Stately Wayne Manor - The Professional Wrestling Years

The Professional Wrestling Years

Fueled by the advent and aggression of punk rock and his interests in performing—he made his public debut at age five—but disillusioned with the music business, Manor regained interest in a childhood hobby, professional wrestling, and was particularly drawn towards the ‘‘heel’’ (‘bad guy’) characters.

Never content to merely observe, but lacking the bulk required to participate in matches, Manor eventually broke into the bonebending business as a feature writer in 1984 and, in 1986, as a pro-heel columnist for Wrestling World magazine, his highly provocative "Stately States" inspiring hate mail from around the globe. Having established himself as The Sultan Of Insultin’ for his blistering attacks on the mat heroes and those who support them, Manor expanded into color commentating, managing grapplers, performing in-ring skits and ghostwriting wisecracks for the performers. Though not publicly accredited, a number of Manor’s column scenarios and zingers have been ‘re-originated’ in the WWE, TNA and WCW.

Manor was the very first color commentator for the ECW promotion (in their pre-Extreme days), though he has nothing positive to say about what they later became. He is also believed to be the first American magazine writer to give international exposure to Sabu, Rey Misterio, Sean Waltman, John Cena, Sandman and Victoria/Tara (Lisa Varon); and in the early Nineties, long before the Texan joined the WWF and become known as Stone Cold, Stately publicly proclaimed, "If I could buy stock in any (active) wrestler, it would be Steve Austin."

On the independent circuit, Manor has written and performed skits with WWE Hall Of Famers Jerry Lawler and Jimmy Snuka, once enraging a Northern audience by publicly apologizing for the Civil War to Memphis-native Lawler(!) By bizarre coincidence, Manor was at one point also scheduled to perform with the pro wrestler named Sid Vicious.

During 1993, in the midst of his 17-year tenure with Wrestling World’, Manor debuted a second villain-praising column, that one in Britain's Power Slam. It too provoked a great deal of controversy among readers. With the uninterrupted streak of pieces in WW and PS, he is the longest-running active columnist in professional wrestling.