Hollywood Sportatorium

Arena in Pembroke Pines, Florida, U. S.

The Hollywood Sportatorium was an indoor arena in Pembroke Pines, Florida (originally Hollywood), located at 17171 Pines Boulevard (originally 16661 West Hollywood Boulevard). The Sportatorium was 26 mile (42 km) from downtown Miami and 23 mile (37 km) from downtown Fort Lauderdale. During its 18 years of operation, it was the only venue of its kind in heavily populated South Florida.

The Sportatorium was built beginning in September 1968 by Stephen Calder and Norman Johnson. Calder would also build the Calder Race Course shortly thereafter. It stood adjacent to the Miami Hollywood Motorsports Park, which Calder and Johnson had constructed four years earlier. Among the plans for the Sportatorium were sports events, ice follies programs, auto and boat shows, and eventually a "Gold Coast State Fair". The Sportatorium was constructed as a hangar like facility constructed out of concrete, a steel roof, an asphalt floor, and no air conditioning. Originally designed to seat 18,000 for stage events and 15,000 for arena events, it opened in December 1969 with only 6,000 seats. "The idea was to have a facility which could have entertainment and events out of weather," said Bruce Johnson, Norman Johnson's son, who managed the arena until 1980. At the time, what is now the six to eight lane Pines Boulevard was a two lane road in a thinly populated area of unincorporated Broward County. The first event held in the Sportatorium was the Miami Rock Festival on December 27–29, 1969. While the seating capacity did eventually increase, by 1974, the Sportatorium still lacked permanent seating, air conditioning, an enclosed roof, and good traffic access. The land on which the arena stood was annexed to Pembroke Pines in 1980.

The Sportatorium was often floated as the home of a professional basketball or hockey franchise. As originally built, however, it did not have permanent seating or air conditioning. Additionally, the arena was only accessible from the then two lane Hollywood Boulevard, resulting in massive traffic jams whenever events there attracted decent sized crowds. Consequently, for a time there was little serious interest in the Sportatorium for a sports franchise. Even so, as early as 1969, there were inquiries to the Eastern Hockey League and the National Hockey League about the possibility of landing a hockey franchise. In 1972, the World Hockey Association awarded a franchise to South Florida called the Miami Screaming Eagles. Herb Martin, the owner, had been rebuffed in his efforts to build his own arena in Miami and considered playing at the Sportatorium instead. However, he ultimately concluded that the arena was unsuitable even as a temporary facility and sold the franchise before playing a single game. Two years later, Calder twice put off an announcement that he would acquire an expansion franchise from the WHA. Miami builder Robert Blum also hoped to get a WHA franchise, but wanted the team to play at the Miami Beach Convention Center (which had fewer than 3,000 seats). Concerning Calder's Sportatorium, Blum said: "I don't even know why they built it. It is a Tinker Toy arena. It's dumb, it's not even good for rock concerts. If they could get good crowds, they couldn't handle them, so even if they succeeded it would be self defeating." However, while four different teams were set to move into the Sportatorium in the first year following the renovations, none of them actually did:

The first attempt to import a team in 1976 was in February, when former Philadelphia Flyers part owner Bill Putnam attempted to bring the WHA's Minnesota Fighting Saints to the Sportatorium; however, the league's board of trustees voted to suspend the franchise rather than award it to the Florida group headed by Putnam. The second attempt was in June 1976, when Diplomat Hotel owner Irving Cowan obtained an option to purchase the Buffalo Braves of the NBA for $6.1 million, and planned to bring them to South Florida and the Sportatorium. Pledges of more than 8,000 season tickets were received. The Braves signed a new, conditional lease with the city of Buffalo, and ended up moving to San Diego two years later, where they became the San Diego (now Los Angeles) Clippers. The third attempt came just a month later, when Putnam managed to conclude a deal to purchase another WHA club, the Cleveland Crusaders, with the first game scheduled for October 15 at the Sportatorium. The deal failed, however, and the Crusaders ended up moving to Saint Paul to become the second incarnation of the Minnesota Fighting Saints (not to be confused with the original Fighting Saints team that Putnam tried to buy five months earlier). Having already accepted deposits for season tickets, Putnam immediately sought to bring the San Diego Mariners to town, to become the Florida Breakers in time for the 1976–77 season. However, this deal failed as well, and ticket depositors who tried to get their money back found the Breakers' Hollywood Boulevard office closed and the phone disconnected. Putnam eventually filed for bankruptcy. (Had the move taken place, it would have been the franchise's fifth identity in four years, having previously played as the New York Raiders, New York Golden Blades and Jersey Knights before shifting to San Diego.) The fourth and final attempt was at the end of the WHA's 1976–77 season. Miami resident Jerry Saperstein, son of Harlem Globetrotters founder Abe Saperstein, agreed to purchase the same San Diego Mariners club that Bill Putnam tried to buy from owner Ray Kroc; pending approval from the WHA board of trustees, the renamed Florida Icegators would've come to the Sportatorium in time for 1977–78 season, However, the WHA sought to merge with the National Hockey League that year, and the Mariners were not among the four WHA clubs that ultimately joined the older league in 1979. While the arena never did attract a truly permanent sports franchise, the Fort Lauderdale Strikers of the North American Soccer League played at the Sportatorium for one NASL indoor season in 1980–81. (The season was a disaster for the Strikers, with a 1 17 record and drawing only 1,590 fans per game, worst in the league.) In addition, the Sportatorium did host one preseason NBA matchup when the New Orleans Jazz defeated the Atlanta Hawks, 113 104, in front of 6,068 fans on October 7, 1977. The first truly big name rock act to play the Sportatorium was Emerson, Lake & Palmer, on August 10, 1971. Less than a month later, on September 1, 1971, Led Zeppelin stopped at the Sportatorium on its North American tour. The remainder of 1971 saw MC5 and Alice Cooper on September 12, Grand Funk Railroad on October 15, and Fleetwood Mac on November 6. In December, the Sportatorium saw appearances by Spirit, The Amboy Dukes, Teagarden & Van Winkle, Bob Seger, Crabby Appleton, and Rain. Deep Purple, with Uriah Heep as the opening act, performed the first concert of 1972 at the Sportatorium on January 13. The Allman Brothers Band played at the arena on January 22, just three months following the death of Duane Allman. Uriah Heep returned as a headliner in February, with Cactus as the opening act. In April, The Byrds, The Moody Blues, and Pink Floyd played concerts at the Sporto. On April 21 Creedence Clearwater Revival, with opening acts Freddie King and Tony Joe White, performed for the last time in Florida before the breakup of CCR. Following yet another visit mid summer by Uriah Heep, Yes performed in September with the Eagles as the opening act. Beck, Bogert & Appice, Poco, and John Mayall played in October, and the year closed out in December with a visit from Humble Pie and return visits from the Allman Brothers Band and Fleetwood Mac. The championship of the Women's Tennis Association tour, the Virginia Slims tennis tournament, took place at the Sportatorium in 1976, 1977, and 1978, featuring such well known players as Fort Lauderdale local Chris Evert, Virginia Wade, and Margaret Court. In addition, numerous conventions took place at the facility, including a Star Trek convention featuring Gene Roddenberry. The Jehovah's Witnesses also held religious assemblies there.

Despite hosting well known musical acts, the Sportatorium was notorious for poor acoustics. Roger Waters described the Sportatorium as a "real compromise" because even though its acoustics left much to be desired, there was no other large concert venue in South Florida at the time. Ironically, numerous bootleg recordings of concerts from the Sportatorium by bands such as Pink Floyd, Rush, Ambrosia, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, and U2 remain sought after. In addition, one of the Grateful Dead's most critically praised live performances ever took place at the Sportatorium on May 22, 1977, most of which was commercially released in 1995 as Dick's Picks Volume 3.

The Sportatorium roof was infamous for occasionally leaking over the stage (and performers) or the audience during heavy rainfalls.

Raucous crowds frequently created problems at the Sportatorium. Minor incidents abounded, such as the throwing of firecrackers inside the arena. After one such firecracker throwing incident in February 1981, Bruce Springsteen announced from the stage, "All right, whoever threw those can come down to the front of the stage. We'll give you your money back and throw you the fuck out of here." In July 1980, about 500 fans attending a Ted Nugent concert at the Sportatorium rioted after deputies from the Broward County Sheriff's Office arrested 15 people suspected of smoking marijuana and took them to a command trailer. The crowd held 35 deputies and 15 prisoners at bay in the trailer for nearly an hour. One deputy was injured by rocks and bottles thrown by the crowd. An additional 20 people were injured before deputies in riot gear ended the violence after 21 additional arrests. In 1981, Pembroke Pines police arrested 13 people at a Rick James concert on charges of illegally carrying weapons, including a .38 caliber revolver and semiautomatic pistols, and possession of cocaine and marijuana. As a result of this incident, a Sportatorium task force was created to handle the rowdyism and related problems. Drug related arrests at the arena peaked at 58 at the 17 concerts held in 1983. Many fans – some without tickets – would turn the impenetrable traffic bottlenecks into impromptu tailgate parties. Cars frequently stalled because of overheated radiators, leading to many concertgoers setting out on foot. This posed some danger, however, because impatient drivers would sometimes attempt to dart down the shoulder of the road to bypass traffic, resulting in a number of pedestrians being struck.

In 1976, the Sunrise Musical Theater (now The Faith Center) opened in Sunrise, Florida. The theater was one of the first modern facilities in Broward County to try to compete with the Sportatorium. But because of its small capacity (3,732), it wasn't able to attract as many musical artists. Even so, the Sunrise Musical Theater hosted acts like Frank Sinatra, Peter Paul and Mary, The Beach Boys, Sheena Easton, Barry Manilow, King Crimson, Frank Zappa and Black Sabbath. The Sportatorium's fate was effectively sealed with the opening of Miami Arena in 1988. It gained a short reprieve in August and September 1988 when shows by AC/DC, Iron Maiden, and others that were originally scheduled to take place at the newer facility had to be moved to the Sportatorium due to construction delays. The last heavy metal group to perform at the arena was Judas Priest in September 1988. Although by the mid 1980s it had become known as the heavy metal showplace of South Florida, the Sportatorium's final show on October 21, 1988 featured country music acts Highway 101, The Desert Rose Band, and Larry Boone. The new team was to be called the Florida Makos, but shortly before the owner was due to put down a deposit on the Sportatorium and commence renovations, the fledgling hockey league failed. A month later, a developer proposed building 1,500 homes on the site and surrounding land, and the Pembroke Pines City Commission voted to change the land's zoning from commercial recreation to residential. In 1992, the Broward County Planning Council approved plans for 1,260 homes and a small shopping center on the site. In 1993, after several years of disuse as well as hurricane damage from the previous year's Hurricane Andrew, the Hollywood Sportatorium was torn down. A Sedano's supermarket now occupies the precise site where the arena once stood. Some of the Sportatorium's target business would return to Broward County in 1998 with the completion of the FLA Live Arena (originally the National Car Rental Center) in nearby Sunrise, Florida.