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WWE TAPE LIBRARY ACQUISITION REVEALED ON A&E TONIGHT

By Mike Johnson on 2023-05-14 23:40:00

During tonight's Randy Savage-centric episode of WWE's Most Wanted Treasures on A&E, it was revealed that WWE is now in possession of 20 boxes of master tapes from International Championship Wrestling, the promotion run by the Poffo family in Kentucky.  The promotion ran from 1978 through 1984 and at one point, was a heated rival to Jerry Jarrett's Memphis Wrestling territory.

WWE Archivist Ben Brown revealed that ICW founder Angelo Poffo had been lent money by an oil company to assist the financing of the promotion with the master tapes used as collateral.  The tapes had been left in a storage locker for decades until being acquired by WWE. 

The timeline of when WWE acquired the footage is not known, but in the episode, Lanny Poffo was brought in to authenticate the footage, some of which he admitted he had never seen before.  Some clips, dated 1983, featuring Randy Savage and Bob Orton, among others, were briefly shown on the episode.

Over the last several decades, WWE has acquired the tape libraries of Jim Crockett Promotions, WCW, ECW, Smoky Mountain Wrestling, Mid-South/UWF, World Class Championship Wrestling, Puerto Rico's World Wrestling Council and more. 

 

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