Boris Profile picture
Feb 11, 2019 28 tweets 16 min read Read on X
In honor of #BlackHistoryMonth I'm doing a thread on African-American women in wrestling and their trailblazing moments and accomplishments. @NaomiWWE @SashaBanksWWE @WWEEmberMoon @AliciaFoxy @BiancaBelairWWE @ArianeAndrew @MiaYim @MeanQueenK @Phenom_Jazz @TheBrandiRhodes.
Let's start with the the woman who blazed the trail for black women in wrestling. In 1951, at age 16, Ethel Johnson became the first African-American female wrestler.
Ethel and her sisters, Babs Wingo and Marva Scott, were selling out shows in Baltimore and Kansas City, and at one point Marva Scott was ranked #3 in the world by Ring Magazine, the same issue where Moolah ranked #14. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 1990, at WrestleMania 6, Sapphire became the first African-American woman to compete and win at WrestleMania. She and Dusty Rhodes defeated Randy Savage and Sherri Martel. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 1993, Jacqueline (as Miss Texas) was the first woman ever to be ranked on PWI's Top 500 Wrestlers list. She ranked at #249. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 1995, at Survivor Series, Aja Kong became the first female sole survivor in a Survivor Series match. She also shares the record with Roman Reigns for most eliminations in one Survivor Series match, at 4. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 1998, Jacqueline became the first African-American woman to win any kind of championship in WWE, by winning the Women's Title. She was the first one to win it twice. #BlackHistoryMonth
In March 2000, Jacqueline competed in the first women’s SmackDown main event, where she was defeated by Stephanie McMahon. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 2002, at WrestleMania X8, Jazz was the first African-American woman to compete in a WM title match. She entered WM as champion and walked out of WM as champion. #BlackHistoryMonth
In June 2002, Linda Miles (AKA Shaniqua) became the first (and so far the only) African-American woman to win Tough Enough. Her career would last 2 years, where she notably competed for the WWE Tag Team titles at 2004 No Way Out. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 2004, Jacqueline became the first and only female Cruiserweight champion in WWE, by defeating Chavo Guerrero. #BlackHistoryMonth
At 2007 Lockdown PPV, Jacqueline competed in the first-ever Knockouts 6 Sides of Steel match, where she was defeated by Gail Kim. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 2008, Awesome Kong became the first African-American Knockouts champion. That year she also topped PWI's first-ever female 50 list and was voted their Woman of the Year. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 2010, Awesome Kong (with Hamada) became the first African-American Knockouts Tag Team champion and the first woman to win both the singles and tag team titles. #BlackHistoryMonth
In June 2010, at the Fatal 4-Way PPV, Alicia Fox became the first and only African-American Divas Champion in history. #BlackHistoryMonth
In June 2010, Naomi became the first-ever FCW Divas champion. Caylee Turner was the last, making it the only title in WWE history whose first and last champions were African American. #BlackHistoryMonth
In 2012, Kharma became the first African-American woman to enter the Royal Rumble and the first to main event a WWE PPV. She managed to eliminate Hunico before being eliminated by Dolph Ziggler. #BlackHistoryMonth
In December 2013, Cameron became the first African-American woman to have an official T-shirt on WWE Shop. #BlackHistoryMonth
In December 2013, The Funkadactyls became the first and only African-American women to win a Slammy Award. They won the Slammy for Best Dance Moves of the Year. #BlackHistoryMonth
At 2014 Battleground Kickoff, Naomi and Cameron competed in the first PPV singles match involving only African-American women. This would happen again only once, when Alicia Fox faced Sasha Banks at the 2017 TLC Kickoff. #BlackHistoryMonth
On this day, 4 years ago, Sasha Banks became the first African-American NXT Women's Champion. She defeated Charlotte, Bayley, and Becky Lynch at NXT Takeover: Rival. #BlackHistoryMonth
In April 2015, Jacqueline became the first (and so far the only) African-American woman to be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. #BlackHistoryMonth
At WrestleMania 31, Eden Stiles was the first African-American woman to ring announce at WrestleMania. #BlackHistoryMonth
At 2015 Takeover: Respect, Sasha Banks (and Bayley) were the first women to main event a Takeover special and to compete in an Ironman match. Their match became the first women's match in history to win the PWI's Match of the Year award. #BlackHistoryMonth
At 2015 NXT Year-End Awards, Sasha Banks won the Match of the Year award for her match against Bayley at NXT Takeover: Brooklyn. #BlackHistoryMonth
In April 2016, the Blasian Baddie Jade (Mia Yim) won the TNA Knockouts Championship by defeating Gail Kim and Madison Rayne. #BlackHistoryMonth
In July 2016, Sasha Banks became the first African-American Raw Women's champion. She would go on to win it 3 more times, making her a 4x champion. #BlackHistoryMonth

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Boris

Boris Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @bvmbshelled

Feb 18, 2019
Since Paige claims WWE never held women back, here are some of the struggles the Divas went through back in the day:
Michelle McCool saying how she and Melina were yelled at backstage for being “better than the guys”
Michelle McCool and Victoria having to re-do their match because their punches looked too good
Read 18 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(