John Hill | |
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Birth name | John Steele Hill |
Born | July 8, 1941 Hamilton, Ontario, Canada |
Died | March 11, 2010 (Aged 68) Indianapolis, Indiana, United States |
Professional wrestling career | |
Ring name(s) | Guy Hill Guy Mitchell The Stomper Jerry Valiant The Masked Strangler Mr. X (in Vancouver) The Destroyer The Assassin Guy Heenan |
Billed height | 6'3" |
Debut | 1959 |
Retired | Mid 1990s |
John Steele Hill (July 8, 1941 – March 11, 2010) was a Canadian professional wrestler best known under the ring names Guy Mitchell, The Stomper and "Gentleman" Jerry Valiant. During his career, he held the top singles titles in Australia and Vancouver, and competed in the World Wide Wrestling Federation (WWWF) where he won the WWWF World Tag Team Championship.
Hill became a professional wrestler in 1959 after working out for a year at both Al Spittles's and Jack Wentworth's gyms in Canada. He traveled to the United States in 1960 in the hopes of making more money. At the beginning of his career, Hill wrestled under the ring name Guy Hill. While wrestling for Georgia Championship Wrestling in 1961, however, a news reporter accidentally referred to him as Guy Mitchell, and Hill was forced to take on the new name. Under his new identity, Mitchell held the Georgia version of the NWA Southern Heavyweight Championship for one week. Shortly thereafter, he teamed with Bob Rasmussen to win the Georgia version of the NWA Southern Tag Team Championship.
Mitchell later wrestled in Indianapolis, where he formed a tag team in the World Wrestling Association (WWA) with Joe Tomasso known as The Assassins. Together, the team won the WWA World Tag Team Championship three times in 1965 and 1966. The team was managed by a rookie manager named Bobby Heenan. Although The Assassins were a heel (villain) tag team who wore masks, Mitchell also competed as a face (fan favorite) singles wrestler without a mask. Mitchell also wrestled as Guy Heenan in some areas, where he was a storyline sibling of Heenan.