It is typical for a Harvard undergraduate to supplement four years of learning within the walls of Harvard Yard with further studies in graduate school before entering his chosen field. Law schools, medical schools and businesses schools are annually inundated with Harvard alums, as are masters programs of every sort.

But Killer Kowalski’s Pro Wrestling School? Nary an alumnus could claim to have passed through its doors since its founding in 1977, until former Crimson defensive tackle Chris Nowinski ’00 began a journey that would take him from the serenity of the Yard to the chaos of the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) ring.

“Non-Harvard grads are usually shocked or surprised,” Nowinski says of his emergence as WWE wrestler Chris Harvard. “Other people think it’s the coolest thing in the world. Most Harvard grads are real jealous of me because most of them hate their jobs and see how much fun I have.”

Life after Harvard

Nowinski’s first steps down a career path didn’t lead to the WWE.

Rather, they carried him to Waltham, Mass., where he came to fill a role not altogether dissimilar from that of many of his former classmates—financial consultant.

“I was doing financial consulting for Trinity Partners, where probably 20 or 30 ex-Harvard people work,” Nowinski says. “It was one of those great consulting jobs where we were all over paid and didn’t have to kill ourselves too bad.”

Working a standard week and easily providing for himself financially, the former sociology concentrator seemed to be living a life that would be called satisfactory at worst by most casual observers.

But deep within, Nowinski harbored acute dissatisfaction with the hours he needed to keep and the life he had begun to lead.

Though certainly less strenuous than the hours many in his field were required to work, the time put in at the office was too much for him.

“Every summer I had interned in marketing, insurance or something,” Nowinski says. “I hated the 40-hour weeks. I didn’t want to make that my long term goal.”

But luckily for him, the man who would provide an alternative was not far down the road.

He was down the hallway in fact.

It was Nowinski’s boss—John Corker ’79—who first suggested the alternative career path.

A die-hard wrestling fan himself, he and Nowinski would eagerly discuss wrestling, using it as an escape from their humdrum daily activities, before eventually Corker suggested that Nowinski try his hand at it.