| Jim White | |
|---|---|
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| Birth name | James White |
| Born | (1942-07-11)July 11, 1942[1] Rogersville, Tennessee, U.S.[1] |
| Died | January 7, 2010(2010-01-07) (aged 67)[1] |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Ring name(s) | Jim White Tony York The Medic Woodrow The Green Shadow Tiny York[2] Red Shadow[2] The Scorpion[2] |
| Trained by | Johnny Thunder |
| Debut | 1959[1] |
| Retired | 1985[1] |
James White[2] (July 11, 1942 – January 7, 2010) was an Americanprofessional wrestler during the 1960s and 1970s in the southern United States. He was frequently thetag team partner ofJerry Lawler.
White entered the professional wrestling business after meeting and training with Johnny Thunder.[1] Thunder later introduced him to Chicago promoterFred Kohler's booker.[1] White's first match was in 1959 againstJohnny Kace. Because he was only 17 at the time, his father had to sign a parental consent form to allow him to wrestle.[1] Afterward, White also began wrestling forNick Gulas in Nashville on the weekends, while he continued to attend high school during the week.[1]
After graduating high school, White became a full-time wrestler, teaming withRon Wright undermanagerRon Bass.[1] He wrestled across the southern United States, even competed as The Medic under a mask.[1] In 1970, he began wrestling in Alabama, teaming with Roy Klein as The Green Shadows.[1] After the team lost their masks, they became known as Woodrow and Roy Bass, withSam Bass as their manager.[1] As a singles wrestler in 1972, he also used the ring name The Green Shadow, withDr. Ken Ramey as his manager.[1]
White also frequently teamed withJerry Lawler.[1] In theGulf Coast Championship Wrestling promotion, the team won theNWA Tennessee Tag Team Championship no later than November 1972, but lost it toTommy Gilbert andBearcat Brown on December 8 of that year.[3] In 1973, the team won theNWA Southern Tag Team Championship.[1][4] They held the title a total of seven times that year.[5] Lawler and White also had a series of matches againstMelvin Nelson and various partners.[6] The team, however, split by 1974.[1]
After the split with Lawler, White moved to the Gulf Coast, where he held theNWA United States Tag Team Championship (Tri-State version) withSteve Lawler in September 1974.[7] He wrestled only occasionally in the 1980s, wrestling his last match in 1985 due to hip pain.[1]
White later worked for Diehard Championship Wrestling from 1999 to 2004 managing such stars as theMongolian Stomper, DCW Heavyweight Champion Lee Luger,Billy Joe Travis, Jamie (Too Cool) Stone, The Hansen Brothers (Brody & Billy Jack), and The Tennessee Connection (Chuck Lee & J.D.Biggs). At the age of 65, he defeated The Matador for the DCW Heavyweight Championship viafireball. He also was commissioner for Southern Championship Wrestling, a southeastern Kentucky promotion, in his last couple of years before his death.
White playedAmerican football in High School.[1] But he could not tell his football coach that he was a wrestler because he would have had to quit the team.[1]
After retiring from professional wrestling, White became an avid camper and fisher.[1] In 1987, he was employed as the transportation for alcohol and drug patients to rehabilitation centers.[1] He also worked as the general manager of Alono, Inc., which was an organization that treated people for drug and alcohol abuse.[1]
White had a wife, Barbara, and two sons, Jeff and Tommy.[1] Years after his divorce, he moved to Kentucky in 1997 and lived with his significant other Beatrice and welcomed her two children, Shelia and Wayne, as his own. White died at the age of 67 on January 7, 2010, of cancer.[1]