THE HIPPODROME
One of the things that I looked forward to every Friday night in the late 1950's and early 1960's was rollerskating at the old Hippodrome. The Hippodrome has since been razed but it was near Vanderbilt University and across the street from Centennial Park. The original hippodrome was an a stadium in ancient Greece used for horse racing and chariot racing. As far as I know our Hippodrome was never used for that but this is where I learned to roller skate as a child. It was a huge building used for a variety of things. It had a 40,000 square foot roller rink. An organ sat up in a balcony on the east end where a lady played music while everyone skated. There were skating parties and baseball was played on skates. During the Depression there were walking marathons where boy and girl couples would walk until one or the other collapsed. The stronger of the two would hold the other up and the couple that finished on their feet would win a cash prize. Big band performers like Benny Goodman and others that performed there. From 1937 until 1941 Vanderbilt's basketball team played at the Hippodrome. In the early days of streetcars you could skate all night for a quarter. During the 1950's and 60's there was professional wrestling promoted by Nick Gulas. Wrestlers such as Tex Riley was one of the good guys. Tojo Yamamoto and the Fargo Brothers were the bad guys that wrestled there. Like most everything else it was segregated and there were the white and colored restrooms.The Hippodrome was torn down in 1968.
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| Ben West Jr's Birthday Party In 1952 |
Competitive Skaters
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| Tex Riley |
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| Nick Gulas |
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| Fargo Brothers |
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| Tojo Yamamoto |
In 1948-1949 a bunch of us would gather at the Hippodrome each Friday night to skate in their large rink. It was the highlight of my week. The organist would play through the entire evening, and at the end of the night we would have a sort of promenade (there was another name for it). A leader (usually a boy) would be chosen - I assume by a Hippodrome employee - to lead the promenade, and the boy would select a partner. All other skaters would line up behind these two, who would lead the procession into a final several minutes of skating. There were bleachers in the rink, and I confess I did occasionally see a boy and girl meeting behind the bleachers. Always a fun night!!
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone remember a wrestler named Bobo Kahn ever wrestling at the Hippodrome? His real name was Donald Cooper
ReplyDeleteMy name is Belinda Cooper. I am the one who posted the question above about Donald Cooper / alias Bobo Kan (wrestler)
DeleteWent skating there when in Jr high! 1949-51! Lived in woodbine, we took bus to downtown Nashville , transferred to west end! We were safe from predators in those days!
ReplyDeleteUsed to skate there in 1958. Several of us girls from out of town had come into Nashville to work. We would go to the hippodrome and skate . I met my husband there. After we go married we had 2 sons and used to take them there to skate. A lot of good memories.
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