Fire Pro Wrestling World

Fire Pro Wrestling World

28 ratings
All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling (1993 - 25th Anniversary)
   
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ADDED
Debbie Malenko 10-18-18
Chaparita Asari 10-17-18
Mima Shimoda 10-16-18
Etsuko Mita 10-16-18
Toshiyo Yamada 10-15-18
Yumiko Hotta 10-7-18
Saemi Numata / Numatchi 10-7-18
Manami Toyota 10-06-18
Kyoko Inoue 10-06-18
Infernal Maeda 10-06-18
Kumiko Maekawa 10-06-18
Bull Nakano 10-05-18
Takako Inoue 10-05-18
Eagle Sawai 10-04-18
Akira Hokuto 10-04-18
Kaoru Ito 10-03-18
Aja Kong 9-29-18
Suzuka Minami 9-29-18
Terri Powers 9-29-18



The All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Corporation, established in 1968, was the successor to the All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Association, which had been formed in August 1955, to oversee the plethora of women's wrestling promotions that had sprung up in Japan following a tour in November, 1954, by Mildred Burke and her World Women's Wrestling Association (WWWA). These promotions included the All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Federation, and the All Japan Women's Wrestling Club, started in 1948, which was the first women's wrestling promotion in Japan. For a time the Club pushed female wrestling as a legitimate sport, booking sporting arenas.

By the mid-1960s, the association had fallen apart, due to infighting between the member promotions, and female wrestling was relegated back to being a sideshow act in strip-tease theaters. In 1967, another attempt to organize the sport of women's professional wrestling was made with a new All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Association. This time the Fabulous Moolah, the NWA Women's Champion, came across from the United States and traded her title with Yukiko Tomoe, to lend legitimacy to the promotion. The new Association broke up later that year. Finally, Takashi Matsunaga, who had been the promoter for All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Federation, formed the All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Corporation (AJW) with his brothers. The promotion held its first card on June 4, 1968, and got a television deal with Fuji TV in the same year.

In the fall of 1970, AJW, which had been contesting the American Girls' Wrestling Association Championship since the previous year, hosted Marie Vagnone, new holder of Mildred Burke's WWWA World Single Championship which had been revived in a WWWA tournament earlier that year in Los Angeles. On October 15, 1970, in Tokyo, Vagnone lost the WWWA title to Aiko Kyo, and AJW had a new world championship singles belt. The next year, AJW acquired the WWWA World Tag Team Championship as well, when Jumbo Miyamoto and Aiko Kyo were made the first champions on June 30, 1971.

During the early 1970s, AJW's championship booking was dominated by the traditional trading between a Japanese face and a foreign (usually North American) heel. The tag belt, for example, was traded fifty-six times between 1971 and 1975, each time between a Japanese team and an American team. This pattern began to change in 1975 with the new stardom of Mach Fumiake and the Beauty Pair (Jackie Sato and Maki Ueda). On March 19, 1975, Mach Fumiake won the WWWA Championship from Jumbo Miyamoto, breaking the pattern in the singles division. After that, only three non-Japanese women ever won the belt, the Canadian Monster Ripper, on July 31, 1979, and March 15, 1980, the Mexican La Galactica, on May 7, 1983, and the American Amazing Kong, on June 4, 2004.

During the 1980s, AJW continued to feature extraordinarily talented and popular female wrestlers, including Wrestling Observer Newsletter (WON) Hall of Famers, Bull Nakano, Jaguar Yokota, Devil Masami, Dump Matsumoto, and the Crush Gals (Chigusa Nagayo and Lioness Asuka). The feud between the pop culture sensations, the Crush Gals, and the heel stable, Gokuaku Domei, led by Matsumoto, was possibly the most popular angle in all of Japanese wrestling during the 1980s, bringing very high ratings to AJW's weekly television program.

Up until 1986, AJW had been the only major women's wrestling (joshi puroresu or simply joshi) promotion in Japan. Then, on August 17, 1986, Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling (JWP) was started, by former AJW stars Jackie Sato and Nancy Kumi, as well as boxer Rumi Kazama and others. In the 1990s the number of joshi puroresu promotions kept increasing, until, by the end of the decade, there were no fewer than seven operating in Japan.

Though AJW remained the strongest joshi promotion during this period, featuring stars such as WON Hall of Famers Akira Hokuto, Aja Kong and Manami Toyota, plus unheralded stars Kyoko Inoue, Toshiyo Yamada, Takako Inoue, Mariko Yoshida, Mima Shimoda and others, eventually matters caught up with them. Financial trouble, defections of talent, and increased competition all combined to weaken the once-dominant promotion.

In 2002 AJW lost its television spot, and the promotion closed its doors in April 2005 after 37 years, making it the longest-running promotion in Japan up to that time (New Japan Pro Wrestling and All Japan Pro Wrestling for men have since reached 44 years as of 2016).
Items (19)
Aja Kong (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(146pts.)...
Suzuka Minami (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(123pts.)...
Terri Power (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(90pts.)...
Kaoru Ito (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(105pts.)...
Akira Hokuto (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(140Pts.)...
Eagle Sawai (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(95Pts.) ...
Takako Inoue (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(142pts.)...
Bull Nakano (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(137pts.)...
Infernal Maeda (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(104Pts.)...
Kumiko Maekawa (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(80Pts.)...
Manami Toyota (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(149Pts.)...
Kyoko Inoue (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(145Pts.)...
Yumiko Hotta (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(141Pts.)...
Toshiyo Yamada (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(147Pts.)...
Mima Shimoda (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(115Pts.)...
Etsuko Mita (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(117Pts.)...
Chaparita ASARI (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(110Pts.)...
Debbie Malenko (AJW 1993)
Created by Rev
(100Pts.) ...
Linked collections (1)
In 1 collection by Rev
Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling
8 items