I’ve added lineups (and very limited results) for lineups from 1980 to 1984 from the El Siglo de Torreon archive. (If you follow the @lucharobot, this is what you saw earlier this week.) Most of the shows are from Gomez Palacio or Torreon. It’s not complete, because there are some days which are missing and we’re only limited to the shows which are advertised in the paper. An article in 1982 mentions Gran Markus having an incident with a 12 year old at Arena Olimpico Laguna, but that’s the only indication that year the arena exists. Still, it’s a few hundred more events added and some neat designs as they get into 1984.
If you’re someone who collects these lineups, I’ve broken them down by year. The files include the graphical cards when I could find them, which should make it easier to check my woeful spelling.
This timespan starts out with one show a week with almost all locals at the bull ring for 1980 thru 1982. That promotions either stops advertising or falls apart by the early 1983, and there’s months with no mention of lucha in the paper until Arena Olimpico Laguna (which dates back into the 60s) starts to advertise. 18 months later, there appears to be four distinct promotions all advertising: at the bullring (having come back from the dead), at AOL, at the Auditorium, and at the Palacio de los Deportes. Those locations are still in use today.
The AOL building is Promociones del Norte/UWA affiliated. The Norte tag team titles are the main titles in the building and the title pattern seems to make sense (and makes me wonder if those brand of titles are historically underrated because there’s enough research on them.) Negro Casas & Black Terry are among the UWA young wrestlers who wrestle in AOL. The Auditorio & Palacio also bring in Mexico City talent, but it’s more unaffiliated guys; Tinieblas is defending the AWWA title as big belt. It’s not until the Plaza de Toros promotion returns that EMLL guys have any regular presence (though some do come thru AOL.)
Some random stories I found thru
- a story on a boxer who passed away at Arena Coliseo Mexico City. Oro and Sangre India are well known, but the boxers seem less remembered.
- an apology printed after a promotion didn’t have any chairs for a show
- a 1983 column complaining lucha libre was killed because of a bad finish
- fan on drugs tries to fight other fans at a lucha libre show
- Death of El Santo wire story, another one, and an interview with his fan club president
I plan on continuing on these later, because I got some interesting stuff out of it, I know more is coming as I get later in the 80s, and it was just more time consuming than difficult. However, the site has put up a paywall (or finally gotten the old paywall to actually work), it doesn’t make sense for me to pay for access until I’ve got a full month to work at it, and I probably won’t have that for the near future. I’ll try to get back at this in 2017.