Product Details
CompanyColiseum Company of Chicago Certificate TypeFirst Mortgage Gold Bond Date IssuedJanuary 30, 1902CanceledYesPrinterGoes Litho Co.SignaturesHand signedApproximate Size13 1/2" (w) by 10" (h) - not including coupons at the bottomImagesShow the exact certificate you will receiveGuaranteed AuthenticYesAdditional DetailsSigned By Charles F. GuntherReference
Historical Context
The Coliseum Company of Chicago was incorporated in Illinois on December 28, 1898.
The company was formed to build a new coliseum (the third on the site) on Wabash Avenue between 14th and 16th Streets.
Candy manufacturer Charles F. Gunther - who has signed this piece - built the third Coliseum at 1513 South Wabash Avenue in 1899. He purchased Libby Prison, a structure in Richmond, Virginia, constructed as a warehouse which became a Confederate prison during the Civil War. Gunther had it dismantled, shipped to Chicago on 132 railroad cars, and rebuilt in 1889 as the Libby Prison War Museum, which displayed memorabilia from the Civil War. After about a decade the old prison was torn down again, except for a castellated wall that became part of the new Chicago Coliseum.
In January 1902, the Coliseum Garden Company procured a five-year lease from the Coliseum "to provide music and high class vaudeville entertainments" for the months of June, July, August and September.
Until 1908, the Coliseum hosted the notorious First Ward Ball, an annual political fundraiser for the two First Ward aldermen "Bathhouse" John Coughlin and Michael "Hinky Dink" Kenna – Coughlin and Kenna had been known as the "Lords of the Levee". Mayor Fred Busse was finally successful in halting the Ball in 1909.
From 1904 through 1920, this Coliseum hosted five consecutive Republican National Conventions, and the Progressive Party convention in 1912 and 1916.
During World War II, the army used the structure to house a radio training school which was previously in the nearby Stevens Hotel.
In 1926, the Coliseum built an ice rink at the arena to support professional ice hockey. The Coliseum hosted the Chicago Black Hawks of the National Hockey League (NHL) from 1926–1929 with a seating capacity of 6,000. It was also the home of the Chicago Cardinals (later renamed Chicago Americans) of the American Hockey Association (AHA) for the season of 1926–27 and the Chicago Shamrocks of the AHA from 1931–32. In June 1928, fight promoter Paddy Harmon announced plans to construct Chicago Stadium, with the Black Hawks as the marquee tenants.
As the 1928–29 NHL season approached, the Stadium was not yet ready, and Blackhawks owner Major Frederic McLaughlin had had a falling-out with Harmon. Consequently, the Blackhawks arranged to continue playing at the Coliseum. However, they could only get ice time through January 1929; they played the remainder of their "home" games in Detroit and in Fort Erie, Ontario, across the Niagara River from Buffalo.
The Blackhawks were back at the Coliseum as the 1929–30 season opened, but negotiations with the Stadium resumed in the fall of 1929 after Harmon was deposed as head of the Chicago Stadium Corporation. In December 1929, the team began play at the Stadium.
In 1932, another dispute led the Blackhawks to return temporarily to the Coliseum, for their first three home games of the 1932–33 campaign. On November 21, the Blackhawks defeated the Montreal Canadiens, 2–1, in their final game on Coliseum ice. Canadiens superstar Howie Morenz was the last player to score an NHL goal at the Coliseum, assisted by Aurel Joliat and Johnny Gagnon, at 7:06 of the second period.
With the Blackhawks gone and the Great Depression in full swing, use of the arena was limited. In 1935, promoter Leo Seltzer, drawing on the Depression-era popularity of roller skating, conceived the idea of a Roller Derby. In 1935, he staged the world's first Roller Derby at the arena. The event drew more than 20,000 people.
Over its history, the Coliseum featured a wide variety of other events that included the 1915 Lincoln Jubilee, which celebrated 50-years since the abolition of slavery in the U.S.; sessions of the 28th International Eucharistic Congress in June 1926; bowling tournaments; professional wrestling bouts that included stars Gorgeous George and Angelo Poffo; circuses and the last convention of the radical antiwar organization Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) in June 1969.
The arena was later re-furbished for use by the Chicago Packers, an expansion NBA team. Among the improvements was an increase of the seating capacity to 7,000. After playing their first season in the International Amphitheater, the Packers changed their name to the Zephyrs and moved into the Coliseum in 1962. In 1963 they moved to Baltimore and took the name Bullets. (Today they are known as the Washington Wizards). The NBA would return to Chicago with the Bulls expansion team in 1966, but the Bulls opted to use the International Amphitheatre and then Chicago Stadium as their home courts, so the Coliseum remained without a major tenant. The Bulls now play at the United Center.
During the 1960s and early 1970s, many popular bands of the era played The Coliseum, including Cream (twice in 1968), Jethro Tull, The Jimi Hendrix Experience (December 1, 1968), The Doors (November 3, 1968) and B.B. King (May 16, 1970).
During 1970 and 1971, The Coliseum occasionally saw duty as "The Syndrome", a general-admission venue for rock music concerts. The inaugural concert was staged on Friday, October 16, 1970, featuring Humble Pie, Brethren, Chase, and the headline act, Grand Funk Railroad. Other bands that played The Syndrome included Rod Stewart and the Faces, The Grateful Dead, Steppenwolf, New Riders of the Purple Sage, Traffic, Ten Years After, Fleetwood Mac, Mountain, Alice Cooper, Siegel-Schwall Band, Mott The Hoople, and Savoy Brown.
On March 8, 1971, riots erupted at both The Chicago Coliseum and Chicago Amphitheater amongst fans attempting to watch a live, closed-circuit television broadcast of the Muhammad Ali – Joe Frazier fight being staged at Madison Square Garden in New York. When Coliseum projection equipment broke down, management asked an audience of 7,000 to leave just before the fight began. A group of youths, angered by the announcement began tearing up ticket counters near the door and throwing them through the front windows. Others, who had paid $10 a head to see the fight, began hurtling chairs and bottles from the balcony onto the main floor. An estimated 80 police were rushed to the Coliseum to restore order." As a result of the damage, all scheduled concerts were cancelled with the exception of March 12, 1971, featuring James Taylor and Carole King.
On March 13, 1971, the city shut the building due to fire code violations, and it fell into disrepair. In 1982, it was sold for redevelopment and partially demolished; however, the planned construction never took place and large portions of the outer wall facing Wabash remained until the early 1990's when it was finally cleared. Part of the Libby facade was given to the Chicago History Museum. The site is now occupied by the Soka Gakkai USA Culture Center. Coliseum Park, located across Wabash Avenue on the site of the former Haven School at 14th Place and Wabash Avenue, commemorates the Coliseum.
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