Portland Wrestling

Portland was frying for the fourth day in a row and the creeks of Sellwood played host to homeless men and women with their dogs and moms and dads with their kids. It was a most curious juxtaposition to observe, but the temporary democratic nature of it all somewhat pleased me.

I was on a leisurely bicycle ride around the neighborhood and pedaling through Johnson Creek Park when I saw Sean sitting at my favorite picnic table near the water. Across from him sat an elderly woman. Next to her stood an elderly man fixing one of the two bicycles leaning against a rail fence. I recognized the couple and knew they were married, homeless, living somewhere in the area, but I didn't know their names. I did remember they always exuded a happy and friendly disposition when encountered.

Sean saw me and waved. I rode over and stopped. The woman had a big book about being a grandmother resting on the table in front of her. She was doing something on her phone.

Downstream came the cheerful sounds of kids playing in the creek.

The trio was malt liquoring. I produced a tin of fine pipe tobacco and handed it to Sean. He thanked me and then opened up a chew can to show me his latest batch of pipe tobacco and Old Crow, although this time it wasn't Old Crow. Instead Sean used Fireball, an utterly vile cinnamon-infused whiskey.

Sean told me he wanted the cinnamon flavor “for the ladies.” I laughed because I knew he wasn't joking.

Just then a mom wearing shorts and a sports bra walked past us with four kids toward the creek. The kids all wore a flotation device of some kind.

What ensued around the table for the next 20 or so minutes was a conversation about various matters related to the subject of Portland Wrestling.

Yes! The late great professional wrestling circus that I watched every Saturday night on KPTV Channel 12 in my Oregon City youth of the 1970s. The card was broadcast live from the Portland Sports Arena and the gloriously monotone Frank Bonnema called all the action from the Crow's Nest.

How in the world the subject of Portland Wrestling originated when and where it did with three homeless people on a late morning in 90-degree heat is long lost to me.

But it came up and we dived in!

We discussed the show's stars: Playboy Buddy Rose, Bull Ramos, Jimmy Snuka, Royal Kangaroos, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Tough Tony Bourne, Rasputin and Dutch Savage.

We discussed cage matches, a coal miner's glove, flying chairs, tag teams and turnbuckle treatment.

The man told a Dutch Savage story. Savage had lived in Oregon City and the man had dated the grappler's daughter. He had a Roddy Piper story, too. The madman ran an auto repair shop in Portland as his day job and once replaced the transmission on the man's truck.

The woman had a Portland Wrestling story as well. She used to work in a bowling alley and one of the wrestlers, (she couldn't remember his stage name), owned one of those monster Big Foot trucks and would rev it up in the parking lot so loud and so long that the owner of the bowling alley had to come outside and tell him to leave.

We then segued into the program's only advertiser, Tom Peterson's, the legendary home appliance retailer in Portland that featured the cornball man himself with his trademark crew cut and trademark gimmick of pounding a piece of Plexiglas and yelling “Wake up! Wake up!” because the show aired at 11 pm and ran for 90 minutes.

The woman had a Tom Peterson story, too! He once delivered an alarm clock to her home. But the damn thing didn't work so she had to return it!!!!!!!

I could have talked Portland Wrestling all day with this crew, but it was time to go. I told them to stay cool and they said they were going to hit the creek soon, where undoubtedly they would continue malt liquoring and conversing about Portland Wrestling because if you watched in its heyday, you would know exactly why.