No idea who Virgil was, but I saw in the same article that Ole Anderson died the same day. That's one I actually do remember.
I know Virgil from his "work" with the Million Dollar Man, but Ole is the one that registered with me. I started watching wrestling with World Championship Wrestling out of Georgia (thanks, cable!) with Piper, and those guys, and the Anderson's were a part of that. Ole and Arn. I watch wrestling a bit now, but it's not what I remember; it's like seeing your favorite band that you saw in a club or as an opening act now headlining stadiums.
In our time there was a darkness to it. That's been replaced by camp now.
Obviously I was watching WCCW here in Dallas, and a regular schedule of ODs, murders, and suicides certainly contributed to that darkness.
What I've enjoyed is watching the old timers tell stories about wrestling back in the 70s and 80s. It was a lifestyle that's nearly incomprehensible to sane, rational people. It's like a bizarre combination of circus folk and rockstars. That fascinates me.
Me too; I find it fascinating as well. And that's a great description; they ACTED like rockstars, but the living conditions and pay... those guys were doing it for the love of the "game". Kudos - I guess - to Vince McMahon for getting the money to flow, but you're right; the darkness was scrubbed for the masses.
The money flowed straight to Vince. While worker pay did increase, it was still a far cry from reasonable. The bennies are good
IF you're working. The day you leave you're pretty much on your own. Wrestlers are independent contractors and will never be anything more. The only thing that changed is bad press from Chris Benoit forcing him to start taking drugs seriously, and CTE will eventually force another big spending program.
Some former wrestler, another guy I'd never heard of, Macy or something, has a YT channel where he provides a lot of the details on how the WWE really worked, and it was all pretty interesting. It wasn't a bad gig, but unless you're The Rock or Hulk Hogan it wasn't a great career.
And in many ways they really were rockstars. While I seriously doubt they were getting the quality of tail that David Lee Roth was, the quantity was still there.