The Eighties

The original St. Louis Steamers joined the the Major Indoor Soccer League (MISL) as an expansion team in 1979 and played until 1988. At its peak of popularity the team was drawing crowds of over 17,000 to the St. Louis Arena. READ MORE ???*Shirt...

This iconic video game first appeared in video arcades in North America in 1987. Home video game versions for various systems followed including the Commodore 64, NES, Game Boy, and Amiga.

Zantigo was a chain of fast food Mexican restaurants that served fresh and tangy delicacies from 1976 to 1987. It was famous for its chili, taco burritos, taco salads, cheese chilitos, and cheap chips & cheese that were to die for according to former...

Red Barn was founded in 1961 in Dayton. The chain, which served hamburgers and fish in addition to fried chicken, grew to over 400 locations in 19 states before shutting down in 1986.

The Ft. Wayne Flames played in the American Indoor Soccer Association from 1986 to 1989. The won the league runners-up in 1988.

Looney T Birds opened in Oxford, Ohio, home of Miami Univeristy, in 1984 and was the premier record shop in Oxford for nearly 20 years. It's convenient downtown location and relationship with WOXY helped cement its place in Tristate music history.??

Legend City Family Fun Park in Phoenix entertained a generation of visitors from 1963 to 1983.

One of the most popular auto racing video games of all time, Pole Position debuted in 1982.

The Cincinnati Slammers began as the Ohio Mixers in 1982. Originally based in Lima, Ohio, the team played its home games at Lima Senior High School. In 1984, the team moved to Cincinnati and was renamed the Slammers. Following the 1986-87 season, the team...

The Nebraska Wranglers were a one-year wonder in the Women’s Professional Basketball League, joining in the league's third and final season in the winter of 1980-81. The expansion club would go on to win the league championship in April 1981.  OS16283

From 1987 to 1997, Aquilon, known as The Lift on Sunday nights, was the trendiest club in Cleveland's dance scene. It was located on Merwin Avenue in the Flats, right beneath the Detroit-Superior Bridge, later becoming The Smart Bar.

The Denver Dynamite??were one of four teams established for the inaugural season of the Arena Football League in 1987.??The franchise suspended operations for the 1988 season but returned in 1989 playing until 1991. Their home field was McNichols Arena.??

The first Derby was held in 1875 in Louisville and is the most famous horse racing event in the world. The entire horseracing world knows its significance.

Gray Drug was founded in 1912. In the 1960s it bought Cincinnati-based Rink's discount department store, later merging it with Cleveland's Bargain City. The drug store chain to over 100 stores by the 1970s. In 1987, Gray Drug was acquired by Rite Aid.

Lazzie Bear was a Christmas plushie sold at Lazarus department stores staring with the 1986 holiday season. He retired in the early 2000s, when the chain, after several mergers and acquisitions, took the Macy's name.

On September 27, 1986, a local charity over saw the launch of a world record??one-and-a-half million balloons from Public Square in downtown Cleveland. The results were disastrous as a cold front rolling through the area kept the balloons inflated longer than expected and reeked...

In 1985, St. Louis??went 101-61, won the pennant, and??are considered to be one of the greatest teams ever.

Big Town Mall opened in 1959 in the Dallas suburb of Mesquite and was the first enclosed shopping center in the Southwest. The center's exterior was featured in the 1985 film??True Stories by Talking Heads member David Byrne. The mall closed in 2001 and...

Shortly after cable TV began to expand across the U.S., Warner Communications (later Warner-AMEX), one of the biggest cable providers, introduced QUBE in Columbus, Ohio in 1977.??QUBE??was an experimental, two-way, multi-programmed??system that played a significant role in the development of American??interactive television. It was...

King Cobra was the first coaster to be designed and built specifically as a stand-up coaster. The ride opened in 1984. The original manufacturer, TOGO, went out of business in 2001 making parts difficult to find causing the ride to close after the 2002...

Taking to the airwaves on 1380 AM in 1925, KFVE became KWK in 1927. From 1978 to 1984 it broadcast a rock & roll format with the slogan "the rockin' best." In 1979 it started simulcasting on 106.5 FM.

The International Record Syndicate, or I.R.S. Records, was a label founded by Miles Copeland (brother of The Police's Stewart Copeland) and Jay Boberg. A division of A&M Records, its roster included some of the most important new wave acts of the '80s including R.E.M.,...

The Edmonton Drillers played in the original North American Soccer League from 1979 to 1982. The team was owned by Peter Pocklington, who also owned the Edmonton Oilers hockey team. The franchise was previously known as the Oakland Stompers and the Hartford Bicentennials.

The Detroit Printing Co-Op was founded by Freddy Perlman, a prolific and widely respected political writer and thinker. Perlman and his wife Lorraine printed all the books published by their press, Black & Red, at the co-op from 1970-1980. Other groups made use of...

The Detroit Lightning was an expansion team in the Major Indoor Soccer League (MISL) for the 1979-80 season. Their home arena was Cobo Hall. In the spring of 1980, they moved to San Francisco to become the Fog. After a year in Northern California,...

The Detroit Express played in the old North American Soccer League (NASL) from 1978 to 1980. Its home field was the Pontiac Silverdome. They also participated in the NASL indoor league during the 1979/80 and 1980/81 seasons.

If you wore a store-bought Halloween costume between 1950 and the late 1980s, there's a good chance it was made by Ben Cooper, Inc. Consisting of an inexpensive vinyl smock and plastic mask to recreate various pop culture icons, the costumes were a staple...

Edgewater Park was a 20-acre amusement park at Grand River and Seven Mile Rd on Detroit's West Side that opened in 1927. For over 50 years its visitors enjoyed such attractions as the Wild Beast roller coaster, the 110-foot Ferris wheel, the Hall of...

Druther's Restaurant was a fast food chain in Louisville that began as Burger Queen??in 1963, with its roots going back to 1956 in Winter Haven, FL. The name change came in 1981 to better reflect the restaurant's offerings which came to include chicken and...

The Bat opened in 1981 as the world's first suspended roller coaster. However, frequent mechanical problems forced it to close after the 1983 season. Learning from The Bat's shortcomings, the ride's manufacturer, Arrow Dynamics, was able to develop a much more successful second generation...