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 - Brandon Truitt 

Barry Windham, as you may know, is the son of Blackjack Mulligan, brother of Kendall Windham, and brother-in-law of Mike Rotundo (Irwin R. Shyster). He's also a multi-time WWF tag champ, a former NWA champ, a member of the most highly regarded lineup of the Four Horsemen, and a fairly honest guy. My only problem with him is that he's a bit scatterbrained and will start a topic but never finish it up (meaning I have to complete some of his thoughts), but I think that's residue left over from some nasty concussions he's had over the years.

The tape starts out with footage of Windham saving someone from the Four Horsemen (then with Lugar in the 4th slot), beating up Ric Flair pretty bad in the process and having an impromptu match(?). I think this may have set up their match at Crockett Cup 87, but I'm unsure of when this aired. Dusty Rhodes and the Rock and Roll Express come out to watch Windham's back while takes on Flair, and ends with Windham winning by DQ after the Horsemen get involved.

The interview opens as RF is interviewing Windham in the Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling dojo in Marietta, Georgia. TCW is Dusty Rhodes' current indy fed.

How did he get started? He was going to West Texas State, which produced some of the GREAT wrestlers of all time including Terry Funk, Bruiser Brody, and Tully Blanchard. He got into the business setting up the ring for Dick Murdoch's territory in 1979. He couldn't wrestle at first because he was on football scholarship to West Texas, but JJ Dillon came to town one night and insisted he wrestle him. He went back to doing grunt-work and learned the business-side of wrestling from Terry Garvin, whom he puts over heavily. He refereed for QUITE a while before he was allowed to start wrestling full-time.

His father's reaction- Blackjack never really asked him if he wanted to get into the business. When he found out Barry was wrestling in violation of his scholarship, he apparently wasn't happy but didn't say much. (Windham claims he was fast enough to make it as a pro football player (4.6 40 yard dash at 238 pounds) and could deep-snap, as well as being a heavily decorated amateur wrestler, so those options were open until he violated his scholarship)

His first major territory- He'd worked Amarillo before but that was more like working a HUGE region rather than a real territory. He thinks he started working in Florida for Eddie Graham and Dusty Rhodes in February 1980.

Guys he learned from- He learned a lot by watching Don Muraco. Unlike the current style in the business, Muraco would be slow and methodical but would make every single move mean something. Manny Fernandez was a guy he learned the technical side of the business from. Dusty also coached him on a lot of stuff.

Tag-teaming with Scott McGhee- Scott was a lot like him, as they both learned from hanging around the rest of the guys in Florida. 

Bobby Jaggers- He's always got a story to top any that you told him. He could talk and wrestle, but he doesn't think he'd even get a shot today because he was a heavyset guy and didn't have "the look".

Mike Graham- One of his best friends. Hard worker, worked his way up from setting up the ring to finally wrestling. During the mid-90's while both were working for WCW, they'd be buying Harley Davidson motorcycles from people up north during the winter and either keep them or resell them in the south, which allowed them to pick up a nice amount of pocket change along with some nice hardware.

Eddie Graham- Long-winded, only had a 6th grade education but learned out in the world VERY well. His suicide was a tragedy and was probably the result of unchecked mental illness. Had a great relationship with him

Dick Slater- "Like a Terry Funk clone." Slater watched Funk like Windham watched Muraco. Hard worker, very stiff. If he hits you, it WILL hurt.

Kevin Sullivan- Vivid imagination. He predicts their shoot with him will be pretty interesting.  "He was like the Devil's Advocate" and came up with a lot of unusual stuff like having Blackjack, Barry, Kendall Windham, and Mike Rotundo team up and discuss how they're family.

Teaming with Blackjack- He'd been riding with Manny Fernandez in Florida when Manny flipped the truck they were in, causing Barry to get a severe concussion. Bugsy McGraw, who's now in the medical profession, was behind them and helped them. Bugsy thought that Barry's head may have been out the window and hit the ground when the truck flipped. Barry didn't want to stay at the hospital, so he went home and went to sleep, and woke up four days later when Blackjack showed up. Blackjack put him in the passenger seat of his (Barry's) classic Camaro, picked up his stuff, then took him home to the Carolinas. When he got his marbles back together, Blackjack told him that he couldn't go back to Florida and that Jim Crockett was willing to hire him if he'd wrestle as Blackjack Jr. He says that he looked rail-thin at that time because he'd lost weight because of the accident and Blackjack was about 6'9" and 300+ pounds.
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