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Early life
Born in Houston, Texas, the tomboyish DeAlva Sibley grew up around wrestling. Her uncle Shorty Roberts worked for local wrestling promoter Morris Siegel, and as she got older, she often hung around the wrestlers and asked them to teach her their moves.[2] On one occasion while DeAlva was playing around in the ring, the women's wrestling promoter Billy Wolfe happened to see her and recognized her potential.[2] Already divorced once and facing poverty,[3] she accepted Wolfe's offer to be trained as a professional wrestler.
DeAlva Eyvonnie Sibley (May 25, 1922–July 20, 1998), better known by her ring name of June Byers, was an American women's professional wrestler famous in the 1950s and early 1960s. She held the World Women's Championship for ten years and is a member of the Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame.
Personal life
The Fabulous Moolah alleges that while traveling with Wolfe's troupe of female wrestlers, Byers often slept with Wolfe (despite his marriage to Burke) in order to get better bookings.[11]
Upon Billy Wolfe's death, Byers moved to St. Louis to work for promoter Sam Meneker, who became her third husband. The early 1960s are now regarded as a period of decline for women's wrestling, due to the title picture fragmenting and a lack of new talent entering the scene. In 1963, while attempting to drive after being hit in the head with a Coke bottle, Byers suffered quadruple vision and collided with a tree.[12] The leg damage from the auto accident cut her career short at age 41 and forced her to retire on January 1, 1964.[2] In her later life, she suffered double vision from the incident.[13]
Byers returned to Texas after retirement from the ring, becoming a real estate agent.[2] She had two children, Billy and Jewel. Her son was fatally electrocuted in an accident, and June was reportedly never the same afterward.[3] She died of pneumonia at her Houston home in 1998.
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