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Award-winning columnist Tom Archdeacon — an old-school storyteller in a brand-new venue — writes about sports, the city, southwest Ohio and anything else that catches his fancy… or yours.Home > Blogs > Through the Arch > Archives > 2009 > July > 12 > Entry
The Night Disco and Baseball Got Torched
As ill-conceived ideas go, today is the anniversary of the biggest promotional back-fire in baseball history. It’s even more moronic than the 10-cent beer night in Cleveland in 1974 that left Texas players using their bats to keep drunken fans at bay.
It was 30 years ago tonight — July 12, 1979 — that Chicago’s Comiskey Park hosted its ill-fated Disco Demolition Night.
The event was the brainchild of Chicago disc jockey Steve Dahl and Mike Veeck, son of Bill Veeck, owner of the Chicago White Sox.
Dahl had been let go at one Chicago radio station — when the format was made all disco — and it likely was that and his general dislike for the genre that fueled his plan, which he hyped from his new DJ job at another station:
Fans would get into the twi-night double-header between the White Sox and Detroit Tigers for just 98 cents if they brought along a disco record to be destroyed.
Between games, Dahl would go onto the field and blow up the bin full of the records that had been turned in.
According to Chicago newspaper reports back then, one of Veeck’s mistakes was that he had planned for a crowd of 35,000 — and that’s what he had security for — but more than 75,000 people showed up. For the most part, instead of baseball fans they were folks already in a full-blown party haze…and wanting more.
When the small bin was filled with records, stadium personnel quit collecting the records. which quickly became sharp-edged frisbees.
“They would slice around you and stick in the ground,” Rusty Staub, then the Tigers’ designated hitter, told the New York Times recently. “It wasn’t just one, it was many. Oh, God almighty, I’ve never seen anything so dangerous in my life. I begged the guys to put on their batting helmets.”
Beer and whiskey bottles became missiles, too, and fans who couldn’t get in stormed the gates.
“People brought ladders,” Staub said. “They were climbing in from the outside. It was like a riot.”
And when Veeck sent his limited security staff outside to deal with the gate-crashers, the knuckleheads inside had mostly free rein.
Chanting “Disco Sucks,” in his microphone, Dahl blew up the bin of records — leaving a big hole in center field — and then left the field by jeep. Whipped into a frenzy, the crowd poured onto the field.
“And then all hell broke loose,” Tigers pitcher Jack Morris told the Times. “They charged the field and started tearing up the pitching rubber and the dirt. They took the bases. They started digging out home plate….Whiskey bottles were flying over our dugout.”
The batting cage was pulled out onto the field and destroyed. Fires were set on the field and fans climbed foul poles.
Finally the umps had had enough — not to mention Tigers manager Sparky Anderson, who said he feared for his team’s safety and would not let his players on the field — and the plug was pulled on the second game. The official reason was that the field was unplayable. A day later, American League officials announced the Sox would have to forfeit the game to Detroit.
After his dad retired. Mike Veeck was blacklisted from Major League Baseball for many years.
In Neal Karlen’s book — “Slouching Toward Fargo: A Two-Year Saga Of Sinners And St. Paul Saints At The Bottom Of The Bush Leagues With Bill Murray, Darryl Strawberry, Dakota Sadie And Me,” — Mike Veeck said he knew there would be fall out from his promotional fiasco:
“The second that first guy shimmied down the outfield wall, I knew my life was over!”
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Comments
By Авария
December 6, 2010 1:00 AM | Link to this
Спасибо за материалы! :) Respect www.daytondailynews.com
By Pornokontac
December 1, 2010 12:20 PM | Link to this
Спасибо понравилось !
By derekpm
July 12, 2009 11:53 PM | Link to this
Rather interesting. Has few times re-read for this purpose to remember. Thanks for interesting article. Waiting for trackback
By Scott
July 12, 2009 11:07 AM | Link to this
Thanks for the story. This was one of baseball’s memorable moments. What’s ironic is that electronics are heard through all forms of popular music (including rap/hip-hop) which started with the Disco genre. So I guess those who wore bellbottoms got the last laugh.
By Dee
July 12, 2009 10:18 AM | Link to this
Nice Job Tom! I was too young to remember this so very interesting, thanks also for the You Tube piece.