Card of the Day - 2025-02-26

Somportex fam tv wrestlers
Somportex Ltd [trade : gum : UK - London] "Famous TV Wrestlers" (1964) SOM-O50

I suppose this card stands for both power and strength, things everyone competing in sport must have in some way, though different - for the power and strength of a wrestler or weightlifter is a different kind to an athlete, and their foods different too, the former for bulk and the latter for speed.

This is a very unusual set, and it records the golden age of British wrestling, so famous that it was televised.

The card that seems to be the one everyone wants is number 45, of Mick McManus, also known as "The Man You Love to Hate", "The Dulwich Destroyer", and sometimes his birth name, William George Matthews.

I have gone instead for this really super example of physique, belonging to a man who appears on the card as Josef Moschi Molnar. As far as I have been able to discover this is inaccurate - firstly he only ever used one forename at a time, either Jozsef (which was probably his birth name spelling), Josef (the anglicised version), or Joschi (which could be a nickname). The "Moschi" on this card definitely seems to be an error, a mis-spelling of "Moschi" instead of "Joschi". 

In fact the card tells us much more than I have been able to find elsewhere, and I can only add that he was a great all rounder, equally adept at man on man or in a tag team - that his height was 5`6" - his weight approximately 240 lbs - and that he died in June 2019.

There are not too many sets that feature wrestling, but the most easy to acquire are the two sets by Ogden`s called "Pugilists and Wrestlers" issued in 1980 and 1909. One card which has always appealed to me is number 8 from the first series, showing Gunner James Moir with a floral tattoo right round the area below his neck.

Then there is that curious "set" of two cards issued in 1910 by Taddy, showing wrestlers Buttan Singh and Frank Crozier - however it is not so curious when you learn that the two are actually connected, for in 1910 Frank Crozier failed to hold on to his wrestling middleweight champion of the world title, being defeated in the semi finals by Buttan Singh.The title went to the German wrestler Fritz Altroggen, with fellow German H. Bauer second and Dutchman J. Gelot third.

This set is rather scantly described in our original British Trade Index part two as :

FAMOUS T.V. WRESTLERS. Md. 82 x 38. Black. Nd. (60) ... SOP-2

In our updated version it is slightly different, reading

FAMOUS T.V. WRESTLERS. 1964. Black. Nd. (60) ... SOM-50