Hinkle Fieldhouse is a
basketballBasketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...
arena located on the campus of
Butler UniversityButler University is a private university located in Indianapolis, Indiana. Founded in 1855 and named after founder Ovid Butler, the university offers 60 degree programs to 4,400 students through six colleges: business, communication, education, liberal Arts and sciences, pharmacy and health...
in
IndianapolisIndianapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Indiana, and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city's population is 839,489. It is by far Indiana's largest city and, as of the 2010 U.S...
,
IndianaIndiana is a US state, admitted to the United States as the 19th on December 11, 1816. It is located in the Midwestern United States and Great Lakes Region. With 6,483,802 residents, the state is ranked 15th in population and 16th in population density. Indiana is ranked 38th in land area and is...
. When it was built in 1928, it was the largest basketball arena in the United States, and it retained that distinction until 1950. It is the sixth-oldest college basketball arena still in use, and it is a U.S.
National Historic LandmarkA National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
. It is among the earliest of the major college fieldhouses, which, along with rules changes that made for a faster game, transformed college basketball in the late 1920s and 1930s.
History
Hinkle Fieldhouse and the 36,000-seat
Butler BowlButler Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. It opened in 1928 and is home to the Butler University Bulldogs football and soccer teams. The original seating in the Butler Bowl was 36,000. It held games against the likes of the Four Horsemen of Notre Dame and...
football stadium were two of the first buildings erected when the university moved to the Fairview campus. The facilities were promoted by a corporation of 41 Indianapolis businessmen who viewed it as a prize for the Circle City as well as for Butler. When Butler signed a lease with the
Indiana High School Athletic AssociationThe Indiana High School Athletic Association is the arbiter of interscholastic competition among public and private high schools in the State of Indiana. It monitors a system that divides athletically-competing high schools in Indiana based on the school's enrollment. The divisions, known as...
allowing the high school state tournament to be played there, the corporation agreed to finance the building at a cost of $1,000,000.
The court was reconfigured in 1933 from running east to west to run from north to south, as over half of the seats were at the ends of the court, when event viewing is typically better from the sides.
ButlerThe Butler Bulldogs men's basketball team represents Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. The school's team currently competes in the Horizon League, of which it has been a member since 1979...
hosted the tourney from 1928 to 1971, except for 1943–1945, when the building housed the US Army Air Forces and US Navy as a barracks during
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
It was as host to annual high school basketball championship games that the fieldhouse was home to the
Milan Miracle, the memorable
1954 victoryThe 1954 Milan High School Indians were the Indiana state high school basketball champions in 1954. With an enrollment of only 161, the Indians were the smallest school ever to win a single-class state basketball title in Indiana. The team and town are the inspiration for the 1986 film Hoosiers...
of tiny
Milan High SchoolMilan High School is a small high school located at 609 N Warpath Drive, Milan, Indiana. Its current principal is Paul Ketcham.-Courses:Milan High School offers a variety of courses in the general and advanced levels...
over the much larger Muncie Central. The film
HoosiersHoosiers is a 1986 sports film about a small-town Indiana high school basketball team that wins the state championship. It is loosely based on the Milan High School team that won the 1954 state championship....
, loosely based on that event, used Hinkle Fieldhouse and the memorable voices of original announcers
Hilliard GatesHilliard Gates was an American sportscaster who was widely regarded as the founding father of Indiana broadcasting and the leading sportscaster in Indiana for decades.-Early days:...
and
Tom CarnegieTom Carnegie, was the public address announcer for the Indianapolis Motor Speedway from 1946 to 2006. His signature calls while at IMS were "He's on it" and "It's a new track record," which were said many times during his tenure...
in filming the climactic game of the popular movie.
A major $1.5 million facelift in 1989 reduced the
seating capacitySeating capacity refers to the number of people who can be seated in a specific space, both in terms of the physical space available, and in terms of limitations set by law. Seating capacity can be used in the description of anything ranging from an automobile that seats two to a stadium that seats...
from 15,000 to 11,043, as well as renovating the main reception area, basketball offices, film rooms and team locker rooms. The Fieldhouse also had its other athletic and physical education offices, sports locker rooms, and fitness facilities renovated as well in 1992. Hinkle Fieldhouse hosted the entire 1994 Horizon League men's basketball conference tournament as well as parts of the 2004, 2008, 2009, and 2010 Horizon League tournaments.
The fieldhouse was originally called
Butler Fieldhouse, and was renamed in 1966 to honor
Paul D. "Tony" Hinkle (1899–1992), who was basketball coach at Butler for 41 seasons ending in 1970. In 1983, it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. On February 27, 1987, it was designated as a
National Historic LandmarkA National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
in recognition of its role in transforming college basketball.
In 2006, to celebrate Butler University's 150th Anniversary, a documentary about Hinkle Fieldhouse was aired on
ESPNEntertainment and Sports Programming Network, commonly known as ESPN, is an American global cable television network focusing on sports-related programming including live and pre-taped event telecasts, sports talk shows, and other original programming....
entitled "Indiana's Basketball Cathedral".
It was an inspiration for the design of the
Conseco FieldhouseConseco Fieldhouse is a multi-purpose arena located in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. Opened in November 1999 to replace Market Square Arena, it is home to the Indiana Pacers of the National Basketball Association and the Indiana Fever of the Women's National Basketball Association...
.
In 2011, Butler University started the first phase of the 2011 renovation and restoration by starting a fundraiser to earn $25 million needed to help with the project project.
Events
The Fieldhouse has served as host to U.S. presidents (
Herbert HooverHerbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
, Dwight Eisenhower,
Richard NixonRichard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
,
Gerald FordGerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...
, George H.W. Bush, and
Bill ClintonWilliam Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
), Evangelist
Billy GrahamWilliam Franklin "Billy" Graham, Jr. is an American evangelical Christian evangelist. As of April 25, 2010, when he met with Barack Obama, Graham has spent personal time with twelve United States Presidents dating back to Harry S. Truman, and is number seven on Gallup's list of admired people for...
, Ice Shows, professional basketball teams, Olympic basketball trials, the first USSR-USA basketball game, all-star basketball games for the NBA,
ABAThe American Basketball Association was a professional basketball league founded in 1967. The ABA ceased to exist with the ABA–NBA merger in 1976.-League history:...
and the East-West College All-Stars, national indoor track events, tennis matches of both
Bill TildenWilliam Tatem Tilden II , nicknamed "Big Bill," is often considered one of the greatest tennis players of all time. An American tennis player who was the World No. 1 player for seven years, he won 14 Majors including ten Grand Slams and four Pro Slams. Bill Tilden dominated the world of...
and Jack Kramer, national equestrian events, the Roller Derby, a six-day bicycle race, a three ring circus, as well as the volleyball matches during the
1987 Pan American GamesThe 1987 Pan American Games, officially known as the X Pan American Games, was a major international multi-sport event which was celebrated in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States, from 7 August to 23 August 1987. Over 4,300 athletes from 38 countries in the Americas competed in 30 sports earning...
. With 15,000 spectators, the volleyball match was the highest attended volleyball match ever held in the United States.
External links