Here is your opportunity to see a professional wrestler away from the arena, out of costume, and in their own element. This is Stan Frazier as a human being, with emotions that go so much further than a wrestling angle would ever let him display. He was a man with a huge heart and love for life; a man that couldn't lead a normal life yet attacked the world with endless enthusiasm. He was a lot more than a plowboy or a country bumpkin uncle. For you fans out there who might have had a low opinion of the man, you will not be able to cling to those prior feelings at all upon reading.

Avalon Brown and Stan were a steady couple for several years during the mid-1970's. Their relationship was filled with love and laughter that has echoed years after they parted. As you will read, few who come in contact with Stan could ever forget the special man he was. For Avalon, who was closer to him than most, her life was forever changed.

This is one of the sweetest stories I've ever chanced to read. I want to thank Avalon for so kindly and willingly sharing her remembrances. This is truly, truly special.

The story of how I met Stan is rather interesting. I was not a wresting fan, so I did not know Stan Frazier existed. My hairdresser and best friend called one evening and said, "How about a couple of drinks?" She had had a bad day and so had I. We went to a lounge here in Nashville where there was a band and dancing. We were sitting there and the door opened and the biggest man I had ever seen in my entire life walked in -- it was like a "shadow' moving over the door. There was another man with him. They came on in, and as they neared my table, my eyes met his. Those eyes full of compassion, I could read them immediately. I fell in love with the biggest guy I ever saw and didn't even know his name. I turned to my friend and said, "I just fell in love!" She always dated good-looking guys and looked around and said, "Where? Where?" I motioned at Stan and she said, "With that?!!"

Our eyes kept making contact and he was called to the stage to sing. What a voice! He could sing like a bird -- a deep voiced bird! He could sing ballads, and tear the heck out of the old-time 50s and 60s rock 'n' roll.

Then he asked me to dance. And we always laughed about that first dance. It was a slow one. I'm 5'8" and it wasn't comfortable at all dancing with a 7 foot giant! But everything went fine for that dance and we stood there on the dance floor, holding hands, waiting for the next song. This was in the early 70's and "The Bump" was the popular dance at that time. (For the youngsters out there that do not know about this dance, it consisted of two persons, bumping their hips together to the music.) The next song was a "Bump!" I laughed and said that I thought we should sit down. He said, "You're right. You don't want to do The Bump with me or you'll land on the other side of the dance floor!" We never did do The Bump but always laughed about that night.

We talked for several hours. He told me he was a wrestler. There was another wrestler with him, but I can't remember his name. I remember he was from North Carolina, but not being a fan, the names didn't mean anything to me. Stan was such a wonderful person. I call him Stan because I did not know him as a wrestler, only as a regular person (well, not too regular. You couldn't be his size and be a regular person).

That was the beginning of a long, wonderful, friendship. What follows is just a remembrance of things that I would like to share with you, his fans. These are not in any order. Things we did, things we enjoyed, etc.

FOOD -
This man could eat a lot of food! He would not eat before a wrestling match, but would put it away afterwards. For example, a whole chicken, ice tea ordered by the pitcher rather than by the glass. We did not eat out a lot because of the rudeness of the fans. Smaller persons in the public eye could put on a cap, sunglasses, and have a little privacy. How could you hide a giant? When we did try to eat out, we would constantly be interrupted by fans wanting his autograph or just asking a lot of questions.

WATERMELONS -
He had a passion for watermelons. BIG watermelons. He would bring them up from Pascagoula, MS and the hotel management where he stayed would keep them in the cooler for us. One was so large it fed the entire lunch crowd in the hotel dining room. He always wanted to share and was always bringing goodies to the hotel staff.

PET PEEVES -
The biggest continuous gripe he had was, "Why don't they make these motel bathrooms larger?" When he got inside those little rooms, most of the time he could never get the door closed! That was another of our private jokes. He would call from out of town and I would ask if he had been stuck in any bathrooms lately.

WRESTLING -
Since I was not a fan, I am not going to be able to name names. Once in a while, I would go to a match in Nashville, but most of the time, since I had a traveling job, too, we would go to the Louisville matches on Sunday nights. My two children, Charles (age 10) and Teresa (age 5) would go with us to Louisville most of the time. They thought Stan was the greatest guy around.

When the match was over, if the crowd was a good one and the match went well, we would meet him at his dressing room and all walk to the car together. He always carried the 5-year old, who was small for her age, on his shoulders. We always teased her that she was going to get a nosebleed from the high altitude. If the crowd was a hostile one, he would send us a message not to walk with him, but to meet him at the car. Those were the nights that I would feel uncomfortable. That wasn't too often, but it did happen.

He was wrestling under the name of Plowboy Frazier. Most of his friends and his fellow wrestlers still called him "Tiny." That was the name he wrestled under prior to Plowboy. I still continued to call him Stan. I never, ever used his wrestling name when addressing him. To me, he was my Stan.

One night we had left the Fairground area in Nashville, and were driving into town, moving quite fast (being on the road so much, it was hard for him to drive slow), and were stopped by a Metro policeman. Stan's car was a large Cadillac El Dorado with the driver's seat pushed all the way back as far as it would go against the rear seat and welded. (I actually tried to drive it once. He pitched me the keys and asked me to move it across the parking lot, but my feet would not even touch the pedals. I got it moved -- don't know how! -- but never, ever tried that again.) He put down his window and the cop said he wanted to see his driver's license. It was in Stan's hip pocket. He told the cop to stand back, that he would have to get out of the car to get to the license. He opened the door, stepped out, and the cop (who was a little on the small side) bent his head back, looked up at him and said, "Did you have to stand up?" Stan told him he did. The cop seemed pretty scared because of Stan's size. Stan mentioned he was a wrestler and there were several more cars of wrestlers following him. The cop just didn't want to mess with him, so he handed his license back and said, "Drive carefully." We always laughed about that, as we didn't know if any were following us or not. (In his glove compartment, if he had needed it, were deputy sheriff appointments from just about every major city/county in the South! He had it covered. Back then that was clout!)

WRESTLING TOGS -
Stan wrestled in cut-off overalls and wore the wrestling boots. I would do his laundry and, believe me, it didn't take very many pieces of his clothing to make a load. The neighbor kids found out about him through my children, as they talked about him a lot. They liked him so much. The kids would come knock on my door and ask, "Can we borrow Tiny's overalls?" I would give them a pair. One kid would get in each leg, over each shoulder went a shoulder strap, and down the street they would go: a four-legged, two-headed monster. Stan loved children and he thought that was great. He would ask how many times his pants had been up the road this week.

He was constantly tearing the overalls on the side, when he wrestled. I remember taking the arms off my son's discarded blue jean jacket and reinforcing them. After that, no more torn overalls.

Oh, one other thing, we had a mark on the kitchen wall, where the top of Stan's head came to. The kids were always showing that to their friends, saying "Mom's boyfriend is this tall!"

HIS BACK -
After he came in from a match, his back was always hurting. He taught me to walk on it and it always gave him relief. I got to where I enjoyed it because I knew it was making him feel better, when it was going Snap-Crackle-Pop! The first time I tried it, though, it nearly scared me to death. No. 1, I was afraid I would hurt him -- can you imagine that, me afraid I would hurt the giant? And No. 2, I was afraid I would fall off!

THE GIANT THAT CRIED
My phone rang earlier than usual. It was the day that he was to be back in town. On the other end of the phone was a very upset, caring, concerned person. It was him. I immediately could tell this was not my normal, "Honey I'm back" phone call. He said, "Can we get together earlier than planned? I have to talk to you." So I dropped everything, left work early and joined him.

The overwhelming nature of the call was to tell me of an incident that had occurred earlier on. He had been staying at his usual motel in Memphis and was out by the pool, when another motel guest walked by him and collapsed. He immediately ran over, started first aid, mouth-to-mouth, etc., all the time yelling for help. When the paramedics arrived the man had had a heart attack. After riding to the hospital with the sick man, he was told by the paramedics that the man would have surely died without the immediate first-aid that he had just received. He didn't even stay to tell anyone his name or ask the name of the victim, he was just glad to have saved his life.

He told me the story and then he cried. This was the first time for me to see "The Giant" Stan Frazier cry.

DRINKING -
Stan was not in good health even then, with his high blood pressure, etc., and was not much of a drinker. But, when he did drink, it took a lot of booze for him to feel it. If he wanted to have a drink, we would always do it in private. It would take a fifth of Jack Daniels Black Label for starters for him to feel anything. I never saw him intoxicated, personally.

SINGING -
When asked by people "Where do you sing?", his answer was "Anywhere I want to!" The only reason we would go to a club was for him to sing. He really loved singing, I believe more than wrestling. His heart was set on a Hit Record and an album. I do not know if he ever accomplished that or not -- maybe the album, but not the HIT. Anyway, if we went to a club, and he was asked to sing, he would always sing, "Walk Through This World With Me," and if they had a cordless mike, we would dance while he sang that song to me. That was our Song! I was always so proud to be a part of his life.

HOTEL INCIDENT -
One night we were at his hotel and had just finished dinner, relaxing. Stan was changing his clothes and was undressed. All of a sudden, he couldn't breathe. Scared me to death! He jumped up, ran out on the balcony (this balcony faced the interstate), and leaned over the railing, hanging on for dear life until he got his breathing back. That later became another of our favorite stories. Afterwards, we always laughed about the night Stan hung over the interstate naked on the balcony. Stan had a good sense of humor, even when it was about him or his size.

Later in our relationship, with his traveling and my traveling on my job, we were finding ourselves drifting apart more and more. When I finally decided that it was time to end the relationship, I found myself, for the very first time, actually scared of Stan. And I had nothing to base this on, as he was never a threat to me, or my children, just a loving person. But I was scared. I called him and told him that I was sending his belongings to him in a cab because I didn't know how he would react to the situation. He assured me that he would never hurt a lady and I believed him. We talked about it and both agreed it was time to end it on a friendly basis. Once again, The Giant cried.

I wrote this in memory of Stan "The Man" Frazier. I will always have a warm place in my heart for Stan. I think he would liked to be remembered as a compassionate, honorable, loving, giant with a heart as big as his body. He was truly that.

Stan, I love you and Thanks for the memories.