Wrestling legend Sweet Daddy Siki remembered across Canada for his greatness

Sweet Daddy Siki, a wrestling legend from coast to coast in Canada, died this week at age 91. He ended up living in Ontario and trained future WWE superstars Edge and Christian.

As the clock struck 12 on a new year, the wrestling world lost one of its most colourful characters from the past.

Sweet Daddy Siki was a legend from coast to coast in Canada back in the days when World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) was not the sole dominating force in professional wrestling.

Siki, who was born Elkin James, died on New Year’s Eve after battling dementia for many years, according to Greg Oliver, the producer of Slamwrestling.net. He was 91.

Oliver, who has written 10 books on wrestling, was involved in producing a documentary on the life of ‘Mr. Irresistible.’ That was another of the monikers for Siki, whose final days few decades were spent living in Toronto near Exhibition Place, far from where his life began.

“The story of Sweet Daddy Siki starts out in Texas and he’s the son of a sharecropper,” Oliver said.

He said Siki landed in Los Angeles after his mother’s death and that was where he picked up a passion for boxing and wrestling.

After serving in the U.S. military during the Korean War, Siki returned home and that was when he began to thrive inside the squared circle.

“He quickly became a decent hand in pro wrestling, as we call it, learning the sport and starting to get his name out there,” Oliver said. “He was an early face that was on the Dumont network, which was a national network. And so his name started to get known nationally.”