(upbeat music) 3

The home to such icons as Andy Warhol, 4

Dan Marino, and Mr. Rogers. 5

♪ It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood ♪ 6

♪ A beautiful day for a neighbor ♪ 7

♪ Would you be mine? ♪ 8

♪ Could you be mine? ♪ 9

But the biggest star to come out of 10

the Steel City is Bruno Sammartino. 11

Now, don't believe me? 12

Well, I'll have my friend Arnold here explain. 13

I realize that this is the star of all stars. 14

He was the best, he was the most popular, he was huge. 15

Bruno Sammartino was 16

a superstar professional wrestler. 17

(rock music) 18

And I mean superstar. 19

You can hear this capacity crowd 20

chanting Bruno, Bruno, Bruno! 21

He sold out Madison Square Garden 22

a whopping 188 times. 23

That's more than Billy Joel, U2, the Rolling Stones, 24

and Janet Jackson combined. 25

In 1959 he was the strongest man in the world. 26

And held the WWE championship belt 27

for 2,803 days, meanwhile Hulk Hogan 28

held his WCW championship belt for a minor 359. 29

But all of that almost didn't happen. 30

How unlikely is his success story? 31

It's impossible. 32

How does a 13 year old malnourished sickly child 33

that doesn't know the language 34

come to this country, and is bullied. 35

Now the wrestler's extraordinary life story 36

is being told in the acclaimed 37

documentary "Bruno Sammartino". 38

The Worldwide Wrestling Federation 39

champion, Bruno Sammartino. 40

(man yelling) 41

Born in 1935, Bruno grew up in Italy. 42

He came of age during the height of World War II, 43

in the small mountain town of Pizzoferrato. 44

So my dad's early life when he was a kid was, 45

it wasn't the best, you know. 46

They were very poor. 47

Then he got sick for most of his younger years. 48

And then the war happened and the Germans came in. 49

And they had to flee the town, 50

and they had to go on top of the mountain for 14 months. 51

And they lived outside. 52

And he was a very sickly, sickly kid. 53

I mean they were basically starving, starving to death. 54

He had rheumatic fever. 55

So rheumatic fever, and as I find out as the years went on, 56

it eventually is gonna affect your heart as you get older. 57

Nazis came to their village, took over, 58

and had one point captured them. 59

Lined them up to be executed. 60

His mother took his brother Paul, sister Mary, 61

and him under her arms and said, don't worry, 62

we'll never be hungry again, we'll never be cold again, 63

we'll be in Paradise with Jesus. 64

And just then they were saved at the last minute 65

by their own villagers who had followed the Germans 66

and killed them right there on the spot. 67

I only survived because of my mom's love and care. 68

She did everything to keep me alive. 69

After the war Bruno's family immigrated 70

to America and settled in Pittsburgh. 71

Steel town, 72

heart of America's industrial might. 73

They came to America in 1950. 74

My dad was poor his whole life until he came here. 75

He made it on his own. 76

Literally. 77

Yet this sickly kid wasn't met 78

with kindness when he arrived. 79

My dad was bullied. 80

He didn't know the language. 81

He moved to Oakland, in Pittsburgh. 82

And because he couldn't speak well and this and that 83

he got bullied, and he was very very skinny. 84

I mean he was 15 years old weighing 87 pounds, literally. 85

You always hear about that 87 pound weight claim, 86

well that was for real. 87

So yeah, he got beat up a lot. 88

And so that's when he started lifting weights 89

and making himself bigger. 90

And, like he said, all the bullies disappeared, 91

after a while. (laughs) 92

So my dad set a bench press record of 565 pounds. 93

And that's with no chemicals, no shirts. 94

None of that stuff. 95

And back then you had 565 pounds, 96

you brought it to your chest, 97

and you counted 1,001, 1,002, and then you lifted it. 98

Bruno caught the attention 99

of the Pittsburgh Steelers. 100

But the world of wresting also came calling. 101

Back then he had basically a choice. 102

You can do wresting. 103

(audience yelling) 104

Or play with the Steelers. 105

Well back then with the Steelers 106

a lineman was making $9,000 a year. 107

And wrestling back then was 35,000. 108

And it's all relative. 109

So 35,000 back then to start was pretty good. 110

So there you have it. 111

Wresting didn't just become something 112

to put food on his family's table, 113

it also made Bruno a global phenomenon. 114

He was the biggest ticket on the planet, at one point. 115

He wrestled on every continent on earth. 116

He was a megastar in Japan. 117

Wrestled in Australia, Canada, Europe, 118

Mexico, South America, extraordinary. 119

And people would come out to see him, 120

and selling out Madison Square Garden, 121

arguably the biggest house in the world, 122

188 times as the headliner. 123

People like Frank Sinatra wanted to hang with him. 124

When he came into the ring people were standing 125

and screaming, and screaming, and screaming. 126

And then the fight began, 127

and I mean he started throwing this guy around. 128

He lifted people up that were 400 pounds, overhead. 129

So this is how powerful he was. 130

Bruno was one of the globe's 131

hottest tickets during his heyday. 132

But those close to him say, he always remained humble. 133

Someone who was homeless would recognize Bruno. 134

And stop in the moment, and go, Bruno! 135

And he would treat that person the same 136

as he would treat the president of a company. 137

I saw that many times. 138

And the fans, all the fans in between. 139

He would stay, sign autographs, and never blow them off. 140

'Cause he said, these are the people that made me who I am. 141

In the late 1980s Bruno retired 142

from the sport to which he gave so much. 143

But his years in the ring had taken a toll. 144

He figures that he was body slammed over 8,000 times. 145

8,000 times in his career. 146

With that, and the beatings you take in the ring, 147

and people can say what they want, you take beatings. 148

And the rheumatic fever, it's amazing 149

that he even lived that long. 150

But he took such good care of himself. 151

He worked out all the time. 152

It was so strict and so, I mean, 153

he would never miss a workout. 154

He'd run miles, and miles, and miles. 155

I mean he was 265 pounds running 12 miles a day. 156

The WWE Hall of Fame came calling in 2013. 157

And his friend Arnold did the honors. 158

Arnold Schwarzenegger flew off a movie set 159

all the way from California just to do his induction speech. 160

In April 2018 Bruno passed away at 82. 161

But his legacy lives on. 162

He says, as an immigrant he always 163

felt like working harder. 164

And he was so appreciative of what kind of a career he had 165

as an immigrant coming over here to America. 166

I appreciate it so much as an Austrian to come over here. 167

I did not go through all the stuff that he went through, 168

and the hardship, and everything like that. 169

It is, I think, one of the greatest 170

immigration stories that anyone can think of 171

when you talk about Bruno Sammartino. 172

He would say, the strength of this country 173

is in its diversity, and I would agree. 174

Because the people that are here wanna be here, 175

fought to be here in many cases. 176

And he was also quick to point out, 177

I'm not the only one who dealt with this, 178

and recognize all the other families, 179

not only in Italy, but around the world, 180

who'd overcome struggles to be here. 181

So he was very cognizant of that. 182

And the strength of this country 183

is the fact that it's so diverse. 184

My dad is 100% the American dream. 185

Like he said, when he came to America 186

the roads were paved in gold. 187

It was a way for him to make a living. 188

And he made a better living for his family 189

than what he had, coming to America. 190

For InsideEdition.com, I'm Steven Fabian.