Sacred Grounds - The Dallas Sportatorium

Throughout professional wrestling history, there have been events at every type of venue, from giant football stadiums down to your local flea market. There have been scores of locales that have seen repeated shows, and then there are those places that become intertwined with specific promotions or certain wrestlers. These are the Sacred Grounds.

While the Dallas Sportatorium was not the biggest arena in the world, let alone the Dallas area, it would become one of those rare arenas synonymous with professional wrestling. Before we get into what exactly makes the Sportatorium so unique, let’s take a trip into the venue's history.

The Dallas Sportatorium was built in 1934 in an octagon style, allowing up to 10,000 spectators. Wrestling would become a regular part of the venue’s event schedule, in addition to country music shows. Part of the building was burnt down in May of 1953 but was quickly rebuilt and reopened with a new configuration by September of that year. This is where the famous tagline of “The Million-Dollar Sportatorium” came from.

Without going into the politics of the wrestling offices at the time, it is much easier to state that Ed McLemore, the Dallas promoter at the time, entered into a partnership with Jack Adkisson, the real name of famed villain Fritz Von Erich. This partnership came after McLemore chose to break away from the Houston office run by Paul Boesch. Following the death of McLemore in 1969, Fritz became the sole owner and promoter of the company that would go on to be known as World Class Championship Wrestling.

WCCW would begin to grow rapidly as Von Erich pushed not only his sons but brought in several other young up-and-comers. The promotion would begin running shows at the Sportatorium every week. While the original configuration of the Sportatorium allowed up to 10,000 people, the newer and smaller setup would allow for a more intimate environment and host up to 4,500 people. Selling out the venue would become a regular event as Fritz changed the company name from Big Time Wrestling, the name he shared while McLemore was in charge, to the much more revered World Class Championship Wrestling. 

On Christmas night of 1982, the biggest feud presented by WCCW would officially begin. Though it took place at Reunion Arena in Dallas, the feud between the three Von Erich boys, David, Kerry and Kevin, against the Fabulous Freebirds consisting of Michael P.S. Hayes, Buddy Roberts and Terry ‘Bam Bam’ Gordy would go on not only define WCCW, but the Sportatorium as well. The Freebirds were brought in, and the feud was designed by one of the most underrated great bookers in wrestling history, Gary Hart. Unfortunately due to issues behind the scenes, Gary would depart the company shortly following the beginning of the feud, and incoming booker Ken Mantell was placed in charge of the feud and keeping the Sportatorium full every night they ran an event.

A classic episode of WCCW from the Sportatorium [Pic: WWE Network]

On the back of the intense feud, the Sportatorium became the place to be in the Dallas area. Soon enough, WCCW began modifying the arena to be able to film weekly television, and the talent started rolling into the Dallas promotion. Some more historical names that made appearances in the Sportatorium include Bruiser Brody, Abdullah The Butcher, Gino Hernandez, ‘Gentleman’ Chris Adams, ‘Ravishing’ Rick Rude, and so many others. The formation of WCCW and its weekly events in Dallas turned what was once a dying territory into one of the hottest areas for a wrestler to work. Given the size of the state of Texas, it was not the only promotion in the state, as Houston (Paul Boesch), Amarillo (the Funk family) and San Antonio (Joe Blanchard) were also popular, but all would soon be dwarfed for a time by the events being run at the World Famous Sportatorium. It would become the hottest ticket in town, but after several years of sell-outs and hot angles, tragedy would strike, and the promotion would begin its downhill slide. The tragic deaths of David Von Erich followed by Gino Hernandez, would affect business. With these tragic passings, followed by the natural order of the wrestling business being entirely upended by Vince McMahon’s national expansion, WCCW would lose several of their top stars to the competition.

While the Sportatorium was not only known for wrestling events, but also for hosting concerts and many other types of events, professional wrestling was the true lifeblood of the building. The closure of WCCW harmed the revenue keeping the building alive. Still, the upstart Global Wrestling Federation, created by Max Andrews and Joe Pedicino, would do its best to replace the previous mainstay tenants.

While GWF was never a truly successful promotion on the level of WWE or WCW, they were able to land a television deal to air on ESPN. In the same vein, as WCCW has a brilliant yet underappreciated mind as a booker in Gary Hart, GWF brought in Eddie Gilbert, who took the book for the first year of the promotion. While the company’s history is quite tumultuous, with a rotating roster that included such names as the aforementioned Gilbert, Cactus Jack, Scotty Anthony (Scott Levy, the future Raven) and the Ebony Express (who would go on to be the Hall of Fame team of Harlem Heat), the one mainstay was the Sportatorium venue, which they bafflingly referred to as ‘The GlobalDome’ for a while, instead of leaning into the building’s history.

Following the closure of GWF in 1994, wrestling became less and less of a priority for the Sportatorium, as the only promotion from then on that had any extended presence was Jim Crockett Jr.’s mid-90s NWA revival attempt, yet another failed experiment in the new age of professional wrestling.

The building’s continued descent into disarray finally came to a head in 2003. Despite several attempts and cries to have the building labelled as a historic site or landmark building, the Dallas Sportatorium was set for demolition. Several former WCCW stars would grab what they could from the building to remember it forever, including Kevin Von Erich taking a bench seat and Skandor Akbar getting a piece of the metal siding. In a strangely morbid coincidence, on February 18th, 2003, the 10th anniversary of Kerry Von Erich’s death by suicide, the building that he and his family made their name in would be levelled off the face of the earth.

And despite this occurring nearly 20 years ago from the day this is written, the Dallas Sportatorium remains one of those fondly remembered buildings for longtime professional wrestling fans. The insane number of talents that passed through its hallowed halls are almost too many to count, with many going on to have Hall of Fame careers. When one thinks of the Sportatorium, the first thoughts that immediately come to mind are World Class Championship Wrestling and the feud between the Fabulous Freebirds and The Von Erichs, but it was so much more than that in the long run. It is revered for a reason, and that is why it was, and still is, considered one of wrestling’s Sacred Grounds.

Other Tidbits

• Chris Adams had an office for a time in the building and ran a training school to help bring up new talent for WCCW. The most notable name who began training in the building would become the biggest star in the history of the business, Stone Cold Steve Austin.

• While the unfortunately numerous tribute events for many of the fallen Von Erich brothers like David and Mike would be run elsewhere, most famously the David Von Erich Memorial Parade of Champions where Kerry defeated Ric Flair for the NWA World Championship at Texas Stadium, GWF ran a Kerry Von Erich Tribute Show at the Sportatorium in 1993, the year after his death. The main event consisted of Kevin Von Erich teaming with Chris Adams against the team of Michael Hayes and Buddy Roberts, who Skandor Akbar managed. It would be billed as the final meeting in the Von Erich/Freebird feud, with Adams wearing Kerry’s actual ring jacket as a tribute to his fallen friend.

• The late, great Percy Pringle (aka Paul Bearer) wrote an emotional tribute to the building that helped launch his career when the building was demolished, which you can read here: Story Time With Percy Pringle.

Many modern fans may not be familiar with some of the older buildings that genuinely helped elevate not only the talent on the shows but the business itself back in the territory days, and there are a considerable amount of these buildings which we look upon with reverence, the Sacred Grounds.