The father of “Puroresu” Japanese professional wrestling, Rickidozan (1924-1963) was born in Korea, but moved to Japan to become a sumo wrestler. He began his wrestling career as a ssireum wrestler in a Korean prefecture of Japan. His father-in-law, who was Japanese, owned a sumo stable in Japan. Rickidozan joined the stable, eventually becoming sekiwake, the third highest. After a dispute over pay, he retired from sumo, finding work in construction. He tried to return to sumo but was refused reentry.
He went to the US and won a number of NWA titles. In 1953, along with Sadao Nagata he helped introduce the Japan Pro Wrestling Association, also known as the Japan Pro Wrestling Alliance, which was a branch of the USA-based National Wrestling Alliance based out of the USA.
In 1963, he was stabbed by a local yakuza after an altercation in a night club and died several days later of complications. The official story is that Rickidozan was killed during a fight, but many believe he was assassinated. He had violated an a contract in a pro wrestling match with Kimura in which he was meant to lose or tie in a series of matches that would earn a lot of money for the wrestlers and promoters. Instead, Rickidozan won, injuring Kimura, who refused to ever wrestle with him again. Mas Oyama was a friend of Kimura and tried to find Rickidozan alone, to fight him, but this proved impossible. Allegedly, Yakuza gamnlers put a contract on Rickidozan’s life because of the money they lost on his match with Kimura and the upcoming series of matches which was cancelled.
For his contributions to professional wrestling, Rickidozan was inducted into the WWF Hall of Fame.
In spite of being a national hero, he was murdered by Yakuza in 1963.
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