There’s Glamour in Being Head Slammer

The first time I met Verne Langdon in the flesh, he reacted to one of my comments with a glare and a dare.

My remark concerned a red liquid that appeared to be blood. It was dripping from another man’s forehead.

All I said was that it certainly looks real.

“Well,” Langdon replied, “I suppose you could taste it and be sure.”

I passed. Call me a lazy reporter, but I draw the line at tasting somebody else’s blood. Come to think of it, I may not be willing to taste my own.

The conversation took place one day deep inside a cavernous room amid the auto-wrecking yards of Sun Valley, not long after I’d witnessed Langdon batter another man with a metal folding chair. Langdon isn’t in the salvage business. He is the impresario of the Slammers Wrestling Federation, an obscure operation that teaches the sweet pseudoscience of pro wrestling and stages small-time exhibitions in the Valley and beyond.

In using the term “pseudoscience,” I trust Langdon understands that I mean it with the greatest respect. As a child I thrilled to televised theatrics from the Olympic Auditorium, from images of Bobo Brazil head-butting Freddie Blassie to the sound of announcer Dick Lane crowing, “Whoa, Nellie!” (Roller derby was just as good.)

Perhaps you prefer opera, with or without English translations projected above the stage. Whatever. Pro wrestling is more popular, as American as pumpkin pie. It doesn’t need the help of the Public Broadcasting System and corporate grants to get on the airwaves. There’s so much money in pro wrestling that Ted Turner hired Hulk Hogan and launched a rival wrestling league to compete with the World Wrestling Federation.

At SWF, Verne Langdon is sort of like Turner and Hogan rolled into one, albeit on a much smaller scale. And Langdon, alias “The Head Slammer,” is more than that. He is also the chancellor and professor emeritus of Slam University, or Slam U., where average Joes go to learn how to apply figure-4 leg locks just like the guys on TV.

Given his credentials as an educator, perhaps it’s fitting that Langdon and Slammers have now entered a business relationship with the Los Angeles Unified School District, paying more than $400 to rent the gym at the Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies.

This is what is known as an arm’s-length transaction. “It is not,” Principal Larry Rubin emphasizes, “a school function at all.”

The first show was last Saturday, and Langdon said about 100 people paid the $5 admission. “We had a good, raucous, noisy little group,” the Head Slammer said.

They witnessed the likes of El Toro Bravo, Beautiful Bruce Beaudine and Amazing Zu the Gargoyle. I couldn’t make it, but Langdon was kind enough to send a news release that captured the flavor of the action:

In the curtain-raiser Jeff “The Young Lion” Lindberg won over Joy Boy by disqualification when “Beautiful Bruce” Beaudine, trying again this year to be elected “Miss Cinco de Mayo,” interrupted the match and tried to take Jeff out. Lindberg held both Joy and Bruce off while official SWF ref Chris Squires called for the bell, gave Bruce hell, and wished Jeff well!

“Iron Mike” Ehrhardt did away with “Amazing Zu the Gargoyle” in 9:55 of their pretty one-sided bout. Mike was all over Gargoyle including some neat aerial stuff off the top rope, but when Joy Boy tried to get into the act with a steel chair Mike knocked them both out, ripped off their boots, and shoved their stinking feet in each other’s faces!

Now, aren’t you sorry you missed that?

This wasn’t the first time Slammers staged an event at the Reseda school. That was in late 1994, a fund-raiser organized by students who were regular spectators at Slammers’ old Sun Valley quarters. I saw that one. The audience was small but seemed to have a good time.

Principal Rubin, who has taken his own 16-year-old son to watch a bout, says the school has heard no complaints about the matches and had no trouble dealing with Slammers. “Verne Langdon is extremely professional,” he says.

For Slammers, Saturday night’s match marked a return to the Valley after a year in Bakersfield. Langdon said he moved out of the Sun Valley location after a firefighter friend told him that the crowds were getting too big for the room. Now he stages Slam U. classes in a small gym in Canoga Park. Sadly, Langdon’s memorabilia from such legends as Gorgeous George and the Fabulous Moolah has been placed in storage.

In Bakersfield, Langdon said, Slammers built such a loyal following that several fans came down Saturday night to cheer their favorites on. Also in the crowd, Langdon says, was a woman who worried whether it would be too violent for her kids, ages 6 and 8, who love watching pro wrestling on TV.

This woman, Langdon said, had called him for advice. He suggested she hire a sitter and bring her husband so they could decide for themselves. If he had young children, Langdon offers, he’s not sure he’d want them to see Slammers.

After the match, Langdon says, this couple said they had a good time and would bring the kids next time. That would be the first Saturday nights of the next two months--June 7 and July 5.

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In June, it seems, the masked Hombre de Oro (Man of Gold) will face Beautiful Bruce in “a dog collar chain match.” More suspense surrounds SWF champ El Toro Bravo and whether he will be able to keep his title. According to Slammers press materials, the dastardly Bravo attained the title by blinding the Young Lion with a lighted cigar. And last Saturday night, he “busted the Samoan Kid wide open” using his championship belt as a weapon. El Toro Bravo, obviously, must be stopped.

Maybe you already have opera tickets. But in pro wrestling, at least you won’t need English translations to understand what’s going on.

Scott Harris’ column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. Readers may write to Harris at the Times Valley Edition, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth CA 91311, or via e-mail at scott.harris@latimes.com Please include a phone number.