27°56′57″N82°27′43″W / 27.94917°N 82.46194°W /27.94917; -82.46194
Curtis Hixon Hall was an indoor sportsarena,convention center, concert venue, and special events center which was located at 600 Ashley Drive along theHillsborough River indowntownTampa, Florida. It opened in 1965, and was the primary concert, indoor sports, and civic gathering place for the city of Tampa for about twenty years. The construction of newer and more specialized facilities around town during the 1980s gradually reduced the number of events held at Curtis Hixon Hall, and the opening of the much largerTampa Convention Center in 1990 made it obsolete.
Curtis Hixon Hall was demolished in 1993, and the land was converted into a public park. The park was redesigned and incorporated into theTampa Riverwalk in 2010, and the facility's former footprint is now home to theTampa Museum of Art, theGlazer Children’s Museum, and the northern portions ofCurtis Hixon Waterfront Park.
The Hall's namesake,Curtis Hixon, was a long-time mayor of Tampa who died in 1956 while serving his fourth term in the office.
Curtis Hixon Hall was planned and built in the early 1960s during the administration of Tampa mayorNick Nuccio, who pushed for the construction of many public works projects around town.[1] It was named forCurtis Hixon, the mayor of Tampa from 1943 until he died while still in office in 1956.[2] Local architect Norman Six designed the uniquely shaped building in a modifiedGoogie architecture style.[3] Construction of the 62,000 square feet (5,800 m2) facility cost approximately $5 million and was mostly financed bymunicipal bonds issued by the city of Tampa. It was dedicated on January 23, 1965.[4]
Curtis Hixon Hall could be reconfigured and subdivided to accommodate many different events. It had a maximum capacity of about 8000 in a concert setup.[4][5] It hosted concerts and sports, conventions and trade shows, large community events such as New Year's Eve dances andGasparilla-related festivities, and political events, such as a large 1968 campaign rally for presidential candidateRichard Nixon.[4][6]
Curtis Hixon Hall was the site of a wide variety of sporting events. The first event in the new facility was aboxing card held on February 15, 1965,[7] and it hosted many subsequent boxing andwrestling cards throughout its lifetime, including a nationally televised 1971light heavyweight championship bout betweenBob Foster andRay Anderson.[8] Other notable fighters appearing at Curtis Hixon Hall includedEarnie Shavers,Emile Griffith,José Roman,Vicente Rondón, andMaurice Watkins.[9]
Curtis Hixon Hall also hosted manybasketball games. It was the first home court of theUniversity of South Florida'smen's andwomen's basketball teams and theABA'sFloridians, and it was also used forhigh school basketball games and tournaments.
Curtis Hixon Hall was Tampa's primary concert venue from the mid-1960s until the early 1980s, with only a handful of the biggest acts playing at much largerTampa Stadium. Many of the top musical performers of the era played at Curtis Hixon Hall, includingBob Dylan (both solo and as part of theRolling Thunder Revue),[10]The Who,the Grateful Dead,Creedence Clearwater Revival,The Monkees,Chuck Berry,Led Zeppelin,Jefferson Airplane,Johnny Cash,Elton John, Elvis Presley,Black Sabbath,Sly & The Family Stone,The Jackson 5,Eagles,Santana,Bob Marley andThe Wailers,The Beach Boys,Kiss,ZZ Top,Hank Williams Jr.,The Isley Brothers,Van Halen,Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers,Rush,The Kinks,Talking Heads,Dire Straits,U2,Yes, andStevie Ray Vaughan, among many others.[11]
Notable shows included:
Curtis Hixon Hall was considered small and outdated by the mid-1980s and was relegated to hosting smaller events such as small trade shows and local events such ashigh school graduations while most sporting events and concerts shifted to places like theUSF Sun Dome (which opened in 1980) and the nearby restoredTampa Theater.
When the much largerTampa Convention Center opened in 1990 and Tampa began making plans to build a new downtown sports arena (the futureBenchmark International Arena, which opened in 1996), city leaders agreed that Curtis Hixon Hall had outlived its usefulness.Mayor Sandy Freedman's administration decided to tear down the building and replace it with Curtis Hixon Park. Demolition of the facility began in 1993 and the park was dedicated in 1995. Aquamarine-colored tiles from the hall were set into each bench at the park.
The site was redeveloped again in the late 2000s to integrate the area intothe city's Riverwalk project. A newTampa Museum of Art and theGlazer Children's Museum opened in 2010 on the footprint of Curtis Hixon Hall, while the open space immediately to the south became a redesignedCurtis Hixon Waterfront Park.
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