Born Terry Gene Bollea in Augusta, Georgia, and from the age of about 16, he doesn’t seem to have ever wanted to be anything other than a professional wrestler. He would go on to become of most famous wrestlers of all time, and one of the very first to be a household name. In 1979, he joined the World Wrestling Federation, where he was mostly cast as a heel, and began his famous feud with Andre the Giant. He branched out into movies and television, although his talents as an actor were limited.
In 1994, while testifying in the trial of Vince McMahon (the owner of the WWF), he admitted that he had used steroids since 1974, and that he had warned McMahon of attempts by other wrestlers to unionize. His public reputation took a massive hit, and his going public about this led to many of his fellow wrestlers going public with more stories about him, few of which reflected well on him. He would eventually die in 2025, at the age of 71.
