1987: Indianapolis hosts 10th Pan American Games

INDIANAPOLIS — Greater than 6,000 athletes, coaches and trainers from 38 nations traveled to Indianapolis for the tenth version of the Pan American Video games in 1987. The video games ran from August 7-23.

Held each 4 years, the Pan Am Video games preceded the Summer time Olympic Video games. They featured athletes from across the Americas.

Indianapolis was picked because the host of the video games on November 9, 1984 thanks largely to the success of the 1982 Nationwide Sports activities Competition.

A sellout crowd of 70,000 attended the opening ceremonies on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on August 8, 1987. Some 6,500 performers stuffed the entrance stretch of the Speedway, which served because the stage of the festivities. It spanned the size of six soccer fields. Eight central Indiana highschool bands mixed to kind a 1,000 member marching band.

The theme of the ceremony was “The Magic that’s America” and it was produced by Walt Disney Productions. Vice President George Bush was readily available as Wilma Rudolph lit the torch.

In response to a 1987 WRTV report, 947,469 followers attended the video games, spending about $9 million on tickets alone. A whopping 38,000 volunteers, 4,000 of which got here from out of state, helped facilitate the video games.

On the conclusion of the Pan American Video games, the manager director of the Indiana Sports activities Company stated, “I believe the outdated saying is that it’s not over till the fats woman sings and we’re not inviting any fats woman to sing at Indianapolis for a very long time.”