The Arena, The Main Event, Providence Auditorium | |
Location | 1111 North Main Street, Providence, Rhode Island |
---|---|
Coordinates | 41°51′2.34″N71°24′6.34″W / 41.8506500°N 71.4017611°W |
Owner | Hubert Milot, Louis A. R. Pieri(1938–1967) |
Operator | Louis A. R. Pieri (Manager, 1929) |
Capacity | 5,300 |
Scoreboard | Yes |
Construction | |
Opened | February 18, 1926 |
Demolished | 1989 [1] |
Tenants | |
Providence Reds (AHL) (1926–1972) Providence Steamrollers (NBA) (1946–1949) [2] Providence Friars (NCAA) (1952–1973) |
Rhode Island Auditorium was an indoor arena in Providence, Rhode Island, at 1111 North Main Street. It hosted the NBA's Providence Steamrollers from 1946 until 1949, and the Providence Reds ice hockey team until the Providence Civic Center (now the Amica Mutual Pavilion) was opened in 1972. [3]
The arena held 5,300 people and opened in 1926. Through the years, a myriad of events including the Ice Capades, public skating, boxing, concerts, and religious events were held at the old barn. The venue hosted 28 of Rocky Marciano's 49 fights over a 4-year span, from July 12, 1948 (his second fight) to May 12, 1952 (his 41st), just four months before winning the heavyweight title by beating Jersey Joe Walcott in Philadelphia. After the Reds departed for the downtown Civic Center, the Auditorium, for a time, became a tennis venue. [2]
At the height of the Great Depression in 1932, the arena faced financial ruin. Industrialist and Rhode Island hockey legend Malcolm Greene Chace rescued the auditorium from foreclosure. [4]
In 1969, a concert by Sly and the Family Stone at the auditorium was followed by a riot. This led mayor Joseph A. Doorley to ban all rock concerts in Providence; the ban only lasted for a few months. [5]
It was torn down in 1989 and parking affiliated with The Miriam Hospital now occupies the site. In 2009, the Rhode Island Reds Heritage Society, a group formed to commemorate the hockey team, marked the site with a plaque commemorating the team's existence. [1]
Date | Band | Opening Act(s) | |
---|---|---|---|
November 3, 1965 | The Rolling Stones | ||
August 14, 1967 | Herman's Hermits | The Who | |
July 18, 1968 | The Who | ||
November 4, 1968 | Cream | The Terry Reid Group | [6] |
November 17, 1968 | Jimi Hendrix | ||
May 17, 1969 | Jimi Hendrix | Buddy Miles Express, Cat Mother & the All Night Newsboys | [7] |
June 9, 1970 | Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young | Country Funk | [8] |
April 21, 1971 | The Grateful Dead | [9] | |
July 15, 1971 | Creedence Clearwater Revival | [10] | |
August 13–14, 1971 | Chicago |
Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, colloquially known as The Aud, was a multipurpose indoor arena in downtown Buffalo, New York. Opened on October 14, 1940, it was home to the Canisius Golden Griffins (NCAA), the Buffalo Bisons (AHL), the Buffalo Bisons (NBL), the Buffalo Braves (NBA), the Buffalo Sabres (NHL), the Toronto-Buffalo Royals (WTT), the Buffalo Stallions (MSL), the Buffalo Bandits (MILL), the Buffalo Blizzard (NPSL) and the Buffalo Stampede (RHI). It also hosted events such as college basketball, concerts, professional wrestling and boxing. The venue was closed in 1996 after the construction of the venue now known as KeyBank Center, and remained vacant until being demolished in 2009.
TD Place Arena, originally the Ottawa Civic Centre, is an indoor arena located in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Opened in December 1967, it is used primarily for sports, including curling, figure skating, ice hockey, and lacrosse. The arena has hosted Canadian and world championships in figure skating, curling, and ice hockey, including the first women's world ice hockey championship in 1990. It is also used for concerts and conventions such as Ottawa SuperEX.
The Providence Reds were a hockey team that played in the Canadian-American Hockey League (CAHL) between 1926 and 1936 and the American Hockey League (AHL) from 1936 to 1977, the last season of which they played as the Rhode Island Reds. The team won the Calder Cup in 1938, 1940, 1949, and 1956. The Reds played at the Rhode Island Auditorium, located on North Main Street in Providence, Rhode Island, from 1926 through 1972, when the team affiliated with the New York Rangers and moved into the newly built Providence Civic Center. The team name came from the breed of chicken known as the Rhode Island Red.
The Amica Mutual Pavilion is an indoor arena located in downtown Providence, Rhode Island. It was built in 1972, as a home court for the Providence College Friars men's basketball program, due to the high demand for tickets to their games in Alumni Hall, as well as for a home arena for the then–Providence Reds, who played in the nearly 50-year-old Rhode Island Auditorium. Current tenants include the Providence Bruins ice hockey team, of the American Hockey League (AHL) and the Providence College Friars men's basketball team, of the Big East Conference. The center is operated by the Rhode Island Convention Center Authority, which also operates the Rhode Island Convention Center and Veterans Memorial Auditorium.
The DCU Center is an indoor arena and convention center complex in downtown Worcester, Massachusetts. The facility hosts a variety of events, including concerts, sporting events, family shows, conventions, trade-shows and meetings. It is owned by the City of Worcester and managed by ASM Global, a private management firm for public assembly facilities.
The MassMutual Center is a multi-purpose arena and convention center complex located in downtown Springfield, Massachusetts, United States, in the city's Metro Center. The arena opened in 1972 and the convention center opened in 2005. It serves as a venue for meetings, conventions, exhibitions, sporting and entertainment events.
Mechanics Bank Arena is a multi-purpose arena in Bakersfield, California. Located downtown at the corner of Truxtun Avenue and N Street, it was built in 1998, and was originally known as Centennial Garden, a name submitted by local resident Brian Landis. Bay Area-based Mechanics Bank has held the naming rights since September 2019, following their merger with Rabobank NA, which had held the naming rights since 2005.
The CHI Health Center Omaha is an arena and convention center in the central United States, located in the North Downtown neighborhood of Omaha, Nebraska. Operated by the Metropolitan Entertainment & Convention Authority (MECA), the 1.1-million-square-foot (100,000 m2) facility has an 18,975-seat arena, a 194,000 sq ft (18,000 m2) exhibition hall, and 62,000 sq ft (5,800 m2) of meeting space.
The Oshawa Civic Auditorium was an indoor arena in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. It operated from 1964 to 2006, and was primarily used as an ice hockey venue for the Oshawa Generals. The auditorium was built as a replacement to the Hambly Arena, which burned down in 1953. The auditorium was part of a larger multi-purpose recreational complex.
Columbus Civic Center is a 10,000-seat multi-purpose arena in Columbus, Georgia, built in 1996.
General James White Memorial Civic Auditorium and Coliseum is a multi-purpose events facility in Knoxville, Tennessee, owned by the Knoxville city government and managed by ASM. Its components are an auditorium with a maximum seating capacity of 2,500, a multi-purpose arena with a maximum seating capacity of 6,500, an exhibition hall and a reception hall. It was built in 1961.
The George V. Meehan Auditorium is a 3,059-seat hockey arena, in Providence, Rhode Island. The arena opened in 1961 and was dedicated on January 6, 1962. It is named for George V. Meehan, the benefactor of the arena, which he hoped would "service and promote" the Brown Bears ice hockey program, which now belongs to the Ivy and ECAC Hockey leagues. It is recognizable for its large white domed roof, and is located on the highest corner of Brown's main athletic complex on College Hill in Providence.
Mobile Civic Center is a multi-purpose facility located in Mobile, Alabama. Owned by the City of Mobile and operated by ASM Global, the facility consists of three venues: a theater, an expo hall, and an arena. It is suitable for large indoor events including sporting events and trade shows. The theater seats for 1,938, while the expo hall can seat 3,000. The largest venue of the Mobile Civic Center is the arena, which can seat 10,112.
Schneider Arena was named in honor of Rev. Herman D. Schneider, O.P., the founder of Providence College hockey and a longtime teacher at the school. It is located at the far northern end of campus, on the corner of Huxley Ave. and Admiral St., and is notable for the reflective energy-conserving ceiling that was installed in 1992.
The Rhode Island Convention Center is an exposition center in downtown Providence, RI. Opened in 1993, it is the largest convention center in Rhode Island, with about 130,000 square feet (12,000 m2) of exhibition space, including a 100,000-square-foot (9,300 m2) exhibit hall. It is connected by skybridges to the Amica Mutual Pavilion, and the adjacent Omni Hotels Omni Providence Hotel. The ground level features a main exhibition hall with 100,000 square feet, and the upper level has a ballroom and meeting halls. The building has a five-story glass front with a large space outside the meeting rooms and exhibit halls where visitors can gather and mingle. The center is operated by the Rhode Island Convention Center Authority, which also operates the Amica Mutual Pavilion and Veterans Memorial Auditorium.
Louis Arthur Raymond Pieri was an American basketball and ice hockey executive and coach.
Malcolm Greene Chace was an American financier and textile industrialist who was instrumental in bringing electric power to New England. He was a pioneer of the sport of ice hockey in the United States, and was Yale University's first hockey captain. He was also an amateur tennis player whose highest ranking was U.S. No. 3 in 1895.
Peter Gilmore Demers is a retired head athletic trainer for the Los Angeles Kings of the National Hockey League. He is a member of the Professional Hockey Athletic Trainers Society Hall of Fame (2007) and a Hockey Hall of Fame honoree (2007). He successfully advocated for improvements to the trainers' and equipment managers’ benefit packages that took effect in 2006.
Rhode Island is one of the traditional centers of ice hockey in the United States. Located in New England, the font of American ice hockey, teams from Rhode Island have played organized hockey as far back as the late-19th century and many residents have played at the highest levels of the sport.