DEATH OF THE TERRITORIES

In 2007, Tim Hornbaker released National Wrestling Alliance: The Untold Story Of The Monopoly That Strangled Pro Wrestling, an exhaustively researched book that became the gold standard of wrestling histories. He followed that up in 2015 with the impressive Capitol Revolution: The Rise Of The McMahon Wrestling Empire.

Given Hornbaker’s track record and attention to detail, Death Of The Territories: Expansion, Betrayal And The War That Changed Pro Wrestling Forever was one of the most highly anticipated wrestling titles in recent memory. Whereas National Wrestling Alliance examined a half-century of wrestling history, Death Of The Territories drills into the 1980s as Vince McMahon Jr. takes the reins of the World Wrestling Federation and looks to expand to a national stage. It’s a fascinating era in wrestling history, and, as the title correctly points out, an era that did change the business forever.

Unlike his previous books, which focused on a single promotion, examines dozens of regional territories as they struggle to defend their turf from McMahon’s national expansion. While comprehensive and fascinating, the result can be a bit jarring as Hornbaker bounces from territory to territory—from the Indiana-based World Wrestling Association to Angelo Poffo’s renegade International Championship Wrestling in Kentucky, on to Georgia Championship Wrestling, for example—within the space of a few paragraphs. It’s engrossing material