Zoneboy
09-12-2010, 02:25 PM
Link (http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Wrestling/2010/09/12/15324721.html)
Mike Shaw, who was known in the wrestling world under various names, including Makhan Singh, Norman the Lunatic and Bastion Booger, and Klondike Mike, died of a heart attack on Saturday. He was 53.
Over the last number of years, Shaw was only loosely associated with the wrestling business, making the occasional appearance at fan fests under his different gimmicks.
Shaw was always lighthearted about his various personas; it's a long way from the lovable Norman the Trucker, treasuring the teddy bears (after he was a Lunatic), to the sadistic, plotting Makhan Singh, to the religiously-inspired Friar Ferguson, to the repugnantly obese Bastion Booger.
"It's funny, in my home town here in Michigan, people on the street still call me Norman," Shaw told this writer in 1999.
He ran a wrestling school in the upper Michigan peninsula for a time, and was a bouncer in a bar in Marquette, Mich., up until 2007.
Born May 9, 1957 in Marquette, Shaw was an amateur star in nearby Skandia and at Gwinn High School in Gwinn. At high school, he won 11 varsity letters -- wrestling (Great Lakes conference heavyweight champion in his senior year), track and field (shot put), football (defensive tackle).
For a time, he played pro softball for the Milwaukee Schlitz, until the American Professional Softball Association folded before the start of its second season, while many of the players, including Shaw, were in Florida for training. It was there that he met an older wrestler (Farmer Brown? Farmer Bill? Stories varied over the years) who suggested he might have a future in the grunt and groan business.
So Shaw set off to Walter "Killer" Kowalski's school in Salem, Mass., to learn pro wrestling.
"Kowalski had a great school. He spent a lot of time with us," Shaw said. "He took a liking to me. I went in there, I was probably one of his bigger guys at that time. I was probably about 6'1", 270, 280 (pounds) at the time. I was training really hard and I had just come out of softball, so I was in really good shape."
According to Shaw, Kowalski was in the ring with the students every day, and after three months of daily training, Shaw started working the small-time shows -- Mike Stryker! -- that Killer put on near the school, and a few WWWF TV tapings as enhancement talent. Kowalski drilled into the bulky Shaw the skills needed to be a non-stop, aggressive heel.
Though still relatively new to the business, Shaw got a publicity photo done up and mailed out promotional packages to 30 territories. The Vancouver All-Star Wrestling promotion, in transition with Sandor Kovacs and Gene Kiniski making way to Al Tomko, were the first to bite. There, his odyssey began as Klondike Mike, a babyface lumberjack.
In a interview with Scott Teal's Whatever Happened To ... newsletter in 1998, Shaw credited veterans such as Moose Morowski, Dean Ho and Eric Froelich for helping him develop.
Up next was Calgary's Stampede Wrestling promotion, the territory he'd be most associated with throughout his career. Though the Vancouver All-Star tapes aired in Calgary, the Alberta promotion made no attempt to explain why Klondike Mike was suddenly a heel in town.
After struggling in Calgary near the bottom of the cards, Shaw headed to South Africa, where he was Big Ben Sharpe for a few months. Upon his return to Canada, Mike Shaw saw the natural heat The Great Gama Singh was getting, and sided with him as Makhan Singh, forming what would become known as Karachi Vice.
Mike Shaw, who was known in the wrestling world under various names, including Makhan Singh, Norman the Lunatic and Bastion Booger, and Klondike Mike, died of a heart attack on Saturday. He was 53.
Over the last number of years, Shaw was only loosely associated with the wrestling business, making the occasional appearance at fan fests under his different gimmicks.
Shaw was always lighthearted about his various personas; it's a long way from the lovable Norman the Trucker, treasuring the teddy bears (after he was a Lunatic), to the sadistic, plotting Makhan Singh, to the religiously-inspired Friar Ferguson, to the repugnantly obese Bastion Booger.
"It's funny, in my home town here in Michigan, people on the street still call me Norman," Shaw told this writer in 1999.
He ran a wrestling school in the upper Michigan peninsula for a time, and was a bouncer in a bar in Marquette, Mich., up until 2007.
Born May 9, 1957 in Marquette, Shaw was an amateur star in nearby Skandia and at Gwinn High School in Gwinn. At high school, he won 11 varsity letters -- wrestling (Great Lakes conference heavyweight champion in his senior year), track and field (shot put), football (defensive tackle).
For a time, he played pro softball for the Milwaukee Schlitz, until the American Professional Softball Association folded before the start of its second season, while many of the players, including Shaw, were in Florida for training. It was there that he met an older wrestler (Farmer Brown? Farmer Bill? Stories varied over the years) who suggested he might have a future in the grunt and groan business.
So Shaw set off to Walter "Killer" Kowalski's school in Salem, Mass., to learn pro wrestling.
"Kowalski had a great school. He spent a lot of time with us," Shaw said. "He took a liking to me. I went in there, I was probably one of his bigger guys at that time. I was probably about 6'1", 270, 280 (pounds) at the time. I was training really hard and I had just come out of softball, so I was in really good shape."
According to Shaw, Kowalski was in the ring with the students every day, and after three months of daily training, Shaw started working the small-time shows -- Mike Stryker! -- that Killer put on near the school, and a few WWWF TV tapings as enhancement talent. Kowalski drilled into the bulky Shaw the skills needed to be a non-stop, aggressive heel.
Though still relatively new to the business, Shaw got a publicity photo done up and mailed out promotional packages to 30 territories. The Vancouver All-Star Wrestling promotion, in transition with Sandor Kovacs and Gene Kiniski making way to Al Tomko, were the first to bite. There, his odyssey began as Klondike Mike, a babyface lumberjack.
In a interview with Scott Teal's Whatever Happened To ... newsletter in 1998, Shaw credited veterans such as Moose Morowski, Dean Ho and Eric Froelich for helping him develop.
Up next was Calgary's Stampede Wrestling promotion, the territory he'd be most associated with throughout his career. Though the Vancouver All-Star tapes aired in Calgary, the Alberta promotion made no attempt to explain why Klondike Mike was suddenly a heel in town.
After struggling in Calgary near the bottom of the cards, Shaw headed to South Africa, where he was Big Ben Sharpe for a few months. Upon his return to Canada, Mike Shaw saw the natural heat The Great Gama Singh was getting, and sided with him as Makhan Singh, forming what would become known as Karachi Vice.