JIM "DANO" McDONALD
1921-2004
James G. (Dano/Danno) McDonald died March 4, 2004 at the age of 81 in Eatonville, Washington of natural causes. He was born in Nova Scotia and grew up in Hamilton, Ontario, and began his wrestling career in 1947/48 in Mexico. He had attempted to work Canada and the U.S. previous to this, but was considered to be too light.

After doing quite well in Mexico and putting on some extra weight and muscle, he made his professional debut in the United States, circa 1949. In 1951, he ventured to the Pacific Northwest for

the first time, where he homesteaded, and worked the territory steadily until 1975. Upon retirement from the wrestling business, he became a mortician, working in Seattle at the Columbia Funeral Home. Dano McDonald is speculated to have worked in more professional wrestling matches throughout the Pacific Northwest than any other performer in the history of the business. During his career, he held the Northwest Championship Singles title and Tag Team Championship (several times), as well as the Seattle Champion, also on numerous occasions.

In addition to working the Pacific Northwest, he was well known in the Southwest, Southeast, and Central area, as well as throughout Canada.

Dano at one time said that he worked against Ivan Kameroff, Kurt von Poppenheim, and Soldat Gorky more times than the New York Yankees took on the Detroit Tigers. Between 1957 and 1968, there was hardly a night in the Pacific Northwest that Dano McDonald was not someplace on the card.

His last match was against Ripper Collins in Seattle in 1975, where he broke three ribs. It was the injury that gave him the idea of finally retiring from the business. He said "Ripper didn't break them, I just fell wrong and didn't want to take the chance of getting seriously hurt, due to my age."

His last main event was in 1974, when he came out of semi retirement to take on the young punk Chris Colt, who publicly called him a grandpa on television.