In 1942, Frank Garbutt, vice president of the Los Angeles Athletic Club, hired former California State Athletic Commission inspector Alvah "Cal" Eaton as the promoter of the Grand Olympic Auditorium at the advice of his secretary, Aileen LeBell. Eaton and LeBell married in 1948, and over the following years the couple became major professional wrestling and boxing promoters in Southern California.[9][3] By the early-1950s, the Eatons, along with Hugh Nichols, Johnny Doyle, and Mike Hirsch (collectively known as the "California Combine"), dominated professional wrestling in Southern California, leading to a United States Department of Justice antitrust investigation in 1955 and 1956.[3]