Jody Hamilton
| Birth name | Joseph Hamilton |
|---|---|
| Born |
August 28, 1938 Saint Joseph, Missouri |
| Residence | Atlanta, Georgia |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Ring name(s) | Jody Hamilton Joe Hamilton Ricky Monroe Assassin #1 Masked Assassin #1 Mighty Bolo The Assassin The Flame |
| Billed height | 6 ft 1 in (1.85m) |
| Billed weight | 265 Ib (120 kg) |
| Trained by |
Michael DiBiase Sonny Myers Nick Roberts |
| Debut | 1955 |
| Retired | 1988 |
Joseph "Jody" Hamilton (born August 28, 1938) is an American retired professional wrestler and current wrestling promoter and trainer. In his active days, Hamilton was best known as one half of the tag team The Assassins where he was called "Assassin #1". When the Assassins ended, Hamilton wrestled as "The Assassin" and "The Flame" both while wearing a mask.
Hamilton teamed up with Tom Renesto in late 1961 to form the masked heel (bad guy) team known as "The Assassins" and, for over a decade, Hamilton and Renesto wrestled all over the world with great success. Once Renesto retired, Hamilton kept the Assassins team alive by partnering with wrestlers such as Randy Colley and "Hercules" Hernandez under the trademark gold and black masks of the Assassins.
In the late 1980s, Hamilton founded Deep South Wrestling (DSW), where he also wrestled until a back injury forced him to retire in 1988. After Deep South Wrestling closed, Hamilton worked extensively for World Championship Wrestling both on the booking team and later on as a trainer at WCW's Power Plant training facility. In 2005, Hamilton reopened Deep South Wrestling, this time as an affiliate of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), to train wrestlers the WWE had signed to developmental contracts. In 2007, WWE abruptly ended their contract with DSW and the promotion suspended operations later in the year.
Hamilton was born in St. Joseph, Missouri. Before turning professional, Hamilton was a promising amateur boxer, but instead of continuing his training, he decided that he wanted to follow in the footsteps of his older brother Larry Hamilton. Larry was a professional wrestler billed as "The Missouri Mauler". Hamilton started working for "Gus Karras Promotions", a professional wrestling promotion based in St. Louis, Missouri, where he made his debut against Rip Hawk in a 40-minute match. By 1957, Hamilton had started teaming with his brother Larry and worked as a full-time professional wrestler. The Hamilton Brothers worked for the New York, NY based Capitol Wrestling, (the pre-cursor to World Wrestling Entertainment), where they were put in a storyline with the top tag team of the promotion Antonino Rocca and Miguel Pérez. In May 1958, the Hamilton Brothers faced Rocca and Pérez in the main event of a Madison Square Garden show making Jody, age 19 at the time, the youngest man to ever co-star in a main event at Madison Square Garden.
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