Here is an interview from 2010 with the Classic Television Showbiz blog.
Kliph Nesteroff: When did your nightclub act start?
Hank Garrett: I’ve always been a clown. I started in the Catskills when I was sixteen. I started working these hotels up in the Catskills but I was also very much involved in working out. I was a power lifter at the gym. I broke the New York state record at one point. A gentleman had approached me and said, “You know, you could make a lot of money as a professional wrestler.” He represented a guy named Toots Mondt. Toots Mondt was a promoter in New York. Met Toots Mondt [and] started professional wrestling when I was seventeen. I am now in The Wrestling Hall of Fame.They changed my name to Hank Daniels, The Minnesota Farm Boy. I’d never been out of New York!
Hank Garrett 