1985- The Screwjob that Changed WWF History. (No, not THAT one.)

People are pretty much aware of the most famous screwjob in WWF history. Bret Hart, WWF Champion, signs with WCW following WWF not being able to afford to pay him- he has creative control for the final 30 days of his contract and refuses to lose in the country of Canada or lose to Shawn Michaels (a problem since the last PPV before he was to go to WCW had him wrestling Shawn Michaels in Montreal, which is at last check in Canada), so WWF has to double-cross him and have him lose the belt to a fake submission hold.

But that was only the more well-known one. Let's go back about 12 years prior to the WWF's beginning.

It's 1983-84, the beginning of WWF changing from the Northeast territory to the national promotion it would become. Vince McMahon was trying to do something never before tried and needed a stroke of luck to do it. The luck happened without his involvement- on a plane trip from Puerto Rico, longtime WWF manager "Captain" Lou Albano was seated next to top '80s rock star Cyndi Lauper. The two struck up a friendship, leading to her casting Albano as her father in the "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" music video- and kickstarting an alliance between WWF and MTV. As part of the alliance (and some lucrative MTV specials that'd really give the WWF's plan a shot in the arm), an angle was worked out for Lauper to do dates with WWF in a storyline that had two angles: Albano manages The Fabulous Moolah, the longtime (28 years, to be exact) WWF Women's Champion and most women's wrestlers in the business's head trainer/booker, business manager, and pimp. Lauper would manage a different woman, and Lauper's client would go over.

The chosen woman was Wendi Richter, A rising prospect at the time, mostly in tag team matches. However, Richter was younger and prettier than most top women's names at the time, so she was given the nod. The storyline started and exploded out of the gate- even though "The Brawl to End it All" only showed the Richter/Moolah match on TV [with a Hulk Hogan/Greg Valentine match on closed-circuit TV; all other matches were dark matches], it still did a 9.0 Nielsen rating, MTV's highest rated show in history...and it was off to the races. Richter changing her gimmick from 'generic cowgirl' to 'friends with Cyndi Lauper' made her one of the biggest stars in the company- at her peak running neck and neck with Hulk Hogan as a star, and was every bit as equal a name to him at the time.

And then, came November 25, 1985.

During this time period, Richter was feuding with a masked rival "The Spider Lady", who was usually performed by wrestler Glen Deane [a relatively younger woman]. However, that night WWE offered Richter a new contract. Richter refused to sign immediately, choosing to have her lawyer look it over [in large part due to problems with her payoffs: Despite being one of the lynchpins for Wrestlemania I at the time, the main event wrestlers received anywhere between $20,000 and $100,000 for their match that night. Richter received $5,000, and usually got $2,500 a week similar to the opening match jobbers for her work. In addition, she was added to the Saturday Morning cartoon "Hulk Hogan's Rock and Wrestling" and was seeking royalties.]

She refused to look it over- and suddenly there was something weird about the Spider Lady. Instead of looking like a in-shape woman in her 20s, the Spider Lady looked like a grandma in her 60s somehow [Richter has claimed she didn't know about the switch in Spider Lady wrestlers, but due to the age of Moolah meaning there's no hiding who she was, that is highly unlikely.] Once the change happened, the fix was in. The referee counted three when Richter clearly kicked out at one, and the Spider unmasked to reveal Moolah.

Following the match, Richter left the arena and was gone from WWF. She would not show up on a WWF event for 25 years until her WWE HOF induction in 2010, and not perform in a WWE ring for 27 years during a guest appearance on Raw. While WWE has hyped up the "Women's Evolution", peaking even for tonight's night one of Wrestlemania likely having the third show where a women's match main evented the WWE's signature event, people can only wonder what would have happened if they played ball here and top women's stars were on the same celebrity air as the top men's stars all along.