In and Out the Wrestling Ring with BigBoyFloyd

Long before D-Generation-X, Nation of Domination and the NWO, there was the gang group that started it all, The Four Horseman.

The Four Horsemen formed in January 1986 with Ric Flair, with Flair's cousins Arn Anderson and Ole Anderson, and Tully Blanchard, with James J. Dillion as their manager. They feuded with Dusty Rhodes (breaking his ankle and hand), Magnum TA, Barry Windham, The Rock N' Roll Express (breaking Rickey Morton's nose), Nikita Koloff (injuring his neck), and The Road Warriors. The Horseman always had most of the titles in the NWA, and they often bragged about their success (in the ring and with women) in their interviews. They lived the gimmick outside of the arena, as they took limos and jets to the cities they wrestled in.

In February 1987, WCW newcomer Lex Luger was made an associate member of the group after he expressed his desire to become a Horseman. The others started to leave Ole out of things, after he cost him and Arn Anderson the NWA Tag Team Titles at Starrcade 1986, and eventually he was kicked out in favor of Luger that March. The fact that Ole missed a show to watch his son Brian wrestle was used against Ole in the split as Blanchard and Dillon questioned Ole's loyalty and Blanchard called Brian a "snot-nosed kid."

During this time, they wrestled Rhodes, Nikita Koloff, the Road Warriors and Paul Ellering in a series of War Games matches. These matches were brutal and ended up with all 5 members of each team in the cage at the end trying to make somebody submit. During the first match, Dillon suffered a separated shoulder from a botched attempt at the Warriors' finishing move, the Doomsday Device. Dillon landed directly on his right arm and shoulder, and was replaced for the series of matches by the masked War Machine, later known as the Big Bossman.

Luger was kicked out for first blaming Horseman manager J.J. Dillon for costing him the U.S. Title, when his attempt to help him win by cheating backfired, and subsequently, not allowing Dillon to win a Bunkhouse Stampede match as the Horsemen had agreed to among themselves. In January 1988, he teamed with Barry Windham to feud with the Horsemen. The pair even defeated Anderson and Tully Blanchard for the NWA World Tag Team Championship at the inaugural Clash of the Champions. In April 1988, Windham turned on Luger and took his spot in the Horsemen during a title defense against Anderson and Tully Blanchard. This group of Horsemen has been called the greatest as far as technical wrestlers goes. It was also in this year when the Horsemen held all of the major NWA titles at once, with Flair as the World Champion, Windham as the United States Champion, and Arn and Tully as the Tag Team Champions.

In September 1988, Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard left to join the WWF. Many men would enter and exit the Horseman group over the next few years, guys like Sid Vicious, Sting, Paul Roma, and Brian Pillman.

The last incarnation came in September 1998. On the September 15 edition of WCW Monday Nitro in Greenville, South Carolina when Ric Flair returned after a hiatus from the ring after a disagreement with WCW president Eric Bischoff. Dean Malenko and Chris Benoit kept going to Arn about reforming the Horsemen. He kept saying no. James J. Dillon, back in WCW's front office, even made a request. Arn eventually gave in and they reformed the Horsemen with Mongo and Flair and Arn was the manager. They feuded with the nWo and Eric Bischoff, with whom Flair had some real backstage problems. This return of the Horsemen, and more specifically Ric Flair, had boosted Nitro's ratings and WCW had beat WWF Raw for the first time in 11 weeks.

The Four Horseman would eventually disband in 1999 for good.

Click Here to read their Wikipedia page where I got most of this info.