Russian Pro Wrestling in 1909

An overview of the top European territory for pro wrestling in 1909.

Let's take a moment and take a look at the Russian pro wrestling scene and the main players within it as of 1909. Why am I picking Russia and 1909 specifically? You could make a case for 1908 too and perhaps even earlier, but by 1909 it was really apparent that Russia was the top territory for pro wrestling in Europe at the time (and it would remain that way for the next few years). Plus, I think in general 1909 was a pretty interesting year in Russia with a lot going on in terms of wrestling.

By 1909 the Greco-Roman pro wrestling boom of the late 1890s/early 1900s in Europe had largely cooled off in most European countries while in the Russian Empire pro wrestling was more popular than it had ever been. In part that was because Russia started peaking a bit later compared to some of the other big European countries. Up to 1908 St. Petersburg had been the key city for pro wrestling in Russia and no other city came even close to matching it in importance, but then in the last quarter of 1908 Moscow started becoming a hotbed for pro wrestling as well. In fact, in 1909 Moscow overtook St. Petersburg as the top wrestling city in Russia, which is evident even just by looking at the sheer amount of pro wrestling events held there that year. By my count in 1909 there were about 300 pro wrestling events in St. Petersburg and in Moscow there were over 360 events, which are crazy numbers when you think about it. The rise of Moscow along with new stars being made and new concepts being introduced led to 1909 being the biggest year the business had ever had in Russia up to that point.

To understand the Russian pro wrestling scene of 1909 you first need to have a general understanding of how the Greco-Roman pro wrestling scene in Europe worked, for the most part. There were two key components to the Greco-Roman scene (well, four in reality, but the other two weren’t always in the mix): the wrestling troupes and the venues they wrestled at. Back in the late 1890s/early 1900s in Europe there was a big rise in the number of music halls, theatres, circuses, etc. and each and every one of those venues needed unique acts to put on their stage so they could attract paying customers. Enter the pro wrestling troupes. These were touring groups of wrestlers that traveled from town to town providing their services to whichever venue was willing to pay their asking price. They’d sign a contract with a venue for an x amount of days/weeks and they’d perform there, typically in the headline spot, along with all the other entertainment acts on the venue’s variety program. Back in the 1890s it was mostly standalone matches, but eventually the format changed to the troupes putting on tournaments in every town where they'd wrestle daily tournament matches at the venue and at the end of the tournament there’d be a final placement and clear winners (well, usually clear, but not always). Another key component to the Greco-Roman scene were the sports magazines and newspapers, which there was also a big rise of at the turn of the 20th century. They would sometimes team up with the venues and the troupes to promote a particular tournament, especially when the venue and the troupe wanted to bill the tournament as a World Championship, European Championship or some other important prize (having the backing of a well-known magazine/newspaper gave extra credibility and publicity to the tournament). And finally, there were also various promoters, or sponsors/backers if you will, who would also get involved and get into business with a particular troupe. And that in a nutshell were the core ingredients that made the Greco-Roman pro wrestling scene in Europe.

As for the troupes, each troupe had a manager behind the scenes, often the top star of the troupe, and in their role as troupe manager they were the ones signing the contacts with the venues and calling all the shots (i.e. deciding who wrestles who and who wins and who loses). Yes, I believe the majority of the matches back then were predetermined. Were there some shoots too? I’m sure there were, but generally the winners seem to have been predetermined and this is well-documented in a number of articles and exposés published in the pre-WWI European press. A lot of the top European stars back then had their own troupes - George Hackenschmidt, Paul Pons, Ivan Poddubny, Stanislaus Zbyszko, Georg Lurich, Jess Pedersen, Giovanni Raicevich, Jakob Koch, etc. These troupes weren’t set in stone by any means - there was a lot of moving around from one troupe to another. There were also cases of popular wrestlers breaking off into their own troupe where they could be the boss. And there were also instances where two troupes would come together for a tournament or few. Back then, with a few small exceptions (e.g. a wrestler signing a personal contract with a manager), there were no long-term contracts like there are today so guys were free to move around if they felt it made sense to do so and there was an open spot in another troupe. It was all very fluid, but like in any business there were some strong personal relationships and certain guys who worked with each other a lot, sometimes for years on end.

Now let’s talk about Russia specifically and the key names there in 1909. And we have to start by mentioning the St. Petersburg Athletic Society. This sports club was the number one sports organization in Russia in the late 1890s and beyond. They were the main driving force behind both amateur and pro wrestling in Russia back then (as well as weightlifting). They were also the ones who hand-picked and backed both George Hackenschmidt and Ivan Poddubny on their way to becoming top stars and World champions. However, by 1909 the St. Petersburg Athletic Society was out of the pro wrestling game (more on one of the main reasons for that here) and the names below were the ones running things. And unlike the United States with Frank Gotch at the center of it all, there was no unified national storyline or narrative. Each troupe was pushing its own narrative and recognizing its own champions. Sometimes troupes would come together for a tournament, sometimes there would be challenges between wrestlers from different troupes, sometimes those challenges would even lead to matches, but at the end of the day the troupes tended to operate independent of each other. Having said all of that, now let's move on to the key figures of Russian pro wrestling in 1909.

- First row: Ivan Lebedev, Baron Mikhail Kister, Nikolai Vahturov, Ivan Poddubny, Ivan Zaikin
- Second row: Grigori Kascheff, Petr Yaroslavtsev, Victor Meyer, Stanislaus Zbyszko, Georg Lurich
- Third row: Alexander Aberg, Peter Jankowsky, Ivan Shemyakin, Peter Kryloff, Wladyslaw Pytlasinski

Ivan Lebedev - A former member of the St. Petersburg Athletic Society, where he trained in various sports including amateur wrestling, turned promoter/troupe manager/referee. He promoted his first tournament in St. Petersburg in 1904 and over the next few years he became the top pro wrestling promoter in Russia. He was the one who opened up Moscow as a major city for pro wrestling in the last quarter of 1908, and that was in addition to also being one of the main promoters in St. Petersburg too. He was already a pretty successful promoter but in 1909 he really stepped up his game and expanded his operation to a point where he would be running months-long tournaments in the two biggest Russian cities at the same time. In the past he had typically teamed up with already established troupes (Lurich’s, Zbyszko’s, Kryloff’s, etc.) and while on occasion he did continue collaborating with other troupes too, in 1908-09 he established a troupe of his own. As you can probably imagine, in a set-up where the guy calling the shots was the top star of the troupe, in the majority of the cases that meant that no matter how good or popular a certain wrestler from the troupe was, they could only go so far within the troupe, because at the end of the day the top star/manager of the troupe wasn’t going to book someone else over himself. And this is where Lebedev’s troupe was different. Because Lebedev wasn’t a pro wrestler, although he did wrestle some matches, he didn’t have to worry about keeping himself on top and as a result of this, as well as the ever-changing roster of his troupe, Lebedev wasn’t always relying on the same top star over and over again. Instead he was elevating new headline stars all the time. Probably more so than any other wrestling troupe back then. This is especially evident when you look at his October 1908-January 1910 tournament winners in Moscow and St. Petersburg: nine tournaments with eight different winners. Now compare this with, for example, the Lurich/Aberg troupe where Lurich or Aberg were always placing first in the tournaments and you’ll easily see the difference. On top of that, Lebedev was more innovative in his approach to the business compared to most of the other troupes that operated in Russia. For example, in 1909 he introduced the mask wrestler gimmick in Russia, among other things. Obviously, the idea of a masked wrestler wasn’t a new one and in this case Lebedev took it directly from Austria, but he made it his own and turned his first masked wrestler (the German Oskar Schneider being under the hood) into a major box office attraction, which then in turn led to other masked wrestlers popping up all over the place in Russia. Before you know it, masked wrestlers were all the rage in Russia, more than they had been in any other country anywhere in the world up to that point. Furthermore, remember how earlier I said that the four ingredients of the Greco-Roman scene were troupe, venue, sports publication and backer? Not only did Lebedev establish his own troupe, but in 1909 he also either leased or bought his own theatre in Moscow (and later did the same in St. Petersburg too) and became partners with Mikhail Kister (a wealthy Russian baron with an affinity for sports). And at different points Levedev also published his own sports magazines. So really, Lebedev had all the bases covered. He was the greatest Russian pro wrestling promoter of all time, there is no question about it. In Russia his name became synonymous with the sport itself, like the names of only a handful of other promoters elsewhere in the world have ever been.

Another interesting point to mention here, and Lebedev is perhaps the key figure in this aspect when it comes to Russia, were the so-called World Championship tournaments. The very first World Championship tournament in Greco-Roman pro wrestling was held back in 1897 in Brussels, but over the next several years Paris became the place where there would be an annual World Championship tournament, which would be seen as the most prestigious tournament in European pro wrestling (for the complete details of the Paris World Championship tournaments go here). What was the difference between a regular tournament and a World Championship tournament, you may ask? Not much, really. It’s just how these tournaments were billed. So, in theory, any random promoter could bill their tournament as a World Championship, but yet very few promoters did that. Why? I can only speculate, but my theory is that they realized that in order for the public to buy into the idea that a tournament was a World Championship there needed to be enough big names in it, it needed to be backed by a popular sports publication and be in a popular venue. Basically, it needed to feel like a big deal, but having all of these components at the same time wasn’t easy so very few promoters attempted to bill a tournament as a World Championship. At least initially. Things started getting watered down in 1906 when there were two World Championship tournaments, by rival troupes, at the same time in Paris. And this trend of multiple World Championships in the same year continued growing. Other countries, not just France, were doing it too. Once they eventually got a hold of the World Championship tournament concept, Russia in particular abused it a lot. To the best of my knowledge up to late 1907 there was only one tournament billed as a World Championship in the Russian Empire (in Riga in 1902, won by Georg Lurich) and even that one was criticized by the Russian sports press for not being a legitimate World Championship compared to the Paris ones. Then in late 1907 there was another World Championship, again won by Lurich, this time in Kharkiv. And then from October 1908 through January 1910 Lebedev promoted five tournaments as being a World Championship (three in Moscow, one in St. Petersburg and one in Tashkent), which sounds kind of ridiculous, but yet it seems the Russian public was buying it. In 1909 there were also another two tournaments in Russia, by different troupes, billed as a World Championship. As the years went on the number of “World Championships” in Russia grew even further and the concept became completely watered down.

Talent-wise the October 1908-January 1910 period was very interesting when it came to Lebedev. His troupe started taking shape in 1908, but it wasn’t fully formed yet and it seems he was still searching for a star he could anchor his troupe around. In late 1908 Lebedev promoted two back-to-back World Championships in Moscow - the Polish veteran Peter “Ursus” Jankowsky winning the first one and the Russian Ivan Zaikin winning the second one. What is interesting about this is that both of those guys would then spend 1909 as the men in charge of tournaments going head-to-head with Lebedev’s own tournaments so essentially in late 1908 Lebedev made his soon-to-be competitors World champions and solidified them as top stars. And Zaikin is especially interesting because historically he hadn’t worked much with Lebedev and was a close associate of Poddubny’s (who also hadn’t worked much with Lebedev and rumor was they didn’t really like each other at that point). Therefore, Zaikin winning a Lebedev World Championship at this point is very random on paper. Another interesting name was the Russian Ivan Shemyakin. Earlier on in 1908 Lebedev had used Shemyakin as the top star of his newly-established troupe, but by late 1908 Shemyakin had split off and was running his own troupe so he’s yet another example of a guy who Lebedev helped make in Russia, who would soon after that essentially become Lebedev’s competition.

With Zaikin, Jankowsky and Shemyakin doing their own thing Lebedev was still in need of a top star for his troupe and he found his top star in the Russian Nikolai Vahturov. Vahturov was a former protege of Poddubny’s. He toured with the Poddubny troupe and then with the John Pohl troupe in Germany and elsewhere, where he rose up the ranks, but as mentioned earlier, in a troupe run by another star he was never going to be the top star. In Lebedev’s troupe though, he could. As soon as Vahturov joined Lebedev's troupe he got elevated to being its top star and became one of the biggest pro wrestling stars in Russia as a whole. In 1909 Vahturov won Lebedev’s World Championship tournaments in St. Petersburg and Moscow and he essentially won another two tournaments (Championship of Russia and Championship of St. Petersburg) but declined the honors and awarded them to other wrestlers (I guess as a way to elevate those wrestlers without having Vahturov lose). Other guys elevated into top positions by Lebedev in 1909 were the up-and-coming German star Hans Schwarz Sr., Karl Kornatzki (Lebedev’s first masked wrestler in Moscow, who later in 1909 also won the Lebedev World Championship in Tashkent), the Dutchman Marinus van Riel, the German Oskar Schneider (Lebedev’s first masked wrestler in St. Petersburg), the Austrian Hans Kawan, and Lebedev’s Russian protege Ivan Spul. All of the names I just mentioned were some of the key stars of Lebedev’s troupe in 1909 and most of these guys weren’t headline stars before Lebedev got a hold of them. In addition to having his own troupe in 1909, Lebedev also worked with Zbyszko for three tournaments so there was still a working relationship there.

Ivan Poddubny / Ivan Zaikin / Petr Yaroslavtsev - The other top Russian troupe in 1909 was this one. The multi-time World champion Poddubny was probably the most popular Russian star back then and had been for a few years. Past versions of the Poddubny troupe had included veteran managers such as the Bulgarian Nicolai Petroff and the Frenchman Leon Dumont, but by now Poddubny was more experienced and he and Zaikin were running things. Zaikin was a protege of Poddubny’s and the two had a close working relationship for a number of years. In 1909 Poddubny stepped aside a bit, which allowed Zaikin to rise through the ranks and become established as a top star too (in addition to having already won a Lebedev World Championship). What I mean by step aside is that Poddubny would wrestle out of the tournaments as a special attraction so that the focus of the tournament would fall on Zaikin, but still typically when the two wrestled each other Poddubny was the one going over so ultimately he was still the top star of the troupe even though Zaikin was the one winning the troupe’s tournaments in Russia. The number three star in this troupe was the Russian giant Grigori Kascheff, who was another protege of Poddubny’s and a popular star. Kascheff was purely a wrestler though and wasn’t calling any of the shots like Poddubny and Zaikin were. The last important name in this troupe was the ex-wrestler turned promoter/referee Petr Yaroslavtsev, who was a business partner of Poddubny and Zaikin. A few years later Yaroslavtsev dissolved his partnership with Poddubny and Zaikin and actually wrote a book exposing the inner workings of the pro wrestling business.

Victor Meyer - Now here’s where the sports magazines come into play. Meyer was the publisher and chief editor of “Sputnik Sportsmena” magazine (one of the national Russian sports magazines). He had an association with Poddubny dating back to 1906, but in 1909 he was more involved in pro wrestling than he had ever been in the past. In 1909 he worked a lot more closely with the Poddubny troupe and was involved as promoter in several of the troupe’s tournaments. In fact, at one point Yaroslavtsev of the Poddubny troupe even became co-publisher of “Sputnik Sportsmena” magazine so this shows you how deep the business relationship with Meyer was. However, Meyer did also do business with other troupes too. In late 1908 he promoted a World Championship tournament in Rostov-on-Don, which doesn’t seem like it was with an already established troupe but rather with a collection of guys from various troupes. In 1909 Meyer also promoted a tournament with the Shemyakin troupe in St. Petersburg. During said St. Petersburg tournament Alfons Schwarzer broke out as a headline star. Back then, while there was no national narrative, having a strong showing in a high profile tournament in Moscow or St. Petersburg could really make a guy’s reputation on the national level.

Stanislaus Zbyszko - The Pole Zbyszko, who was one of the top stars in Russia/Europe back then, and his business associate/manager Adolf Specht had a troupe of their own too. Russia wasn’t Zbyszko’s sole focus in 1909 but he did wrestle in four tournaments there (two in Moscow and two in St. Petersburg), and also had the most high-profile Russian match of the year - a grudge match with Zaikin, a star from another troupe. The match ended in scandal and got a ton of press (you can read more about the Zbyszko/Zaikin match here). Three of Zbyszko’s Russian tournaments in 1909 were in association with Lebedev while the fourth one was in association with Jankowsky.

Georg Lurich / Alexander Aberg - The Estonians Lurich and Aberg had been two of the top stars in Russia/Europe, for a number of years and their troupe was one of the top troupes in Europe. At that point they also had a business partner in the promoter Charles Normann. In previous years the Lurich/Aberg troupe had usually had a big tournament or few in St. Petersburg, but that wasn’t the case in 1909. They were still in the Russian picture and doing tournaments on Russian territory (and elsewhere), but those tournaments were away from the big spotlight of Moscow and St. Petersburg so this troupe wasn’t that big of a factor in 1909. That said, Lurich did wrestle some matches in Moscow during a Zbyszko/Jankowsky tournament.

Peter "Ursus" Jankowsky – The Pole Jankowsky was a popular veteran wrestler and someone who had run his own troupe in the past. In 1909 he ended up being the second most active promoter in Moscow, after Lebedev, and as such he also deserves some credit for Moscow becoming a hotbed for pro wrestling. After working some for Lebedev as a wrestler (including winning Lebedev’s first ever World Championship) and working one tournament with the Shemyakin troupe in Kiev, Jankowsky then turned to promoting in Moscow. He ran three tournaments there in 1909. At that point he didn’t have a regular troupe of his own so he promoted the tournaments in association with other troupes - namely Zbyszko’s and Kryloff’s. After his Moscow promotional run was over, he toured elsewhere in Russia and finished the year wrestling for the Poddubny troupe.

Ivan Shemyakin - The 6'6" Russian powerhouse Shemyakin was a guy who had made a pretty good name for himself bouncing around with different troupes (Pons, Koch, Pohl, Poddubny, Lebedev). His work with Lebedev earlier on in 1908 solidified him as a popular star in Russia and then in late 1908 he started touring around with a troupe of his own. In the big two Russian cities, St. Petersburg and Moscow, the tournaments with the Shemyakin troupe were backed by sports magazines, which surely added some extra attention to them - the St. Petersburg tournament was promoted by “Sportnik Sportsmena” magazine (Victor Meyer) while the Moscow tournament was promoted by “Sports Echo” magazine. Shemyakin ended the year working in the Lebedev World Championship in Moscow. However, he was not in the tournament itself, but rather he was positioned as an outsider who was challenging Lebedev’s wrestlers.

Peter Kryloff - A popular Russian strongman/bodybuilder/pro wrestler. He did work as a member of the Lurich/Aberg troupe for a while (without much success) and did some business with Lebedev, but most of the time he had spent running his own troupe. His troupe was different from Lebedev’s, Lurich’s and Poddubny’s in that up to 1909 the Kryloff troupe had never visited the two biggest Russian cities. Their focus was on touring other parts of Russia that typically didn’t get a lot of wrestling. That changed in 1909 and the Kryloff troupe had two tournaments in the new wrestling hotbed Moscow, both tournaments being promoted by Jankowsky. Kryloff’s troupe was very much anchored around him as the top attraction, a somewhat close second being Kryloff’s protege Karl Mikul.

Wladyslaw Pytlasinski - A popular Polish veteran, who in the 1890s was one of the pioneers of the Russian scene and was the biggest wrestling star in Russia at one point. At different times he also had his own troupe and was instrumental in the rise of Stanislaus Zbyszko. By 1909 Pytlasinski’s career as a wrestler was winding down, but he was still in the mix working in various troupes. Seeing how hot pro wrestling was becoming in Moscow, Pytlasinski tried promoting a tournament there, but the competition from a Lededev tournament, which was taking place at the same time, pretty much crushed Pytlasinski’s tournament and it got cancelled midway due to weak ticket sales. He then moved his troupe to Odessa, which was also becoming a bit of a hotbed for pro wrestling in 1909 (there were about 200 pro wrestling events in Odessa that year), where he had more success. The other important name in Pytlasinski’s troupe was the top Hungarian star Janos Czaja, who shortly after that joined the Poddubny troupe.

The names and troupes I’ve mentioned above were the most high-profile ones, but they weren’t the only ones. Russia is big in territory today, but back then the Russian Empire was huge. That meant a lot of opportunities for a lot of different people (both men and women) to take pro wrestling to a town that normally didn’t get to see pro wrestling so in addition to the troupes mentioned above there were also other smaller troupes operating in various parts of the Russian Empire.