The Fabulous Moolah: First Goddess of the Squared Circle (Hardcover)

~ (Author) "I DON'T MIND TELLING YA, DARLIN', it got me revved up..." (more)
Key Phrases: Daddy Vince, New York, World Wrestling Entertainment (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Lillian Ellison, known in the ring as the Fabulous Moolah, is one of wrestling's pioneering veterans and heroines, both in and out of the squared circle. When wrestling first caught the attention of the public, Moolah had a ringside seat. Appearing on the scene in 1949 as a "valet" for some male wrestlers, she was introduced to the crowd as a "slave girl" dressed in revealing leopardskin. But the woman who got into the business for the "moolah" wouldn't remain a valet for long, and soon Moolah turned her humble beginnings into a successful and long-lived career.

Growing up in Tookiedoo, South Carolina, Moolah was the youngest of thirteen children -- and the only girl. Surrounded by twelve rambunctious brothers, she had to be tough from the get-go. After the death of their mother when she was just ten years old, Moolah and her father spent Tuesday nights at local professional wrestling matches. At first she was just excited to do something special with her father. But everything changed when Mildred Burke (one of the most popular "lady rasslers" of the day) came to town. After years of being surrounded by boys, Moolah had finally found a woman she could look up to.

From that night on, Moolah was hooked. She stayed in the ring throughout the 1950s and 1960s, even though technically women were banned from wrestling "for their own good." When the Women's Division of the National Wrestling Alliance was failing, Moolah started training girls at her home base in South Carolina, and by the late sixties the girls she had trained at Girl Wrestling Enterprises represented the single largest group of female wrestlers in the country. Soon the National Wrestling Alliance recognized her as the undisputed Women's Champ, a title she would hold for the next twenty years.

Here, for the first time, the Fabulous Moolah tells all, from her friendship with the infamous Jerry Lee Lewis to a marriage proposal from country-music legend Hank Williams Sr. Moolah dishes plenty of wrestling dirt as well and relates hilarious moments from her decades long friendship with her in-ring cohort Mae Young.

After more than half a century of wrestling, Moolah still trains girls for the ring and even manages to get into the ring herself now and again. She is a role model for strong women everywhere, and she will go down in history as one of wrestling's all-time greats.

About the Author

Now in her seventies, Lillian Ellison has been part of more than half a century of wrestling history and is a living legend. She lives on Moolah Drive in South Carolina, where she still trains girls hoping to get in the ring.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: HarperEntertainment; 1st edition (August 6, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060393971
• ISBN-13: 978-0060393977
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #968,109 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Don't mess with Moolah! (but she's still fun), July 29, 2004

By	krebsman (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Fabulous Moolah: First Goddess of the Squared Circle (Paperback)

I got a big kick out of this book and I am NOT a wrestling fan. In fact, I had never heard of Moolah when I saw the book in the bookstore and looked at the pictures and thought it might be fun. I was not disappointed. Oh sure, I wish that the book had been about twice as long and I wish that there were more photographs, but I did enjoy Moolah's stories and her outrageous attitude. ("If I didn't fight dirty, I wouldn't win!") Moolah is larger-than-life and one-of-a-kind. I think a lot of what she says is pure fantasy (like wresting itself), especially the big whopper she tells that country music legend Hank Williams asked her to marry him. (It's not like he's around to refute her!) But that was part of the fun for me. It's a rather schizoid book in that she flat out says that wrestling is fake (that's why it's called "wrestling ENTERTAINMENT") and then she goes on and on describing various matches as if they were unrehearsed. It seems to me that "wrestling entertainment" is similar to the "super hero" comic books. There are heroes, villains and clowns. When wrestlers are young and attractive, they play the heroes. When they get older and heavier, they become the villains. If they are still at it when they are REALLY old, they play the clowns. Moolah's buddy Mae has played all three roles and Moolah's descriptions of her antics are hilarious. Also very interesting was Moolah's relationship to Katie, her dwarf protege, whom Moolah always refers to as "my damn midget." (Moolah also appears in a delightful documentary film about women wrestlers that I saw at the Tribeca Film Festival last spring called "Lipstick and Dynamite." I recommend this book and the film.) I loaned this book to a friend who was in the hospital recently. He liked the book and passed it around. The book became very popular with everyone on his floor of the hospital (including some of the night staff). I also lent it to a friend who has a PhD and she found it delightful too. I wouldn't want to tangle with Moolah, but I really enjoyed reading her book. It's a quick read and very amusing.

12 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Moolah still pulling her punches, October 22, 2002

By A Customer

This book is about as unsatisfying as winning by count-out.

Might be interesting for a newbie to the spectacle of Pro Wrestling but for the long time fan it's disappointing. The book's narrative, well...it didn't work for me, unlike Missy Hyatt's breezy and straight-from-the-shoulder biography, which ranged from laugh-out-loud funny to heart touching. Perhaps most surprising is how very few new or unique photographs illustrate this bio on one of the most flamboyant performers of all-time--male or female.

If you're a hard core wrestling fan expecting/hoping for a book that will provide an "authentic" if not "honest" glimpse behind the stage curtain, this isn't it. Missed opportunity comes to mind here, and it's a shame. From her undeniable (and enviable) ringside seat to wrestling history, Ellison had the chance to "shoot" for us here - perhaps for the final time in her career - and give us the unvarnished dirt on the Early & Golden Era pro game and its most colorful characters. But in true villain form, the Moolah character takes over, slips under the ropes and goes for a walk outside for a 20 count when the action gets too hot.
A major annoyance throughout the book is Ellison's steadfast references to the mirage that retaining her coveted championship was a feat of real physical strength or actual professional prowess. Moolah, who ARE you kidding? Liston gave it up to Ali; Ali was past it with Holmes; Tyson humbled Holmes. Youth must be served; anything less and the fix is-even in this game. (Hey, I'm not knocking someone who can still take a bump through a table at age 75+, but let's be realistic.)

Ellison compares her longevity (which IS truly amazing) and various "comebacks" to athletes like Muhammad Ali, yet it dawns on the reader that perhaps the real reason for Moolah's title tenure is due to having trained, managed, booked (and in some cases, housed/fed) most of the active women wrestlers of her time. It's hard for "contenders" to become champ when the boss/landlord doesn't want to give it up and says, "take a dive" tonight.

Ellison describes well the "early days" when she was breaking into the sport, but shies away from anything approaching controversial or hard-hitting in stating either cold hard facts or personal opinions about most people and events she recalls. Her real life-stories from childhood and various marriages, family relationships and friendships-get the majority of play throughout the first half of the book and help explain why Ellison (the real person) is the way she is. The origin and inspiration for Moolah (the character) is given some, but not as much development, and would have been just as welcomed.

There's very little retold about the women Moolah competed against; no "Ali-Frazier, Leonard-Hagler, or Lewis-Schmelling" dramas are described. Cindi Lauper/MTV and the famous rift with Wendy Richter are addressed, but not nearly as in depth as we would like. As mentioned before, few photos or illustrations show fans of today the paltry conditions she endured on the road or in the arena. One would have thought that over 60 years in the biz, she and her publisher could have come up with bushels of seldom seen photos, reprints of wrestling posters, autographed memorabilia, wrestling magazine covers, stills from network TV programs or mainstream newspaper/magazine articles.

As a businesswomen who perhaps single-handedly kept the woman's division active with a stable of performers in the 1960s and 70s, there's practically nothing about her talent recruiting practices, training regimens, "old school" ring work techniques, or even her philosophy on "faces" and "heels." Of the dozens of women wrestlers Ellison trained or otherwise assisted, there are not many stories about those times or relationships; and from thousands of bouts, only a few battles with prime opponents or storylines are described. (True, it's a book about Moolah, but even so, there's very little insight to what went into keeping her "Moolah, Women's World Champion" all those years.)

I would agree that this book is mostly a "G" rating, but there are a few salty words and situations in there. Also, repeated and somewhat offensive references to little people (midget) wrestlers are sure to surprise, if not insult, some readers (even if she professes feelings of love and family toward them).

Sorry, but come back to this one later (paperback), especially when there are so many more titles in this category. In the meanwhile, let's hope some studio picks this up for a wide screen movie, like "All the Marbles."

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars She's a Moolah girl, in a Moolah world!, July 10, 2006

By	Brad from OWW "http://www.onlineworldofwrestl... (Nova Scotia) - See all my reviews

The Fabulous Moolah will go down as the greatest Woman's wrestling champion of all time. However, that doesn't necessarily mean it is TRUE. Moolah is an example of someone coming along at the right place and the right time and meeting the right people. The place, New York; the time, early 80s; the people, the McMahons. The McMahon family used a few loopholes and slightly rewrote history and claimed Moolah was Woman's champion for "several decades". Moolah was THE GIRL when the WWF was expanding in the early 80s, and became the postergirl from Woman's wrestling when it was taken national, even though her best years were behind her.

This book..... okay, I admit it, I was pleasantly surprised. It was a great story. But as with many WWE-produced books, I'm not sure where truth begins and lies begin. It's flat out Moolah's perspective, and she dances around some of the issues that might diminish her status if people actually knew. I continually got the impression that Lillian couldn't see much further outside of "Moolah's World" and had a poor sense of the reality around her.

It seemed like every single page of this book resulted in me changing my opion of Lillian Ellison -- from good to bad, to good, back to bad, and so on. In all fairness she HAS done a lot for woman's wrestling, but she also did a lot of horrible things like screwing her roster of girl wrestlers out of unfair booking fees. I think this is a scar on what could have been a legendary career.

Rating: I give it a generous 5 out of 10. I enjoyed this book, but I wouldn't recommend that anybody MUST READ it. If you want a better look at the early days of Woman's professional wrestling then I recommend picking up Penny Banner's book..