Dusty Rhodes held the NWA world championship on three different occasions. Above, he wears the 1973-1986 version of the NWA title belt known popularly as the "ten pounds of gold."
In 1986, he won his third world title and briefly wore the new version of the title popularly known as the "big gold" belt. It was not known until recently that a special nameplate was ordered for the big gold belt with Dusty's name on it, but it never made it to the belt.
You can read all about both belts and the men who wore them in our books "Ten Pounds of Gold" and "Big Gold", available directly from the Gateway or on Amazon.com.
The legendary Harley Race wrestles the patriarch of the Poffo wrestling family, Angelo Poffo. Angelo was the father of Randy "Macho Man" Savage and "Leaping" Lanny Poffo.
Gordon Solie provides the call of the action, during which he gives a good history of the NWA title during those years.
NWA World Champion Tommy Rich with Freddie Miller on
"Best of Championship Wrestling" 5/3/81
In April of 1981, Tommy Rich shocked the world when he upset Harley Race to win the NWA World Heavyweight Championship and the belt known as the "ten pounds of gold."
Most fans didn't learn about Rich's historic win until after he had already lost the title back to Race. He won the belt on a Monday night in Augusta, GA and lost it back to Race 5 days later on a Friday night in Gainsville, GA.
Back in those days, the main TV shows for the territorial wrestling promotions all aired on Saturdays, and so Rich didn't even have a chance to celebrate his win in proper fashion on television.
When "Georgia Championship Wrestling" aired the Saturday after Rich's loss back to Race, Tommy was noticeably melancholy even when being congratulated by host Gordon Solie and NWA President Jim Crockett, Jr. They showed film footage of Rich's win over Race at the Bell Auditorium in Augusta. Crockett talked about having just flown back to the U.S. from Japan where that nation was all abuzz over Rich's title win.
Since that time, now 35 years later, the only VCR footage that has widely circulated was that Saturday segment with Solie, Rich, Crockett, and the footage from Augusta. It has been on YouTube for years, as well.
But recently, additional footage has surfaced (posted on YouTube by user KrisZ891979) of Rich being interviewed while he was still NWA champion, footage I had heard might exist but had never seen before.
In this clip, Rich is being interviewed by Freddie Miller, who did promotional announcing and occasional ring announcing on Georgia Championship Wrestling on WTBS. Miller also served as the host of the "Best of Championship Wrestling" program that aired on Sunday evenings on WTBS, and it was on this Sunday show that this interview aired, two days after Rich lost the title back to Race.
Which then begs the question when was this interview with Rich actually taped? Since Rich still had the belt, it almost certainly had to have been taped during the week in which he held it. However, the interview took place on the actual Georgia set with the Georgia Championship Wrestling backdrop which normally wasn't set up until Saturday morning before the weekly Saturday TV taping to air later that evening on WTBS. "Best of" was a studio show (without a studio audience) usually taped late on Saturday mornings or early Saturday afternoon after the 2-hour taping of the main Georgia show with Solie.
Could it be that this interview was actually taped on Saturday 5/2 after Rich had lost the belt back to Race on Friday 5/1? I suppose that's possible. Race was still booked with the georgia office on that Saturday, and defended the title for them that Saturday night in Chattanooga, TN, a GCW town during those days. Point being, the belt would have still been available for this interview with Race still in the territory.
But I doubt that could have happened. It would have been way too big a breach of kayfabe with so many people at the WTBS TV studio seeing this (cameramen, studio crew, director, etc.) and in those days that would have been unheard of. I'm guessing either (1) the studio backdrop was set up early for this interview before Tommy lost the belt, or (2) the backdrop was left hanging in the studio during the week as a normal practice in those days. It's also worth pointing out that Rich is wearing different clothes in each of the segments, indicating as well that segments were taped on different days.
Regardless of when or how the interview was conducted, it is great to see that a formal interview with Rich and the NWA title belt took place and still exists. Rich's reign as NWA champion is not much more than a mere footnote to the title's grand history, but as even Harley Race has said himself, Rich won the title in the ring and deserves to be recognized as a world champion.
The footage on YouTube contains both the Saturday and Sunday segments. The link below will take you to YouTube and directly to the point in the footage (7:33) where the Sunday interview begins.
Freddie Miller Interviews NWA World Champion Tommy Rich "Best of Championship Wrestling" - WTBS Atlanta GA - Airdate Sunday 5/3/1981 https://youtu.be/d7UCExVvVo0?t=7m33s
Thanks to Scott Bowden for letting us know about this rare footage of Tommy Rich with the "Ten Pounds of Gold."
Tommy Rich's Week As NWA World Champion (1981)
Monday 4/27 - Augusta GA - Rich wins NWA world title from Harley Race
Tuesday 4/28 - Macon GA - Rich beats Race to retain the NWA world title
Wednesday 4/29 - Columbus GA - Rich beats Race to retain the NWA world title
Thursday 4/30 - Rome GA - Rich beats Race to retain the NWA world title
Friday 5/1 - Gainsville GA - Race defeats Rich to regain the NWA world title
Saturday - 5/2 - Rich appears on "Georgia Championship Wrestling" with Gordon Solie and Jim Crockett, Jr.
Sunday - 5/3 - Taped interview airs on "Best Of" of Freddie Miller and Rich with the NWA title belt.
This article was originally published on The Mid-Atlantic Gateway. The Domed Globe website is part of the Mid-Atlantic Gateway family of websites.
Dory Funk Jr. with the Ten Pounds of Gold
(Photo from the Pete Lederberg Collection - plmathfoto@hotmail.com)
Dory Funk, Jr. believes he has one the NWA world championship from Ric Flair in Florida, but in the end, the title was returned to Flair.
It's hard to think of Dory Funk, Jr. as world champion without the classic "Thesz" style belt he held from 1969 through 1973. The domed-globe version of the title belt came along shortly after he lost the title to Race.
We have a few photos collected of wrestlers who never held the NWA title, but came close, and these photos feature them with the "ten pounds of gold." It's a feature called "Great Pretenders" You can see those by clicking the links below.
Funk, Jr. doesn't really fit here becasue he wasn't a pretender to the thrown (to say the least), but we've included the photo in that section becasue of how interesting it is to see him with the domed globe belt.
See earlier posts with other photos featuring great pretenders to the NWA title:
Great Pretenders (featuring Bruiser Brody, Mr. Wrestling II, Wahoo McDaniel, Jerry Lawler, and Buddy Landel)
The Japanese magazines still do an excellent job of remembering the old NWA champs. These are images from a special section of a recent magazine there that looked back at the history of the NWA World title and presented a special interview with Harley Race.
It broke my heart when the NWA champions of my youth (Jack Brisco, Terry Funk, Harley Race) all left for the WWF in the mid-1980s during the early days of the wrestling wars. I was an NWA loyalist!
But in retrospect, I'm glad they did as it gave all of them an additional run in the spotlight they so richly deserved but might not have received in the remaining NWA territories which, with the exception of Jim Crockett Promotions, were all falling by the wayside.
Here are a few "Piper's Pit" segments that featured the Brisco Brothers and Terry Funk, from 1984 and 1985. Fun stuff.
