Perry Satullo during training before first match

How I Became "The Iron Horseman" Perry Saturn

June 4th, 1988 was my first day of training with Walter ‘Killer’ Kowalski. Back then, Saturday night on TBS was the only national show. Wrestling was still all territories, so you could only see wrestling in your area. This made wrestling magazines very popular. There were three or four with monthly issues. In one of the magazines, Bill Apter had a monthly column where you could send him questions, and he’d answer them. So I wrote to him, told him a brief history about myself, and asked him where I could learn to wrestle. He wrote at the bottom of the letter to try Walter Kowalski, with his number and sent the letter back to me.

As soon as I got the letter, I called Walter. He asked me how big I was. I was 5 foot 9 inches and weighed about 160 lbs. However, I told him I was 5 foot 11 inches and weighed 175 lbs. He told me I was too small to be a wrestler and that I could train to be a ref or a manager. I insisted I only wanted to train to be a wrestler. He explained to me that wrestling was a lot harder than I realized and he thought I would end up quitting. I guaranteed I would never quit. So he said I’d have to pay him $1,500.00 upfront and it was non-refundable, no matter how long I lasted before I quit. He also informed me that he could never use me on a show until I gained weight. I had studied Karate since I was five but I never lifted weights, so I thought I could just take steroids and gain 50 lbs of solid muscle in a month. Well, that’s not how they work. It takes hard work and years to change my body like I needed to.

I had another problem. I didn’t have the $1,500.00 either. I’ve always been able to figure something out. I had a Chevy Sprint, which was a small hatchback. They were pretty cheap even new. Mine was a couple of years old. So by just dumb luck, a local NBC news van backed into me and smashed up the passenger door and fender. The car was still drivable, just a little smashed. I got $8,000.00 from their insurance. Instead of fixing the car, I moved to Boston and joined Kowalski’s school.

My trainer Walter Killer Kowalski

When I met Kowalski, the first thing he said was that I was a lot smaller than I told him. He reiterated that I couldn’t wrestle on a show until I gained weight; if I even lasted. It's not that he was being a jerk about it; he just wanted to be honest.

So, on June 4th, I went to the school. It was on the second floor of a Tang Soo Do dojo in Malden, Mass. There was a boxing ring there. For his shows, he used a WWF wrestling ring. A wrestling ring has a spring in the center, while a boxing ring has a post in the center, which means a boxing ring hurts like hell. I think he did it that way to make training tougher to get anyone who wasn’t serious to quit.

Myself with Walter's Light Heavyweight Championship

As time went on, I slowly won Walter over. Because of my martial arts background, I could do some things Walter had never seen before. About a year later, I got up to about 200 lbs. I also worked my ass off training. Walter thought I was finally ready to work on a live show. While he was filling out the card, he couldn’t remember my last name, which is Satullo. So he just put Saturn. I never changed it. In fact, it’s the only name I ever used, which is why I own my intellectual property.

When he told me I was working my first match, he said I was going to be ‘Cowboy’ Perry Saturn from Crossroads, New Mexico. He wanted me to wear a cowboy hat and a vest. Well, I didn’t want to be a cowboy. I thought I could do a biker/cowboy gimmick, so I asked if I could be ‘The Iron Horseman’ Perry Saturn. I’m sure he just heard me say horse and said great. So I got some leather chaps, a leather vest, and a leather cowboy hat. And that's how I became ‘The Iron Horseman’ Perry Saturn, from Crossroads, New Mexico.