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Which stations carried what wrestling promotions in the territory era?

Ultimajock

Ultimajock

...was watching some old AWA tapes last night and had that question flit across my mind. Anybody recall who carried what promotions when y'all were first getting into pro rasslin' fandom, before the McMahon virus spread westward? ;-) Here's what I recall from when I was a young'un:

AWA:
Wisconsin
Green Bay: WLUK/11, WLRE/26
Fond du Lac: KFIZ/34
Milwaukee: WVTV/18, WCGV/24, WTMJ/4
Madison: WKOW/27
Wausau: WAOW/9
Illinois
Chicago: WCIU/26
Rockford: WREX/13
Moline: WQAD/8
Minnesota
Minneapolis-St. Paul: WTCN/11, KMSP/9 (Gagne taped at these stations' facilities)
Manitoba
Winnipeg: CKND/9

International Championship Wrestling (Angelo Poffo's "outlaw" outfit):
Wisconsin
Green Bay: WLRE/26

World Class Championship Wrestling:
Illinois
Aurora: WPWR/60
Minnesota
Minneapolis-St. Paul: KITN/29

Southwest Championship Wrestling:
Illinois
West Chicago: WBBS/60

World Wrestling Association (Dick the Bruiser's Indianapolis-based promotion):
Illinois
Chicago: WCIU/26

Mid-Atlantic Wrestling:
Illinois
Aurora: WPWR/60
 
I watched these growing up in the Mid-Late 70s and early 80s:

1)Georgia Championship Wrestling from Atlanta
2)Southeastern Championship Wrestling from Knoxville Tennessee
3)Mid South Wrestling from Memphis
4)Mid South Wrestling from Baton Rouge Louisiana
5)World Class Championship Wrestling from Dallas
6)Southwest Championship Wrestling from San Antonio Texas
7)World Wrestling Federation
 
In the Nick Gulas/Jerry Jarrett territory often just called Memphis wrestling (later called CWA and then USWA), the primary towns were:

Memphis--WHBQ from 1959 to March 1977 and then on WMC-TV from March 1977 to the late 1990s.

Nashville--WSIX/WNGE or WZTV.

Birmingham--WBMG

Chattanooga--WDEF

Huntsville--WHNT

Louisville--WDRB, later WLKY and then WAVE

Evansville--WTVW

Lexington--WLEX

Jackson (TN)--WBBJ

Tupelo-WTWV/WTVA

Florence (AL)--WOWL

At one time Gulas had live studio wrestling in most of these markets, but by the 1980s the live Memphis show filmed at WMC-TV would be edited and shown in the other towns.

In the Southeastern Championship Wrestling territory:

Knoxville--WBIR and before that on the old WTVK channel 26.
Dothan (AL)--WTVY which was also the home for Gulf Coast Wrestling before Southeastern purchased the territory.
In the 1970s, Gulf Coast also had a studio show taped at WEAR in Pensacola.

Others in the South/Midwest:

St. Louis wrestling was always on KPLR.
I believe that Dallas wrestling was on KTVT for the vast majority of its run both as NWA and World Class.

Tri State wrestling that later became Mid-South and I believe was taped in Oklahoma City or Shreveport was shown in most markets in Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi and Springfield and Joplin, Missouri and Wichita Falls, Texas.

I know it was on WJTV in Jackson (MS), KARK in Little Rock and WGNO in New Orleans. Someone with more knowledge of this territory might know other stations.
 
World Class Wrestling
KXTX 39 carried the same WCCW program that was syndicated out while KTVT carried a local show called "Championship Sports" that featured matches from the Will Rogers Coliseum in Ft. Worth.

Southwest Championship Wrestling in San Antonio was carried on KENS 5 in addition to the spanish language version on KWEX 41. When the promotion was sold and changed its name to Texas All-Star Wrestling around 1984 the programming moved to KMOL 4. KMOL also carried the WCCW show.
 
Tim-In-Houston said:
We had mid-South Wrestling out of Memphis on WTVW-7-Evansville. I don't recall any other stations in the market carrying wrestling.
Click to expand...

Y'all didn't have WWA wrestling out of Chicago and Indianapolis,on Evansville tv?
 
As of June 1986, per cwfarchives.com , these stations carried Championship Wrestling From Florida, an NWA franchise and one of several telecasts that Gordon Solie hosted:

Tampa-St Pete [home base]--Channel 44
Jacksonville--Channels 17 + 47
Tallahassee--Channels 6 + 17[LP]
Perry--Channel 69[LP]
Orlando-Daytona Beach--Channel 2
Sarasota--Channel 40
Gainesville-Ocala--Channel 51
West Palm Beach-Ft Pierce--Channels 12 + 34
Miami-Ft Lauderdale--Channels 6 + 39
Nassau, Bahamas--Channel 13

By then, the "territory" era was winding down as Vince McMahon's then-WWF and Jim Crockett's WCW [which was still an NWA franchise, mostly in Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia, until the early '90s] were gaining more and more national exposure, to say nothing of the Dallas-based World Class and the Minnesota-based AWA.
 
In my neck of the woods....

ATV: International Wrestling, later Grand Prix Wrestling (Atlantic/World; the WGPW promotion used Bon Jovi's Livin' on a Prayer for their theme for a while :D); they also ran WWF and the Canadianized version of WCW programming at various points
MITV: WWF for a while IIRC
WJBK Detroit: WWF (Superstars of Wrestling)
WVII Bangor: ICW (the NJ-based promotion); I think they also aired WWF at one point
WXYZ Detroit: UWF
 
In the '70s "Championship Wrestling From Florida" was carried
in the Bay Area on WTOG Saturdays at 7, and on WLCY/WTSP
Sundays at 1 PM. WFTV Orlando also carried the show on
Saturday afternoons.

Nobody's mentioned Jim Crockett's shows; he had "Mid-Atlantic
Championship Wrestling" and "World Wide Wrestling," both taped
in Raleigh until the early '80s, then in Charlotte.

"Mid-Atlantic," I know, was carried on:

WBTV Charlotte
WRAL Raleigh
WXII Winston-Salem
WFBC/WYFF Greenville, SC
WSLS Roanoke, VA
WAVY Norfolk, VA
WTVR Richmond, VA
WNOK/WLTX Columbia, SC
WCSC Charleston, SC

"World Wide" was on

WGHP High Point, NC
WLOS Asheville, NC
WRET/WCNC Charlotte
I think WSET Lynchburg, VA might have carried it, as well
as WOLO Columbia, SC.

If others can add to this list I'd appreciate it.
 
"Big Chuck" Schodowski mentions in his biography about working sound production on Wrestling Matches originating from WJW-TV 8 studios in Cleveland early in his career around 1961-62, though I wouldnt know what organization put them on..TV Guide confirms this with "Wrestling-Cleveland" listings in this same era..WJAN-TV 17 in Canton also may have had matches from Canton Auditorium/Civic Center.
 
David67 said:
I watched these growing up in the Mid-Late 70s and early 80s:

1)Georgia Championship Wrestling from Atlanta
2)Southeastern Championship Wrestling from Knoxville Tennessee
3)Mid South Wrestling from Memphis
4)Mid South Wrestling from Baton Rouge Louisiana
5)World Class Championship Wrestling from Dallas
6)Southwest Championship Wrestling from San Antonio Texas
7)World Wrestling Federation
Click to expand...
...on what stations?...
 
Ultimajock said:
David67 said:
I watched these growing up in the Mid-Late 70s and early 80s:

1)Georgia Championship Wrestling from Atlanta
2)Southeastern Championship Wrestling from Knoxville Tennessee
3)Mid South Wrestling from Memphis
4)Mid South Wrestling from Baton Rouge Louisiana
5)World Class Championship Wrestling from Dallas
6)Southwest Championship Wrestling from San Antonio Texas
7)World Wrestling Federation
Click to expand...
...on what stations?...
Click to expand...
Channels 17(WTCG and later WTBS),36 and 46 in Atlanta
 
David67 said:
Ultimajock said:
David67 said:
I watched these growing up in the Mid-Late 70s and early 80s:

1)Georgia Championship Wrestling from Atlanta
2)Southeastern Championship Wrestling from Knoxville Tennessee
3)Mid South Wrestling from Memphis
4)Mid South Wrestling from Baton Rouge Louisiana
5)World Class Championship Wrestling from Dallas
6)Southwest Championship Wrestling from San Antonio Texas
7)World Wrestling Federation
Click to expand...
...on what stations?...
Click to expand...
Channels 17(WTCG and later WTBS),36 and 46 in Atlanta
Click to expand...
...uhm, wanna comply with the question at the beginning of the thread and identify which stations acrried which promotion? Or were you an Eddy Mansfield mark??? ;D ...
 
bpatrick said:
Nobody's mentioned Jim Crockett's shows; he had "Mid-Atlantic
Championship Wrestling" and "World Wide Wrestling," both taped
in Raleigh until the early '80s, then in Charlotte.
Click to expand...
...I mentioned Mid-Atlantic in my original post -- WPWR/60 Aurora/Chicago carried it briefly (as a lead-in to World Class on Saturday afternoons) in the early '80s...
 
You did; my bad. I'm a little surprised, though, that
"Mid-Atlantic" would be carried in Illinois, but then again,
"Championship Wrestling From Florida" aired in both Charlotte
and Raleigh.
 
David67 said:
Y'all didn't have WWA wrestling out of Chicago and Indianapolis,on Evansville tv?
Click to expand...

One of the other two stations may very well have, but Mid-South was extremely popular in the Evansville area. At one point Jerry "The King" Lawlor opened up a furniture (perhaps appliance) store there.

It sticks in my mind because of the opening video of two grapplers locked in combat with the "2001: A Space Oddessy" theme overlayed. IIRC, WTVW aired it Sunday afternoons around noon.
 
Evansville was part of the Memphis wrestling territory from around 1971 to the mid 1990s. I don't know why it wasn't part of the WWA. I think for awhile promoter Jerry Jarrett actually paid Dick The Bruiser some small commission on the weekly Wednesday night cards, but eventually stopped. I don't know if Bruiser promoted Evansville in the 60s and the area had been dormant for awhile or how it became part of Memphis wrestling.
 
Here's what Southern Saskatchewan viewers got in July 1988, from the Regina Leader-Post:

AWA
TSN

NWA
WDIV Detroit (Pro and World Championship Super Bouts)

POWW
WDIV

Stampede
TSN (TSN also aired Pro Wrestling Plus, a weekly anthology show carrying clips from NWA and different US promotions, produced by the same company who did TSN's Stampede show)
CJFB Swift Current
CFRE Regina

WWF
CHCH Hamilton (Maple Leaf-rebadged Superstars; WWF Cavalcade-rebadged Spotlght; also a 3rd show late night Saturdays... CHCH produced re-edited WWF programs for syndication across Canada)
WJBK Detroit (Superstars)
WXYZ Detroit (Spotlight)
 
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