I don't know that there's been any family in wrestling,
either related for real or professionally,
that had as much impact, as much reach,
and as much influence as the Graham family did.
Graham lands the hardest punch in wrestling history.
Eddie Graham was not only a great wrestler and
a great promoter, he was a visionary.
Eddie's Championship Wrestling From Florida,
it was built on wrestling,
and the main events were violent.
Agh!
He gave the people the circus.
Eddie Graham coming back into that ring after...
[narrator] Eddie Graham was a titan of
professional wrestling, who ruled his era,
and passed on his iconic legacy
to his only son, Mike.
The son of any great athlete,
they've got the scrutiny on them.
But Mike Graham didn't take shit off anybody.
I think maybe he felt like he had to be
as good as his father.
Mike Graham followed in his father's footsteps
to wrestling greatness...
and also descended into his own dark world of
pain, addiction, and grief.
The wrestling culture is very cutthroat.
You have to have this thing about you,
where nothing's gonna break you.
He was under tremendous pressure
from so many different angles.
Mike kept shit to himself, too, like his father.
The apple didn't fall far from the tree.
It all gets pushed under the rug in certain families.
Who are you supposed to go to for help?
The tragic legacy of a wrestling dynasty,
haunted by self -destruction and suicide.
It is with a deep sense of regret that I announce the
untimely death of a friend, colleague, and a leader.
It was like somebody dropped a bomb on all of us.
Grandfather, father...
and then the kid.
That runs in the family genes, right.
Once that spotlight's gone or once you
don't have that ring, like, it's emptiness.
♪
Championship Wrestling From Florida was one of
the most respected and successful
wrestling promotions of modern times.
The legacy of the Graham family in Florida is,
they meant professional wrestling
to millions of people, all over the state,
for almost thirty years.
One member of the Graham family was on the card,
or in the main event, or behind the scenes.
In the glory years when they were selling
a million tickets a year just in the state of Florida
to see live matches,
and their TV ratings were Super Bowl level.
I guess I was used to it, like,
when you don't know what's different,
it's just what your life is.
I just knew that that was a huge part of, like,
my grandfather and my dad's life.
I am Nicole Gossett, and Eddie Graham was
my grandfather, and Mike Graham is my father.
And that's Eddie Graham in the centre of the ring now,
his son Mike watching very carefully.
Every Sunday, they'd have matches
at the Eddie Graham Stadium.
And, the first phone call in the morning was my
grandfather calling my dad to talk about the night.
We'd wake up, and we'd walk into like our family room to
see who was crashed out on our couch for
a little while, you know.
'Cause we had different wrestlers
sleeping on our couch at times.
Magnum T.A.- Terry Allen- when he first started,
he slept on our couch, and he was so sweet.
And so, I was pretty accustomed to having big,
boisterous personalities and people around.
The one that scared me was Andre the Giant.
When he came, like, crouching through
our front door, I- he freaked me out,
yeah, I was scared. [Laughing]
[Cheering]
It was the family business.
Everybody wanted to be on the roster of
Championship Wrestling From Florida.
For the money, the weather, for the girls...
And also, to learn from Eddie Graham.
I'm Jim Cornette.
I've had a 40-year career in professional wrestling,
but for even longer than that,
I've been a collector and an historian.
Eddie could make you believe that he was the toughest man
in the state of Florida, which is exactly what
most of the fans believed.
He just had a magnetism about him,
and he was somebody that you wanted to listen to,
and if you were working for him,
you wanted to follow.
A leader, a general.
I was born up in them Tennessee Mountains, brother.
If you didn't have heart and desire,
you were finished to begin with.
So, I ain't gonna lay down and quit.
That's my bottom line.
There you have it.
The comments from Eddie Graham.
There goes a wrestler, and one hell of a man.
Eddie was a legend in Florida.
He could get a reaction just walking to the ring.
My name is Kevin Sullivan.
I worked for the Graham family for decades,
and I've been a wrestler for over 50 years.
Your nightmare is just starting.
Eddie was about 5"10 and a half,
wide shoulders, bleach blond hair,
and he just had a presence about him.
Nobody else was ever in his class.
The genius of the business, our Einstein.
Eddie was from the hills in Chattanooga.
Very difficult life.
His father died young.
Eddie came up through the college of hard knocks.
Just a good old touch country boy.
My name is Dotty Curtis,
and I am the wife of the late Don Curtis.
Don was a very, very knowledgeable wrestler.
Don and Eddie met back in around '52,
I think it was.
They became friends, and Eddie asked to Don to
come up here to Jacksonville, and
he was the promoter up here for quite a few years.
Now it's Graham, and a good, solid chop across the throat.
Eddie Graham is probably one of the
finest wrestlers that was around in his time.
I don't think there'll ever be another Eddie Graham.
Though born Edward Gossett, Eddie's wrestling career is
forever altered when he adopts the "Graham" name
from one of the ring's top stars.
♪
The originator of the Graham wrestling family dynasty
was Dr. Jerry Graham.
He had the bleached hair,
and he carried himself like a star.
And what's more, he had the gift of gab.
Brother teams in New York were over at the time.
But, if you could find a guy that looks something
like you, nobody's reading your birth certificate,
just say it's your brother.
Eddie Gossett was in Texas wrestling as Rip Rogers,
and a lot of people told him,
"You look like Jerry Graham."
Jerry and Eddie connected, and in 1958,
the Graham Brothers, "The Golden Grahams",
as a team, ruled the roost in wrestling
in the biggest TV market in the country,
where wrestling is already red-hot,
being presented in the most famous arena in the world,
Madison Square Garden.
Dr. Graham has just the treatment for that
tired, nagging backache.
Eddie performs the surgery
while Jerry looks on approvingly.
If you could sell out Madison Square Garden,
you could sell out anywhere.
Eddie and Dr. Jerry made a fantastic duo,
hated by everybody,
and just really drew the crowds in.
Just main eventing Madison Square Garden,
they were probably making close to six figures per year
in 1958, 1959, and that would translate into somewhere
over a million bucks apiece in today's money.
With money and fame to burn,
Eddie and Jerry are box office sensations.
But before long, Dr. Jerry's behaviour outside the ring
becomes even more notorious than his matches.
Dr. Jerry Graham, as big of a genius as he was
in wrestling, was an alcoholic,
was mentally ill, and...
he got in a lot of trouble and caused a lot of trouble.
Jerry Graham, to impress fans,
used to light his cigars with $100 bills.
Or, he would walk into a biker bar and walk right up
in front of a guy and say- [Shouting] "Hey!
My name's Balls! You got any?"
♪
But the most shocking incident involving
Jerry Graham transpires years later,
in his hometown of Phoenix, Arizona.
One day he got the word that
his mother was sick and in the hospital.
And he called the hospital, and he told the doctor that
his mother better come out of that hospital in good health,
and then she died.
So, Dr. Jerry Graham shows up with a 12-gauge shotgun...
a .38 caliber revolver,
and an 8-inch long hunting knife...
And appears...
in the intensive care unit, where he fires a shot-
[Bang]
...at the doctor.
And then goes down the hallway and
grabs the gurney...
that his mother's body is on.
And as he's taking it down the hallway,
here come the orderlies and the interns.
And they're trying to tackle him.
So, he grabs his mother's corpse and
slings her over his shoulder.
And he's screaming,
"I just want to take her and bury her!"
♪
Jerry Graham was so good at his chosen profession.
And he was also completely, utterly insane.
♪
After two years, Eddie Graham
could not put up with
being partners with Jerry Graham anymore.
And he had to leave the greatest spot that
he'd ever had.
In 1960, Eddie uproots his family from New York,
and settles in Tampa, the hub of
Championship Wrestling From Florida.
He was a visionary. He said to himself,
"I know my capabilities as a wrestler.
I can get over here. I can be the star.
And this whole thing can be bigger."
And over the next 25 years,
not only did he become the most successful wrestler
in the history of Florida, and the most popular-
but he worked his way into being able to buy into the
promotion, then taking it over completely,
and expanding wrestling in the state of Florida,
and made it the place that everybody wanted to go
to wrestle and to learn.
Eddie probably bought the territory just knowing that
he had the wherewithal, the brains,
the connections with the talent,
to take the territory to another level.
Hi, I'm B. Brian Blair,
and I started wrestling in Florida in 1977.
Got my start right here in Tampa.
Blair has him up, the Airplane Spin!
The Armory was hot.
I would call it like Saturday Night Fever.
It was so entertaining.
Tonight, we're in a jam -packed Armory in Tampa,
Florida, the home of Championship Wrestling.
All the wrestlers from Championship Wrestling
From Florida gave their all
every Tuesday night at that place.
Growing up in Tampa, wrestlers were just huge.
The fans would come up to them.
We couldn't go anywhere without someone
wanting to talk to my dad or my granddad.
And it was telling that Eddie Graham would have
continued good relations with Vince McMahon Sr,
and later on with Vince McMahon Jr.
He was someone that the other promoters
all called to ask for advice.
[News] The president of the NWA, Eddie Graham,
now describing the conditions in the contract,
both wrestlers are to...
[Jim] The National Wrestling Alliance was an
organization of promoters from regional territories
all over the country.
There was no major decision made in the NWA
without consulting Eddie Graham.
He was president twice.
He was well-respected.
But he was a complicated guy.
Eddie would do some violent things.
He was a tough, tough person.
You either did what he told you to do,
or you were out.
♪
Now, there was the side of Eddie Graham that
did want to keep the credibility
of the wrestling business, and guys were expected
to lay shit in to make people believe
what they were doing was real.
Eddie Graham was a stickler. He said,
"If anybody here gets their ass kicked by
a mark, you're fired." In other words,
you get your butt kicked by a wrestling fan,
you're out of here.
You protect the business at all costs.
I guess you could call it, um...
maybe a, a horror chamber down there
at the Sportatorium.
The fellas would say they wanted to wrestle,
and they figured all you had to do is
get in the ring and perform.
They put them through their paces and, you know,
some of them were just- they couldn't take it.
I had to...
do things that I'm not proud of.
Ah, that I didn't like to do, but-
A couple of 'em, I did.
Well, they wanted you to break people's bones.
[Wrestler shouting & groaning]
Somehow, this guy got booked for TV.
He said, "Oh, I've worked some local shows.
I'm a butcher by trade."
And I see Eddie's ears perk up like a dog's.
And the guy says,
"I'm gonna make you look good.
I'm gonna tell all the guys you're a nice guy."
So, the guy drifts off in the corner, and Eddie said,
"If he doesn't come back bleeding, you're through."
♪
I kept my job.
I had a family.
At that period, it was my livelihood.
[Off-screen] Right.
It wasn't his livelihood.
He was gonna go back to that job no matter what.
Worst thing I probably ever did.
Eddie's hard-nosed ambition to dominate
the wrestling trade is all-consuming.
But his desire for power is far from his only flaw.
Wrestler and promoter, Eddie Graham,
is known for his unrelenting drive, limitless ambition,
and his determination to legitimize the business.
Eddie was a go-getter.
He had a portfolio of a lot of property.
He expanded outside of the wrestling business.
He wanted to write cheques rather than receive cheques.
Eddie wanted to elevate the perception of wrestling.
That's where he started getting involved with the
Boys Ranch, and with charitable organizations in
every town and every county in Florida.
They're furthering amateur wrestling programs.
Eddie was a rock star in Florida.
I mean, politicians were kissing Eddie's ass.
To be seen on Championship Wrestling Florida
when you were running for office was a big deal.
And I'm sure...
Eddie got favours from that too.
Eddie was involved in everything.
I think Eddie put a lot of pressure on himself.
He never wanted to fail in anything he did.
And for most of the things that he did,
like flying and being a boatsman and that-
diving- he was fabulous.
His only problem was that alcohol got to him.
One night, Eddie was drinking and,
decided he was going out on his boat.
And his son, Mike, was panicking
'cause he took off in the car.
And so, Mike, as a young boy, he got on his bicycle,
and he drove to a cross bridge over the water.
And his idea was
he was going to jump off that bridge and
onto the boat, 'cause he was afraid his father would
kill himself out in the water.
And thank God, he missed the boat.
I mean, it wasn't there.
'Cause if he'd have jumped off of that bridge,
he would have possibly drowned in the water.
That scared Eddie.
That was one of his sobering moments,
if you want to call it that.
♪
Mike idolized his father, and vice versa.
I believe you told me that your own boy
does quite a little wrestling.
Well, yes, he does.
In fact, I'm hoping he'll take the state....
state tournament in the 95-pound division.
-How old is he? -He's 10 years' old.
Even though he's a lovable father, he was demanding.
He put high expectations on Mike.
♪
Then when my dad started wrestling,
he obviously started wrestling under "Mike Graham".
So, maybe that gave him a little bit more of
a chip on his shoulder at times.
[Announcer] At 222 and 1/2 pounds,
Mike Graham, Mike Graham!
He gave me all the tools to get as good as
I could get before I turned pro.
But even at that, the pressure really-
and a lot of it came from him-
I loved going someplace where he wasn't
gonna be 'cause I knew I could go out,
I could wrestle. I could come back,
and it wasn't constant scrutiny.
My grandfather did throw my dad in the ring, be like,
"Okay, let's see what you got."
Graham breaking up again. Arm Drag Takedown.
I remember my dad always saying, "Nicole, don't worry.
The bigger they are, the harder they fall."
He was not intimidated by anyone's size.
[Jim] Mike was shorter and
didn't have the same over-the-top personality.
But he had the wrestling knowledge in there,
growing up with Eddie Graham.
There it is, there's the fall right out of the blue.
[Cheering]
So, he was a very good worker.
He was in plenty of great tag teams,
but the attention never went on him, specifically.
And to be honest, he didn't want to be the top guy.
He didn't want to be the big star because people
would have said it was because of his father.
[Kevin] Mike swallowed a lot of shit,
you know, and let things go.
He did as well, if not better,
than anybody I ever saw at being a promoter's kid,
to blend in with the guys.
[Announcer] And Graham after Kevin Sullivan.
I had the pleasure of being his partner,
and I had the pleasure of being his opponent.
Can't believe this! They're going to hang him!
I get violent, Sullivan. I'm waiting for you.
If you got on Mike's bad side,
you were on his bad side and he wasn't gonna back down.
He knew the pressure he was under.
He couldn't go home if he got his ass kicked.
My grandpa was bloody all the time, right?
My dad also was bloody.
So, mornings in my house,
my mom would get my brother and I up.
My dad would be in bed 'cause he'd get home so late,
and he was just hungover and beat up.
And we'd go in to like kiss my dad goodbye
in the morning, and there'd be like tape on his forehead
with blood and like bite marks on his finger, and...
the smell of alcohol oozing from his body.
[Laughing] And, we'd kiss him goodbye.
"See you later, Dad! Have a good day!"
[TV Host] Let me turn right now to Mike Graham
because I know he's...
As the 1980s dawned, Mike Graham joins Eddie
in steering the ship at Championship Wrestling
From Florida, as the company becomes a
breeding ground for wrestling legends...
including Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair,
and Dusty Rhodes.
I am the dream! I am the man!
Go on with it, baby!
Dusty was like the original surrogate son.
He loved Dusty, and Dusty loved him too.
Dusty Rhodes, of course, was always around.
We'd all go out to the beach together.
Dusty would always say that fat looks better tan.
[Laughing]
[Jim] Eddie Graham took Dusty under his wing,
and he became the most popular wrestler in the
history in the state of Florida.
[Brian] When Dusty turned babyface,
the territory was on fire.
All of us became so close, we were like family.
[Announcer] And now the ring beginning to fill.
Gerry Brisco charges in! Don Serrano!
Brian Blair! And a host of others!
As this younger generation elevates the territory to
a whole new level, Eddie, now in his 50s,
decides to quit the ring for good...
just as his pursuits outside of the business
begin to bring him trouble.
There were a lot of things going on in Eddie's life.
He was torn between two women.
He was in business with some shady characters.
I could tell that Eddie was drinking too much.
He was maybe taking too much medication.
He had a lot of struggles in his life, um...
personally.
[Dotty] When he came back on the plane
at nighttime...
there was a store that was open,
and he could get a cheap bottle of wine there.
Every time he was driving,
he would chug-a-lug that wine down,
and he would take the bottle and
he'd throw it out of the car...
into the grass.
And he came home one night,
and the place wasn't open.
And he was so desperate.
He went out into the field there,
and he grovelled around in the dirt and
found all these bottles, and he sat there in the field
and drank the dregs out of those bottles.
By this time, alcohol had taken over.
He couldn't stop.
Consumed by his alcoholism,
and burdened with personal and professional troubles,
Eddie Graham struggles to find meaning
beyond the ring.
Over time, people forget who you are, right?
My grandmother told a story about how they had gone to
a restaurant, and they didn't know who he was.
He wasn't in the spotlight anymore,
but I remember my grandmother being like,
how he was just not himself after that encounter.
When that career is over, who are you?
Who's looking back in the mirror?
One of the last cheques my grandfather wrote
was to a liquor store for $8.
In the memo, it said, "Peace of Mind".
I think if anyone's had time of their life and
they just can't find comfort within themselves,
and they feel like everything's out of control,
you just don't have that peace of mind and,
he couldn't find it.
He turned 55.
And, I had gone over to my grandparents' house.
And I was roller-skating, and so I was like skating
around him in circles, and I'm like,
"So, what did you get for your birthday?"
He's like, "55." I was like, "55 what?"
He said, "55 years."
Looking back, I realize,
he was telling me that he was...
done.
♪ [Somber] ♪
That he got 55 years, was what he had.
♪
I was at the Super Bowl. The Miami Dolphins
were playing the San Francisco 49ers.
They paged me, "Mike Graham!
Mike Graham! Please come to the box office."
I walked into the box office, and said, "Hey,
my name's Mike Graham. You paged me?"
And the woman goes, "Oh, yeah, you gotta call home."
Call home.
"What's wrong, what's wrong, what's wrong?"
"It's your dad." "Dad?
What's wrong with my dad?"
His wife, Lucy, went out-
is what she told my daughter.
And when she came back, he had shot himself,
not once, but twice.
That's what I heard from what the coroner said.
And, I will spare you the gory details
about the bedroom.
He's in the hospital, and he's hooked up to machines,
and a family member has to say to
unplug him or keep him alive.
And I got back home the next morning...
and went to the hospital, and there he sat,
back in the corner of his head all bandaged up
and everything.
And I said, "Well, it was no accident."
So, I looked at Mom, and I said, "Mom,
you know, we gotta do it.
He wouldn't want to be here like this."
So, we went out and said, "Okay, pull it."
And he lived about...
ah, 5 minutes.
It was shocking.
I mean, everybody was in a state of shock.
It is with a deep set of regret that I announce to you
at this time the untimely death of a friend,
a colleague, and a leader...
Eddie Graham.
♪
I immediately started crying.
I, I couldn't believe it, I mean...
Why? Why, Eddie?
Why would you do that to your son?
To your...
to your grandchildren.
We were young, but my brother was like,
"If he loved us so much, how could he do this?"
My brother was very attached to my grandfather,
yeah, very attached.
[Kevin] I think that people knew he was depressed,
but they never thought Eddie would go that far.
He was keeping that to himself.
[Dotty] I think he bottled a lot of it up because
he didn't want people to know he wasn't
as strong as his outside persona was.
He realized that if he let people know he was weak that
there were people that would love to have just walked in
and taken over, and I think he was probably
fighting for the territory, too.
♪
We hear the news, "Eddie Graham's dead." And...
holy shit, what's gonna happen to Florida?
We found out within a year,
Florida was on its last legs.
Vince McMahon was starting the national expansion
in 1984, and the territories were going out of business
because Vince was trying to suck up all the talent.
When WWE...
started robbing the territories,
Eddie saw the writing on the wall...
probably much earlier than most of the people did.
Yeah.
Yeah, big time.
Well, Dusty left.
Took the whole crew with him.
Dad had spent years getting Dusty over and
creating Dusty Rhodes, but when Dusty left,
he took half the territory with him.
And that really made Dad mad.
It was like he was almost trying to kill the territory
for taking all the talent with him.
In 1984, Dusty Rhodes leaves Florida
to work for Jim Crockett Promotions.
With the wrestling industry in chaos,
Mike Graham is still reeling from his father's death
when he inherits the daunting task of leading
Championship Wrestling From Florida.
Mike picked up like a man,
ran the territory and...
you know, life went on.
[Jim] Mike was, obviously,
attempting to fill his father's shoes.
It wasn't just him trying to do everything,
but it just, it wasn't the same place.
Where have you been? You've been home!
-[Indistinct shouting] -Hey, shut up a second!
They even ran an angle after Eddie's death.
The Freebirds were down there,
and they were trying to heat things up, and they thought,
well, if we desecrate the memory of Florida's most
popular wrestler ever, then the fans will hate us.
Like father, like son! You're a loser!
[Fans shouting & screaming]
Eddie would have wanted Mike to use his death
in something that enhanced wrestling.
I'm gonna prove to you that he was more of a man
than the three of you will ever be as long as you live.
Your [censored] are mine.
It was too far, it was too much.
The fans could tell it was desperation because
they could see the crowds had shrunk.
[Nicole] At the time, things were already shifting.
I guess cable TV was starting to come out.
And my dad was just trying to
keep it afloat and, no matter what he did,
it wasn't gonna quite stay afloat.
Struggling under the weight of Eddie's absence,
the once great territory lasts just two more years
before closing its doors.
Eddie would've been the only one to be able to save it
because of all the NWA promoters,
of every other territory in the country,
the one guy that had the best relationship
with Vince McMahon Sr,
and would have had one with Vince Jr,
was Eddie Graham, and he was gone.
Mike and I were at a bar
having a couple beers...
just talking about his dad, and all of a sudden,
he broke down.
I could tell that his dad not being there
weighed heavy on Mike every single day.
Already grieving the death of his father and the
loss of their family's wrestling empire,
Mike Graham is soon to face another devastating tragedy.
Following his father's death and the collapse of
their company, Mike Graham must now forge a new path
outside the promotion that has defined his life's work.
This should be an interesting matchup-
Mike Graham and Diamond Dallas Page-
to take on Bill Cashier and Jushin "Thunder" Liger.
By that point, Mike was closing in on 40.
He got a position with WCW, and he was trying to
help mentor some of the younger guys.
Obviously, people who knew Mike and knew Eddie
respected him and etc., but I think, unfortunately,
he never made his mark in WCW as anybody with a lot of pull
because he was just one of the soldiers at that point.
Ah, right in the face!
I think that when it shifted and it was more theatrics,
it was being written by people that had no idea
about wrestling, he got a little bit bitter
'cause he was old school.
My dad was definitely not a corporate guy.
Mike never reached the pinnacle of Eddie's dreams,
but he still had a very successful wrestling career
and, he was a good businessman.
He had a great lifestyle, he lived on the water.
He had a multitude of boats.
He won a bunch of offshore races.
[Nicole] My brother loved racing boats, and so,
my dad and brother actually got the chance
to race a couple times.
My dad never wanted to sit still.
He would always be like,
"Yeah, you sleep when you die."
He got his first tattoo when he was 40,
and it was, like a skull with like fire coming
out of the head and a lightning bolt
going through it.
And then underneath it, it said, "Peace of Mind".
So, my dad would always talk to my brother about it.
Peace of mind, like, if you don't have it...
you have nothing.
But like his father before him,
Mike's search for inner peace often ends
at the bottom of a bottle.
He had two driver's licenses, actually.
One, legally, under Mike Gossett,
and one under Mike Graham.
♪
So, Mike Gossett got one DUI.
Then Mike Graham got one.
And then, his drinking got so much worse.
After my grandfather passed away,
he was miserable and...
it just, he changed.
Normally, you know, my dad was not like that.
He never showed that side to my brother and I.
He was always just upbeat.
More tough to like my brother, I think,
because he wanted him to be a strong, strong man.
Stephen did have to fight and...
prove that he wasn't a wimp, growing up.
Because he was from a wrestling family and
he did have kind of like a stronger build,
I think everyone expected him to be
some tough, mean guy.
I think that that hurt him in the long run,
but he just kind of never found his stride.
We talked every day, you know,
text, phone call, whatever.
I sent my brother a text in the morning,
and he didn't respond, and I just thought
he was working or doing something.
And then my dad called me,
asking me if I'd heard from Stephen.
And I was like, "I'll go check on him."
♪
And so, that's how we found out...
that he took his life.
♪
When I found my brother, I, you know,
ran outside and I called my dad first.
♪
My dad was saying he'd be there.
I'm like, "No, no, don't come here, don't come here."
♪
And so, once I was able to leave,
I walked in the kitchen with my dad, and he said...
[Exhaling sharply]
He said, "It's a good thing you found Stephen
because if I would have found him,
you'd be burying both of us 'cause I'd have
taken my life right then and there."
[B. Brian Blair] It just floored me.
I don't know what the demons were that got him.
Again, now I hear his, his sister, poor, little Nicole,
you know, just... distraught.
His dad, everybody, distraught, you know.
It just didn't have to be.
I wasn't expecting it, um, at all.
'Cause Stephen and I went through and saw
how hard it was with my grandfather.
We saw what it did to my dad.
We saw how it absolutely destroyed our family.
But, with my grandfather doing what he did,
I felt that it made it an option.
It turned into something that my brother felt,
"Ah, he did it." Now we have my grandfather,
and my brother- who is my best friend-
you know, and I found my brother.
So, everyone was so worried about me.
But, I was worried about my dad.
Haunted by the death of his son, Stephen,
in 2010, Mike Graham struggles with the pain of
losing another family member to suicide.
I think every parent blames themself.
He said, "I must have been a shitty son and
a shitty father." Pretty heavy.
Sometimes we're our own worst critics,
and we're hard on ourselves about different things, and...
I think that, you know, there's many things that
Mike could have thought about,
and it was just another one of the things
just knocking on the bad side of his brain.
You know, between his dad and now my brother,
he just, he just absolutely was crushed.
[Kevin] Mike and I were close, but we weren't that
fuzzy, fuzzy good feeling close.
He called me up and said,
"Hey, you know I love you, right?"
I said, "I love you too, Mike."
And that was it, he hung up the phone.
♪
My dad met my daughter and I at a park,
and I was like, "Dad, this ends with Stephen."
I'm like, "Look at her. She doesn't deserve this.
What your dad did was horrible.
What Stephen did...
we're never gonna recover from it, but this ends now.
Look at her. She doesn't deserve this."
And he was like, "You're right, Nicole.
You're right, Nicole. You're right."
[Exhaling sharply]
Less than two years later, he did the same.
Well, he was in Daytona Beach.
Bike Week or something...
with his wife.
And...
from what I gather...
she went outside and said
she was gonna go see some friends.
♪
When she got back and opened the door,
simultaneously she heard a gunshot.
♪
And, there was Mike-
dead- in his son Stephen's boots.
♪
He couldn't break the cycle.
You can't see what's behind the person's eyes.
They're telling you one thing, they're smiling,
but they may be, you know,
they may be just absolutely torn up inside.
Then you realize he's gone.
End of story, you know.
No more, there's no more.
I mean, I was still trying to pick up the pieces
after my brother.
And it wasn't, it was less than two years apart
between my brother and my dad.
After the conversations I had with my dad,
asking him, telling him, begging him,
"Please, this ends with Stephen,"
it was just a different level of pain.
♪
Mike had been away from wrestling for some time,
and I hadn't seen him in years,
but then the news comes out, and I-
That was a shock.
Even if you're not shocked at anything in wrestling,
you still think, well, the same thing
can't happen to two different generations.
They can't do the same thing.
And it happened to three generations.
You just, how much...
the same family, what- how much more can go on?
The pattern of suicide that haunts the Gossett family
reaches far beyond Eddie, Mike, and Stephen.
This heartbreaking cycle of tragedy actually
spans four generations, and five men.
A lot of people don't know this,
but Eddie's father killed himself.
And also, Eddie's brother, Skip, killed himself.
It's a very vicious cycle
when you have more than one suicide.
One suicide is one too many.
But when you have multiple suicides within
the same family structure, it's...
just tragic.
My only explanation or thought,
'cause I'm not a doctor, obviously,
but is that when one happens,
then it makes it viable for someone else
when they're having a hard time.
And also, the fact that depression and
addiction is hereditary.
And unless you have someone step in and
recognize it, and get help, and...
let them know that it's not normal what you're feeling,
but it's gonna be okay,
that just wasn't quite happening in my family.
Big-time lesson to learn, because it isn't just...
the people that go.
It's the people that are left behind.
Every burden for Nicole to carry,
and every burden for her daughter.
We are at the old Armory, which is now the
Brian Glazer Jewish Community Center.
And, Larry Simon, who was Boris Malenka,
who my grandfather had huge feuds with,
his son helped put this together in a way to
commemorate all the wrestlers that came here
every Tuesday for many, many years.
So, it's, it's pretty great to see, actually.
This is my, my dad and my grandfather.
[Announcer] Mike and Eddie Graham have won
the Florida tag team championship.
"Nothing can keep the fans away.
This was the home of the Titans of Tampa.
And this will always be the house that
Championship Wrestling From Florida built."
[Voice breaking & sniffling]
♪
I think wrestling fans should know that
they absolutely respected the fans.
And I hope that the fans that met them felt that.
There was so much good.
So much laughter.
A lot of good times, and...
those are the things that I focus on more than anything
else because they were really exceptional people.
I remember Eddie, my Papaw, as bare-chested,
with a cast net off the dock catching mullet for us.
A lot of love, a lot of love.
My brother, my bestie, my best friend.
I just wish he knew how everyone loved him and
wanted to be there for him.
[Sighing] Dad.
♪
We had that...
tough relationship because I called him out on things.
But there was so much love and respect.
♪
I miss my dad so much.
I wish he was here to see my daughter grow up.
Because he's missing out on a lot,
but that I miss him.
Some of the best times of my life were
with the Grahams, and...
with all the people that the Grahams brought in.
There is a plethora of good times.
A plethora of good times.
They were dear friends of mine.
I enjoyed my time with them.
Wish we could have had a lot more days.
The thing to do is not dwell on the bad.
Dwell on the good, that's what gets me through.
Nicole, love her, love her.
She's the legacy of that family.
This is my grandfather being silly with me, always.
[Laughing]
And it took me a while to get to a place where
I felt like I could finally offer some type of assistance.
And so, I found the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay.
And they offer amazing services and,
I feel that I've come to a point in my recovery and
healing that I can, hopefully,
get a word out there that may strike a chord with someone
to make them call for help, or survivors that are
struggling to get out of bed because
they've lost family members,
to know that they should live their lives,
to honour those that they have lost.
There has to be a lesson to everybody that's watching
this program that if you feel suicidal,
there's help just right around the corner.
And, I don't care who you are,
somebody loves you. Always.
You have to just make that step by reaching out to
someone, just to say, "Something's not right.
I'm having these thoughts."
Just speak up, is what I'd ask.
You can have fame, family, money, like,
but if you don't have that peace of mind,
you have nothing.
My grandfather and my dad clearly didn't have it.
And, my brother didn't have it,
but it occurred to me
less than a year ago that I have it.
And I had been wanting to get a tattoo-
I'm not a tattoo person-
and all I wanted was my handwriting that says,
"peace of mind" and a semicolon,
which represents mental health, you know,
suicide awareness. Very simple.
And it's just an amazing reminder of
where I've gotten with my life,
and how I feel in peace.
I have so much to be grateful for,
and I'm going to live my best life because
that's the best way I can honour them.
I am so happy right now. Things are great.
My daughter's thriving. Amazing friends, family.
Like, I'm, I'm really happy actually.
Does it show? [Laughing]
♪