-- Just how respected was the late great Jack Brisco?
Dick Bourne of the super Mid-Atlantic Gateway site (midatlanticgateway.com) relates a conversation he recently had with Jim Nelson as the two were lamenting Brisco’s passing.
Nelson got his first
big break in the business in the early ‘80s as one
of Sgt. Slaughter’s two Marine recruits (along with
Don Kernodle) here in the Carolinas. Jack and
brother Jerry Brisco had just returned to the
Mid-Atlantic region during that period, and they
were set to meet Gene and Ole
Anderson
in the main event of a card at the Township
Auditorium in Columbia.
Relates Bourne: “Jim was on the card that night as well, and in the same locker room as the Andersons. Jack had been suffering from the stomach flu and sent word to the Andersons in their locker room via referee Sonny Fargo to go easy on him that night. Ole, sensing an opportunity to make Jack miserable (as was apparently Ole’s tendency to do to everyone), just laughed and said, ‘We’ll see about that.’ But Gene, one of the legit toughest guys ever himself, knew better.
“‘Don’t mess with Brisco, Ole,’ Gene said. ‘You mess with Brisco, you’re on your own.’
“Ole, who probably really knew better, decided not to heed Gene’s warning and when the match began, Ole started going after Jack pretty good. The word had gotten around, and Jim said all the boys in both locker rooms had their heads sticking out the door to watch what was about to happen.
“The match got underway and Jack had soon had enough of it, and started stretching Ole — bad. Ole tried to tag in Gene, but Gene would short-arm him. ‘You (ticked) him off, you deal with him.’
“After the match, Ole came back to the locker room, all worked up. ‘How can a guy with arms that little make me hurt so bad?’”
And speaking of tough old cusses, Bourne also relates this story about two of the toughest, Danny Hodge and Ole Anderson.
Ole, who spent a few days in the hospital over the recent Christmas holidays while suffering from kidney stones among other ailments, confided to a nurse that he hadn’t been in that much pain for a long time.
“Have you ever felt worse pain?” she asked him. “Sure I have,” he told her. “What could have possibly caused you more pain than a kidney stone?” she asked.
Ole quickly replied: “Danny Hodge.”
The nurse didn’t get the joke, says Bourne, but Ole felt better for setting the record straight.
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Read Mike's entire column here.
See the original posts on the Mid-Atlantic Gateway here.
