The Hart Foundation vs. The United States (Mar 1997 – Nov 1997)

Background

Bret Hart spent early 1997 chasing the WWF Championship rather than holding it. At In Your House: Final Four in Chattanooga on February 16, he won the vacant title in a four-way with Vader, The Undertaker, and Steve Austin, last eliminating Undertaker at 24:06.[1] He held it for a day. On the next night's Raw in Nashville, Sycho Sid pinned him for the belt after Austin hit Hart with a chair while Hart had Sid in the Sharpshooter.[1] Sid had already been in his face the night before, interrupting Hart's celebration at Final Four as the show went off the air.[1]

Austin was the problem. He had won the 1996 King of the Ring and coined "Austin 3:16" in his coronation speech.[2] At Final Four, Hart threw him over the top rope, and Austin came back minutes later to attack him.[1] Their WrestleMania 13 match was made a submission match, with UFC fighter Ken Shamrock as special referee.[1][6]

The family side of the story was already on television. Owen Hart and his brother-in-law, the British Bulldog, had held the WWF Tag Team Championship together since September 1996, and the partnership kept fraying on camera.[2][1] After a disqualification finish at a February 15 show in St. Paul, they argued, and Bulldog broke Owen's Slammy award.[1] On February 26 in Berlin, Bulldog pinned Owen in 22:43 to win the tournament for the new European title.[1]

Two more names were close at hand. Brian Pillman, on whom Bret's brother Bruce Hart had been a big influence, signed with the WWF in June 1996, two months after a Humvee wreck he was told he would never fully recover from.[2][8][9] Jim Neidhart, Bret's real-life brother-in-law and his tag team partner in the original Hart Foundation, had been gone from the WWF for more than two years.[10][1]

Build-up

WrestleMania 13 was on March 23 at the Rosemont Horizon outside Chicago, in front of 18,197.[1] Hart hit Austin with the timekeeper's bell and locked on the Sharpshooter, and Austin passed out in the hold rather than quit. Shamrock stopped the match at 22:03, then had to hold Hart off when he kept attacking.[1] Austin hit a Stunner on an official who tried to help him up and walked to the back on his own.[1] WWE later described him as "an unlikely hero thanks to a gutsy, albeit losing, effort."[6]

The next night's Raw in Rockford made the turn official. Hart apologized to his fans all over the world except in America, and said American fans' cheering for Austin and Shawn Michaels disgusted him.[1] The Observer reported that he also apologized in the Calgary Sun for what he was about to do on TV, promising that his issues were only with American fans and that "it'll come out in the end that it's all part of a master plan like Charles Bronson in Death Wish."[3]

The Hart Foundation came together on the March 31 Raw is War, taped in Peoria. Owen and Bulldog fought to a no contest after the referee went down and both men went for a steel chair, and Bret came out and held them apart.[1] He told them they shouldn't be fighting for a crowd with no family values, and reminded Bulldog of how the two of them had hugged at Wembley Stadium. He reminded Owen that he had looked out for him since he was young and helped get him into the WWF.[1] Then he told Owen he loved him. Owen broke down, and the three men hugged and left together.[1][14] Later that night, when Austin attacked Bret after his match with Rocky Maivia, Owen and Bulldog ran in and the three of them beat Austin down on the floor.[14]

It worked on television. Even as Nitro beat Raw 3.69 to 2.19 on April 7, the Observer reported that the angle with Bret reuniting the Hart Foundation was proving to be a real ratings winner.[4]

Austin kept coming. On the April 21 Raw, a streetfight between them ended when Austin went after Hart's knee with a steel chair and wouldn't let go of the Sharpshooter, and when Hart was loaded into an ambulance, Austin turned out to be in the driver's seat.[1] Hart had knee surgery in Calgary two days later.[1] On the April 28 Raw in Omaha, Owen dedicated his match to his injured brother and beat Rocky Maivia for the Intercontinental Championship with a leg backslide. Bret cut a promo on America from a wheelchair, and at the end of the night Jim Neidhart made a surprise return and helped send Austin off the stage.[1]

By In Your House on May 11 in Richmond, the group was five: Bret, Owen, Bulldog, Neidhart, and Pillman.[1] Its one real loss came on the May 26 Raw, when Austin and Michaels, who had been brawling with each other on the same shows, took the tag titles from Owen and Bulldog in 13:25. Austin pinned Bulldog after Michaels superkicked him behind the referee's back, and the rest of the Hart Foundation jumped Michaels afterward.[1]

Hart has said the promos were deliberately built to walk a line. "I'm walking this line between being a babyface and a heel, and I remember a lot of times saying, 'I've got to say something smarter than that. I can't just go out there and say stupid stuff,'" he said in 2020.[5] He credited McMahon with the material: "Vince was hands-on telling me how to do the whole US / Canada thing."[5] One of McMahon's ideas was a line about giving Pittsburgh an enema. "I remember I was like, 'Geez, that's a bit strong,'" Hart said. "I'm not sure I've ever been forgiven in Pittsburgh for saying that."[5]

The Matches

There was no single blow-off between the Harts and the Americans. The closest thing was In Your House 16: Canadian Stampede, on July 6 at the Saddledome in Calgary, the Hart family's hometown.[1] The crowd was 12,151, with 10,974 paid.[1] Alberta Premier Ralph Klein and the entire Hart family sat at ringside, and the Canadian national anthem was sung before the main event.[1]

The ten-man tag put Bret, Owen, Bulldog, Neidhart, and Pillman against Austin, Ken Shamrock, Goldust, and the Legion of Doom.[1] WWE's own later description: "Though the fans watching at home on pay-per-view may have been a little more partial to 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin and his team of The Road Warriors, Goldust & Ken Shamrock, Calgary was firmly in the corner of The Hart Foundation."[7]

Austin took Owen out early by attacking his knee with a chair, and Bret took Austin out in turn with the ringpost figure-four. Both came back before the end.[1] With Austin distracted by several of the Hart brothers at ringside, Owen rolled him up for the pin at 24:30.[1]

The finish was the start of the celebration. The whole Hart family came into the ring and made sure everyone from the other team left it. When Austin came back by himself, the family attacked him while the crowd chanted "Austin sucks!", and he was handcuffed and led away while the Harts celebrated.[1][13] The show drew a 171,000 buyrate, and the Wrestling Observer named it the Best Major Show of 1997.[13]

Canadian Stampede settled nothing between Bret and Austin, and it was the last big match of their feud. From the next night's Raw, Austin's fight with the family moved to Owen, which led to their Intercontinental title match at SummerSlam.[13][1] That match would cost Austin far more than the belt.[15]

Aftermath

SummerSlam on August 3 at the Continental Airlines Arena drew 20,213, a WWF record for the building.[1] Austin beat Owen for the Intercontinental title in 16:17, but in the final minute Owen's tombstone piledriver drove Austin's head into the mat and broke his neck, leaving him temporarily paralyzed.[1][15] Once feeling came back, he rolled Owen up for the win, needed help to leave the ring, and was out of action for months.[15] The rest of the group had their own stipulations that night. Bulldog kept the European title over Shamrock by disqualification in a match where he'd have had to eat dog food if he lost, after smearing Shamrock with it on Raw the week before.[1] Goldust pinned Pillman, who by the prematch terms had to wear a dress on the next night's Raw.[1]

In the main event, Hart challenged The Undertaker for the WWF Championship with Michaels as special referee. If Hart didn't win, he could never wrestle in the United States again, and if Michaels favored Undertaker, he couldn't either.[1] Hart had the Canadian anthem played and dedicated the match to his international fans. Late in the match he spat in Michaels' face, and Michaels swung a chair Hart had brought in and hit Undertaker with it. Hart pinned him at 28:08, then wrapped himself in the Canadian flag and celebrated with Owen, Pillman, and Bulldog while fans threw trash into the ring.[1]

The group's British side got its night on September 20 at One Night Only, a UK pay-per-view at the NEC Arena in Birmingham, England, in front of 11,000.[1] Bulldog defended the European title against Michaels with his wife, mother, and sister, who was being treated for cancer, at ringside. He hurt his ankle on the floor, and Michaels won the title at 22:53 when the referee stopped the match with Bulldog in a figure-four, with Triple H, Rick Rude, and Chyna illegally helping. Bret and Owen came out to save Bulldog and his wife, Diana, afterward.[1]

Hart has said the angle peaked with SummerSlam. "Vince mysteriously ran out of ideas about the end of August," he said. "If you watched my promos for the next two months, I'm walking out there and... I'm saying what I said the week before."[5]

On October 5, before Badd Blood in St. Louis, it was announced that Pillman had died, and his match with Dude Love was cancelled.[1] On the show, Owen won the Intercontinental title tournament final over Farooq after Neidhart distracted the referee and Austin, sitting in as timekeeper, hit Farooq with the belt.[1] Bret and Bulldog beat The Patriot and Vader in a flag match.[1]

At Survivor Series in Montreal on November 9, in front of 20,593, Bulldog and Neidhart won an elimination match, and Austin beat Owen for the Intercontinental title in 4:02.[1] Hart came to the ring with Bulldog, Owen, Neidhart, and his son Blade. The planned finish of the main event was a Hart Foundation run-in and a disqualification, leading to a brawl with D-Generation X.[1] Instead, with Michaels holding Hart in the Sharpshooter, Earl Hebner called for the bell at 12:18 on McMahon's orders, though Hart never submitted. Hart spat in McMahon's eye at ringside.[1]

The group came apart within weeks. Bulldog's Survivor Series match was his last for two years; around Christmas he paid the WWF $150,000 to buy out the last 32 months of his contract and agreed to a deal with WCW.[1] Neidhart was written out in an angle where D-Generation X invited him in and then turned on him, and at a late-November Raw taping in Roanoke, DX spray-painted "WCW" on his back.[1]

Owen stayed in the WWF. On May 23, 1999, at Over the Edge in Kansas City, he fell 78 feet from the catwalk when his harness released during his entrance as the Blue Blazer, and died within minutes.[11]

Behind the Scenes

The group worked because it was real. Bret's March 31 speech pulled from the family's actual history, from the Wembley hug to the years he spent looking out for his youngest brother.[1] Neidhart was married into the family, and ESPN's obituary of him described the 1997 group as Neidhart alongside "three of his brother-in-laws -- Bret Hart, Owen Hart and the British Bulldog -- and Brian Pillman."[10]

It also cost Bret something outside the ring. "I can remember in some of those places like Montgomery, Alabama, and places like that, getting in my car to drive off after the show and I would have hillbilly guys in trucks follow me for miles, shaking their fists at me and trying to drive me off the road," he said. "It was dangerous stuff."[5]

The Observer noted at the time that Hart was still a babyface in Canada despite the turn.[3] Hart has said that was the whole point: "I'm kind of still a babyface. It has to be done in a very intelligent way."[5]

Hart has suggested that the fall-off after SummerSlam was deliberate. "I think it was part of my intentional grounding was to go, 'Okay, now we'll cut the power on him. Let him go out there and he doesn't know what to go out there and say,'" he said.[5] That is Hart's reading of it.

Off camera, Hart's view of the premise was gentler than his character's. "Canadians have always been the more gentler, laid back version of Americans anyway," he said in 2020. "We're really the bastard child of Britain and America."[5]

Pillman was the most fragile part of the group. Before he had wrestled a WWF match in 1996, he argued with McMahon on Raw that he hadn't been paid yet for signing.[2] His 1997, as told in Dark Side of the Ring, included a drug test he was upset over, several crashed rental cars, and the weight of coming to terms with his physical decline at 35.[8]

He was found dead on October 5 at the Budgetel Motel in Bloomington, Minnesota, where he had stayed the night before. An autopsy attributed his death to a heart attack caused by previously undetected atherosclerotic heart disease, the condition that had killed his father. Painkillers and muscle relaxers were found in the room.[12] The next night on Raw, McMahon interviewed his widow, Melanie. She had asked him to avoid any discussion of drugs because the autopsy was still pending, and the request was ignored on the air.[8]

Legacy

The angle's opening match is now in the WWE Hall of Fame. In 2025 Hart and Austin received the inaugural "WWE Immortal Moment" award for WrestleMania 13, and the Wrestling Observer and Pro Wrestling Illustrated both named it the 1997 Match of the Year.[6][1]

The business numbers were mixed. The Observer reported that WrestleMania 13 did a 0.77 buyrate, the lowest for any WrestleMania to that point and below several recent WCW shows.[3] Canadian Stampede drew 171,000 buys, and WWE later ranked it tenth on its list of the 15 best pay-per-views ever.[13][7] SummerSlam and Survivor Series both drew more than 20,000.[1]

The summer's most lasting moment turned out to be an accident. WWE lists Owen's SummerSlam piledriver among its 15 SummerSlam moments it can't forget: "Hart stuffed Austin with a piledriver and, in a freak accident, fractured The Texas Rattlesnake's neck."[16]

Hart has kept defending the angle. "It's too bad. I've always thought that was one of the smarter storylines," he said in 2020. "I always loved the line I had about 'they don't shoot each other and kill each other on every street corner' and all that stuff."[5]

Pillman was 35 when he died.[9] Owen was killed at Over the Edge in 1999.[11] Neidhart died on August 13, 2018, at 63, after a fall at his home in Wesley Chapel, Florida. His brother-in-law Ross Hart suggested he had suffered a seizure related to Alzheimer's disease.[10]

See Also

Sources & Further Listening

1. WWF 1997 results (event results, attendance, and TV segment details) — The History of WWE. http://www.thehistoryofwwe.com/97.htm
2. WWF 1996 results — The History of WWE. http://www.thehistoryofwwe.com/96.htm
3. Wrestling Observer Newsletter, April 7, 1997 (WrestleMania 13 buyrate, Hart Foundation formation, Hart's Calgary Sun apology) — issue recap, "Wrestling Observer Flashback – 04.07.97," Scott's Blog of Doom. https://www.blogofdoom.com/2025/11/18/wrestling-observer-flashback-04-07-97/
4. Wrestling Observer Newsletter, April 14, 1997 (Raw and Nitro ratings) — issue recap, "Wrestling Observer Flashback – 04.14.97," Scott's Blog of Doom. https://www.blogofdoom.com/2026/08/04/wrestling-observer-flashback-04-14-97/
5. Sean Ross Sapp, "Bret Hart Looks Back At Canada vs. USA Comments From 1997 WWF" — Fightful, November 2020 (Hart interview). https://www.fightful.com/wrestling/bret-hart-looks-back-canada-vs-usa-comments-1997-wwf/
6. "Bret 'The Hitman' Hart & 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin to receive inaugural 'WWE Immortal Moment' Award" — WWE.com, March 31, 2025. https://www.wwe.com/shows/wwe-hall-of-fame/article/bret-hart-stone-cold-steve-austin-immortal-moment-hall-of-fame-2025
7. "The 15 best pay-per-views ever" — WWE.com. https://www.wwe.com/classics/15-best-pay-per-views
8. John Pollock, "Pollock's Review: Dark Side of the Ring – Brian Pillman" — POST Wrestling, May 7, 2021. https://www.postwrestling.com/2021/05/07/pollocks-review-dark-side-of-the-ring-brian-pillman/
9. "The unlikely story of 'Crazy Like a Fox,' the biography of Brian Pillman" — ESPN. https://www.espn.com/wwe/story/_/id/23204001/wwe-unlikely-story-book-crazy-fox-comprehensive-brian-pillman-biography
10. Tim Fiorvanti, "Jim 'The Anvil' Neidhart, member of Hart Foundation, dies at 63" — ESPN, August 13, 2018. https://www.espn.com/wwe/story/_/id/24365302/jim-anvil-neidhart-dies-age-63
11. Dan Greene, "The Owen Hart Tragedy Was the Moment We Came to See Wrestlers as Human" — Sports Illustrated, May 23, 2019. https://www.si.com/wrestling/2019/05/23/wwe-owen-hart-death-20th-anniversary
12. Brian Pillman — Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Pillman
13. In Your House 16: Canadian Stampede — Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Your_House_16:_Canadian_Stampede
14. "WWF RAW 3/31/1997" — Wrestling Recaps. https://wrestlingrecaps.com/2011/08/19/wwf-raw-3311997/
15. "WWE Superstars fight through the pain" — WWE.com (Austin's neck injury at SummerSlam 1997). https://www.wwe.com/classics/superstars-competing-with-injuries
16. "15 SummerSlam moments we can't forget" — WWE.com. https://www.wwe.com/shows/summerslam/15-summerslam-moments-we-cant-forget

Further Listening

• Bret Hart's Hitman: My Real Life in the Cartoon World of Wrestling — his own account of the Hart Foundation angle and the family dynamics behind it
• Wrestling with Shadows (1998 documentary) — filmed contemporaneously through 1997, covering the Hart Foundation run and its collision with the Montreal finish
• Dark Side of the Ring: 'Brian Pillman' — the loose cannon's life and death in the middle of the Hart Foundation's biggest year
• Stampede Wrestling and the Hart family's own oral histories on the Calgary scene that the Canadian Stampede crowd was drawing on