Olympic Auditorium

The Grand Olympic Auditorium is a former sports venue in southern Downtown Los Angeles, California. The venue was built in 1924 at 1801 South Grand Avenue, now just south of the Santa Monica Freeway. The grand opening of the Olympic Auditorium was on August 5, 1925, and was a major media event, attended by such celebrities as Jack Dempsey and Rudolph Valentino. One of the last major boxing and wrestling arenas still in existence, the venue now serves as a worship space for the Korean-American evangelical church, "Glory Church of Jesus Christ".

History

Throughout the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s it was home to some of the biggest boxing, wrestling, and roller derby events.

1932 Olympics

The Auditorium was leased by the 1932 Summer Olympics Organizing Committee for a very nominal sum sufficient to cover expenses, for the purpose of conducting the training and competitions of the boxing (1932), wrestling (1932) and weightlifting (1932) events of the Games. At the time it was the largest indoor venue in the United States.

Boxing

It has become somewhat of a landmark for boxing history. Charles Bukowski wrote about the Olympic: "even the Hollywood (Legion Stadium) boys knew the action was at the Olympic. Raft came, and the others, and all the starlets, hugging those front row seats. the gallery boys went ape and the fighters fought like fighters and the place was blue with cigar smoke, and how we screamed, baby baby, and threw money and drank our whiskey, and when it was over, there was the drive in, the old lovebed with our dyed and vicious women. you slammed it home, then slept like a drunk angel."Bukowski, Charles (1982) "Goodbye Watson" in '' Erections, Ejaculations, Exhibitions, and General Tales of Ordinary Madness.'' City Lights Books: San Francisco. Page 315.

The 1960s and 1970s were a major boom period for the Olympic, as major boxing and wrestling events were held at the arena every other Friday night, as well as being the home to the Roller Games Los Angeles T-Birds.

Closure

The arena closed its doors in the mid-1980s when promoter Mike Le Bell discontinued his weekly wrestling shows due to low attendance figures when the boom of the professional wrestling era began. This was when the wrestling scene shifted from Los Angeles to Dallas' World Class, Minneapolis' AWA, Jim Crockett Promotions Mid-Atlantic/NWA, and Stamford's WWF, now known as the WWE.

Reopening

It reopened in 1993, but the capacity was reduced from 10,400 to just over 7,300. In the 2000s the Auditorium sat 7,030 for boxing and wrestling, 4,514 for seated concerts, and 7,007 for general admission concerts. Up to 773 seats could be put on the arena floor, which measured 12,100 square feet (110' by 110').

Throughout the early and mid 1990s, the venue was often the host of many large, all-night rave parties, often held outdoors in the back parking lot, as well as inside the auditorium. On New Year's Eve of 1996/1997, a large-scale rave called In Seventh Heaven was being held at the Olympic. Dozens of people had to be taken to the hospital from a suspected overdose of a legal high called Liquid fX, which was being handed out at the party. The event which had already gathered over 10,000 ravers was shut down by the LAPD before midnight, sending much of the crowd into the street, where a melee broke out between upset revelers and riot police.
/ref>

On July 16, 2000, Extreme Championship Wrestling, ECW held its Heatwave pay-per-view at the Grand Olympic Auditorium. It was ECW's first and only West Coast appearance. Prior to the main event, six wrestlers from the LA-based Xtreme Pro Wrestling promotion, who were given front row tickets by promotion owner Rob Zicari, donned shirts of their promotion, which caught the attention of Tommy Dreamer and ECW security and were promptly ejected. A brawl followed in the parking lot between XPW ring crew and the ECW locker room, based on false reporting that Francine had been touched by someone from XPW.

On February 23, 2002, XPW held its Freefall event at the Grand Olympic Auditorium where New Jack tossed Vic Grimes off a 40-foot scaffold.

Wrestling legends such as Jim Londos, Joe Stecher, Ed "Strangler" Lewis, Gus Sonnenberg, Ray Steele, Frank Sexton, Man Mountain Dean, Everett Marshall, Ed Don George, Enrique Torres, Baron Michele Leone, Freddie Blassie, John Tolos, Buddy Roberts, The Sheik, Fritz Von Erich, Gorgeous George, The Great Goliath, Black Gordman, Bobo Brazil, Buddy Rogers, Roddy Piper and Chris Adams competed in the arena at one point in their careers, along with the legendary Lou Thesz, Mil Mascaras and André the Giant. Adams was one of the last big draws at the Olympic before promoters Mike Le Bell and Gene LeBell ended its wrestling cards in 1982. Adams went to Portland afterwards and eventually to Dallas to join Fritz Von Erich's World Class Championship Wrestling, as the sport's top wrestling city shifted from Los Angeles to Dallas and Atlanta before Vince McMahon's WWF reached national prominence.

Music venue

Until 2005, the Olympic Auditorium was host to many music concerts and shows, as well as boxing and wrestling. The arena is famous for its box office number "RI-9-5171" [phone] which is no longer in use.

As far back as 1951, there had been rhythm and blues concerts at the Grand Olympic. In 1969-70, The Grand Olympic Auditorium hosted concerts by hard rock acts such as Mountain, Jack Bruce, and Ten Years After. It would be used more extensively as a musical venue after 1980. This period in music performances began with a concert by the band Public Image Ltd. which was produced by Punk Rock impresario David Ferguson and his independent CD Presents production company. This was the first concert held at the auditorium since the early 1970s and is credited with beginning the Olympic's reputation for being a notorious Punk Rock venue. Thereafter legendary promoter Gary Tovar and Goldenvoice Productions started booking shows at the venue, with monthly concerts by the likes of GBH, The Exploited

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases