Column: Former pro wrestler Mickey Shannon plots comeback at 63. ‘You walk a thin line of danger.’

I am walking down a flight of narrow concrete steps that lead to the lower level of the Bridgeview Park District Sports Complex fitness center. I am headed to the weight room with Ed Shanahan, 63, of Burbank.

“I call this the Iron Dungeon,” Shanahan says, unlocking the weight room door. “Iron for the weights, and dungeon because it’s in the basement.”

The setting might seem more ominous were it not for the cartoon characters painted on hallway walls in bright colors. Other rooms in the fitness center basement apparently host activities for children.

Shanahan flips a switch. Cold fluorescent lighting fills the space, revealing treadmills, stationary bicycles, a cross trainer, a stepper, an elliptical, a leg press, a shoulder press and other implements of torture, I mean, fitness equipment.

“I have lived in Burbank all my life, but I got rebuilt here in Bridgeview,” Shanahan says.

Shanahan transformed himself over the past year through diet and exercise. He lost 92 pounds in 11 months. He weighed 312 pounds when he started nearly a year ago.

He has beaten cancer three times. He quit smoking cigarettes nine years ago. Now he’s resurrecting the ghost of his alter ego, Mickey Shannon, the name he used when he worked as a professional wrestler during the 1980s.

“I learned from a trainer called the Iron Guru, who was amazing in the bodybuilding field,” Shanahan said.

The Iron Guru was a moniker used by Vince Gironda, 1917-1997, an author, co-founder of the supplement company NSP Nutrition and owner of Vince’s Gym in North Hollywood, California.

Shanahan, as Mickey Shannon, will perform during a wrestling event at 7 p.m. Saturday at Commissioners Park, 8100 S. Beloit Ave., Bridgeview. The free, family friendly event also features live music at 5:30 p.m. and fireworks at dusk.

POWW Entertainment, a pro wrestling company based in Fox Lake, is promoting the wrestling showcase. Mickey Shannon will be in the corner of POWW owner Jimmy Blaze, who will take on 21-year-old Mason Perks. Other matches feature such names as Masked Marauder, Hardcore Craig and the Bad Hombre Cartel.

When Shanahan was in his 20s, Mickey Shannon was a regular on the American Wrestling Association circuit. The AWA lasted from 1960 to 1991 and toured mainly in the Midwest. The league produced many stars, with Hulk Hogan becoming the biggest name.

Televisions audiences and live crowds lapped up the entertainment.

“A lot of it was TV studios, which was kind of cool, because people are more personable. There were crowds of maybe 300, 400 people,” Shanahan said. “At the end it was the Hammond Civic Center,” a 4,500-seat arena across the border in Indiana.

Shanahan worked with and learned from wrestlers like Dick the Bruiser. Many on the circuit lived like rock stars on the road.

“They say every night is a Friday night and every day is a Saturday,” he said. “I was kind of a loner, though. I wasn’t one to go out partying.”

He smoked a lot of cigarettes, though — three packs a day, he said. Then, a week before his 30th birthday, he was diagnosed with cancer for the first time. He quit wrestling and underwent surgery to treat melanoma, skin cancer on his back.

Ed Shanahan, 63, of Burbank, visits Bridgeview Park District’s Commissioners Park, where he will perform Saturday as his pro wrestling persona, Mickey Shannon. (Ted Slowik / Daily Southtown)

He had worked hard and paid his dues, but the cancer diagnosis ended Shanahan’s dream of making Mickey Shannon a household name.

“I was moving up the charts, as far as TV matches,” he said. “I always made the stars look good, but the stars were making me look good too, back in the day.”

Skin cancer would return twice more over the years, Shanahan said, showing off a surgery scar on his neck. He found success in a less physically strenuous form of entertainment. Shanahan works as a psychic reader, medium and paranormal expert.

He hosts séances, performs at parties, conducts private readings and co-hosts a podcast called “The Unexplained World.” He also calls himself a spiritualist and life coach.

“I believe in miracles, because I am one myself,” he said.

Shanahan showed me a picture of himself a year ago, when he hit his maximum weight. His epiphany, or “aha moment,” came in the produce section of a Fairplay Foods grocery store.

“My shoe came untied,” he said. “Being that weight, once you get down to tie it you have to push up, so I found a cooler by the veggies. I couldn’t even touch my toes back then.”

That’s when Shanahan says he experienced divine intervention. An angel approached him in the form of a human woman.

“She said, ‘Sir, I’ll tie your shoe for you if you need me to.’ I said, ‘No, ma’am, the only person that’s going to tie it is the guy that buries me.’ That was the switch. I call her a holy angel for that fact.”

Shanahan was raised Catholic and attended elementary school at St. Albert the Great in Burbank. He played football freshman year at St. Laurence High School in Burbank, but sustained a concussion.

A doctor scared his mother into believing her only child would be paralyzed or killed if he kept playing football, so she refused to let him play, he said. He transferred to Reavis, Burbank’s public high school. His mother redeemed herself in his eyes, however, when she suggested he enroll in a wrestling school.

“People have dreams. I was always put down for my dreams,” Shanahan said. “I was a heavy kid in grammar school. Kids would make fun of me and all that stuff. Then I said I wanted to be a pro wrestler and, you know, bla bla bla.”

Shanahan showed them. He pursued his dream and chased success in a physically demanding trade where employees jump from ropes around a ring and tackle other employees.

“You need the respect because you walk a thin line of danger,” he said. “You could mess up and be hurt, or hurt the other guy.”

Shanahan looks good. His gray beard is neatly trimmed. His biceps bulge. He’s launching a brand called Never Say Never, he said. He maintains a serious expression and strikes an intimidating pose. He may be three times as old as the 21-year-old his partner will wrestle Saturday, but he’s ready for the challenge.

Twice-weekly

News updates from the south suburbs delivered every Monday and Wednesday

“In my mind I feel I can do this,” he said. “I hold myself to a high expectation of what the ability should be in the ring. If I couldn’t accomplish that, I wouldn’t be here.”

I asked if Saturday’s event was a one-off, or if Mickey Shannon would make more appearances. Shanahan said he didn’t know but would see how it goes.

Shanahan may project a tough guy image, but our conversation revealed he is a caring person. He’s married with two adult daughters and a 7-year-old grandson. When I asked about his outlook on life, he sounded like someone who thinks of others more than himself.

“The thing is, try not to judge somebody, because you don’t know what they’re going through at that time of their life,” he said. “Sometimes it does good if you can give somebody a smile. You don’t know what tomorrow’s going to bring.”

Ted Slowik is a columnist with the Daily Southtown.