Extreme Championship Wrestling

Extreme Championship Wrestling

Paul E. Dangerously addressing the ECW crowd on December 23, 1999
Industry	Professional wrestling, Hardcore wrestling, Lucha libre, Puroresu, Shoot
Founded	April 25, 1992
Founder	Tod Gordon (Eastern) Paul Heyman (Extreme)
Defunct	April 4, 2001
Fate	Bankrupt; assets purchased by the WWE
Headquarters	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
Owner	Tod Gordon (1992–1996) Paul Heyman (1996–2001) Vince McMahon (2003-present)

Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) was a professional wrestling company that ran from April 25, 1992 to April 4, 2001. The company was known for its hardcore style of wrestling as well as Mexican (lucha libre) and Japanese (puroresu) styles of wrestling.

The company was originally known as Eastern Championship Wrestling and was owned by Tod Gordon.^[1] It was then renamed Extreme Championship Wrestling and Paul Heyman was brought in as the new owner after Tod Gordon sold ECW to him in 1995. The World Wrestling Federation (now known as WWE) purchased Extreme Championship Wrestling after Heyman filed for bankruptcy on April 4, 2001.^[2]

WWE made a pay-per-view called ECW One Night Stand on June 12, 2005 which featured former ECW wrestlers. They made another ECW One Night Stand on June 11, 2006 which helped introduce the restart of the ECW franchise as a WWE brand like Raw and SmackDown.^[3] Paul Heyman was also brought back to be the new figurehead for the ECW brand and he reintroduced the ECW World Heavyweight Championship as the brand's world title. He gave it to Rob Van Dam after Van Dam won the WWE Championship at the 2006 One Night Stand. The brand existed until February 16, 2010.^[4]

1. ↑ Williams, Scott (2006). Hardcore History: The Extremely Unauthorized Story of ECW. Sports Publishing LLC. ISBN 978-1-59670-021-5.
2. ↑ Loverro, Thom (2006). The Rise and Fall of ECW. Pocket Books. p. 233. ISBN 978-1-4165-1058-1.
3. ↑ "WWE Brings ECW to Sci Fi Channel". WWE. Retrieved 2013-11-15.
4. ↑ "McMahon announces the end of ECW". Wrestling Observer. Retrieved 2013-11-15.^{[permanent dead link]}