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In Native Lights, people in Native communities around Mni Sota Mkoce - a.k.a. Minnesota - tell their stories about finding their gifts and sharing them with the community. These are stories of joy, strength, history, and change from Native people who are shaping the future and honoring those who came before them.
Native Lights is also a weekly, half-hour radio program hosted by Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe members and siblings, Leah Lemm and Cole Premo. Native Lights is a space for people in Native communities.
Native Lights: Where Indigenous Voices Shine is produced by Minnesota Native News and Ampers, Diverse Radio for Minnesota’s Communities with support from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage fund. Online at https://minnesotanativenews.org/
[Music: Native Lights Theme]
David Amitrano: We're one of the only organizations to highlight women's wrestling. It's been my goal to at least have two or three women's matches on every show, because my daughter is a huge wrestling fan, and one day she said, “How come there are no girl wrestlers?” And made me think, why is there no girl wrestlers? And we started a women's division up here, but I tell you, the fans up here, they go crazy for wrestling.
Leah Lemm: Boozhoo, hello. Welcome to Native Lights:where Indigenous voices shine. I'm your host.Leah, Leah Lemm. Miigwech for joining me. Native Lights is more than a podcast and radio show. At its core, it's a place for Native folks to tell their stories each and every week, we have great conversations with wonderful guests from a bunch of different backgrounds, musicians, artists, doctors, educators, athletes, you name it. We have a wonderful mix of passions that join us, and we talk to our guests about their gifts and how they share those gifts with their community, and it all centers around the big point of purpose in our lives, and it is another day, another chance to amplify Native voices. Today, I am really stoked for my upcoming conversation with David Amitrano. Now, I don't know much about
wrestling or the wrestling world, but David does, and he is a member of the Bois Forte band, and he's a co-owner of Midwest All Star wrestling, and he's a pro wrestling promoter, so super excited to chat with him. And here he is. Boozhoo David.
David Amitrano: hello, Boozhoo.
Leah Lemm: how are you?
David Amitrano: And I'm good. How are you?
Leah Lemm: Good, perfect. Well, I will kick us off then. Aaniin, David, can you introduce yourself and tell us where you're joining us from?
David Amitrano: Yeah. My name is David Amitrano. I'm the owner of Midwest All Star wrestling. It's a Minnesota based-independent wrestling organization that is Native owned, and I'm based out of Woodbury, Minnesota. I'm originally from Ely, Minnesota, and I'm from the Boyd's fork tribe, which is in Nett Lake, Minnesota.
Leah Lemm: Thank you so much. And can you tell me, how is your family doing? How are you doing? How's your family?
David Amitrano: I have four wonderful kids at home. I have an 11 year old, a 10 year old, a two year old and a one year old, and so it's been crazy, but my wife, Brittany has been super awesome, being supportive with my daytime job and her daytime job and then doing the wrestling on the side. So it's been working out fabulous.
Leah Lemm: Well, is there anything that you are kicking around thinking about at this point in time.
David Amitrano: As far as wrestling related, I'm working on bringing in some more guests for our biggest show of the year, called the Grand Slam. And that's how I got into wrestling, because I'm the CFO for the Native American organization, women and nations. It's a women and children's domestic violence and sexual assault shelter, and I've been there for 13 years, next month, and that's kind of how wrestling fell in my lap, and it is our biggest fundraiser in the 43 years that the shelter has been open.
Leah Lemm: Wow, wait. Can you tell me a bit more about the shelter women donations?
David Amitrano: Yeah. So I'm currently the CFO. I'm going to be there for, like I said, 13 years it's a 44-bed domestic violence shelter for Native women and children is founded in 1982 and we are in St Paul, Minnesota. We're one of the largest Native shelters that are off reservation land. We are pet friendly, we're transgender-friendly, and we accept women of all nations. You don't have to be Native American to be in our shelter. That's just the basis of our funding.
Leah Lemm: Wow, that's so interesting. And I'm really curious how you got from women of nations into wrestling promotion.
David Amitrano: So 2017 I was at work, and I got a call from Jesse Ventura. He had seen a video that Cara Levin did about missing, murdered Indigenous women, and they highlighted our shelter. And Jesse called me up and said that he wanted to do a fundraiser for victims of domestic violence and put me in contact with one of the owners of of Midwest All Star wrestling at that time. I didn't know anything about pro-wrestling back then, but we held our first event at the Minneapolis American Indian Center, and it generated $10,000 for funds for the shelter. So it was amazing. And ever since then, we've we've done it every year, and last year's event raised over $113,000 it's grown from 300 people when we started to over 3000 last year.
Leah Lemm: Wow
David Amitrano: yeah, it's pretty big.
Leah Lemm: Wow. That's incredible. So how about you tell me more about Midwest All Star wrestling.
David Amitrano: Then I came onto the company in May of. 2017 with my business partner Eli. He approached me after the success of the fundraiser and asked me if I would be interested in purchasing the company. And I told him, I don't know anything about pro wrestling, but prior to working at the shelter, I was a Regional Sales Director for GNC, the nutrition company. So I had that sales background, and then I was able to sell the product to different venues. And I didn't realize how crazy wrestling was in Minnesota, and then it just kind of took off from there. Work with a lot of different reservations and tribes to put on family friendly entertainment for people. And last week, I was up on the Red Lake reservation doing a show for Charlie Norris, who had passed away about two years ago. He was a Native American wrestler, and we did a show in his honor, and it was a huge turnout. And I was really honored to be able to do that for him. Wow.
Leah Lemm: Okay, so I only remember wrestling from being a kid and watching wrestling. Come on after cartoons on Saturday mornings. Why don't you tell me more about what's wrestling in Minnesota? Like, who's who? Who are the movers and shakers? Like, what are the story lines?
David Amitrano: Well, right now, in our organization, we're one of the only organizations to highlight women's wrestling. It's been my goal to at least have two or three women's matches on every show, because my daughter is a huge wrestling fan, and one day she said, How come there are no girl wrestlers? And made me think, Why is there no girl wrestlers? So I got in contact with Ken Anderson, who owns the Academy of Professional wrestling in St Paul where everyone goes to train to be a professional wrestler. He put me in contact with some other females from Chicago area, Florida area, and we started a women's division up here. But I tell you, the fans up here, they go crazy for wrestling. Two of our biggest names right now are Paul Burke. He's currently our champion, and Maggie Lee is our female champion, and she's currently signed to an organization called Total non stop action TNA wrestling. And you can see that weekdays on TV. I believe it's on access TV, but it's TNA wrestling. Fans are crazy. Like I said, the summertime, I do town festivals, fairs, celebrations, you name it. I'm up in Duluth for the fourth year at the head of lakes fair. Then the following week I'm down in Lonsdale and Mankato. It's every weekend we're somewhere
Leah Lemm: You're listening to Native Lights: where Indigenous voices shine. Native Lights is produced by Minnesota Native News and AMPERS, with support from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. Today, we're speaking with David Amitrano from the Bois Forte band. He's a Minnesota pro-wrestling promoter, and he's a co-owner of Midwest All Star wrestling. I see that you have a lot of shows. So like, how do people keep in contact with like, what you're doing? Is there newsletter or website?
David Amitrano: Yeah. So we're, we're big on Facebook and Twitter. It's Midwest All Star wrestling on Facebook. You can follow along on Facebook to see all of our events. About two years ago, we had a TV show on the CW called MAW Warriors, and that's currently switched off of the CW onto YouTube now, MAW warriors, or MAW Live on YouTube, and you can follow along and watch the story lines and see some great matches. And yeah.
Leah Lemm: so, would David in his youth imagine him doing this right now?
David Amitrano: About 12 years ago, I used to fight professionally for mixed martial arts. 2012 was the last fight I did, and then wanted to the corporate world, and kind of did that, but I also co own a Native American mixed martial arts company called throne MMA with the late Stephen Bonner from the UFC, and my business partner, Dean Lam, who's from White Earth. We do MMA shows up in northern lights on the Dakotas, and we're all over. So if you asked me about 20 years ago, yes, I would have loved to have been a professional wrestler.
Leah Lemm: That's so cool. Okay, so tell me about the first wrestling match you ever saw.
David Amitrano: First wrestling match I saw...It's funny that you mentioned that, because I actually found the program to the very first show I went ever went to. And it was December 23, 1988 I was six years old. It was at the Duluth deck arena. And I just recently had Jake the Snake Roberts up at the Charlie Norris, though, and I gave it to Jake last week to sign for me. So that was the very first show I ever saw. He wrestled Andre the Giant of the Duluth Deck. And I was hooked.
Leah Lemm: Whoa, how did you feel six years old? We must be the same age, by the way, just so you know. That's so rad.
David Amitrano: It was crazy. I mean, to be that small and look up and see Andre the Giant walking down the aisle. Could we were room side? It was, it was crazy. Yeah. And then as I got older, you know, kind of drifted away from the wrestling. And when I married my wife, Brittany, and moved from northern Minnesota down here, I was looking. Living in Cottage Grove for a while, and then we moved to Woodbury, and I lived next to Baron von Raschke, who was a huge wrestler back in the 70s and 80s. I didn't even know it until, you know, I got into maw. So it's, it's been a fun and wild ride. And a lot of our shows, we bring in legends from the past, from WWE so to be able to work with them, like Jake the Snake, Roberts and, you know, Bret Hart and Jimmy Hart, and just everybody that you could think of has just been a dream come true. And it's they're awesome. So to be able to work with those Legends is just kind of like a dream come true. It's nostalgia for me.
Leah Lemm: Well, how'd you get into MMA then?
David Amitrano: I got a call from Dean at the shelter. He was looking for another Native American to help work the reservations. We work with the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, the Athletic Commission. And he introduced me to Stephen Bonner from the UFC. And at that time, Stephen was living in Las Vegas, and Dean was up in Alexandria, and they needed some someone's help in the in the metro, and he just contacted me. And with my MMA background, it kind of fits together.
Leah Lemm: Very cool. And so you yourself know how to fight too. Let's hear about it.
David Amitrano: Yeah. So I graduated college in 2006 from Bemidji State University. I got a master's degree in kinesiology, and I went there to play football, and I got extremely heavy. And then afterwards, when I was done playing football, it was like, I need to get this weight off. Started Training up at a gym in northern Minnesota. I was running a GNC in Virginia at the Thunderbird mall, and there was a gym down the street called the Supreme Court. Met a couple of guys, Mike ju and Darby smart, who ran a MMA company called the Iron Range wolf pack, started training there for about two years and just got into my first fight and kind of got hooked.
Leah Lemm: Cool.
David Amitrano: yeah.
Leah Lemm: Can you tell me a bit about how it feels? So as a little background, I do not consider myself any knowledgeable expert on this, but I did train in Krav Maga for like, two years or so, yep, and I loved it. And you know, just to, like, feel a little bit more capable, and like, stand up a little straighter and like, a little less nervous and stuff, but I noticed, like, mentally, how, how much it affected me just to be able to, like, think on my feet and be more aware and stuff like that. Can you tell me a bit about how fighting and that sort of practice affected you mentally?
David Amitrano: It heightens your sensitivity around you, and you don't know that you're capable of doing these things until you at least try. And everyone says, well, didn't it hurt, you know, getting punched in the face and, no, it didn't. I mean, yes, don't get me wrong. Yes, it does hurt, but when you first get in there, you're, you know, your anxiety is through the roof. You're on a high. You can't really feel anything until the day after. But just mentally, just knowing that, you know, I was losing the weight that was becoming more confident, I was getting better in my skills. It just made me feel better all around.
Leah Lemm: yeah. Do you remember your first fight?
David Amitrano: My first fight was August 17, 2008 it was in Virginia, Minnesota. It was at a bowling alley. It was called battle on the Iron Range. I fought a gentleman by the name of Adrian, the animal Flores. He was from Dickinson, North Dakota. We went three rounds, and I won by judges decision, and it was the craziest fight I've ever been in my life, because I'm I'm not really a confrontational person. I'd rather talk it out or whatever. So it was really weird to actually have my first fight, rather than just training and goofing around with guys and but actually getting in there, it was, it was incredible. My last fight was June of 2011 it was at the myth nightclub in Maplewood, Minnesota, and I lost to a guy named Shelby. Shelby Swanson, I think his last name was, but I got caught in a rear naked choke in the second round, and I
was done.
Leah Lemm: I don't know what that is, but that sounds tough. Did you have a name? Did you have like a, I don't know, like a David, the something?
David Amitrano: No, no, I couldn't. I could never figure out a name. No, that's one thing I never had. Could never figured out.
Leah Lemm: Well, tell me what keeps you motivated then to keep going with this sort of work. It must be pretty interesting, pretty fun. But is there something that gives you like greater meaning?
David Amitrano: Well, working at the shelter, working with Native women that are subjected to domestic violence, it's always the stories when they leave the shelter and they come back and they're in a better place. That keep me going, because there's been a lot of times coming from the corporate world to nonprofit where I wanted to leave it was really tough, you know, especially when you'd see the trauma that affected children. And being a father of three daughters and three sons, you know, it was really hard, but that keeps me going. Just. Knowing that I'm making a change with wrestling. I like the excitement on the kids' face, especially with my kids. I like that, you know, they get caught up in the storylines, and
they really think that the women are, you know, I mean, not that they're not good people, but, you know, there's bad guys and good guys, and they can't tell who's who, and that's what I like, plus it's, it's cheap entertainment for families to do on the weekends that's not going to break the bank. And it's just, you know, it's exciting. Like I said, meeting with the the wrestling legends from when I was a child, seeing people get their figures and posters and pictures signed, that's pretty cool as well.
Leah Lemm: Say, are there notable names, notable like Native wrestlers.
David Amitrano: Charlie Norris, who had recently passed away, he was from Red Lake. He was in WCW is really well known in Minnesota. Ken Anderson, Mr. Anderson from WWE is currently here. He runs the Academy of Professional wrestling school. So if you want to be a professional wrestler, you go to his school, and then once he gives you the blessing to take matches, we'll book you here. We worked with Joe Henning. His father was Mr. Perfect, Kurt Henning, so we were Pam Eddie Sharkey, the guy who trained everyone from brick rude the Road Warriors. We worked a lot with the Road Warriors before they passed away, had Jake the Snake, Roberts we have from Tokyo, Japan, WWE, Hall of Famer the Great Muda, one of the world renowned Japanese wrestlers.
Leah Lemm: Cool. Are there any Native women wrestlers?
David Amitrano: There is one currently in Las Vegas. Her name is Desi dorada, and she was the very first women and nations Grand Slam Cup winner back in 2019
Leah Lemm: so you're saying there's an opening?
David Amitrano: Yes, yes, yes. She hasn't. She hasn't wrestled since then, but she did transition to mixed martial arts.
Leah Lemm: Okay, yeah. Oh, fascinating. Great. Well, what are some aspects of wrestling that you want people to know? Are there misconceptions, maybe that you'd want to clear up, or any secrets?
David Amitrano: Yeah, one misconception is people when they say that wrestling is fake, being there firsthand, the punches, the slams, the getting hit with objects. It's not fake. All the workers are putting their health on the line to entertain us, and we should be respectful for that. And there's no stigma. As far as like women wrestlers can be men wrestlers and all-around fun, entertainment. That's the best thing I can say, is it's entertainment. It might not be your thing, but it's a lot of people's thing in Minnesota, especially, it's not something that you're going to get rich on by any means. But we are really blessed to have a lot of businesses that sponsor us. Our businesses will sponsor legends to come in for autograph signings, or they'll sponsor matches. When we first started out, like I said, we were maybe 10 or 12 people in the crowd. Now we're into the hundreds to 1000s of people in the crowd, and maybe one show a month. And now, like I said, it's every weekend. We're somewhere so without the fans and the sponsors, and especially the workers, the people that wrestle for us, this wouldn't be as successful as it is.
Leah Lemm: gotcha. And so what's next for your company? Is there any like expansion or like other plans, or location expansions, or anything like that that you're looking at?
David Amitrano: One thing that I've been kicking around for the last six months is opening up a MAW Bar and Grill. I want to open a restaurant based around wrestling with different, you know, like drop kick chicken wings and headlocks and hamburgers and things like that. I want to, I want to open up a space where you can bring the family out, have a burger and watch some live wrestling. So that's something I've been working on. Hopefully, you know, get that going in the next year or so.
Leah Lemm: Great. I want to bring back the conversation to your family a little bit. You mentioned your kids, like their faces laid up and you see this. How about your wife and your kids? How involved are they with? With the wrestling
David Amitrano: my wife, she she'll come to shows every once in a while. She definitely comes to the Grand Slam for the cause. But she's without her, I wouldn't be able to be gone every weekend putting these shows on. She's the rock at home, keeping the kids in line while I'm gone. So without her, it wouldn't be possible. And she has her own, you know, she has her own things going on. She's the Native American liaison for South Washington County School District. She owns a Native American Beauty Company. So she has her hands in a lot of different places as well. Oh, where's she from? She's originally from the Lower Brule Sioux reservation, okay? Yeah, she's from South Dakota, from Lower Brule. Her mom is from Three Affiliated in Mandan, and her grandmother is from Fort Thompson. Okay, so And we've been married for 13 years, and wouldn't be able to do this without her.
Leah Lemm: You're listening to Native Lights, where Indigenous voices shine. Native Lights is produced by Minnesota Native News and AMPERS, with support from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. Today we're speaking with David Amitrano from the Bois Forte band. He's a Minnesota pro-wrestling promoter, and he's a co-owner of Midwest All Star wrestling. How did you begin your work with women of nations?
David Amitrano: So back in 2012 I had just left GNC, and I was looking for something different. And I had met my wife, Brittany, who had started there prior to me, and she said they were looking for a Native American for human resources and finance. And I kind of just took a gamble with it and went for the interview, and went for the second interview, and then they gave me the position, and it was something that I didn't see myself doing, but I'm I'm glad I did. I knew I wanted to get out of retail. I oversaw 20 different stores with GNC before I left. And I was in North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin, and and she had just become pregnant with our first son, and she didn't want me traveling every weekend to different
stores, and that just kind of popped up. And, yeah, I've been there ever since. It's been a wild and crazy ride. I can tell you that coming from a small town like Ely to seeing big things that you people don't talk about and you don't see it's it's been very eye opening to see other trials and tribulations that people have to go through.
Leah Lemm: So just so I'm clear. David, how many jobs do you have right now?
David Amitrano: Well, I oversee the shelter. I'm CFO, my own Midwest All Star wrestling. I co own throne MMA. I own a Tattoo Convention company called Ink fusion, and then I help my wife with her company called iqpa beauty. I don't do too much with the beauty products, except for getting the inventory off the palette and putting it in my garage. Yeah.
Leah Lemm: So five jobs, yeah, all right, being a father and a husband. Oh, yeah, okay, six and seven for sure.
David Amitrano: I have Tyron, Sierra, Titan and Siren.
Leah Lemm: That's so rad. My kid's name is Marvin. That's a family name. Oh, I saw also that you incorporate cultural aspects into your work with the wrestling promotion. Can you tell me more about that, like, like, Native dancers and stuff like that?
David Amitrano: Yeah. So at Grand Slam, every year we have my cousin Terry good sky. He opens up the show every year with a drum and a prayer and smudging. We also do that on our reservation shows, and then we highlight dancers to open up for the shelter as well as a way to give thanks and bless the ring before the wrestlers fill in.
Leah Lemm: Very nice. Okay, that's great. Okay, so you mentioned you also work with a tattoo company. Sorry, you own it.
David Amitrano: So I own Ink Fusion Expos. What we do is we put on tattoo conventions at local reservations casinos or event centers. Okay, we get contracted out to put on tattoo conventions for different people. We're looking at Minneapolis right now, but the last three we've been at the St Croix casino in Danbury, Wisconsin. Oh my gosh.
Leah Lemm: Okay, tattoos. Are you a tattoo artist yourself, or simply in the business side?
David Amitrano: No, it was. So it was the same thing as wrestling. I was doing the wrestling for the St Croix Casino. I do two shows a year for them, and two years ago, they came to me after wrestling and they said, Hey, we want to do a Tattoo Convention out here, and we want you to put it on. And I said, I only get tattoos. I don't know how to tattoo. I don't know anything about that. And it was basically, well, this is the date. We have faith in you. This is what we want to do. Let's get it done. So I created an LLC and started contacting tattoo artists and went on a Tattoo Convention.
Leah Lemm: So it sounds like you are a business owner, project manager, like you can kind of do whatever, like give you a topic, you'll handle it.
David Amitrano: Yeah, yeah, yep, I'll figure it out. I've always been like that. Growing up in Ely, and my parents owned a grocery store up there, and working there and portaging people, I always had to think on my feet, especially when we go up to the Boundary Waters, and I'd have to bring a family up there at 16 and, you know, get the moms that don't want to carry the back. Packs or the canoes, and it's like you got to think on your feet. And I've always been like that. I've been working since I was 13 years old, and it's fun. I always like to do different things.
Leah Lemm: I mean, it just sounds like you're just following kind of a like, I'm just gonna have my adventure and see what happens.
David Amitrano: Yeah, I'm very blessed and honored to have people give me the ability to do things knowing that I don't have a background in that. I went to school, got a degree in kinesiology. I was down in Florida for about a year, then I moved up to New York. I worked at Cornell University, and then came back to Minnesota and just started working at GNC as a part time sales associate, and then worked myself up to a regional sales director, and then I just the shelter fell in my lap. And everything I've done I've always been self-taught, so went and got a degree in Human Resources and finance. It to be more profound at the shelter. And, yeah, it's, it's been exciting.
Leah Lemm: Well, let's talk about some of that self teaching. Then that's what it sounds like you're really good at. Yeah, what is that that motivates you to just be a voracious learner?
David Amitrano: You know, when I came back to Minnesota, I got the job with GNC, and they wanted me to be the store manager, and I had never been a manager before, and they said, well, we just want you to give it a shot. And at that time, GNC was based out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and I was in northern Minnesota. And if you ever been to Virginia or Ely, you know, there's not much up there in the winter. So I kind of, I kind of just got suckered into it, really, and then they started giving me all these responsibilities, and I had no idea what I was doing, so my store in the mall there was right next to a bookstore called Woodward's books. They're no longer there, and I went and bought a book called HR and finance for Dummies, and I read that book all winter long. And that's kind of how I learned the basics of being able to do finance and human resources and how to manage stuff, and kind of self-taught myself until I kept getting promoted and promoted, and then the shelter fell in my lap and had to learn, learn it all over again. If you have the opportunity to try something new, do it. Don't be scared not to do it, because if you don't, you're always going to ask yourself, What if a couple of things I regret in life that I wish I could go back and change? And I've been blessed with different opportunities, and if I get an opportunity, and if I think I can do it, I do it, even if it sounds crazy.
[Music: Native Lights Theme]
Leah Lemm: All right, that was David Amitrano from the Bois Forte band. Chi- Miigwech. You know, just doing it, just taking opportunities, seizing opportunities, and even if you don't feel 100% I think there's a good lesson in that about if you're really interested in doing something, trying something, going for it can pay off, can lead to an adventurous life. So, Miigwech, David Amitrano from the Bois Forte band. David is a Minnesota pro-wrestling promoter and co-owner of Midwest All Star wrestling. I'm Leah Leah. Miigwech for listening. Giga-waabamin. You're listening to Native Lights: Where Indigenous voices shine. Native Lights is produced by Minnesota Native News and AMPERS, with support from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund.