[INTERVIEW] -- FRANKIE CAIN (The Great Mephisto, The Inferno)

[Scott M. Teal]

INTERVIEWS WITH THE LEGENDS
Frankie "The Great Mephisto" Cain

Frankie Cain was better known to wrestling fans under other names. His
career skyrocketed in the mid-60s when he and Rocky Smith, together with a young referee
from Tennessee named J.C. "Jimmy" Dykes as their manager, joined forces to form a tag team
known as The Infernos.

he Infernos are a legend in wrestling circles and considered by many as the most famous
masked tag team in the history of professional wrestling. In the early '70s, Frankie removed
the mask and began wrestling as The Great Mephisto.

Frank reveals stories that have never been told in print before and relates every aspect of
his life and career --

-- as a street-wise kid hustling a buck in post-depression Columbus, Ohio.
"It was after the depression, but there still wasn't any jobs, so how
you'd make a living is by going into bars with a shoeshine box. My hair was real long, and I
kept it that way. Even after the war, when everyone had crew cuts, I had long hair. The guys
in the bars would think I was a little girl, so they'd let me shine their shoes. You know
what I mean? I used mine as a gimmick. Sure, there were times I cut my hair, and I looked
like a little boy. But, hell. There was a lot of little six and seven year old boys running
around with a shine box ... but there was no little, ragged girls."

-- as a member of the Toe-Hold Club.
"Ben Hayes, the sportswriter, talked (Casey) Fredericks (Ohio State
wrestling coach) into letting us work out with the amateurs. We could stay with 'em a little
bit, but they could beat us. So Ben said, "Let the kids wrestle their style of wrestling."
Casey says, "Alright." At first, he was kind of puzzled why Ben would bring us up there, but
he found out when we started doing our own stuff. My God! We made those guys scream standing
up, before we ever went down on the mat. We could leg dive like a bast**d. We would grab
their ankle and go backwards with it. Casey Fredericks panicked. He said, "Holy, Christ
... wait! You guys can't do that." He's hollering, "No, no, you guys can't workout." Then,
after the amateurs had left, limping and holding their arms and everything, he said, "How'd
you guys ever learn that stuff?" I didn't know until years later ... but what we were doing
was kind of unique."

-- as a fighter in the carnival.
"If you were the stick, you had to make the people think you was a local, or from around
the surrounding area. You'd mill around and start talking to the people. You'd stand in the
crowd and say you just moved back into town, or make up some other story. The carnival patch
man ... the one that went into the town ahead of time ... he found out about the high
schools or colleges. Let's say they have a Lincoln High School ... you'd say you went to
school there ten years ago and just moved back to town. Then, when you're with a group of
people, and other people (from the town) would see you talking, they'd think all of you were
together. You'd just try to find a crowd to get in with, and talk about any bullsh**. Then,
when you issue a challenge to the carny wrestler, they think you're a local boy making the
challenge. You challenged, then you went ahead and worked a match."

-- as a professional boxer.
"The boys don't believe this, but it's the truth. The (boxing) promoter would never sit
down, like wrestlers would, and work out your match, or anything like that. They sometimes
would come in and say, "You've gotta go by the fourth round." It wasn't sitting down and
working it out. Just whenever it looked good, you'd go down. That kind of thing had to be
negotiated and was really a kayfabe thing. It had to be, or everything would just go to hell
... especially with the commissions, who would suspend you or hold your money for fixing a
fight."

-- as a young professional wrestler.
"The old-timers (wrestlers) didn't want to give you too much. You would have to kind of
look after yourself to get any respect from them. Consequently, they was worrying about the
promoters or some of the boys watching, and they would get testy. They would get you down
and hold you down, and you'd have a lousy match. Of course, the old-timers would say,
"Well, the guy was trying to move against me." The promoters would respect their word and,
consequently, didn't want you back. So, to try to get a match out of the bast**ds, you had
to take a lot from them."

-- as The Infernos, one of the hottest tag teams in the world.
"The business we did in Amarillo was just phenomenal. The houses were just unreal ...
packed every night. Every night, we'd be fightin' them Mexican fans, man. They'd come at ya
with knives. Oh, sh**. It was just horrible. It was a lot of money, but a lot of greed. We
were there close to three years, and very seldom did we have a day off. We was workin' seven
nights a week. The schedule, workin' under the mask in hot buildings ... and, man! When
you're workin' with the type of babyfaces we had, brother, you had to get up and move. We
worked with a young Dory Funk Jr. and a young Terry Funk every night ... and they're wantin'
to make a name in the business. Terry was wild and crazy, but a hell of a worker. That kid
was a natural from day one ... and of course, Dory Jr. was a class worker."

-- as The Great Mephisto.
"I used to bring the supernatural into all my interviews. As a matter of fact, Anton Lave
sent a couple of his disciples to see me. That's the guy who had the big devil-worshipping
thing in San Francisco. They took me to see him and he lived in this weird place ... a big
black house. While I'm talking to him, he starts using some kind of ... like double talk. I
thought, "Oh, man," and asked him, "What are you. What do you do?" He said, "You know. We
believe in Satan, Beelzebub, and all that stuff." By the tone of the conversation, and in
the surroundings I was in, I got scared and I said, "Well, it's time for me to go." I got
out of there."

-- as a booker and wrestler.
"I was always fighting and arguing with promoters all over the country, because of the way
they ran the business, the lousy payoffs, and the nonchalant attitude they had towards
promotion. When I knocked (Roy) Shire on his ass in front of the boys, he tried to have me
blackballed, but promoters ... no matter what anybody else says about you, if their
territory is down, and they can use you, they're gonna bring you in ... It was always
my contention that there wasn't any dead territories. There was just dead promoters. They
were satisfied with making three times as much as the boys. Even the guys that had lousy
territories could make themselves a thousand bucks a week. And there was always an alliance
for the promoters, but there was none for the boys."

-- as a wrestling promoter.
"We was all old. We looked like the wax museum. (laughs) We'd use the pictures from when
we was young. They would laugh when we'd come to the ring, but after we started working a
little bit, they'd settle down and get into it. At least I could repeat in a town, which a
lot of promotions couldn't do. I had Lash Larue, George Strickland, Johnny "Swede" Carlin.
We were all ancient." (laughs)

-- as the subject of this book.
"I don't want it to be just a dull, humdrum story. I'll get into the promotional aspect
... things the wrestlers don't even know about. I was lucky enough to be there firsthand, in
the offices, and knew things like how much income tax the promoter paid. They wouldn't tell
me, but you knew approximately how much money was brought in. Then, at the end of the year,
they could have bonused the boys, and used it as a tax write off. Instead, they chose to
pay the money out in taxes. There were alliances for the promotions, but there was never any
for the boys. There was the rebel like me, who raised hell with the bast**ds ... and they
branded me a rebel. Sure, I had a bad reputation for leaving territories. I punched a few
promoters, but I never hit one that was a nice guy. The guys that I punched were the pricks
in the business and everyone knew it."

"We'll get into old friends that turned on me ... how Bill Watts was panic stricken over
us promoting opposition to him ... throwing Nick Gulas in the shower ... about me punching
Roy Shire out in the dressing room and how he had me blackballed ... and a lot more. I want
to really do an in-depth thing. I don't want anyone who picks this book up, and reads it, to
think that I'm the bast**d that they've heard stories about. The boys don't knock me. The
promoters knock me."

"Dick Steinborn called me and says, "Is it true that Scott's going to write your story?" I
said, "Yeah." He said, "This will be the first time, won't it, Frank?" I said, "Yeah, with
the exception of the newspaper stories."

****************************************

This is a must-read for everyone. In this lengthy interview, Frank
relates every aspect of his life and career. Frank's story is a true
classic and a unique behind-the-scenes look at the wrestling business.
This material has never been printed anywhere before. This first
edition includes rare photos of Frankie in his early days as a boxer,
plus many of his ring personas, such as the Inferno and the Great
Mephisto. Several are from Frank's personal photo collection. Each copy
is professionally-bound with a protective cover.

$20 each postpaid in the U.S. and Canada ($25 overseas), or send $22
and Frank will personally autograph your copy.

If you'd like to read more stories like this, or for information about
subscribing or ordering back issues of the printed version "Whatever
Happened to ...?", check out our webpage or contact us at:

P.O. Box 2781
Hendersonville TN 37077-2781

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The Who's Who of Professional Wrestling
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