There are a number of pro wrestling families who are big names in the business — the McMahons, the Flairs, and the Rhodes family, just to name a few — but it’s easy to forget about The Funks, who were huge parts of the Texas wrestling scene, the NWA territories, and Japan.
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Fans of course know about Terry Funk, who wrestled everywhere including ECW, WCW, and WWE and may be aware of his brother Dory Funk Jr., who wrestled in WWE as Hoss Funk. Then there’s their father, Dory Funk Sr., a pillar of the Texas wrestling scene. Rather than just cover one Funk, let’s talk about fascinating stories and anecdotes about the whole family, including kayfabe relative Jimmy Jack Funk.
10 How Dory Sr. Got To Texas
Born in Indiana in 1919, Dory Funk Sr. was an accomplished amateur wrestler and World War II veteran when he entered the world of pro wrestling, performing in the various NWA territories and winning myriad Junior Heavyweight Championships. By the end of the 1940s, he moved to Texas and wrestled there, where he was presented with a unique opportunity in the early ‘50s to team up with promoter Karl “Doc” Sarpolis to buy the promotion Western States Sports. With the purchase, Dory Funk Sr. co-owned the entire West Texas wrestling scene, where he performed as a top star and invented the Texas Deathmatch.
9 Dory Jr. Trained Kurt Angle
To jump forward, in 1998 Dory Funk Jr. was running a WWE-affiliated training camp called the Funkin’ Dojo, which basically functioned as WWE developmental. Among Funk’s students — which included Christian, Christopher Daniels, and Rhyno — was Kurt Angle, who was making the transition from olympic wrestling to pro wrestling. In training, Funk encouraged Angle to incorporate his amateur background into his moveset, and by the end of their first session Kurt Angle told Dory Funk Jr. that pro wrestling training was difficult, but he loved it.
8 Terry Getting Stabbed
In a 1999 interview, Terry Funk reminisced about the old days of pro wrestling, back when a heel could cause a riot among the fans. Funk experienced this myriad times, relishing the opportunity to fight his way from the ring to backstage. While West Texas was Funk’s home territory, he shared a wild story that happened on the other side of the state.
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On one night, fighting his way to the back as usual, Funk felt a poke in his neck that he assumed was a dart, only to find out that it was actually a small knife. While he was expectedly shocked, Funk also considered it a badge of honor that he did his job so well that someone tried to kill him.
7 Jimmy Jack Getting The Rockers Fired
WWE fans of course remember The Rockers — Shawn Michaels and Marty Jannetty — for their 1988 to 1992 run in the company, which ended with Michaels’ legendary betrayal of his partner. But they originally came to WWE from the American Wrestling Association in 1986, and arrived with a reputation for partying way too hard. On one outing with the locker room, Jimmy Jack Funk began to antagonize them over said reputation, and Michaels smashed a glass over his own head before things got out of hand. Funk told Vince McMahon that The Rockers trashed the bar, resulting in Michaels and Jannetty being fired.
6 Dory Jr’s Gets Advice From Gene Kiniski
In February of 1969, Dory Funk Jr. defeated Gene Kiniski for the NWA World Heavyweight Championship, kicking off an epic reign that lasted four-and-a-half-years. Outside the ring, however, Kiniski was a mentor of sorts to Funk, and once gave him some crucial advice after Funk sustained a knee injury that was bad enough to require surgery. When he called Kiniski to cancel some dates he was booked for, the Canadian legend told him to just bind his legs in tape and wear long tights to account for the injury, a process that took an hour before matches.
5 Dory Sr. Pranking A Hitchhiker (And Dory’s Friend)
Pranks — or “ribs” as they’re called in the business — are a regular part of the pro wrestling lifestyle, with Terry Funk having some notable ones in his day. But his father Dory Funk Sr. also had a reputation for pranks, including with a tendency to pick up hitchhikers only to make them repeatedly run for the car. On one occasion, his travel buddy, French Canadian wrestler Benny Trudel, decided to hang his butt out of the window during the gag, but Funk decided to stop the car and hold Trudel in place, resulting in the angry hitchhiker punching Trudel’s butt.
4 Terry’s Beef With Hulk Hogan
Despite being one of the biggest stars of the 1980s and 1990s, Hulk Hogan also has a reputation for backstage politicking and stretching the truth to absurd degrees. This latter tendency ended up being a major sticking point for Terry Funk. At one point, the two were close and Funk had set-up a match between the two in Botswana that had a huge payday.
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After doing the legwork and handling Hogan’s money, Terry Funk ended up holding a grudge once he found out that the Hulkster was claiming to the Japanese papers that he defeated Funk despite the match ending in a DQ.
3 Jimmy Jack vs. Haku
There is a backstage story about Jimmy Jack Funk getting into a fight with Haku that just might outdo Terry Funk getting stabbed in the neck — if it were true. Jimmy Jack ended up angering Haku mad in the WWE locker room, resulting in a fight between the two. The incident became an urban legend, with claims that Haku ripped Funk’s eyeball out. In recent years, Haku dispelled the legend, saying that he was prepared to rip his eye out, but he quickly realized that would be a poor decision.
2 Terry, Cactus Jack, And The Explosion That Wasn’t
In the 1990s, Terry Funk developed a reputation for taking part in bloody death matches in Japan, including taking on Cactus Jack in the finals of a King of the Deathmatch tournament. The bout was an exploding barbed wire match with a timebomb system that, according to Funk, cost the promoter roughly $10,000. Unfortunately, the bomb didn’t go off as planned, and the two ment were forced to continue to fight and were able to win back the disappointed crowd in the process.
1 The Death Of Dory Sr.
On June 3, 1973, just after a show, Dory Funk Sr. hosted a group of wrestlers at his ranch, where the group drank and began challenging one another to legitimate wrestling, putting one another in holds and attempting to escape. In the middle of the evening, Funk suffered a heart attack, and ended up dying in the hospital afterward. In 1980 his death, his sons sold Western States Sports to fellow wrestlers Blackjack Mulligan and Dick Murdoch, who attempted to revive the West Texas wrestling scene. Sadly, it didn’t pan out and the promotion shuttered the following year.
