My George “The Animal” Steele Story w/ Guest Appearance by Andre The Giant

B.K. Momchilov
3 min readMay 14, 2017

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George “The Animal” Steele died in Florida from kidney failure. We knew him as Coach Myers, the varsity football and wrestling coach at Madison Heights High School. Even though he wrestled all over the country for the WWF (now the WWE) on weekends, in the summer, and after he retired from teaching, he kept a low profile and one would never know that the night before he was throwing Randy “Macho Man” Savage or The Iron Sheik around a wrestling ring and grunting like a Neanderthal into a microphone.

Back in 1991, I was about to referee a regional amateur boxing tournament at Detroit’s Cobo Hall and having arrived a little earlier than necessary I found myself with some time to kill. Wandering around the facility I was pleased to find that a World Wrestling Federation show was about to start in the arena side of Cobo. I went down by the loading dock rear entrance area and saw nerdy little rasslin’ boys standing around waiting to see their heroes coming into the building. Greg “The Hammer” Valentine and Brutus Beefcake arrived to the cheers and shouts of the rasping groupie boys. Many asked for autographs and Hammer and Beefcake obliged by grabbing the pens and autograph books and throwing them over their shoulders, laughing and cursing as they did.

King Kong Bundy came by and someone asked him for an autograph. He quickly turned, got in their face and violently shouted, “NOOOOO!!” I swear their hair blew back when he did. He passed me, within an arm’s length away, I cringed in fear and thought to myself that he was the biggest human I had ever seen.

Until…

A cheer rose from the crowd as a beat up old car made its way down the ramp. One of the autograph boys shouted, “It’s George “The Animal” Steele and his son Randy!!” A dented green Ford Falcon rolled up and came to an abrupt halt. A person opened the side door and climbed out. The car lifted at least two feet as the man got out and when he stood he rose higher, and higher, and higher until all 7 foot 4 inch, 520 pounds of Andre The Giant appeared like a mountain rising from a canyon. He grinned that sleepy grin of his and came towards us like a huge ship navigating a narrow channel. George Steele aka Jim Myers walked alongside Andre, his son Randy followed behind. No one dare asked Andre for an autograph and we stood slack jawed and in awe. Several people reached out to touch him as he lumbered by. I have never witnessed a person that large and impressive and probably never will again.

Jim Myers wrestled for many years, “fell in love” and chased Miss Elizabeth, beat Bruno Sammartino, ate the stuffing out of turnbuckles, had his career salvaged by Captain Lou Albano and even enjoyed a brief movie career.

In 1994, he played the role of Tor Johnson in Tim Burton’s “Ed Wood” starring Johnny Depp. Jerry Seinfeld even mentioned him in the “Man Hands” episode of Seinfeld. He died at the grand old age of 79. Thanks Coach, safe travels to you.

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