CITYSCOPE

Dallas is about to become the scene of something it hasn’t seen in more than twenty years: a pro wrestling promotion war. Fritz Von Erich, one of the pseudo-sport’s great villains during the Sixties and Seventies, has lone had a headlock on the North Texas area. He’s continued that dominance with his four sons-Kevin, David (who died last year in Japan). Kerry, and Mike-as co-stars of the promotion. Other promoters have iried to run live shows in the Dallas area, butthe loyalty of local wrestling fans to the Von Erich clan has been too strong to overcome: even the over-hyped Hulk Hogan underwhelmed fans in a Dallas appearance last year.

Now, however, there’s word on the circuit that at least two major promotions are ready to challenge Fritz and the boys again on their home turf. Operators of the new Mesquite Arena, home of the Mesquite Championship Rodeo, would like to have a weekly wrestling show at their facility, and since Fritz is already at near-saturation locally with the live shows weekly in Dallas (at the Sporta-torium, which he owns), and in Fort Worth, they’ve been talking to promoters based in Charlotte, N.C., and Oklahoma about muscling in on Dallas. Regardless of who manages to get the Mes-quite Arena booking, both companies are likely to give Dallas a try. One group has already signed up some of Fritz’s best talent-including the notorious Freebirds-in preparation for Dallas shows.

The reasons for all the interest in Dallas are threefold. First, Fritz Von Erich has broken away from the National Wrestling Alliance, pro wrestling’s oldest “league,” and is running what is essentially an outlaw promotion, which means he can’t expect any help from other promoters. Second, as popular as the Von Erich kids are, fans say the promotion has gone stale because of the lack of turnover in talent. Third, pro wrestling promoters traditionally take their live shows wherever their television shows appear, and in the Dallas area, cable television subscribers can watch up to twenty-eight hours of professional wrestling each week. Those viewers are a potential audience for live shows, and pro wrestling promoters have a history of taking a dollar where they can get it.

Dallas has withstood so far the industry-wide shakeout in pro wrestling that began roughly three years ago and has changed the game from a regional business with many promoters to an international business with only three or four big promoters competing for fans. For all of the reasons noted above, however, that’s about to change. It’s not likely the wrestling war will be as openly vicious as the tussle that took place here in the Fifties (one of the rival groups burned the Sportatorium to the ground), but it should be intense. …



If you’ve lived in Dallas since the early Seventies, then you’ll probably remember the Gourdian Society. The group won its reputation and its place in local history by running for several years what was hands-down the best party in town. One year the party even made Time magazine, with a photo and story about thenSenator John Tower | in costume, playing Superman. What made the Gourdian Society parties so memorable was not only the zany skits and open bars but the crowd mix, which brought together local news media people and politicos. Says Joe Barta, a local public relations consultant and one of the society’s founders: “People ask me all the time why we don’t do it again.”

Well, the society is willing to do that, if someone will step forward and agree to sponsor the bash. The Press Club of Dallas had a shot at acquiring the party, says one source, but its leaders turned down the opportunity “because they didn’t want anything competing with their Gridiron Show.” If the Press Club won’t do it, then the society will keep looking until it finds someone who will. And that shouldn’t be hard at all….



Former Mayor Robert Folsom has kept a pretty low profile since leaving office in 1981, so it was somewhat of a surprise to see him make not one but two public speaking appearances in the same day recently. First, he appeared with four other former mayors on a program for middle-level management employees of the City of Dallas; immediately after that, he spoke to the Greater Dallas Planning Council, along with former city manager George Schrader, on the subject of public/private partnerships. Asked one newsman: “Are you getting all of your public appearances for the next two years out of the way in one day?”

“Two years? It’s more like five years,” Folsom laughed. He doesn’t like to speak on local politics, he says, because he believes in letting the current elected and appointed officials have the spotlight. ’I don’t believe it’s in the best public interest to second-guess the people who are running the show.” Besides, Folsom is busy enough as it is building a ranch north of Dallas for his latest passion: thoroughbred racehorses.. ..



Good politicians usually have better sources than the news media represent atives who cover them, so it should surprise no one that Mayor Starke Taylor knew that Dallas Morning News reporters George Rodrigue and Craig Flournoy had won a Pulitzer Prize before they did. Taylor got the word a couple of hours be fore the list of 1986 Pulitzer win ners was released on April 17, and without knowing that the results had not been made pub lic, called to congratulate Rod- rigue, who used to cover City Hall for the News. “It was a funny conversation,” says a City Hall staffer who was in the room when Taylor reached Rodrigue. “The mayor kept congratulating him, and Rodrigue kept saying, ’Well. I’m told we’ve got a pret ty good chance.’” The mayor finally realized that Rodrigue hadn’t been told yet, that he’d “scooped1 Rodrigue on his own story.