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I remember this night, actually. When I was living in another city, I was actually watching the scrambled picture the best I could (I actually adjusting the contrast and brightness on my TV to get the picture in actually rather well). I heard JR say this was not a wrestling "angle" (I quote angle because JR seemed to stress that word as if he was quoting it himself). Then the words that will live in infamy: "Owen Hart...has died."
In the words of one CNN reporter as he watched on 9/11 when the scond tower came down: "There are no words" to describe the feeling I had that day. Somber, saddened, angry, whatever you would think you would be feeling after that kind of statement. And the decision to keep the Over The Edge show going as planned even after that statement was, like it or not, and this is just my opinion which I am entitled to, the right thing to do. Instead of stopping the show and ending it, they continued to perform, which, in my own mind, was one of the most courageous things anyone could be asked to do. You could say that the rest of that night's matches were being done with Owen in mind.
The next day, WJW Channel 8 out of Cleveland (a FOX affiliate) had a story about it, and they had pointed out that Vince McMahon had ALREADY made the monumental decision to never do the rafter thing again. I believe they ran the story twice in their 5:00 PM news the next day.
To this day, he is saddly missed in not only the WWE and its fans, but in the wrestling world. I don't believe that there will ever be anyone like the guy, who loved the business for what it was: a lifestyle. In my opinion, no one worked as hard as Owen did, and it will be very hard if not impossible to find anyone else LIKE him.
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