1980s professional wrestling boom

The 1980s professional wrestling boom, more commonly referred to as the Golden Era or the Rock 'n' Wrestling Era, was a surge in the popularity of professional wrestling in the United States and elsewhere throughout the 1980s. The expansion of cable television and pay-per-view, coupled with the efforts of promoters such as Vince McMahon, saw wrestling shift from a system controlled by numerous regional companies to one dominated by two nationwide companies: McMahon's World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) and Ted Turner's World Championship Wrestling (WCW). The decade also saw a considerable decline in the power of the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA), which had until then dominated the wrestling landscape, and in the efforts to sustain belief in the kayfabe of wrestling.