Mae Young

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Mae Young
An image of Mae Young.
Statistics
Ring name(s) Mae Young
The Queen
The Great Mae Young
Born March 12, 1923 (1923-03-12) (age 85)[1]
Sand Springs, Oklahoma[1]
Resides Columbia, South Carolina[1]
Debut 1939[2][3]

Johnnie Mae Young[1] (born March 12, 1923) is a former female professional wrestler. She was one of the most recognizable female wrestlers during the 1940s. Beginning in 1999, Young had a high-profile "second career" in the World Wrestling Federation (WWF).[3] For the last decade, Young, along with best friend The Fabulous Moolah, has been apart of the WWF/WWE family by making occasional appearances on WWE television.[1]

Contents

Wrestling career

Early career

Mae Young was an amateur wrestler on her high school's boys' wrestling team at the age of fifteen.[1][2][3] Her brother taught her to wrestle and helped her join the team.[1] She also played softball with Tulsa's national championship team.[2][3] While still in high school, Young went to a professional wrestling show and challenged then-champion Mildred Burke when she visited Tulsa to wrestle Gladys Gillem.[1][2] Because the promoters told her she could not wrestle the champion, she wrestled Gillem in a shoot fight, beating her within seconds.[1] After the fight, promoter Billy Wolfe wanted Young to become a professional wrestler.[1] She left home two years later to wrestle professionally.[2]

In 1941, Young, along with Mildred Burke, opened up Canada for female wrestling.[1] In Canada, they worked for Stu Hart.[1] She was wrestling in Memphis, Tennessee on December 7, 1941, the day that Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese, which led to the United States entering World War II.[1] During the war, Young helped women take advantage of the fact that the men were fighting overseas by expanding their role in the sport.[2][3]

Johnnie Mae Young with one of her former students, Ric Drasin (circa 1991)
Johnnie Mae Young with one of her former students, Ric Drasin (circa 1991)

She fought under the nicknames of "The Queen" and "The Great Mae Young", but she used her real name for most of her fights. During the 1950s, she wrestled for Mildred Burke's World Women's Wrestling Association (WWWA). In 1954, Young and Burke were some of the first females to tour Japan after the war.[3]

In 1951 she became the National Wrestling Alliance's (NWA) first Florida Women's Champion, and, in 1968, their first United States Women's Champion.

As an instructor, one of her students was Ric "The Equalizer" Drasin.[3] Another one of her students was The Fabulous Moolah.[2][3]

World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment

Early storylines (1999–2000)

Young made her World Wrestling Federation (WWF) debut on the September 9, 1999 episode of SmackDown!, seated at ringside with The Fabulous Moolah. Jeff Jarrett invited Moolah into the ring and smashed a guitar over her head.[3] When Young tried to help Moolah out, Jarrett put Young into the figure four leglock.[3] After this appearance, Young and Moolah began appearing regularly on WWF televised shows. On the September 27 edition of Monday Night RAW Young and Moolah defeated then WWF Women's Champion Ivory in a Handicapped Evening Gown match, where Young got stripped to her bra and panties. Young managed Moolah during Moolah's WWF Women's Title victory over Ivory at the No Mercy pay-per-view in October 1999. Young and Moolah both competed at Survivor Series with Debra and Tori against Ivory, Jacqueline, Terri Runnels, and Luna.[4]

At the age of seventy-six, she was named the WWF's "Miss Royal Rumble 2000" at the Royal Rumble by winning a bikini contest.[3] Young appeared to remove her top during this pay-per-view show, which aired from Madison Square Garden. Young, however, was wearing a prosthesis and was not actually exposing herself.[2] Also in 2000, Young began a storyline where she dated WWF superstar Mark Henry,[2] including an announcement that Young was pregnant. During this storyline, The Dudley Boyz, specifically Bubba Ray Dudley, powerbombed Mae from the stage through a table.[2] The "child" was eventually delivered and found to be nothing more than a bloody rubber hand.[2]

Sporadic appearances (2003–present)

In 2003, Young made an appearance at Bad Blood where she stripped in the rings and performed a bronco buster on Eric Bischoff.[5]

In 2004, Young and The Fabulous Moolah were invited to tour, as guests of honor, with the WWE's modern stars as part of that organization's fiftieth anniversary. Also in 2004, she was inducted into the Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame. Young, along with several other lady wrestlers, starred in the 2004 film Lipstick and Dynamite,[3] a documentary about the women wrestlers from the 1950s era. Moolah and Young appeared on episodes of the Jay Leno show and the Conan O'Brien show while promoting the movie.

Young re-appeared in 2006 at New Year's Revolution during the Bra and Panties Gauntlet match, where she entered the ring and did a strip-tease, whilst Moolah watched.[6] She was attacked by Victoria as she left the ring, which led to Moolah and Mae removing Victoria's top, which helped Ashley Massaro win the match.[6] Mae made an appearance at WrestleMania 22 in April 2006 in a backstage segment with Gene Snitsky (who had a storyline foot fetish), in which he "fondled" her feet.[7] Mae also appeared (with the aid of a walker) with The Fabulous Moolah on the RAW Family Reunion special on October 9, 2006, where the duo waved to the crowd from the stage.

On March 31, 2007, Mae Young, along with The Fabulous Moolah, attended the WWE Hall of Fame 2007 Ceremonies on the eve of WrestleMania 23. At WrestleMania 23, she appeared dancing backstage with several other WWE superstars of the past and present.[8] Mae made another appearance at the 2007 Draft Lottery on June 11. Mae also made a special appearance on SmackDown! on August 24 winning a bikini contest.[3] She also appeared at the Raw 15th Anniversary special in a skit with the McMahon family, where Vince McMahon implied that he had a sexual relationship with Young after Moolah's funeral.

On March 29, 2008, Pat Patterson inducted Young into the WWE Hall of Fame as a part of the Class of 2008.[3] She is the oldest living female to be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame.[1] She plans to keep wrestling until she is 100 years old.[1][2]

In wrestling

  • Finishing and signature moves
  • Wrestlers managed

Championships and accomplishments

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Ryan Nation (March 27, 2008). HOFer Mae Young vows to keep wrestling. SLAM! Wrestling. Retrieved on 2008-04-01.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Dave Scherer (October 2000). Life Begins At 77: Mae Young Interview. Wrestling Digest. Retrieved on 2008-04-01.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Hall of Fame: Mae Young. WWE.com (March 2008). Retrieved on 2008-04-02.
  4. ^ John Powell (November 15, 1999). Booking blows Survivor Series. SLAM! Wrestling. Retrieved on 2008-04-07.
  5. ^ John Powell (Jun 16, 2003). Bad Blood just plain bad. SLAM! Wrestling. Retrieved on 2008-04-07.
  6. ^ a b Chris Sokol (January 9, 2006). Edge surprise champ after Revolution. SLAM! Wrestling. Retrieved on 2008-04-07.
  7. ^ Chris Sokol (April 3, 2006). WrestleMania delivers big time on PPV. SLAM! Wrestling. Retrieved on 2008-04-07.
  8. ^ Dale Plummer and Nick Tywalk (April 1, 2007). Undertaker the champ, McMahon bald. SLAM! Wrestling. Retrieved on 2008-04-07.
  9. ^ Warned.net (June 9, 2006). Interview with Johnny Flex. Retrieved on 2008-04-01.
  10. ^ N.W.A. Florida Women's Title. Puroresu Dojo. Retrieved on 2008-05-13.
  11. ^ World Women's Tag Team Title. Puroresu Dojo. Retrieved on 2008-05-13.

References

  • The Great Mae Young. Lipstick & Dynamite - The First Ladies of Wrestling [DVD]. World Wrestling Entertainment.

External links

  • Profile at Online World of Wrestling
  • Young's WWE Hall of Fame profile
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