Big Time Wrestling was a staple of the regional carnival circuit and regularly visited New England's summer resort towns.

Santos slowly lost his hold on Boston after WWWF television programming began airing in New England and the emergence of Sammartino as a major star in the Northeastern United States.

Tony Santos, Sr. formed Big Time Wrestling following the death of Paul Bowser and subsequent departure of Eddie Quinn from Boston in 1960.

[6] When Doyle left the U.S. with Jim Barnett to start World Championship Wrestling in Australia, Jack Pfefer was brought in as a booker.

Frankie Scarpa was the promotion's main attraction,[7][8][9] however, Santos built a small group of his own stars by the early-1960s including The Boston Bruiser, Bull Montana,[10] Gypsy Joe[11] Jesse James and Alma Mills.

[17] In April 1961, Bearcat Wright defeated Killer Kowalski for the BTW Heavyweight Championship in Boston,[18][19][20] becoming one of the first African-Americans to win a major singles title during the Territory-era.

[5] A few months later, Santos faced a second challenge when Abe Ford, representing McMahon's New York–based World Wide Wrestling Federation, arrived in the city.

Ford's first-ever event on April 20, 1963, however, turned into a complete disaster when half of his wrestlers failed to appear including the recently crowned WWWF World Heavyweight Champion Buddy Rogers.

[5] This time, Ford had considerably more support from Vince McMahon Sr. which included the debut of the WWWF's Heavyweight Wrestling on WIHS (Channel 38).

He also took a more aggressive approach against the Santos-Pfefer group including the placement of special newspaper advertisements attacking their "knockoff" versions of WWWF wrestlers.

Abe Ford told me it took him years to rebuild the popularity of wrestling from the days that Paul Bowser ran [Boston] because there was such a dry spell.

A high point in the Samartino-Tanaka feud occurred at the Boston Garden on September 30, 1967, when Tanaka pinned the champion while using his feet on the ropes for leverage.

Ford's efforts ensured the WWWF was in Boston to stay, beginning the turning point in the war with Big Time Wrestling, with the city becoming one on the most valuable markets in Vince McMahon's territory.

The young champion from the WWWF was readily embraced by a new generation of fans and ultimately eclipsed Scarpa, middle-aged and in poor health, as the region's most popular "babyface" wrestler.

[17] With the additional star power provided by the NWA, however, McMahon was able to maintain control over Boston while preventing Big Time Wrestling, which still enjoyed a significant cult following, from making a comeback in the city.

The experiment with television was short-lived, however, as many local fans stayed home to watch the shows on tv hurting attendance for the live events.

Santos also had ties to the Tennessee area and used wrestlers from the Southeastern U.S. including, most notably, Jackie Fargo and Buddy Fuller from NWA Mid-America.

[53] Rhodes drove to Boston after seeing a newspaper advertisement for the Santos promotion, and despite not having any wrestling experience, bluffed his way into working for the company by using his real life friendships with Bobby Duncum and the Funk brothers.

Mills, who was the head instructor for female students at the Santos wrestling school, spent 18 months training Black Ozzie before their debut match at Martha's Vineyard in July 1959.

[60] At local carnivals and fairs, the promotion often put out an open challenge to the audience offering as much as $50 if they could pin one of their wrestlers – usually the company's "veteran shooters" Killer Curt Douglas and Ronnie Hill.

One of the adult carnival bouts nearly caused a riot when a group of men attempted to storm the ring to save their friend being pummelled by Ronnie Hill.

Hill and Les Thatcher, who was refereeing the bout, were saved from the mob thanks to local police officers, nearby "carnies" and drivers from the Joie Chitwood Thrill Show.

During Pfefer's tenure as booker, the promotion used a number of "sound-alike" wrestlers[3] including, most notably, "Hobo" Brazil (Austin Johnson[7] and Rufus R. Jones), "Ted" Blassie (Don Carson), The Great Mortimer (Harley Race[61][62]), Haystacks Muldoon (Bill Toomey[7]), Lou Khesz (Al Tomko), Prince Kukuya (Carlos Colon), Bull Montana (Lenny Montana), Franz (Chris Markoff) and Naldo Von Eric (Chris Jelavrou), "Bummy" Rogers (Ripper Collins), Bruno "Sanmartino" (Isaac Rosario)[63][64] and The Fabulous Zangaroos (Bull Montana and Gene Dundee).

One night, upon discovering Pfefer taking a nap in the locker room, rookie Joe "Red" Sasso mistook him for a homeless man and threw the elderly, shabbily-dressed booker out of the building.

After an all-night hunt, Ozzie was spotted at 6:45 AM by local patrolman Thomas Michenzie walking through a field at the end of Pellana Road in Norwood.

On September 26, 1962, 40-year-old Manuel Silvia of Fall River suffered a knee injury after a 280-pound wrestler was thrown out of the ring by his opponent and fell into the front row.

[70] Starting in 1970, Boston had become the final part of the WWWF's "Northeast Triangle", a wrestling territory which included Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, New York City, New York and Washington, D.C. By this time, however, Abe Ford had fallen out of favor with Vince McMahon Sr. as the WWWF's local promoter in Boston and had since been replaced by Bobby Harmon and his manager Ernie Roth.

In 1974, Tony Santos Sr. decided to retire from pro wrestling to work in the country music industry with wrestler-turned-music producer Buddy Lee at his famed talent agency.

On April 15, 2006, BTW's Killer Kowalski Tribute Show in Lynn, Massachusetts, headlined by Dusty Rhodes vs. Steve Corino in a Texas Bullrope match, was attended by 1,100 fans.

On March 27, 2009, a crowd of 1,687 showed up to Danburymania to see John Walters defend the BTW Heavyweight Championship against Jay Lethal with Ric Flair as special referee.