Sunday, November 01, 2009

Ringling Barnum ZING ZANG ZOOM - Philadelphia Spectrum

From Chris Berry

Another bit of circus history is about to meet the wrecking ball. The Philadelphia Spectrum hosted its final event ever - a "Pearl Jam" concert - on Hallowe'en night. The building will be demolished and replaced with a hotel complex - part of the new "Philly Live!" development in South Philadelphia.

ZING ZANG ZOOM
The Spectrum opened in the fall of 1967 and quickly became a fixture of Ringling-Barnum east coast tours. Philadelphia has long been a good circus town and tens of thousands saw Ringling-Barnum at the Spectrum over the past 41 years. In addition to basketball and hockey games, the Spectrum was a great venue for other traveling shows. Early in the arena's history, in the spring of 1968, the "Ice Capades" was showing at the Spectrum when high winds blew off a large piece of the Spectrum's roof. It was months before the building reopened. Zing-Zang Zoom was the last Ringling-Barnum show to play the arena this past May.

Posted by Buckles at 11/01/2009 07:10:00 AM

2 comments:

Jack Ryan said...

Buckles,

The Spectrum was a great building -- built in the same era as The Forum in LA and the Garden. Enjoyed my many work/visits there. Too bad it is to be demolished but life goes on.

The Garden is about the last of those late 60s buildings. Wonder how much longer it will be around?

Best to all,

Jack

01 November, 2009 20:38
Jimmy Cole said...

The building in Orlando is also soon to be replaced. It was only built in 1989.

Seems that it lacks adequate corporate box suites..or something like that.

The "new" arena will be ready in 2012. Not sure if they will retain the "old" building or not?

02 November, 2009 06:48

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