All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling

The All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Corporation, established in 1968, was the successor to the All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Association, which had been formed in August 1955, to oversee the plethora of women's wrestling promotions that had sprung up in Japan following a tour in November, 1954, by Mildred Burke and her World Women's Wrestling Association (WWWA). These promotions included the All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Federation, and the All Japan Women's Wrestling Club, started in 1948, which was the first women's wrestling promotion in Japan. For a time the Club pushed female wrestling as a legitimate sport, booking sporting arenas.

By the mid-1960s, the association had fallen apart, due to infighting between the member promotions, and female wrestling was relegated back to being a sideshow act in strip-tease theaters. In 1967, another attempt to organize the sport of women's professional wrestling was made with a new All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling Association. This time

In the fall of 1970, AJW, which had been contesting the American Girls' Wrestling Association Championship since the previous year, hosted Marie Vagnone, new holder of Mildred Burke's WWWA World Single Championship which had been revived in a WWWA tournament earlier that year in Los Angeles. On October 15, 1970, in Tokyo, Vagnone lost the WWWA title to Aiko Kyo, and AJW had a new world championship singles belt. The next year, AJW acquired the WWWA World Tag Team Championship as well, when Jumbo Miyamoto and Aiko Kyo were made the first champions on June 30, 1971.

During the early 1970s, AJW's championship booking was dominated by the traditional trading between a Japanese

On July 6, 1980, the promotion had enough popularity to run more shows throughout the country, which resulted in AJW splitting into two teams. Team A featured wrestlers such as Jackie Sato, Jaguar Yokota and Mimi Hagiwara while Team B featured Nancy Kumi, Lucy Kayama and Chino Sato. This lasted until June 1981.^[2]

During the 1980s, AJW continued to feature extraordinarily talented and popular female wrestlers, including

Up until 1986, AJW had been the only major women's wrestling (joshi puroresu or simply joshi) promotion in Japan. Then, on August 17, 1986, Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling (JWP) was started, by former AJW stars Jackie Sato and Nancy Kumi, as well as boxer Rumi Kazama and others. As All Japan Women's popularity cooled off after the Crush Gals retired, the promotion's television show was moved to midnight.

While AJW remained the top promotion through the early 1990s, due to talent including Akira Hokuto, Aja Kong, Manami Toyota and Kyoko Inoue, the number of joshi puroresu promotions kept increasing, with Ladies Legend Pro-Wrestling and JWP forming in 1992 after the collapse of Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling. This created an unprecedented era of co-operation between the various companies which resulted in many inter-promotional shows including Big Egg Wrestling Universe, the first ever all women's show at the Tokyo Dome.^[1] Competition increased again as Gaea Japan formed in 1995 and JDStar formed in 1996 with both promotions having former All Japan Women's stars including Chigusa Nagayo, Akira Hokuto, Lioness Asuka and Jaguar Yokota.

1997 would prove to be a nightmare year for All Japan Women as the owners of All Japan Women's went bankrupt after losing money in real estate, the stock market and other business ventures. Due to this, they lost 14 wrestlers from July to September 1997.

In 2002, AJW lost its television spot again and the promotion closed its doors in April 2005 after 37 years, making it the longest-running promotion in Japan up to that time (Men's promotions

Promotion company Tajima Kikaku re-established "New" AJW in 2006, however they only acquired the rights to the promotion's name and logo from the Matsunaga family, not the titles. The talent was mostly borrowed from JWP Project and the cards were sporadic. In 2012 the "New" AJW stopped promoting cards.^[5]

Events

The most notable annual events in AJW were the Japan Grand Prix and Tag League the Best. The Japan Grand Prix was held each summer, from 1985 to 2004, and was a tournament to determine the number one contender for the WWWA World Single Championship, similar to the G1 Climax or Champion Carnival seen in the men's promotions New Japan Pro-Wrestling and All Japan Pro Wrestling, respectively. Tag League the Best was held each fall, also from 1985 to 2004, and was a tag team tournament.

AJW also held several regular annual events during the 1990s. The first was Wrestlemarinpiad, which was held in the fall or spring from 1989 to 1997, and for the last time in 2000. Also prominent was Wrestling Queendom, held from 1993 to 1997, the first held in November and the rest in the end of March.

Championships

World Women's Wrestling Association

All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling commission

International Wrestling Association

American Girls' Wrestling Association

Tournaments

AJW Hall of Fame

The AJW Hall of Fame had its first inducted class enshrined on November 29, 1998, at the Yokohama Arena in Yokohama, Japan. This was at AJW's 30th anniversary event. All but two members of the Hall of Fame (indicated with a †) were inducted at the initial ceremony.

Members

Rookie classes

Rookies by year

References

External links

• "Archived Official Website". Archived from the original on October 18, 2000. Retrieved March 21, 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
• Information about All Japan Women's
• All Japan Women's title histories
• AJW Hall of Fame
• Japanese women's wrestling clips