Tales From The Territories - WWWF Capitol Wrestling Corp. - Full Episode 7/30

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The National Wrestling Alliance recognized an undisputed NWA World Heavyweight Champion that went to several different professional wrestling promotions across the globe.
The NWA generally promoted strong shooters as champions, to give their sport credibility and guard against double-crosses.
While doing strong business in the Midwest, these wrestlers attracted little interest along the eastern seaboard in the Capitol Wrestling Corporation territory.
and to top it off In November 1954, Jess McMahon passed away.

The 1927 Evening News Described Jess McMahon as the greatest matchmaker and one of the first promoters to cross the “color line” by giving wrestlers of diverse cultural backgrounds equal opportunities as caucasian wrestlers. At a time of racial divide , Jess was loved and highly respected by fans of all ethnic backgrounds.

Mondt, brought in Jess’s son Vincent James.
The younger McMahon and Mondt were very successful and soon controlled approximately 70% of the NWA's booking, largely due to their dominance in the heavily populated Northeast region.

In 1961, the NWA board decided to put the championship on bleach blond showman "Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers, who was an effective drawing card in the region.
 The rest of the NWA was unhappy with Mondt because he rarely allowed Rogers to wrestle outside of the Northeast.
Mondt and McMahon wanted Rogers to hold-up the physical NWA World Heavyweight title, but Rogers was unwilling to sacrifice his $25,000 deposit on the championship belt.
championship holders at the time had to pay a deposit to insure they honored their commitments as champion
Rogers lost the NWA World Heavyweight Championship to Lou Thesz in a one-fall match in front of 9,000 fans in Toronto, Ontario, on January 24, 1963.
This led to Mondt, McMahon, and the Capital Wrestling Corporation leaving the NWA in protest, creating the World Wide Wrestling Federation in the process.
In April that year, Rogers was awarded the new W.W.W.F. World Heavyweight Championship, supposedly winning a fictional tournament in Rio de Janeiro.
He lost the championship to Bruno Sammartino a month later on May 17, 1963, after suffering a heart attack days before the match.
To accommodate Rogers' condition, the match was booked to last under a minute.

Notable wrestlers from this era included Haystacks Calhoun, Al Costello, "Captain" Lou Albano, Pat Barrett, "Classy" Freddie Blassie, Johnny Valentine, Bruno Sammartino, Arnold Skaaland, Lord Littlebrook and Johnny Powers.

Bruno Sammartino would retain the title for seven years, eight months and one day, making his the longest continuous world championship reign in men's wrestling history.
Although Sammartino was the face of the W.W.W.F, wrestlers such as Superstar Billy Graham and Bob Backlund were also hugely popular.
The federation gained notoriety in the 1970s by holding their biggest shows at Shea Stadium or Madison Square Garden and doing strong business across the entire Northeast region
They leveraged former, but still popular, wrestlers such as Captain Lou Albano, "Grand Wizard of Wrestling" Ernie Roth and "Classy" Freddie Blassie to act as managers for Sammartino's heel opponents. Around this time, only fan favorite wrestlers were allowed to have long championship reigns, such as Bruno Sammartino, Pedro Morales and Bob Backlund, who all retained for more than one year each.
The heel champions, such as Ivan Koloff and Stan Stasiak, were used to "transition" the championship from one wrestler to another, and they generally kept the title for no more a single month-long program before dropping it to the next good guy.
Superstar Billy Graham was the only heel character to keep his championship for longer than one month, as the W.W.W.F felt it needed time to build Bob Backlund up as championship material.[3]
The W.W.W.F was relatively conservative for promotions of its day; running its major arenas monthly rather than weekly or bi-weekly.

Programs generally involved a babyface champion facing a heel challenger for one to three meetings in each scheduled town; for longer programs the heel would often win the first match in a non-decisive manner such as a countout or via excessive blood loss.

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