Legendary promoter Vince McMahon is a well-known figure in the wrestling world after having set up WrestleMania and still holding the CEO position at WWE.
However, there are some things which aren’t as well known about McMahon; some surprising and some just outright strange.
Find out what he did at Military School to get a court martial, the kind of pranks he likes to perform and, why he hates sneezing.
He didn’t see his dad, Vince McMahon Sr, until he was 12
Although he worked for his father for many years by commentating for what was then called WWWF (before rebranding to WWF and eventually, WWE) and followed in his footsteps to be a third-generation wrestling promoter, he didn’t meet his dad until he was 12 years old.
When McMahon’s dad left the family once his marriage with his wife Vicky fell apart, he opted to take their eldest son Rod with him, leaving Vince with his mum and stepfather to be raised as Vinnie Lupton (the surname of his stepdad.)
However, when the father and son reunited Vince caught the wrestling bug off his dad and went on to work with him before buying WWE off him in the 1980s and then monopolising the industry.
He was court marshalled at Military School
McMahon was wild and unruly as a teenager so in an attempt to calm him and down and straighten him out he was sent to Military School, but it didn’t have the desired effect.
Instead of following orders and behaving correctly, Vince fed his Colonel’s dog a laxative by putting it into a hamburger and giving it to the pooch.
As you can imagine the dog left a massive mess in the Colonel’s apartment later that day – it wasn’t enough to get him kicked out, but it didn’t go unpunished.
He went bankrupt before WrestleMania
After buying the promotional company from his dad in 1982, McMahon developed WrestleMania, the most successful professional wrestling event in the history of wrestling.
However, it almost didn’t happen – before it was set up he was declared bankrupt after getting involved in construction companies, horse farms and a cement plant which ultimately didn’t work out and left him in a lot of debt.
The banks eventually wrote off all this debt, which he blames on getting into bed with people that “weren’t very bright” business-wise.
But in 1985 WrestleMania was launched which is still held today between mid-March and mid-April by WWE.
He wanted to kill his abusive stepfather
When his father walked out on him and mother, instead opting to take his older brother with him, Vince was left to live with his mum’s boyfriend who became known as his stepfather.
But this wasn’t a step towards a normal family at all, his stepfather was an abusive man and he regrets not killing him for what he did to him and his mum.
“It’s unfortunate that he died before I could kill him. I would have enjoyed that,” he said during an interview with Playboy in 2001.
He has an irrational hatred of sneezing
You know that thing that everyone’s body forces them to do against their will – sneezing – well McMahon absolutely hates doing it and hates other people carrying out this perfectly normal bodily function.
The reason he doesn’t like sneezing is because he gets annoyed at not being in control and he believes other people should be strong enough to hold their own sneezes instead of giving into the urge.
Seeing sneezing as a weakness shows how Vince feels about people and how cutthroat the WWE world can be.
He adores pranking people
The wrestling industry is the ultimate pranking paradise and Vince has fully embraced it, sometimes even taking them a bit too far.
One memorable prank involved him calling the Police on Jonathan Coachman to arrest him for his backstage gambling pools on college football games which led to the wrestling personality breaking down in tears when he was it was simply a prank.
Another odd McMahon prank happened at a bowling alley when he threw away an NBC executive’s normal shoes away meaning he had to go home in bowling shoes.
Very strange!
He can’t stand people nodding at him
To follow on from his hatred of sneezing, Vince does not like people nodding at him when he speaks and one his employees found this out the hard way.
Stephanie McMahon, Vince’s daughter, had to take a writer out of a meeting because he was nodding, and she had to explain his weird pet peeve.
No sneezing and no nodding – who does McMahon want to employ, robots?
Words by Lucy Roberts, who you can follow on Twitter, @Lucy_Roberts_72.
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