Mark Hildreth, the former WCW wrestler known to fans as Van Hammer, has died at 66. Marc Mero said he shared the news publicly and said the cause of death had not yet been confirmed, with an autopsy still pending.
Mero said he and Hildreth first met while Hildreth was vacationing in Venice, Florida and working out at a local gym. Not long after, Mero said, Hildreth drove him eight hours so he could sign his first contract with World Championship Wrestling.
That bond carried through wrestling school, where the two trained together, and into Atlanta, where they lived while building their careers. Mero also said they were chosen to help promote WCW for a United Kingdom tour, making appearances and television spots and even working promotional events alongside Gladys Knight.
Hildreth began his wrestling career after being trained by Dean Malenko and Dan Spivey and debuted in World Championship Wrestling in 1991 with a heavy metal rock-and-roll persona. During his early WCW run, he wrestled Mick Foley in a Falls Count Anywhere match on a live Clash of Champions special. He won the 1992 Jesse Ventura Invitational arm-wrestling tournament, received a WWF tryout in 1993 but was not signed, then later returned to WCW during the Monday Nitro era and became part of Raven’s Flock.
The details left unanswered by Tuesday’s announcement are the final ones around his death, but Mero’s tribute made clear what Hildreth meant to the people around him: a loyal friend who kept showing up, even when life got hard. Hildreth is gone, but the story of Van Hammer is still tied to the career he built and the people he carried with him along the way.
