1800 South First Street, Champaign
The Assembly Hall was designed by Max Abramovitz, a distinguished University of Illinois alumnus, with structural engineers Amman and Whitney. Abramovitz also designed the Krannert Center for Performing Arts and Hillel Foundation at the University. His firm was responsible for the Philharmonic Hall, the RCA Music Hall, the Time-Life building, and the Metropolitan Opera House. Assembly Hall has been declared eligible for the National Register of Historic Places and was ranked #3 in importance by a 1994 Campus Historic Preservation Plan, behind only Altgeld Hall and the Auditorium Building (Foellinger).
The Assembly Hall was born out of a need for a single arena that could seat an entire University class. The growing number of students had long since overwhelmed Foellinger’s seating capacity. Assembly Hall opened on May 3, 1963 and continues to attract attention for its design and construction. The four hundred foot diameter building–reaching its peak at 128 feet above the center floor–at the time of its construction was one of only two edge-supported domes in the world.
The $8.7M building was constructed on a truly massive scale in every respect. During construction a special horizontal-wheeled tractor was borrowed from missile silo work to wind 614 miles of 1/4″ steel wire around the dome’s edge, circling the dome 2,467 times. This placed more than 130,000 pounds per square inch of tension on the concrete, which caused it to squeeze inward and rise upwards, such that the 800,000 square feet of wooden scaffolding which had supported the concrete when it was poured was uncovered and removed. The dome today is 2 inches less than it was when it was originally poured, due to this operation. Even the concourse was built on an impressive scale, with 24 bridges leading onto the quarter mile concourse, which is lit by 24 skylights.
The third-largest Illinois arena after the United Center in Chicago and the Allstate Arena in Rosemont, Assembly Hall has nearly 16,000 permanent seats. An additional 2,000 temporary seats can be brought in. The center floor can also be covered with 225 sectional panels to create a regulation basketball court, and a unique theater grid hovers 85 feet above the ground.
The home of University of Illinois women’s and men’s basketball teams, Assembly Hall also played host to such performers as The Rolling Stones, Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, U2, and The Harlem Globetrotters and continues to host a variety of Illinois High School Association events. It is the home of the state individual wrestling tournament since 1967. From 1963 to 1995, Assembly Hall played host to the state finals of the boys’ basketball tournament. From 1978 to 1990, it also hosted the IHSA girls’ basketball tournament.
As of April 2, 2008, the Assembly Hall was added to the annual top ten endangered Illinois historic places list as published by Landmarks Illinois, a non-profit historic preservation group. The only other endangered athletic site on the list is the Cubs’ Wrigley Field in Chicago.
The University expects to complete a study this year to either replace the facility with a dedictated basketball arena or make major renovations to accomodate luxury suites and elevators.
[Wikipedia and UIUC Campus Tour]