SLAM! Wrestling Canadian Hall of Fame: Bob 'Legs' Langevin
|
|
From left: Bob 'Legs' Langevin, Dino Bravo, Guy Soucy and Paul LeDuc in 1989. Photo courtesy Paul LeDuc.
|
REAL NAME: Florian Langevin
BORN: October 13, 1913 in Magog, Quebec
280 pounds
AKA: Bob 'Legs' Langevin, The Million Dollar Leg Sensation
Where does one start when recounting the most amazing story of Bob 'Legs'
Langevin?
Well, since this is a wrestling site, the starting point will be in the
squared circle before moving on to prime ministers, governor generals, the
police, movie stars and the Pope.
Langevin wrestled for 38 years, and by his estimate, had 5,672 matches, and
went around the world three times.
His heydey was the 1930s to 1960s. You name them, he wrestled them.
"I wrestled Lou Thesz in Hawaii. I didn't win though," said Langevin in an
interview with SLAM! Wrestling at the Rougeaus' February 1999 show in
Montreal. "I faced [Killer]
Kowalski, I faced
Yvon Robert, then I wrestled
Jim Londos. I even wrestled Stranger Lewis in New York." In 1950, he even
wrestled former world boxing champion Joe Louis on three occasions.
"When you make that many bouts, you have to meet all these guys!" he
laughed.
|
|
Bob 'Legs' Langevin. Photo courtesy Bob Langevin.
|
Born in Magog, Quebec, Langevin was orphaned at age 4, and lived until age
7 in an orphanage run by nuns. He worked on farms until he was 14 and then
got a job at Dominion Textiles.
But it was a job at the Dow Brewery, carrying cases of beer, that made his
physique.
"I built my legs by squatting. Taking the case of beer down and up," he
explained. At 16, he started to learn amateur wrestling. Many people
encouraged him to give the pro game a try. Langevin saw Yvon Robert
wrestling, and decided to try it himself.
Borrowing money from his sister, he spent a year training with Yvon Robert,
Leo Lefebvre and Lou Gagnon. Then he completed his training with Frank
Sexton at the Montreal YMCA.
Beginning on the Quebec circuit, it didn't take him long to realize that
his given name of Florian wouldn't fly. So he became Bob Langevin. 'Legs'
followed not too long after.
Langevin explained how his nickname came about.
"There used to be a champion wrestler. He used the airplane scissors for hi
s finish. It was Jim Browning. He used to be champion," he said. "I was
wrestling Toronto. I had strong legs because, in the United States, I used
to split a bag of flour by squeezing with my legs. He thought that I had
good legs to make his hold. So, he showed me how to do it. The first time he
showed it to me, I did it perfectly, the hold that he was doing. That's when
the name came -- Bob 'Legs' Langevin -- because I had very, very strong
legs. And I was the only one in the world then to do this hold. When my
career finished, the hold finished with me, because no one else could do
it."
The legendary wrestler likes to bring up the story of how, when he was
young, a fortune teller told him that he would never travel much. One very
wrong prediction.
"I enjoyed travelling very much, from one town to another. I don't know if
it's because I was good, or whatever I was doing, [but] I could go to any
territory. When I had finished in one, I could to another one, the promoter
was giving the okay," Langevin recalled.
In Canada and the United States, he was a bad guy. But in Europe, he was a
good guy -- and even appeared in a few films with stars like Marlene
Dietrich, Charles Laughton and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
"To me, to be more popular with the people, I like better to be a nice guy"
Langevin said. "Because what made me good with them was on account of my
legs. For the hold that I was doing that no one else could do."
At age 19 in St. Jerome, Quebec, he was attacked by a fan with a piece of
wire. The attack left him impotent. Still, he insists that he received many
marriage proposals over the years, despite his injury.
During the Second World War, he was hired as a policeman on the murder
squad with the Quebec Provincial Police. After getting out of policing after
the war, his wrestling schedule lessened a bit.
Instead, Langevin took a young wrestler by the name of
Edouard Carpentier
under his wing, and became his manager. He also owned a nightclub, and got
involved in bodyguard work, and politics for the Quebec Liberals.
Perhaps you have heard of some of the people he served as bodyguard to:
former Prime Minister of Canada, Louis St. Laurent; Elizabeth Taylor and
Richard Burton; Princess Soroya, wife of the Shah of Iran.
In 1966, at the age of 51, he life changed drastically. Langevin was
diagnosed with cancer, and had an urgent colostomy, which removed part of
his intestines and colon, and left his powerful legs paralysed. It took
seven months of physiotherapy and much pain to be able to walk on his own
again.
Langevin even tried to commit suicide twice, depressed because he was no
longer the strapping, muscular wrestler known around the world. The
operation aged him, and changed his life forever. He can joke about it now,
saying of the suicide attempts that "God didn't want me in Hell either."
One saviour came in the form of Johnny Rougeau, who ironically, was to die
of cancer himself in 1983. Rougeau was the promoter in Montreal at the time.
"[Rougeau] said you're going to promote, and I'm going to wrestle. So I
started promoting at Centre Paul Sauvé," Langevin explained. He later filled
a similar role for promoter
Eddie Quinn. It was never his money promoting
the shows, but it was his face in front of the crowds. At its peak, the
Montreal-based promotion ran about 23 towns in Quebec. Langevin was promoter
to some degree in Montreal until about 1990, when the Centre Paul Sauvé was
closed.
At about the same time he got involved again with wrestling, a priest
encouraged him to tell other people about his battles with cancer and
suicide. Langevin found that he was in an unique position to be able to help
others.
Langevin became involved with various Ileostomy-Colostomy Assocations, and
the Canadian Cancer Society, and served on the board at St. Luke's Hospital
in Montreal. He also visited thousands of patients in hospitals,
convalescent homes and private houses.
In 1973, he took the esterostomy therapy course at the Centre Hospitalier
Universitaire de Sherbrooke and has since helped in many operations,
preparing patients, marking for the doctor where to operate. After the
operation, he helps with the rehabilitations and re-visits patients during
their recovery.
Needless to say, Langevin's battles with cancer, and determination to help
others have not gone unrecognized.
"In Canada, I'm the most-decorated person because I have the Order of
Canada, and I was decorated by the Queen," Langevin told SLAM! Indeed,
Langevin received a Silver Medal in 1977 during the Queen's Jubilee, has
been honoured by the Canadian Cancer Society, received the 'Vraie-Vie', the
highest honour given to volunteers, from the federal government. And on May
6, 1988, he received the Order of Canada from then-governor general Jeanne
Sauve. In September 1995, the WWF honoured him (and
Omer Marchessault) at a show in Montreal, and Jacques and
Raymond Rougeau presented Langevin with a plaque in mid-ring. The Illeostomy and
Colostomy Association of Montreal has even created The Florian 'Bob'
Langevin Trophy in his honour.
But, it is the January 1994 papal blessing from Pope John-Paul II that
stands out for Langevin.
Wrestling has been good to Langevin, and he still has a special place in
his heart for it.
He was honoured that Jacques Rougeau Jr. gave him tickets to come to his
February show.
Langevin was asked his impression of today's wrestling "There's so much
difference," he replied. "Sometimes I don't approve. But I think that it
must be good because there's more people that watch it than before."
He wishes that wrestling in general honoured its oldtimers more, like they
do in other sports. But he also recognizes that "there's too much politics"
for it to ever happen.
"To me, all my life, I did the best I could. I was well-liked, a villain or
not a villain. The people liked to see me," Legs Langevin concluded. "Every
wrestler, to be a good wrestler, he's got to be a little bit [of a]
psychologist, because you build your people up and then there's a limit to
it. What makes a great wrestler is that he knowns when the limit, how far he
can go to please the people."
And in Langevin's case, he took it to even greater heights once outside the
ring.
-- By GREG OLIVER, SLAM! Sports
Memories
I never saw Legs wrestle, at least not professionally.
I never saw any of the wrestlers he named wrestle either.
But I have seen his battle with suicide up close and in person. I battled it
myself. He battled it for a semblance of a reason at least, medical
problems beyond most peoples ability to cope. I battled it as pure
depression.
But you will see that for Florian and myself, it was a tag team effort with
the Lord in our corners and we have both come out the other side victorious.
He shares his life with countless others and deserves every blessing heaped
upon him.
I am just starting my journey into professional wrestling and I will use it
as a means to share my blessings with the world. After all it's hard not to
listen when your in a side headlock!
I hope you read this "Legs". You inspire me and further strengthen my faith.
May God Bless You "Legs"
Guy McDowell
