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The dual sides of Vachon's personality were never made more public than when Howard Brody, the former NWA President, spotlighted Vachon in his excellent book Swimming with Piranha. Promoting a women's independent at the time, Brody found out the television company that was backing them was falling apart and with it went the weekly salaries for himself and Vachon, who was doubling as his secretary and booking talent. Not realizing the entire situation but realizing she was getting fired, Vachon went completely berserk and on the offensive against Brody verbally, trashing him loudly before storming out.
It was so wild and abusive that others in the same office complex believed that the pair were having a sexual relationship that went South. The reality was that the company was dead and Vachon's real concern wasn't for herself, but that she was counting on the salary to cover Christmas gifts for her children. When Brody (as he had already planned) paid her a final two weeks salary, the venom was gone, replaced by the sweet and quiet Angel, with a baby voice saying "thank you" before demurely leaving.
While demure is hardly how anyone would think of Luna Vachon, that story fully explains the ying and yang of Angel and Luna, who as one performer cultivated such an intense, unique persona. It's not hard to consider her one of the toughest female wrestlers of all time. Vachon was more than willing to stand toe to toe with men physically and there aren't many stories of men being willing to test her in the ring, likely because she could have taken them apart. Of the few stories there are about women being on Vachon's wrong side, none ended up happy when they were in Vachon's sights.
Like many other children of wrestlers (Paul "Butcher" Vachon was her stepfather), she was dissuaded from entering the ring. Like many other children, she ignored it. She had been in the ring playing with wrestlers from the time she was a teenager and caught the bug hard. There was no denying it was what she loved.
She was soon training under her "aunt" Vivian Vachon and the late Fabulous Moolah before debuting for Florida Championship Wrestling as part of Kevin Sullivan's band of evil followers. Following that run, she had runs in Japan (managed by her stepfather), Memphis and Puerto Rico's AWF, among other companies in Florida and beyond.
Vachon also managed the masked duo known as the Blackharts, which led to a unique situation where Vachon, then married to Tom Nash of the team, soon split with Nash to date David Heath. That ended the team but Heath was soon working as the Vampire Warrior. He made appearances in the AWF and ECW under that name before ending up in the WWF as Gangrel, the persona he is best known under today. He and Vachon later divorced.
Vachon signed with the WWF in 1993, debuting at Wrestlemania IX as Shawn Michaels' valet as Michaels defended the Intercontinental championship against Tatanka. With the painted veins, muscular body, shaved head and incredible facials, Vachon was a natural for the cartoonish WWF of the era. While she and Michaels never really clicked together character-wise, the debut was more to bring in Vachon as heel foil against the late Sherri Martel, who had been wronged by Shawn Michaels and accompanied Tatanka to the PPV bout as a way to get into Michaels' head. Vachon and Martel soon split off into a feud of their own.
Vachon's next angle was one of the strangest romantic pairings in the history of even the WWF, as the late Bam Bam Bigelow announced he had "fallen in love" with Vachon. That set the pair up as a most unique couple, eventually feuding with the babyface version of Doink the Clown (Ray Apollo) and Dink the Clown, his midget sidekick. The storyline culminated at Vachon's Wrestlemania in-ring debut at Wrestlemania XX in Madison Square Garden, with Bigelow and Vachon going over. Bigelow soon headed for an angle as part of the Ted DiBiase-led Million Dollar Corporation. Vachon was involved for a short time against then WWF Ladies champion Alundra Blayze before leaving the promotion.
In 1995, Vachon's journeys took her to the original Extreme Championship Wrestling, where she attacked Stevie Richards during a Tommy Dreamer vs. Raven match to offset Richards' interference. While Raven vs. Dreamer is remembered now as the hardcore epic feud of ECW, at the time, ECW management was having a hard time getting the Philadelphia fans to take to Dreamer, who was still seen more as a pretty boy than as the John McLaine-esque every man persona that he eventually morphed into. Vachon was a perfect choice to toughen up Dreamer's character, teaming with him against the likes of Raven, Richards and The Pitbulls during the summer of 1995.
While Vachon's run was short in ECW, there were a number of memorable brawls and matches, spotlighted by Vachon defeating Stevie in a man vs. woman steel cage match at Heatwave '95, utilizing the first-ever testicular claw for a submission win. The match was actually billed as one of the two main events that night, sharing the stage with The Public Enemy vs. The Gangstas. Luna departed ECW in August 1995 after transportation issues kept her out of a scheduled eight person tag match. ECW claimed travel problems due to a hurricane in Florida, which also prevented Bill Alfonso and Marty Jannetty from appearing, so it was likely the case. Mick Foley substituted for Vachon and turned heel, setting Foley off on one of the greatest periods of his career as the anti-hardcore, demented Cactus Jack. She was mentioned one final time during a Dreamer promo, but the woman who was the original "Queen of Extreme" before Francine was known by that moniker, never returned.
Vachon then popped up in the Paul Alperstein version of the AWF, working with Honkytonk Man under a wig as Peggy Sue, a takeoff of Elvis' Peggy Lee. The AWF spent a lot of money hard and fast. While they had huge coverage, it was all due to buying syndicated shows nationally. The business plan was an abject failure and the promotion was dead faster than you could assume.
Vachon was then picked up by WCW for a series against Madusa, then the WCW Women's champion, putting her over in a series of matches in 1997. Once the feud ran its course, the company had no further use for her, and Vachon was quietly working in Florida, having removed herself from the business.
Then one day a private detective showed up and informed her the WWF was looking to use her. Vachon was back in, working with Goldust, pushing the boundaries of how far the company could go with the character during the Attitude era. But the real reason Vachon was back was to carry and make Rena Mero (now Lesnar). Mero was taking off as Sable, the hottest female act the company had ever seen. A beautiful blonde with massive implants, she was a ratings draw during the Attitude era and had become one of the most popular characters in the company, something that bothered the hell out of the wrestlers on the card. The decision was made to put Sable in the ring. The angle was that her then-husband Marc Mero would be jealous of her popularity and try to hold her down. She would break out and declare her independence and Mero would be paired with Luna Vachon. The idea here was that Vachon could play a great heel and carry Sable in the ring, because Sable was beyond green and would be learning on the job.
At Wrestlemania XIV, Sable made her in-ring debut in a mixed tag, teaming with Mero against Goldust and Luna. In the ring with Luna, Sable was amazingly good, although due to her upcoming Playboy shoot, Vachon was under strict orders to stick to exactly what was booked out in advance and not do anything that could injure Sable's looks. Vachon, who had toiled all over the world to make her name, was pained by that, often saying it was the one and only "choreographed" match in her career. In the end, Vachon had done her job, but like a lot of good workers, she was overlooked for the bigger star who was drawing the money. Sable's attitude towards others backstage was said to have been anything but gracious, which drove Vachon equally nuts. She had been brought up a Vachon, with respect. Sable walked into main events thanks to her cups and looks. For the male wrestlers, it was a grave annoyance. For a female wrestler brought up old school, it was a haunting anger.
Vachon remained with WWF for several more years, doing such unique roles as the manager of the comedic Oddities, a collection of Giants and strange characters that WWF got more mileage out of than anyone deserved to, but not without bumps in the road. After Sable was attached to the Oddities (don't ask), Vachon turned heel under a mask and began another run with her, this time for the Women's title. The two personalities backstage led to a blow up and as the much lesser star when it came to political favor, Vachon was out.
Vachon was brought back several months later and feuded with Ivory, including a Hardcore match on PPV, before managing Gangrel for the first time on WWF television. Another incident backstage led to her final dismissal and she was never brought back.
While she worked a number of independents in the years that followed, with no other national companies to have a run with, Vachon's chances of making huge money were pretty much done. There were the occasional tours overseas and lots of independent companies everywhere from New York to Puerto Rico and beyond, but it was a fly by night way to make a living. Vachon and Heath parted the ways.
On December 5, 2007, Luna Vachon announced her retirement. Her last official bout took place just days later for Great Lakes Championship Wrestling in Milwaukee. She successfully defended her GLCW Ladies Championship against Traci Brooks and then retired as champion. GLCW promoter Dave Herro had been one of her closer confidantes in recent years and often was the middleman when it came to arranging her appearances.
Before she opted to retire, she was a big part of the New Jersery-based Womens' Superstars Uncensored, helping to get that group, which runs monthly DVD tapings, off the ground, playing the same role she held in real life, the tough veteran you didn't want to cross. She made several convention appearances but for the most part, quietly disappeared, partially because she couldn't be paid to wrestle if she wanted to receive the benefits she was receiving.
After, Vachon had pulled herself out of the ring, she was working as a tow truck operator and kept a low profile. She had a number of personal issues from her battles with a bi-polar condition, which was only exacerbated by substance issues that came with running her body hard in the wrestling world. She had been through rehab sponsored by WWE at least once that I was aware of.
Vachon nearly made one last public appearance in wrestling on television, but turned it down. When Mick Foley learned of Vachon losing her home and many of her possessions in a house fire, he pitched Vachon working the TNA Hardcore Justice PPV to Tommy Dreamer. Dreamer agreed and passed on her information to Terry Taylor. However, when Taylor called Vachon to book her as a surprise for the PPV, she turned down the opportunity, which surprised everyone. I don't know how she would have been used but my guess would have been that she'd have made a cameo during the Raven and Dreamer bout.
The announcement of her death took the world by surprise since it was just a few weeks earlier that Mick Foley had publicly disclosed Vachon had lost much of her belongings in a fire and asked fans for help in building her memorabilia collection of her own career. At one point, her passing was the top trending topic, not just in the United States, but worldwide on twitter. More than than that, Luna's passing was a death that a number of people in and around the industry took very hard because while many of them had seen the wrath of Luna firsthand, they all loved Angel, the woman behind her. Like many of them, she had her dark side but she was one of them and they understood why she was who she was, because she walked in their shoes and vice versa.
While Vachon was never a drawing main event player on the national scene when you look at the numbers and the placement of the stars on a list, she was one of those performers that wrestling needed to make the bigger companies run. She worked hard, making matches and situations that were ridiculous work. She was unique and tough in a business that did and still does, favor soft, sexual females as their stars. She was a hardcore brawler before that was a buzz word in marketing wrestling. She was widely respected by her peers and friends and had been everywhere, working with just about everyone and more than many women that come in and out of the business, was considered one of the boys.
More than that, she was a Vachon, which carried more than it's own weight (and stress) in both respect and in work ethic.
Vachon was survived by two sons, one of whom has become a well known chef and was featured on the FOX reality series Hell's Kitchen.
Her family has announced there will be no public funeral.
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