one
thing lead to another and they asked if they could post my letter and a
couple of the flood photos and they wanted
to send me something to start my collection up again. I told them they
could post my pictures and that they didn’t need to send me anything as
I wasn’t looking for anything. Next thing I know I’m getting invited
to down to tour Titan Tower and be their guest
for the day.
A
couple months later this momentous event occurred and you can read about
it in the pages of the October 2012 issue of WWE Magazine and they
didn’t and interview with me and a two page photo
spread of the day. I even met Shane McMahon! I’ll write a blog about
it.
After
this my collecting changed. I stopped buying everything wrestling that
I see and I have even slimmed down what I had l which surprised even
me. I still collect books, figures, and
DVD’s but I only buy certain ones. I only have about 20 figures now. I
save all my tickets stubs to everything I have been too in a very nice
album. I also have over 400 signed trading cards that I get only from
the wrestlers themselves either in person
or through the mail, never eBay or other third party. I don’t buy 8 X
10’s at all any longer staying with my trading cards. My collection of
photo’s with people has grown dramatically these last few years as
well.
One
of my favorite things that I own is a poster that I made for when Jay
and I went to NWA Legends Fanfest in 2009 that I got all the Super
ticket attendees to sign, which included the original
Four Horsemen and Barry Windham!!!
What do you like to collect, wrestling or otherwise, leave a comment below letting me know.
Thanks for reading, don’t forget to leave a comment and please like my blog’s Facebook page. Until next time.
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