Encyclopedia
The
Astrodome, at one point "the
Reliant Astrodome", is a
domed sports
stadium, the first of its kind. It is located in
Houston, Texas, and is part of the
Reliant Park complex. It opened in 1965 as
Harris County Domed Stadium and was nicknamed the "Eighth Wonder of the World".
Reliant Energy purchased naming rights to the building in 2000.
History
Major League Baseball expanded to Houston in 1962 with the
Houston Colt .45s, who were later renamed the
Astros. Houston's unpredictable subtropical weather made outdoor
baseball difficult for players and spectators alike. Several baseball franchises had toyed with the idea of building enclosed,
air-conditioned stadiums. Former Houston mayor Judge Roy Hofheinz claimed inspiration for what would eventually become the Astrodome when he was on a tour of
Rome, where he learned that the builders of the ancient
Colosseum installed giant velariums to shield spectators from the Roman sun.
The world's first domed stadium was conceived by Hofheinz, and designed by architects Hermon Lloyd & W.B. Morgan, and Wislon, Morris, Crain and Anderson. Structural engineering and structural design was performed by Walter P Moore Engineers and Consultants of Houston. It was constructed by H.A. Lott, Inc. for Harris County,
Texas. It stands 18 stories tall, covering 9˝ acres. The dome is 710 feet in diameter and the ceiling is 208 feet above the playing surface, which itself sits 25 feet below street level. Despite innovations neccessitated by the novelty of the design the Dome was completed in November 1964, six months ahead of schedule.
When the Astrodome opened, it used a natural Bermuda
grass playing surface. The dome's ceiling contained numerous clear plastic panes made of
Lucite. Players quickly complained that glare coming off of the panes made it impossible for them to track fly balls, so all of the panes were painted over, which solved the glare problem but caused the grass to die from lack of sunlight. For most of the 1965 season, the Astros played on green-painted dirt and dead grass. As the 1966 season approached, there was the possibility of the team playing on an all dirt infield.
The solution was to install a new type of artificial grass on the field, ChemGrass, which became known as AstroTurf. Because the supply of AstroTurf was still low, only a limited amount was available for the home opener on April 18, 1966. There wasn't enough for the entire outfield, but there was enough to cover the traditional grass portion of the infield. The outfield remained painted dirt until after the All-Star Break. The team was sent on an extended road trip before the break, and on July 19, 1966, the installation of the of the outfield portion of AstroTurf was completed and ready for play. The infield dirt remained in the traditional design, with a large dirt arc, similar to natural grass fields. The "sliding pit" configuration, with dirt only around the bases, did not arrive in Houston until the mid
1970s. The sliding pits were introduced by
Cincinnati with the opening of
Riverfront Stadium on June 30, 1970. It was then installed in the new stadiums of
Philadelphia in 1971, and
Kansas City in 1973. The artificial turf fields of
Pittsburgh and
St. Louis were traditionally configured like the Astrodome, and would also change to sliding pits in the
1970s.
The floor of the stadium was never paved with a hard surface, like other stadiums. The AstroTurf was laid upon the dirt surface of the once natural grass playing field.
Teams who played there
In 1968, the
AFL Houston Oilers moved into the Dome. Over the years, college basketball and football games, soccer matches, religious gatherings, and music concerts have been held at the stadium. The
Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, one of the city's biggest annual events, was held at the Dome from 1966 until 2003.
In 1968, No. 1
UCLA played No. 2
University of Houston before a crowd of 52,963 - the largest attendance ever for a basketball game. Houston defeated UCLA 71-69 behind a 39 point scoring effort from Elvin Hayes. Houston's victory in this game ended UCLA's 47-game winning streak.
The 1971 NCAA men's basketball Final Four was held at the Astrodome.
On September 20, 1973, the Astrodome played host to one of the most talked-about events in sports history: the famous "Battle of the Sexes"
tennis match which pitted female star
Billie Jean King against former men's Wimbledon champion
Bobby Riggs. King defeated Riggs 6-4, 6-3, 6-3.
The 1968 and 1986
Major League Baseball All-Star Games were held here, as was the 1989
NBA All-Star Game.
The
World Football League's
Houston Texans called the stadium home for part of the 1974 season.
The
Houston Gamblers of the
USFL also played home games at the Astrodome.
The Astrodome was also home to the
University of Houston's
football team until Robertson Stadium on campus was renovated in 1998.
The
Bluebonnet Bowl was played at the stadium from 1968 through 1984, and again in 1987.
The stadium was also home to the
Houston Bowl in 2000 and 2001.
Scoreboard
The Astrodome was well-known for a four-story-tall scoreboard, composed of thousands of lightbulbs, that featured animations until its removal in the late 1980s. This loss was brought about by threats from Oilers owner Bud Adams to move his football team to
Jacksonville, Florida unless stadium seating capacity was expanded. The city buckled to his demands, and the scoreboard was removed and approximately 15,000 new seats installed to bring total capacity over 60,000. In 1989, four cylindrical columns were constructed outside the Dome, housing pedestrian ramps.
Recent history
The 1992 Republican National Convention was held at the Astrodome in August of that year. The Astros accommodated the politicians by taking a month-long road trip.
The Astrodome began to show its age by the 1990s. Oilers owner Adams issued a new set of demands, this time for a completely new stadium, but the city of Houston refused to fund such a venture. After years of threats, Adams moved the team to Tennessee in 1996. Around that time the Astros also threatened to leave the city unless a new ballpark was built. Houstonians acquiesced this time, and the retractable-roofed Enron Field was erected in downtown Houston in 2000.
One of the largest crowds in the Astrodome's history took place in 1995, when Tejano music superstar
Selena Quintanilla-Pérez and her band Los Dinos performed for a sell-out crowd during the Houston Livestock and Rodeo Show at the Astrodome, attracting more than 64,000 fans. This was also to be Selena's final performance, as she was later shot to death on March 31, 1995 by her fan club president Yolanda Saldívar. This would be the Astrodome's largest crowd until
WrestleMania X-Seven was held at the Astrodome in 2001, establishing a new all-time record for the facility at 67,925 fans.
The Astrodome was joined by a new neighbor in 2002, the retractable-roofed
Reliant Stadium, which was built to house Houston's new
NFL franchise, the
Houston Texans.The
Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo moved to the new venue in 2003, leaving the Astrodome without any major tenants. The last concert preformed at the Astrodome was George Strait & the Ace in the Hole band. George would also perform at Reliant Stadium next year. The stadium is currently called the "lonely landmark" by Houstonians because hardly any well-known events take place there. The historic facility now hosts occasional concerts and high school football games. Although some Houstonians want the Astrodome
demolished by 2009 or 2010, to be replaced by a large parking lot for the other structures of
Reliant Park, city council has rejected that plan for environmental reasons. They reasoned that demolition of the Dome might damage the dense development that today closely surrounds it.
Houston's plan to host the 2012 Olympic Games included renovating the Astrodome for use as an
Olympic Stadium. Houston became one of the USOC's bid finalists, but the organization chose
New York City as its candidate city; the Games ultimately were awarded to
London by the IOC.
In 2005 Astrodome Redevelopment Corporation sought funding to convert the building into a "self-contained hotel", and the company will announce further plans in a letter-of-intent agreement with Harris County in January 2006.
In 2006, the Astrodome hosted what was called the largest indoor amusement park.
Hurricane Katrina
On August 31, 2005, in the wake of
Hurricane Katrina, the
Harris County Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management and the State of
Louisiana came to an agreement to allow at least 25,000 evacuees from
New Orleans, especially those that were sheltered in the
Louisiana Superdome, to move to the Astrodome until they could return home. The evacuation began on September 1. All scheduled events for the final four months of 2005 at the Astrodome were cancelled. . However, eventually officials declared that the Reliant Astrodome was full at 13,000 and could not accept additional hurricane evacuees from the disaster. Overflow evacuees were held in the surrounding Reliant Park complex including 3,000 at the
Reliant Arena and 8,000 at the
Reliant Center. No more evacuees were taken into the Astrodome. There was a full field hospital inside the Reliant Arena, which cared for the entire evacuee community.
The entire Reliant Park complex was scheduled to be emptied of evacuees by September 17, 2005. The Astrodome has no other current use, aside from a handful of conventions, and originally the Astrodome was planned to be used to house evacuees until December. However, the surrounding parking lots were needed for the first Houston Texans home game. Arrangements were made to help evacuees find apartments both in Houston and elsewhere in the United States. By September 16, 2005 the last of the evacuees living in the Astrodome had been moved out either to the neighboring Reliant Arena or to more permanent housing. As of September 20, 2005, the remaining evacuees were relocated to
Arkansas due to
Hurricane Rita.
