Andrew Lutzke
Presented by RF Video
When Mad Dog was a kid, Montreal hosted a weekly wrestling event and his family would go 80% of the time.
The Dusek Brothers were stars in the territory and would often fight amidst their matches. Dog says they argued in real life as well and an argument while bird hunting led to them not talking to each other for 40 years.
Mad Dog came home from school quite often with blood on his clothes from fighting – his dad didn’t mind – as long as Maurice had won.
Eventually he was going to be trained to box at the local YMCA and he met the local wrestling coach first and took that sport up instead.
Maurice’s dad was a cop and was able to knock criminals out with a single punch.
Verne Gagne was an Olympic alternate. His quickly balding head caused him some issues when his passport picture didn’t look a lot like the real deal after a few years.
Mad Dog became a bouncer and fought a lot of guys as his reputation grew.
Maurice tossed a patron down a flight of stairs and that created a rumor around town that he killed the guy.
He became a pro wrestler for 10 dollars a match after his rep for fighting was heard by the right people.
Detroit was his next stop as they worked 6-7 nights a week and that allowed the guys to learn the craft.
Maurice lived with midgets at the time.
Montreal was somewhat down and had maybe 300 fans attending. Vachon can’t recall his first match.
Mad Dog ended up in Texas for a run. By then Vachon had 2 kids to support.
His family and him ended up in a car crash in their new car. His wife and daughter had some minor injuries and he was fine.
He sold the wrecked car for scrap and almost ended up in trouble for selling not paying some Canadian “duty” (taxes) for selling his car in America. He got off on a technicality when it was decided that scrap couldn’t be considered a car anymore.
Playing the villain saw Vachon nearly stabbed, shot, and attacked with acid.
Vachon would challenge fans to fight in the ring to prove his toughness. Mad Dog ended up pulling a fan’s eye out during one of these brawls.
Maurice worked in Hawaii for over a year and then went on to Portland.
Promoter Ed Francis told him to grow out his beard and started billing Vachon from Algeria as there was a war ongoing between France and Algeria at the time.
Vachon started working a more violent style and Portland promoter Don Owens dubbed him “Mad Dog”.
Owens and others would pay the wrestlers to shoot on each other for the promoter’s amusement.
Mad Dog’s brother Paul became a wrestler as well and they adopted a fake brother Stan “Vachon” to take on a trio of brothers in Atlanta.
Vachon can’t recall being banned from the US mat wars but the interviewer believes it occurred.
Andre the Giant was brought to North America for the first time with Mad Dog’s help.
Mad Dog’s brother traveled the world as a wrestler and told Maurice about working in front of 100,000 people in Pakistan.
Vachon started working in the AWA for the sake of gas money as he traveled from the West Coast to Montreal. Vachon wowed the AWA promoters and was asked to return someday.
Mad Dog wrestled on “Wide World of Sports” and he busted his opponent’s nose and blood poured everywhere. The announcers couldn’t mock the business after seeing that.
AWA travel was dangerous at times with the crappy mid-west weather.
Crusher and Bruiser were tough guy brawlers in and out of the ring.
Red Bastien was one of the best performers in wrestling history.
Baron Von Rasche did shoot fights in Montreal against the fans and it seemed to help the box office expand. They gave Baron the Nazi gimmick.
Mad Dog got drunk in the late 70’s and opened an airplane’s door in mid-flight to get some fresh air. It wrecked the door and could’ve been a real disaster.
Nick Bockwinkel is a credit to the profession of wrestling.
Vachon made 250 dollars a night in Detroit and found a hotel for 50 bucks a night.
Vachon can’t remember Bob Orton or their team.
Maurice’s handler jumps in and explains that Mad Dog is getting tired and his brain is failing. We run through Abby the Butcher, Bruiser Brody and Stan Hansen and Mad Dog can’t remember any of them.
Fabulous Moolah trained Maurice’s sister Vivian Vachon. She had a documentary made about her in the 70’s.
Vivian knocked out a guy who mocked wrestling.
Lou Thesz was worth the price of admission and Thesz was incredible on the mat.
Bobby Heenan was a master of getting fans to hate him.
Hulk Hogan had a great body and worked hard in the ring.
Vachon was willing to be face or heel – whatever was best for business.
Johnny Valentine tried to injure the Iron Sheik and Sheik wanted to shoot on him.
Mad Dog had to outsmart his younger opponents as he worked into his 50’s and he didn’t want to be embarrassed.
Angelo Mosca was incredibly big and fast and Vachon thinks he was one of the toughest guys ever.
The Japanese wanted to start trouble with Vachon for polluting after he tossed beer bottles out a train window. 2 other wrestlers backed him up and no fight ensued.
Vachon was struck by a hit and run driver while jogging. The doctors didn’t bother to drain the blood from his leg that was building up. It would have taken 5 minutes to accomplish and once it hardened, they had to chop his leg off. The doctors were more worried about his other leg since it was obviously fractured.
Mad Dog was depressed about his leg and his brother flew in to help cheer him up.
Vachon ended up with an injured shoulder when his fake leg was used in finish to a Shawn Michaels vs. Diesel match. The guys who carried him to the back carried his weight awkwardly and strained his shoulder muscles.
Vachon enjoys poker and Jeopardy in retirement.
Joe LeDuc was Mad Dog’s favorite opponent.
Mad Dog reminisces about building a casket for Jerry “Fatwell”.
Jerry was a great athlete despite being humongous.
Final Thoughts: Despite his 80+ year old memory failing him at times, this was a interesting shoot to watch. We didn’t get too in depth on anything for obvious reasons. Had this shoot happened 10 years sooner maybe we’d have been able to get stories about his AWA title wins, his run with Verne as tag champs, deeper memories on any number of feuds and so forth. I’m not sure I can recommend this one as anything but one for an AWA completist as Mad Dog just wasn’t up for meeting the potential greatness that his incredible story offered up.
