Birth name Adolph Ernst Retired 1933 Billed height 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) Name Ad Santel | Billed weight 185 lb (84 kg) Role Professional wrestler Debut 1907 | |
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Born April 7, 1887Germany ( 1887-04-07 ) Ring name(s) Al SantelOtto CarpenterMysterious CarpenterAdolph Ernst Died 1966, Alameda, California, United States Similar People Egawa Hidetatsu, U Nu, Chujiro Hayashi, Eiji Sawamura, Yuko Tojo | ||
Ad santel entertains midgets 1920
Adolph Ernst (April 7, 1887 – November 10, 1966), better known for his ring name Ad Santel, was an American professional wrestler, considered one of the greatest practitioners of catch wrestling ever. He is known for his feud with the Kodokan judo school.
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Career
Ad Santel fought one of the early clash-of-the-styles matches in modern martial arts history against Tokugoro Ito, a 5th degree black belt in judo from Japan. Fighting under judo rules, Santel defeated Ito when a slamming takedown rendered the judoka unable to continue the point and proclaimed himself the World Judo Champion. Tokugoro Ito went on to avenge the loss a few months later on June 10, 1916, by defeating Santel with a choke hold, being one of very few to ever defeat Santel. The two had a third match, which ended in a draw.
In October 1914, Santel came to Seattle and challenged resident judo master Taro Miyake, who Santel had already met in a draw. Santel won with such a powerful half nelson slam that Miyake remained dizzy for half an hour after the match. Seeing this as a new offense, judo founder Jigoro Kano sent 5th degree black belt Daisuke Sakai to avenge his defeat, but Santel again got over him, submitting Sakai twice with a biceps slicer. The Kodokan school did not send more challengers, but Santel decided to return the move and assembled a team with fellow wrestlers Henry Weber and Matty Matsuda in order to go to Japan. Their travel was possible thanks to Kodokan member Heita Okabe, who helped to host a series of matches between Ad's team and the Kodokan judokas. They would be contested under neutral rules that demanded judogi jackets yet allowed all sorts of holds. Though Kano refused to sanction the bouts and threatened his students with expulsion if they fought, six of them accepted the challenge nonetheless, among them 5th degree black belts Hikoo Shoji and Reijiro Nakata. Before a crowd of 10.000 at the Yasukuni shrine, Santel defeated Nagata by TKO after a devastating headlock, and the next day, he had a 60 minutes draw with Shoji, who left the mat so battered that Santel himself had to help him out of the arena. Later Santel would defeat another judoka, Hajime Shimizu, to avenge Shimizu's victory over Weber, and drew with him at their rematch.
The impact of these performances on Japan was immense. The Japanese were fascinated by the submissions taught in catch wrestling, and Japanese fighters traveled to Europe in order to either participate in various tournaments or to learn catch wrestling at European schools such as Billy Riley's Snake Pit in Wigan, UK. Okabe and the judo challengers were effectively expelled from Kodokan, but Hikoo Shoji and some of them followed Santel to the United States to train with him. Ad would keep battling judokas over the years, facing renowned Tsutao Higami in a two falls match; Ad won the first one with a neckscissors and Tsutao won the second via juji-gatame, thus ending the match with a draw. In 1926, he would face Setsuzo Ota, drawing again. After that bout, both contendants claimed it to be the toughest match in their lives.
Years after the famous 1911 match between Frank Gotch and Georg Hackenschmidt, Santel told Lou Thesz that he was paid $5,000 by Gotch's backers to cripple Hackenschmidt in training, and make it look like an accident. According to Hackenschmidt himself, the injury was accidentally inflicted by his sparring partner, Dr. Roller, when trying to hold Hackenschmidt down onto his knees and Roller's right foot striking Hackenschmidt's right knee; his sparring partners were Jacobus Koch, Wladek Zbyszko and Dr. Roller. Ad Santel is not mentioned in any account of Hackehschmidt's training by either Hackenschmidt or Roller, both of whom offered their insights and accounts. However, Ad Santel was Hackenschmidt's head trainer and sparring partner using his real name of Adolph Ernst for about a year prior and right up until the 2nd Gotch match when he was replaced with Dr Roller. Ernst was listed in almost every newspaper story on Hackenschmidt in the months prior to the Gotch rematch. It's believed Hackenshmidt put out the Roller story in hopes of Gotch and Burns refusing to pay Santel.
Ad Santel's professional wrestling career took him all throughout the world, wrestling some of the top wrestlers of the 1910s, '20s and '30s including Joe Stecher, Gus Sonnenberg, John Pesek and Dick Daviscourt.
In 1922, Santel lost his World Light Heavyweight Championship to Gobar Goho of Calcutta (now Kolkata), India in San Francisco.