Chicago Stadium

Chicago Stadium was an indoor arena in Chicago from 1929 to 1995, located at 1800 West Madison Street. When it was built, it was the largest indoor arena in the world with a maximum seating capacity of 26,000. It was the home of the National Hockey League's Chicago Blackhawks and the National Basketball Association's Chicago Bulls. It was used for numerous other sporting events, opening with a championship boxing match in March 1929. In sports, it gained the nickname, the "Madhouse on Madison", and a feature during events was the playing of the largest Barton pipe organ ever built. It also hosted five United States presidential nominating conventions, including for Franklin D. Roosevelt, and for his opponents in 1932 and 1944.
The Stadium was built by Paddy Harmon, a promoter, who sank his entire fortune into the project, only to lose control to the Stadium shareholders. After exiting receivership in 1935, the Stadium was owned by the Norris and Wirtz families until its closure in 1994 and demolition in 1995. It was replaced by the United Center built across the street, also owned substantially by the Wirtz family.

History

The Stadium hosted the Chicago Blackhawks of the NHL from 1929 to 1994 and the Chicago Bulls of the NBA from 1967 to 1994. The arena was the site of the first NFL playoff game in 1932; the 1932, 1940, and 1944 Democratic National Conventions; and the 1932 and 1944 Republican National Conventions, as well as numerous concerts, rodeo competitions, boxing matches, political rallies, and plays.
The Stadium was built by Harmon, first proposed in 1926, not long after the legalization of professional boxing in Illinois. Encouraged by the success of the New York Rangers and New York Americans expansion NHL teams, and their Madison Square Garden, Harmon also wanted to bring an NHL team to Chicago, but he lost out to Col. Frederic McLaughlin. This team would soon be known as the Chicago Black Hawks. With or without the Black Hawks, Harmon then spent $2.5 million and borrowed more funds from friends, including $600,000 from James E. Norris, in order to build the stadium. Eric Hall was the architect and he designed a stadium where all had a view of the action. His design philosophy was "The man who pays the lowest admission price has as much right to see the show as those who sit at the ringside". The building used Art Deco flourishes, including flattened columns, long vertical windows, relief sculptures of various athletics and medallions of wrestlers adorned the walls above entrances.
Breaking ground in July 1928, it opened eight months later, on March 28, 1929. Various reports give the cost at US$5 million, US$7 million and. Chicago Stadium was the largest indoor arena in the world at the time, with permanent seating for 15,000 people, and a capacity for 26,000 with floor seats and standing room. It was situated in Harmon's old "Valley" neighbourhood where he grew up. Its first event was a boxing match between Tommy Loughran and Mickey Walker for a purse of.
Detroit's Olympia stadium, built two years earlier, was a model for Chicago Stadium. The Stadium was also the first arena with an air conditioning system. However, the system was fairly rudimentary by modern standards, and was memorably given to filling the arena with fog during late-season basketball and hockey games. The Stadium also had no elevators. To get kegs of beer to upper-floor concessions, concession workers formed a line to pass the kegs upstairs. To return the kegs downstairs, the workers simply rolled them down the stairs, damaging the stairs in the process.
Harmon became the Stadium's first president. Building it incurred enemies. Harmon himself helped put out a fire on the Stadium's roof set by disgruntled workmen. Harmon reached an impasse in getting the Black Hawks as a tenant, although both sides wanted the team to move to the Stadium from the Chicago Coliseum, which was much smaller. Fed up with the delay, the Stadium board of directors forced Harmon to resign as president, although he remained an executive with the Stadium. Sheldon Clark became the new president, and he retained Nate Clark as the Stadium's boxing matchmaker. The board acceded to the Black Hawks' terms and the team moved in weeks later. After Harmon was ousted, dynamite was placed at the home of James Norris when Sidney Strotz, treasurer of the Stadium was attending for dinner. The dynamite's fuse went out, preventing its explosion.
Harmon sank his entire fortune into the Stadium, and when he died less than a year later due to a car crash, he had only his shares in the Stadium and $2.50 in cash on hand to leave to his widow and daughter. His funeral was held in the Stadium, paid for by friends, and the Stadium held a benefit boxing show in August 1930 to benefit his family.
Struggling to pay the interest on the Stadium's debt, the Stadium planned to turn the Stadium into a dog track for the summer of 1930 with the backing of Thomas Duggan, but dog racing was ruled illegal in Chicago. Al Capone had operated dog racing tracks in Cook County for several years before the authorities stopped his tracks from operating.
On January 20, 1933, the Stadium went into receivership. Sidney Strotz of the Stadium Corporation and Fred E. Hummel were named receivers. Strotz announced to the media that the Stadium would operate much like it had before. In 1935, the Stadium was sold to Norris and Arthur Wirtz, a Chicago real estate owner. Norris and Wirtz had in 1933 purchased the Detroit NHL franchise and the Detroit Olympia. By court judgment, control of the Stadium changed hands to Norris and Wirtz for a total of, of which $150,000 went for back taxes, $50,000 for reorganization expenses, and $50,000 for new working capital.

Seating capacity

The Stadium sat 17,317 for hockey at the time of closure, though standing room pushed the "actual" attendance beyond that figure. The official attendance figures in the published game summaries were often given in round numbers, such as 18,500 or 20,000. The largest recorded crowd for an NHL game at the stadium was 20,960 for a playoff game between the Blackhawks and Minnesota North Stars on April 10, 1982.

Years	Capacity
1929–1958	17,000
1958–1986	17,374
1986–1989	17,458
1989–1994	17,339
With standing room	18,676

Years	Capacity
1929–1952	16,000
1952–1984	16,666
1984–1994	17,317
With standing room	18,472

"The Madhouse on Madison"

In addition to the close-quartered, triple-tiered, boxy layout of the building, much of the loud, ringing noise of the fans could be attributed to the fabled 3,663-pipe Barton organ. It was estimated to have the total volume of 25 brass bands. The organ was considered to have the world's largest theater organ console with six manuals and over 800 stops. It was Harmon's intention that the massive organ would be needed to provide the music for whatever event was playing in the building. It was played by Al Melgard for decades during hockey games there, earning the Stadium the moniker "The Madhouse on Madison".
For years, the Stadium was also known as "The Loudest Arena in the NBA", due to its barn-shaped features. When the Stadium closed in 1994, the organ was removed and prepared to be installed in the 19th hole museum. Soon after the museum closed, sending the organ along with another theatre organ to a warehouse in Phoenix Arizona. In October 1996, a year after the stadium was razed, a propane tank explosion melted and destroyed both pipe organs, excluding the console. The organ is currently in the residence of Phil Maloof and is in good working condition with new pipes.
In the Stanley Cup semifinals of 1971, when the Blackhawks scored a series-clinching empty-net goal in Game seven against the New York Rangers, CBS announcer Dan Kelly reported, "I can feel our broadcast booth shaking! That's the kind of place Chicago Stadium is right now!" The dressing rooms at the Stadium were placed underneath the seats, and the cramped corridor that led to the ice, with its twenty-two steps, became the stuff of legend. Legend has it a German Shepherd wandered the bowels at night as "the security team."
During the 1973 Stanley Cup Finals against Montreal, Blackhawks owner Bill Wirtz had the horn of his yacht installed in the building, and had it sound after Blackhawks goals. This practice would, in the ensuing years, become commonplace in professional hockey.
Nancy Faust, organist for 40 years at Chicago White Sox games, also played indoors at the Stadium, at courtside for Chicago Bulls home games from 1976 to 1984, and on the pipe organ for Chicago Blackhawks hockey there from 1985 to 1989. She was replaced at the keyboard in 1990 by Frank Pellico, who served as the Hawks' organist until 2025.
It also became traditional for Blackhawk fans to cheer loudly throughout the singing of the national anthems, especially when sung by Chicago favorite Wayne Messmer. Denizens of the second balcony often added sparklers and flags to the occasion. Arguably, the most memorable of these was the singing before the 1991 NHL All-Star Game, which took place during the Gulf War. This tradition has continued at the United Center. Longtime PA announcer Harvey Wittenberg had a unique monotone style: "Blackhawk goal scored by #9, Bobby Hull, unassisted, at 6:13." Chicago Stadium also provided a unique fan experience. On the west side of the building was the Players/Employee/VIP Visitors Parking Lot. It is also where Teams/Bands/Politicians/Performers would enter the building through the legendary Gate 3 1/2. Although protected by fencing, it was where fans could see the talent get out of their cars or teams exit their buses before going into the building. It was also a great autograph and informal "meet and greet" opportunity.
The mid-1980s saw the beginning of a famous tradition for Bulls games at Chicago Stadium. Then-public address announcer Tommy Edwards would introduce the team's starting lineup, accompanied by spotlights amid a darkened stadium, and the playing of "Sirius" by The Alan Parsons Project. This trademark introduction would continue under Edwards' successor Ray Clay, and soon became synonymous with the Bulls' 1990s dynasty with Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and head coach Phil Jackson. During this period, the Bulls ceased using the organ in favor of recorded music in-game.
In 1992, both the Blackhawks and the Bulls reached the finals in their respective leagues. The Blackhawks were swept in their finals by the Pittsburgh Penguins, losing at Chicago Stadium, while the Bulls won the second of three straight NBA titles, the first on their home floor, against the Portland Trail Blazers. The next time the Bulls clinched the championship at home was in the newly built United Center in , their second season at the new arena, and the Blackhawks would not reach the Stanley Cup Finals again until , their 16th season in the new building, although they won their first championship since in Philadelphia. The Blackhawks last won the Stanley Cup at the Stadium in ; they did not win the Cup again at home until at the United Center.