Private | |
Industry | Professional wrestling |
Founded | 1935 |
Founder | Jim Crockett |
Defunct | November 1988 (sold to Turner Broadcasting System) |
Headquarters | Charlotte, North Carolina, United States |
Area served
|
Eastern Seaboard |
Owner |
James Allen Crockett (1931–1973) James Allen Crockett, Jr. (1973–1988) |
Jim Crockett Promotions Inc. was a family-owned professional wrestling promotion headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, United States. Founded in 1931, the promotion emerged as a cornerstone of the National Wrestling Alliance. By the 1980s, Jim Crockett Promotions was, along with the World Wrestling Federation, one of the two largest promotions in the United States. The Crockett family sold a majority interest in the promotion to Turner Broadcasting System in 1988, resulting in the creation of World Championship Wrestling.
Jim Crockett (1908–1973) was a promoter of live events including professional wrestling, music concerts, plays, minor league baseball, and ice hockey. In 1935, he founded his own professional wrestling promotion, Jim Crockett Promotions. Crockett built JCP as a regional promotion centred on the Carolinas and Virginia.
Although the business was always called "Jim Crockett Promotions," it used a variety of pseudonyms as brand names for specific TV shows, newspaper and radio ads, and even on event tickets, themselves. Among those brand names were the generic standbys, "Championship Wrestling" and "All Star Wrestling"; as well as "East Coast Wrestling"; "Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling"; "Mid-Atlantic Championship Sports"; "Wide World Wrestling"; and, "World Wide Wrestling".
Crockett joined the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) in 1952, and his "territory" covered Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina. The name "Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling" became JCP's primary brand name in print, radio, and other advertising (the name was also used for its main television programs). Two years later, JCP introduced the Wide World Wrestling brand name and television show (which was renamed World Wide Wrestling in 1978, and renamed WCW WorldWide in the late-1980s after its sale to Turner Broadcasting System). JCP used the "Wide World/World Wide" and "Mid-Atlantic" brands concurrently.