History of roller derby
Encyclopedia
The history of roller derby
traces the evolution of roller skating
races into a unique sport which has undergone several boom-and-bust cycles throughout most of the 20th century. Although it was a form of sports entertainment
for much of its existence, a grassroots
, early 21st century revival spearheaded by women has restored an emphasis on athleticism.
in the United States led to the formation of organized endurance races as early as 1884, when skater Victor W. Clough skated 100 miles over the course of nearly ten hours in Geneseo, Illinois
. In 1885, a six-day "go-as-you-please" competition was staged at Madison Square Garden
in New York City
, with 36 skaters competing for $500 in prize money. Two deaths resulted from the six-day race: both the winner, William Donovan, and skater Joseph Cohen died shortly after the race was completed. Though the inquest that resulted from Cohen's death led to a recommendation for a law prohibiting roller skating activities exceeding four hours in length, a second six-day race was announced in May 1885.
The popularity of roller skate racing, including endurance events, continued in the early 20th century. Races routinely featured amateur skaters as well as professionals, some of whom toured as troupes. Due to rowdiness at some events, including tripping and pushing, speed roller skating acquired a reputation for being something less than a legitimate sport. The International Skating Union of America, a competitor of the International Skating Union
, formed in 1907 partly in response. This network of regional associations lasted 20 years, organized championship races, and established rules that prohibited rough play.
Although tripping and pushing may not have been allowed at certain events, popular speed and endurance races continued to be held on both flat and banked tracks in the century's first three decades. Among these races was an 8.5-mile roller marathon organized in 1908 by a group of Chicago, Illinois rink owners, a 24-hour endurance championship held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin
in 1913, and a 24-hour banked track race held at Madison Square Garden
in 1914. The New York Times noted that the crowd at Madison Square Garden enjoyed the sudden sprints and spills during the event's preliminary races.
The term derby, meaning a race or multi-race event, appeared in the press as early as 1922, when the Chicago Tribune
announced and reported on the results of two "roller derby" events held that year. These were multi-day events during which various roller skating races were held on a flat track at Chicago's Broadway Armory.
began, struggling film publicist Leo Seltzer
(1903–1978) observed that cash prize-awarding dance marathon
s among out-of-work contestants and spectators were undermining attendance at his Oregon
cinema
chain, so he sought ways to capitalize on the trend. Seltzer began holding his own dance marathons, dubbed "walkathons" since contestants usually ended up just shuffling around for the duration of the contests, which could run as long as 40 days. Hundreds of unemployed people participated, hoping to win cash prizes. The contests were emceed by celebrities like Frankie Laine
and Red Skelton
, and grossed $6 million in three years. Seltzer held his first commercial walkathon in 1931 in Denver, Colorado
, then held 22 more, grossing $2 million before retiring, citing that the events had become "vulgar."
In 1933, Seltzer moved his family to Chicago, Illinois and began booking events at the Chicago Coliseum
.
magazine that said ninety-three percent of Americans roller skated at least once in their lives. While discussing the article with regular patrons at Ricketts, a restaurant in Chicago's Near North Side, Seltzer was challenged to invent a sport incorporating roller skating. Jotting his ideas onto a tablecloth, he decided to combine then-popular six-day bicycle races and roller skating. Some sources give co-credit for the idea to Leo's brother Oscar.
In August of that year, Seltzer organized his own Transcontinental Roller Derby, an event more than a month long. Staged at the Chicago Coliseum, it was a simulation of a cross-country roller skating race in which 25 two-person (male-female) teams circled a wooden, oval, banked track thousands of times, skating 11½ hours a day, to cover 3,000 miles, the distance between Los Angeles
and New York City
. Team standings were indicated by multicolored lights tracking their imaginary progress on a large map of the United States. Teams were disqualified if both members were off the track during skating times. Sixteen teams dropped out due to injuries or exhaustion, but nine teams finished, and the winning team, Clarice Martin and Bernie McKay, held the lead for the last 11 days of the event. Although Seltzer's spectacle had elements of originality, a U.S. District Court, ruling against Seltzer when he sued a competitor in 1938, found that the marathon roller race concept had long been in the public domain
, so Seltzer couldn't claim copyright violation.
Following the first event's success, Seltzer took the Transcontinental Roller Derby on the road, holding similar races throughout the U.S. with a portable track that reportedly cost $20,000. Daily crowds averaged 10,000 in number, with spectators paying 10 to 25 cents admission. These races were billed as covering "4,000 miles" even though the simulated route was still about 3,000, covering the distance from San Diego to New York City. Contestants were the winners of elimination races in Seltzer's Transcontinental Roller Derby Association, which in September 1935 already had 3,000 members, paying $2 each, at 1,600 rinks. By early 1936, Seltzer had selected a group of teams who competed in Chicago, Miami, Louisville, and Detroit. Skaters in these races only had to skate 8 hours nightly, but were encouraged to engage in "jams" and, at specific times, 5-minute sprints referred to in event programs as "open house". Later that year, Transcontinental Roller Derby debuted in New York at the New York Hippodrome
, simulating a 21-day "short course" from Salt Lake City to New York. Appearances at the Pan Pacific Auditorium in Los Angeles, California
attracted celebrities such as W.C. Fields, Mickey Rooney
, Eddie Cantor
, George Burns
, Gracie Allen
, Jack Benny
, Milton Berle
, Cary Grant
and Eleanor Powell
.
Occasionally, massive collisions and crashes occurred as skaters tried to lap those who were ahead of them. In 1936, 1937, or 1938 (sources vary), after seeing a match in Miami, Florida
and realizing this was an exciting element of the sport, sportswriter Damon Runyon
encouraged Seltzer to tweak the game to maximize physical contact between the skaters, including elbowing, "whipping", and slamming each other into the track's outer rail, as well as exaggerating hits and falls. Seltzer bristled, wanting to keep the sport legitimate, but agreed to the experiment, which fans ended up loving.
In the Depression's later years, some cities hosted the Derby's "short course" engagements, simulating semi-transcontinental distances. Points were accumulated on behalf of three "factions", each named for a color (Black, White, or Green) and consisting of five two-person teams skating in 15-minute shifts. With all three factions on the track at the same time, two teams frequently banded together to rout the third. A more sporting variety followed, with just two teams being named after Indian tribes
. This, too, was short-lived. The two-team concept survived, but teams were built around the idea of there always being a "home team" named for wherever the match was being played, even though the skaters were always the same people. By 1939, the organization had four pairs of teams touring the country at the same time, always billed as the home team versus either New York or Chicago. The format of two five-person teams on the track at the same time, with a team scoring points when its members lap members of the other team, is the basic premise of roller derby to this day.
, collided with a bridge abutment, rolled onto its side and burst into flames, trapping passengers inside. The accident occurred near Salem, Illinois
, as the bus was en route from St. Louis, Missouri
to Cincinnati, Ohio
for another performance. Only a few of the 23 passengers escaped the burning wreckage, and two of them died later from their injuries, bringing the total fatalities to 19 or 20 (sources vary). The ghastly tragedy nearly put Seltzer out of business, but replacement skaters were signed and Roller Derby survived. As a tribute to those killed in the tragedy, the number "1" was permanently retired for all Roller Derby teams.
Transcontinental Roller Derby rapidly grew in popularity as a spectator sport. Matches were held in fifty cities in 1940, for more than five million spectators, some of whom formed fan clubs and newsletters like Roller Derby News (later renamed RolleRage). Teams began to represent and compete in other U.S. cities, although some teams were actually the same traveling group that would just change names depending on where they were playing, and all were part of the Seltzer-owned Roller Derby league. The league's own estimates of audiences for 1941 were comparable, with four million Midwestern spectators in 20 cities being claimed.
The entry of the United States into World War II
at the end of 1941 interrupted the sport's ascent; many skaters enlisted in the armed forces, crowds dwindled, and the fledgling league was reduced to one team skating mainly for the entertainment of soldiers. After the war's end in 1945, Seltzer successfully resumed growing the sport, although a 1946 attempt to bring it to New York's Polo Grounds
failed due to twelve straight days of rain.
, beginning a 13-week run on the CBS
-TV network, broadcasting at a time well before television was in widespread use. The first televised matches were between teams representing New York and Brooklyn, and took place at the 69th Regiment Armory
four nights a week, which was actually a reduction from the troupe's usual touring schedule that included a performance every day, sometimes with two on Sundays. Although few people owned TVs at that time, broadcasts could be seen on sets in bars and storefront windows. The fledgling medium allowed underwhelming audience sizes to be made to look like they had packed venues to capacity, leading spectators to turn out in droves for subsequent matches. Armory crowds began in the low hundreds, but were soon in the five to seven thousand range. Then in June 1949, Seltzer secured an appearance at Madison Square Garden
before a cumulative crowd of 55,000 over a five-day period.
Early stars of Roller Derby after its debut on TV included Ken Monte, Bert Wall, and the temperamental Midge "Toughie" Brasuhn. Skater salaries were about $
200 to $260 a week, established by a players' association.
Meanwhile, from 1946 through 1948, flat-track roller derby was enjoyed as an intramural sport
at the University of British Columbia
in Canada.
For the 1949–1950 season, Seltzer opened franchise teams and formed the National Roller Derby League (NRDL). The NRDL consisted of six teams: the New York Chiefs, the Brooklyn Red Devils, the Jersey Jolters, the Philadelphia Panthers, the Washington-Baltimore Jets, and the Chicago Westerners. The Jolters played at Armories in Newark, Jersey City, Teaneck, and Paterson. The Westerners played in Chicago, but also in Columbus, Ohio and Miami, Florida. The Red Devils had no venue in Brooklyn, and were essentially a road team, often cast as villains. NRDL season playoffs sold out Madison Square Garden for a week.
Also in 1949, when the CBS contract expired, broadcasting was taken over by ABC
, and games were televised live throughout the United States. The contract with ABC lasted until Seltzer negotiated its termination in 1951 over scheduling disputes.
Between 1949 and 1951, Seltzer's organization grossed $2.5 million, bolstered by Madison Square Garden appearances in 1950 and 1951 that set five-day records of 77,000 and 82,000, respectively. In this period, Seltzer also sold the Jolters to an outside syndicate. Skater salaries, negotiated by an informal players' union, were around $250 a week, with $35 and $60 bonuses for captains and player-coaches.
to sponsor the broadcast of games on NBC. The deal fell through when, according to Seltzer, General Motors, fuming over an NCAA decision preventing them from sponsoring the broadcast of University of Notre Dame
football games, lost interest in televising any sports at all. A handful of independent TV stations continued to broadcast games, but the loss of network broadcasting caused fan interest to plummet. Madison Square Garden no longer wanted to host matches, fan clubs disbanded, and Seltzer returned to pursuing real estate interests. At some point, Seltzer changed his residence to Encino
(Los Angeles) a westward move that foreshadowed changes to come.
In July 1953, citing the effects of the Korean War
and a dearth of venues, Leo Seltzer moved the Derby from New York to Los Angeles and created the L.A. Braves for their debut at the Rose Bowl
. The Braves became the first international team when a tour of Europe was launched in 1953.
However, this was not the first time audiences outside the U.S. had seen the game played live. A separate organization, International Roller Speedway, known in some countries as Roller-Catch, formed in 1937 and toured Europe
, where they played at the Harringay Arena
in London, and the Philippines
. Roller Speedway was a modified version of the sport and normally featured two teams, representing Europe (the "home" team) and USA. The 1950 film The Fireball
, starring Mickey Rooney
, was based on the life of one of the league's stars, Eddie Poore, who skated under the name Eddie Cazar. Roller Speedway ceased operations in 1952.
In 1954, the Derby established the most fabled team in the history of the sport, the longtime champion San Francisco Bay Bombers. Stars on this team eventually included Charlie O'Connell
, Joanie Weston, and Ann Calvello
.
In his keynote address at the 2007 roller derby convention RollerCon, Leo's son Jerry Seltzer
revealed that at its peak in the 1950s, the National Roller Derby League had just 83 skaters spread among its six teams.
In 1958, weary of Roller Derby's off-air struggle — by this time, crowds at San Francisco's Cow Palace
had dwindled to two hundred or less — Leo transferred Roller Derby to his son Jerry. Jerry soon struck a deal with independent Oakland TV station KTVU
to broadcast Roller Derby matches kinescope
d in a deserted garage.
format for recording games for broadcast. One of Roller Derby's sponsors, a San Francisco auto dealer, got a Portland, Oregon
TV station to broadcast an unedited tape of a match, in an attempt to advertise the dealership's new lot in the area. To his surprise, Jerry Seltzer received three hundred letters asking for Roller Derby to come to Portland, so he obliged and the Derby made an appearance before 9,000 fans. Realizing he had stumbled onto a promotional formula, he began syndicating videotapes of games to more independent TV stations, and followed up broadcasts with personal appearances of the Derby in each city. In 1961, forty stations carried Derby. Several years later, UHF
TV stations, mostly independent and desperate to compete with older, network-dominated VHF
counterparts, snatched up broadcasting rights for their areas. Although TV exposure was an important component of Roller Derby's revitalization, Seltzer didn't want to repeat the experience of mainstream professional sports organizations that had become dependent on TV; he used the medium only for exposure and publicity for the live matches, not a source of revenue for player salaries.
Jerry Seltzer also changed some of the rules. For the first time, skaters were required to wear helmets, and, at the behest of KTVU
television announcer Walt Harris, he made the game more TV-friendly by making jammers' helmets easier to spot.
A more theatrical imitation called Roller Games
was started in 1961 in Los Angeles featuring retired Roller Derby skaters who chose not to make the move to San Francisco. Owned by Bill Griffiths, Sr. and Jerry Hill, Roller Games was the only viable rival organization to the original Roller Derby and actually consisted of several separate leagues, including the (U.S.) National Roller Derby (NRD), soon renamed to National Roller League (NRL) since the "Roller Derby" trademark was aggressively protected by the Seltzer organization. The NRD/NRL consisted of the Northern Hawks (sometimes billed as the Chicago Hawks), New York Bombers, Texas Outlaws, Detroit Devils, Los Angeles Thunderbirds (nicknamed "T-Birds"), and Philadelphia Warriors (sometimes billed as the Eastern Warriors).
There were also several attempts in markets that failed quickly, with teams such as the Baltimore/Washington-based Mid Atlantic War Cats, the Florida Jets, and the Western Renegades. Roller Games also encompassed the Canadian National Roller League (CNRL) and Japanese National Roller League (JNRL). Some former Roller Derby stars found new fame in the Roller Games, and a handful of skaters simply went back and forth between the two organizations. After 1968, however, the Roller Derby to Roller Games defections were quite few; instead, a handful of Roller Games skaters returned to their roots and began skating for the Derby again.
1961 or so also saw the advent of a short-lived New York City
area rival league, the American Skating Derby (ASD), promoted by Joe Morehouse and Mike O'Hara. ASD debuted two teams of ex-Roller Derby skaters — one team representing "New York" and the other representing Brooklyn
— at Long Island Arena
in Commack, New York
, around April 1961, with plans to appear throughout the Tri-State Region. A league split later that year resulted in the formation of another league, the Eastern Skating Derby (ESD), which lasted until mid-1964 and skated only in New York, sometimes at the same venues as the ASD.
In 1962, Jerry, in partnership with his uncle Oscar Seltzer (who had founded the Roller Derby Skate Corporation
in 1936), created the Dixie Devils, a "home" team for the Southern United States
cities of Nashville
, Atlanta
, Jacksonville
and Orlando
. Ronnie Robinson
, son of boxer Sugar Ray Robinson
, was designated the team's star player. Dixie Devils games had to be recorded with kinescope, when TV audiences had already grown accustomed to the relatively clean, clear appearance of videotape, and the result was disastrous; no loyal TV audiences were grown, fan attendance was low, and the venture folded after one month. Seltzer remained fond of the idea of regionalization
, however, and envisioned his organization eventually becoming more like other sports leagues, with teams being independently owned and operated, and with the teams being associated with regions (South, Northeast, Mideast, Midwest, Central South, Southwest Plains, and West) rather than individual cities.
The ASD, ESD, and Dixie Devils, much like Roller Speedway, aren't remembered today by anyone outside the most dedicated fans and the skaters who participated in them. To the media, there was only one Roller Derby. From Jerry Seltzer's takeover in the late 1950s, the game reached new heights of popularity with a 120-station television network where taped games from the Bombers' home, Kezar Pavilion
in San Francisco, were shown weekly. Television made fans of thousands and the Bay Bombers packed arenas from coast to coast on cross country tours, regularly selling out arenas such as Madison Square Garden
, Boston Garden
, Kiel Auditorium
in St. Louis and dozens more. In 1969, television viewership of Roller Derby peaked with approximately 15 million viewers each week.
Two other developments in 1960s Roller Derby were profit sharing and annual contracts for skaters; many skaters previously held day jobs to supplement their income, or were only employed as athletes for part of the year.
in Chicago.
At this point, the Bay Bombers home-team concept was duplicated with the New York Chiefs representing the Eastern U.S. and the Pioneers based in Chicago (but really everything west of Philadelphia). A one-season run in 1971 by the Cincinnati Jolter team in the Midwest (Ohio, Kentucky, and other areas) was not financially successful, and the team became a road franchise once again. The Bombers were briefly a Southwest team moved from the Bay Area, but potential new owners couldn't come to terms with the Seltzer family and so the Bay Bombers were returned home. (In an unusual move, the Chiefs were a "replacement" team for the Bombers during the period that franchise was supposedly based in Texas.)
In 1973, high overhead and other factors led Jerry Seltzer to elect to shut down Roller Derby. In a 2005 interview, Ann Calvello mentioned gas shortages during the 1973 oil crisis
as a contributing factor because teams could not travel. Some of the IRDL star skaters were recruited to skate for Roller Games' International Skating Conference (ISC), which quickly eliminated all Derby teams except for the Chiefs to again focus on the Los Angeles Thunderbirds. However, within two years, Roller Games' wrestling/circus-like approach doomed that organization; many Roller Derby skaters quit and fans deserted the arenas. Cultural historian Paul Fussell
, perhaps editorializing, attributed the collapse of the sport to the declining economic class of its fan base in its final years; fans were ultimately unable to support the sponsors that had been keeping the sport on television.
, but a handful of games were skated in the Northeastern United States
, the Midwest
, and Canada
. Many skaters from Roller Derby were in the IRSL, and some of the team names were the same as in Roller Derby.
Initially the league was composed of the San Francisco Bay Bombers, the Midwest Pioneers, the Brooklyn Red Devils and the Manhattan Chiefs. In 1979, the league was bought out and restructured by one of its owners, former San Francisco television producer Dave Lipschultz. At this time, two more teams, the Northeast Braves and Southern Jolters (later renamed the Southern Stars), were added, and the Chiefs were renamed the New York Dynamite and, eventually, the Eastern Express. A final team, the Northern Knights, representing Canada, was announced in 1986 but never competed. As before, most of the attention was centered on the Bay Bombers. After skating primarily in Northern California, a Midwest tour was launched in 1984, but flopped due to competition from baseball and football as well as weather related problems. In 1986, a tournament was carried on ESPN and the IRSL set up sporadic appearances in New York. ESPN dropped the contract in its pursuit of the more lucrative professional football market, and although talks were underway to broadcast IRSL matchups on USA Network
, the IRSL was unable to survive without television support. Lipshultz shut down the league after its last game at Madison Square Garden
on December 12, 1987. Around that time, Lipschultz and skaters were negotiating over how to keep it going. Lipschultz wanted to make it more like professional wrestling in an attempt to win over a fickle TV audience, but the players had different ideas. No agreement was reached, and potential sponsors lost interest.
The 1985 IRSL matches have been shown twice on ESPN Classic
's sports comedy show Cheap Seats
, as ESPN retains the right to air those matches.
American Skating Derby, promoting the game as Rollerjam!, formed in 1987 and played a spring season with two teams, the San Francisco Slammers and the Los Angeles Turbos. The name American Skating Derby was the same as the early 1960s New York-based league, but was unrelated. Composed of inactive Roller Derby and IRSL skaters, the 1987 ASD was formed primarily as a means to keep the game alive, and the two teams (with the Slammers being essentially replaced by the Bay City Bombers) skated around Northern California communities for high school charities. For the next decade, with sometimes as few as one game annually, the ASD attempted to keep the traditional game going.
RollerGames, created in 1989 by two television producers, David Sams and Michael Miller, and Roller Games owner Bill Griffiths, Sr., was a U.S. television show that presented a theatrical version of the sport of roller derby for a national audience. It featured a steeply banked figure-eight track, an alligator pit, and a number of skaters who had been in the Roller Games league, as well as younger participants. The six teams were the T-Birds, Violators, Bad Attitude, Rockers, Hot Flash, and Maniacs. The show only lasted thirteen weeks despite garnering over a 5 national rating during its prime-time debut, and was in the top 25 of all syndicated shows for the season—even beating the popular American Gladiators.
Announcers were Chuck Underwood, David Sams, and Shelly Jamison.
Between January 1999 and January 2001, Knoxville, Tennessee
television impresarios Ross K. Bagwell Sr. and Stephen Land, under the name Pageboy Entertainment, collaborated with CBS
to stage another televised revival known as RollerJam
or Roller Jam. Bagwell and Land recruited numerous stars from the Roller Derby of yesteryear, as well as newer stars from various athletic backgrounds, including nationally ranked speed skaters, to skate in the six-team World Skating League (WSL). Jerry Seltzer was named RollerJam "commissioner".
RollerJam games were televised out of "RollerJam Arena," situated on the grounds of Universal Studios
in Orlando, Florida
. Initial teams, each consisting of seven men and seven women, were the New York Enforcers, the California Quakes, the Florida Sundogs, the Nevada Hot Dice, the Texas Rustlers and the Illinois Riot (Original names of the latter three teams were the Las Vegas High Rollers, Texas Twisters, and Illinois Inferno. These names were changed prior to the start of the first season). Despite strong funding and four seasons of broadcasts on The Nashville Network (TNN, now known as Spike TV
), the venture never became a "live" attraction. After MTV's takeover of the CBS Cable group, fabricated storylines and uncharismatic characters were being featured more than actual competitive skating. This did not go over well with many skaters nor die-hard roller derby fans. Two notable veterans from Roller Games, Rockin' Ray Robles and Patsy Delgato, were featured in the second season of RollerJam. When RollerJam was cancelled, many of the skaters found smaller leagues to skate in. 40 episodes of Roller Jam have been reversioned for UK television after successful televised seasons in other countries. Airing from October 2, 2006 on Challenge TV much of the narrative has been removed with sex and violence toned down for a family audience.
One major rule difference between previous leagues was the legalisation of in-line skates, which the WSL required for younger players in an attempt to push the league to younger players, more familiar with the in-line game, allowing for more precision skating over the traditional quads, allowing faster skaters to participate.
musician, recruited women to skate in what he envisioned would be a raucous, rockabilly, circus-like roller derby spectacle. After an organizational meeting and a disputed fundraiser, Policarpo and the women parted ways. The women then self-organized as Bad Girl Good Woman Productions (BGGW) in 2001, creating a new generation of roller derby, open to women only. Founders formed four teams, and staged their first public match in Austin in mid-2002. Shortly after, the league split over business plans: The Texas Rollergirls embraced flat-track play, while the BGGW league took the name TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls
and went on to skate banked-track roller derby.
The revival then began in earnest, with over 50 similar all-female leagues in existence by late 2005, more than 80 by February 2006, and more than 135 by mid-August 2006. The sport's sudden growth in 2006 is attributed to its exposure via the Rollergirls reality television
show, which depicted portions of the lives of real skaters from the TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls. The show began broadcasting in January 2006, but was not picked up for a second season due to unsatisfactory ratings.
Leagues outside the U.S. began forming in 2006, and international competition soon followed. The first all-female Canadian league of fifty members, the Terminal City Rollergirls, was formed in January 2006 in Vancouver, British Columbia. The league appeared before an audience of 4500 on March 4, 2006 to participate in a game of "Last Woman Standing" ("Blood and Thunder") against The Rat City Rollergirls at the Everett Events Centre in Everett, Washington
. The first full, international bout in women's flat-track derby occurred in December 2006, when the Oil City Derby Girls (Edmonton, Alberta, Canada) hosted the Rocky Mountain Roller Girls (Denver, Colorado
, USA). By mid-2009, there were 425 amateur leagues, including 79 in Canada
, Australia
, the United Kingdom
, New Zealand
, Germany
, Belgium
and Sweden
combined.
Although this revival of roller derby was initially all-female, some leagues later introduced all-male teams. Junior roller derby leagues associated with this revival also emerged and play under modified adult derby rules.
) now competing under their real names, and 13 members of the Denver Roller Dolls' travel team who began skating under their real names during their 2009 season.
In 2010, Race City Roller Derby of Charlotte, NC announced that all of its players will compete using their legal names.
Roller derby
Roller derby is a contact sport played by two teams of five members roller skating in the same direction around a track. Game play consists of a series of short matchups in which both teams designate a scoring player who scores points by lapping members of the opposing team...
traces the evolution of roller skating
Roller skating
Roller skating is the traveling on smooth surfaces with roller skates. It is a form of recreation as well as a sport, and can also be a form of transportation. Skates generally come in two basic varieties: quad roller skates and inline skates or blades, though some have experimented with a...
races into a unique sport which has undergone several boom-and-bust cycles throughout most of the 20th century. Although it was a form of sports entertainment
Sports entertainment
Sports entertainment is a type of spectacle which presents an ostensibly competitive event using a high level of theatrical flourish and extravagant presentation, with the purpose of entertaining an audience...
for much of its existence, a grassroots
Grassroots
A grassroots movement is one driven by the politics of a community. The term implies that the creation of the movement and the group supporting it are natural and spontaneous, highlighting the differences between this and a movement that is orchestrated by traditional power structures...
, early 21st century revival spearheaded by women has restored an emphasis on athleticism.
Endurance races
The growing popularity of roller skatingRoller skating
Roller skating is the traveling on smooth surfaces with roller skates. It is a form of recreation as well as a sport, and can also be a form of transportation. Skates generally come in two basic varieties: quad roller skates and inline skates or blades, though some have experimented with a...
in the United States led to the formation of organized endurance races as early as 1884, when skater Victor W. Clough skated 100 miles over the course of nearly ten hours in Geneseo, Illinois
Geneseo, Illinois
Geneseo is a city in Henry County, Illinois, United States. The population was 6,586 at the 2010 census, up from 6,571 at the 2000 census. Geneseo is located 20 miles east of The Quad Cities and Geneseo is part of the Quad Cities Metro Area....
. In 1885, a six-day "go-as-you-please" competition was staged at Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden (1879)
Madison Square Garden was an arena in New York City located at East 26th Street and Madison Avenue in Manhattan. The first venue to use that name, it had a seating capacity of 10,000 spectators...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, with 36 skaters competing for $500 in prize money. Two deaths resulted from the six-day race: both the winner, William Donovan, and skater Joseph Cohen died shortly after the race was completed. Though the inquest that resulted from Cohen's death led to a recommendation for a law prohibiting roller skating activities exceeding four hours in length, a second six-day race was announced in May 1885.
The popularity of roller skate racing, including endurance events, continued in the early 20th century. Races routinely featured amateur skaters as well as professionals, some of whom toured as troupes. Due to rowdiness at some events, including tripping and pushing, speed roller skating acquired a reputation for being something less than a legitimate sport. The International Skating Union of America, a competitor of the International Skating Union
International Skating Union
The International Skating Union is the international governing body for competitive ice skating disciplines, including figure skating, synchronized skating, speed skating, and short track speed skating. It was founded in Scheveningen, Netherlands in 1892, making it one of the oldest international...
, formed in 1907 partly in response. This network of regional associations lasted 20 years, organized championship races, and established rules that prohibited rough play.
Although tripping and pushing may not have been allowed at certain events, popular speed and endurance races continued to be held on both flat and banked tracks in the century's first three decades. Among these races was an 8.5-mile roller marathon organized in 1908 by a group of Chicago, Illinois rink owners, a 24-hour endurance championship held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Milwaukee is the largest city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin, the 28th most populous city in the United States and 39th most populous region in the United States. It is the county seat of Milwaukee County and is located on the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan. According to 2010 census data, the...
in 1913, and a 24-hour banked track race held at Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden (1890)
Madison Square Garden was an indoor arena in New York City, the second by that name, and the second to be located at 26th Street and Madison Avenue in Manhattan...
in 1914. The New York Times noted that the crowd at Madison Square Garden enjoyed the sudden sprints and spills during the event's preliminary races.
The term derby, meaning a race or multi-race event, appeared in the press as early as 1922, when the Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
announced and reported on the results of two "roller derby" events held that year. These were multi-day events during which various roller skating races were held on a flat track at Chicago's Broadway Armory.
Seltzer's walkathons
In 1929, as the Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
began, struggling film publicist Leo Seltzer
Leo Seltzer
Leo A. Seltzer is generally credited as the creator of the sport of roller derby, and was the founder and head of the original Roller Derby league from 1935 until his son Jerry Seltzer took over the business in 1958....
(1903–1978) observed that cash prize-awarding dance marathon
Dance marathon
A dance marathon is an event in which people stay on their feet for a given length of time. It started as a popular fad in the 1920s and 1930s, when organized dance endurance contests attracted people to compete to achieve fame or win monetary prizes...
s among out-of-work contestants and spectators were undermining attendance at his Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
cinema
Movie theater
A movie theater, cinema, movie house, picture theater, film theater is a venue, usually a building, for viewing motion pictures ....
chain, so he sought ways to capitalize on the trend. Seltzer began holding his own dance marathons, dubbed "walkathons" since contestants usually ended up just shuffling around for the duration of the contests, which could run as long as 40 days. Hundreds of unemployed people participated, hoping to win cash prizes. The contests were emceed by celebrities like Frankie Laine
Frankie Laine
Frankie Laine, born Francesco Paolo LoVecchio , was a successful American singer, songwriter, and actor whose career spanned 75 years, from his first concerts in 1930 with a marathon dance company to his final performance of "That's My Desire" in 2005...
and Red Skelton
Red Skelton
Richard Bernard "Red" Skelton was an American comedian who is best known as a top radio and television star from 1937 to 1971. Skelton's show business career began in his teens as a circus clown and went on to vaudeville, Broadway, films, radio, TV, night clubs and casinos, all while pursuing...
, and grossed $6 million in three years. Seltzer held his first commercial walkathon in 1931 in Denver, Colorado
Denver, Colorado
The City and County of Denver is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Denver is a consolidated city-county, located in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains just east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains...
, then held 22 more, grossing $2 million before retiring, citing that the events had become "vulgar."
In 1933, Seltzer moved his family to Chicago, Illinois and began booking events at the Chicago Coliseum
Chicago Coliseum
The Chicago Coliseum was the name of a succession of three large indoor arenas in Chicago, Illinois from the 1860s to 1982 that each served as a sports venue, convention center, and exhibition hall over the course of their respective histories. The first Coliseum briefly made an appearance in the...
.
Transcontinental Roller Derby
In 1935, the novelty of walkathons had worn off, but a roller skating fad arose again. According to folklore, Seltzer read an article in Literary DigestLiterary Digest
The Literary Digest was an influential general interest weekly magazine published by Funk & Wagnalls. Founded by Isaac Kaufmann Funk in 1890, it eventually merged with two similar weekly magazines, Public Opinion and Current Opinion.-History:...
magazine that said ninety-three percent of Americans roller skated at least once in their lives. While discussing the article with regular patrons at Ricketts, a restaurant in Chicago's Near North Side, Seltzer was challenged to invent a sport incorporating roller skating. Jotting his ideas onto a tablecloth, he decided to combine then-popular six-day bicycle races and roller skating. Some sources give co-credit for the idea to Leo's brother Oscar.
In August of that year, Seltzer organized his own Transcontinental Roller Derby, an event more than a month long. Staged at the Chicago Coliseum, it was a simulation of a cross-country roller skating race in which 25 two-person (male-female) teams circled a wooden, oval, banked track thousands of times, skating 11½ hours a day, to cover 3,000 miles, the distance between Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. Team standings were indicated by multicolored lights tracking their imaginary progress on a large map of the United States. Teams were disqualified if both members were off the track during skating times. Sixteen teams dropped out due to injuries or exhaustion, but nine teams finished, and the winning team, Clarice Martin and Bernie McKay, held the lead for the last 11 days of the event. Although Seltzer's spectacle had elements of originality, a U.S. District Court, ruling against Seltzer when he sued a competitor in 1938, found that the marathon roller race concept had long been in the public domain
Public domain
Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...
, so Seltzer couldn't claim copyright violation.
Following the first event's success, Seltzer took the Transcontinental Roller Derby on the road, holding similar races throughout the U.S. with a portable track that reportedly cost $20,000. Daily crowds averaged 10,000 in number, with spectators paying 10 to 25 cents admission. These races were billed as covering "4,000 miles" even though the simulated route was still about 3,000, covering the distance from San Diego to New York City. Contestants were the winners of elimination races in Seltzer's Transcontinental Roller Derby Association, which in September 1935 already had 3,000 members, paying $2 each, at 1,600 rinks. By early 1936, Seltzer had selected a group of teams who competed in Chicago, Miami, Louisville, and Detroit. Skaters in these races only had to skate 8 hours nightly, but were encouraged to engage in "jams" and, at specific times, 5-minute sprints referred to in event programs as "open house". Later that year, Transcontinental Roller Derby debuted in New York at the New York Hippodrome
New York Hippodrome
The Hippodrome Theatre, also called the New York Hippodrome, was a theatre in New York City from 1905 to 1939, located on Sixth Avenue between 43rd and 44th Streets in the Theater District of Midtown Manhattan. It was called the world's largest theatre by its builders and had a seating capacity of...
, simulating a 21-day "short course" from Salt Lake City to New York. Appearances at the Pan Pacific Auditorium in Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
attracted celebrities such as W.C. Fields, Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney is an American film actor and entertainer whose film, television, and stage appearances span nearly his entire lifetime. He has won multiple awards, including an Honorary Academy Award, a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award...
, Eddie Cantor
Eddie Cantor
Eddie Cantor was an American "illustrated song" performer, comedian, dancer, singer, actor and songwriter...
, George Burns
George Burns
George Burns , born Nathan Birnbaum, was an American comedian, actor, and writer.He was one of the few entertainers whose career successfully spanned vaudeville, film, radio, television and movies, with and without his wife, Gracie Allen. His arched eyebrow and cigar smoke punctuation became...
, Gracie Allen
Gracie Allen
Grace Ethel Cecile Rosalie Allen , known as Gracie Allen, was an American comedian who became internationally famous as the zany partner and comic foil of husband George Burns...
, Jack Benny
Jack Benny
Jack Benny was an American comedian, vaudevillian, and actor for radio, television, and film...
, Milton Berle
Milton Berle
Milton Berlinger , better known as Milton Berle, was an American comedian and actor. As the manic host of NBC's Texaco Star Theater , in 1948 he was the first major star of U.S. television and as such became known as Uncle Miltie and Mr...
, Cary Grant
Cary Grant
Archibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English actor who later took U.S. citizenship...
and Eleanor Powell
Eleanor Powell
Eleanor Torrey Powell was an American film actress and dancer of the 1930s and 1940s, known for her exuberant solo tap dancing.-Early life:...
.
Occasionally, massive collisions and crashes occurred as skaters tried to lap those who were ahead of them. In 1936, 1937, or 1938 (sources vary), after seeing a match in Miami, Florida
Miami, Florida
Miami is a city located on the Atlantic coast in southeastern Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, the most populous county in Florida and the eighth-most populous county in the United States with a population of 2,500,625...
and realizing this was an exciting element of the sport, sportswriter Damon Runyon
Damon Runyon
Alfred Damon Runyon was an American newspaperman and writer.He was best known for his short stories celebrating the world of Broadway in New York City that grew out of the Prohibition era. To New Yorkers of his generation, a "Damon Runyon character" evoked a distinctive social type from the...
encouraged Seltzer to tweak the game to maximize physical contact between the skaters, including elbowing, "whipping", and slamming each other into the track's outer rail, as well as exaggerating hits and falls. Seltzer bristled, wanting to keep the sport legitimate, but agreed to the experiment, which fans ended up loving.
In the Depression's later years, some cities hosted the Derby's "short course" engagements, simulating semi-transcontinental distances. Points were accumulated on behalf of three "factions", each named for a color (Black, White, or Green) and consisting of five two-person teams skating in 15-minute shifts. With all three factions on the track at the same time, two teams frequently banded together to rout the third. A more sporting variety followed, with just two teams being named after Indian tribes
Classification of indigenous peoples of the Americas
Classification of indigenous peoples of the Americas is based upon cultural regions, geography, and linguistics. Anthropologists have named various cultural regions, with fluid boundaries, that are generally agreed upon with some variation...
. This, too, was short-lived. The two-team concept survived, but teams were built around the idea of there always being a "home team" named for wherever the match was being played, even though the skaters were always the same people. By 1939, the organization had four pairs of teams touring the country at the same time, always billed as the home team versus either New York or Chicago. The format of two five-person teams on the track at the same time, with a team scoring points when its members lap members of the other team, is the basic premise of roller derby to this day.
Disaster
On March 24, 1937, at least eighteen members of a touring group of Roller Derby skaters and support personnel were killed when their chartered bus blew a tire while going 40 mph down a hill on U.S. Route 50U.S. Route 50
U.S. Route 50 is a major east–west route of the U.S. Highway system, stretching just over from Ocean City, Maryland on the Atlantic Ocean to West Sacramento, California. Until 1972, when it was replaced by Interstate Highways west of the Sacramento area, it extended to San Francisco, near...
, collided with a bridge abutment, rolled onto its side and burst into flames, trapping passengers inside. The accident occurred near Salem, Illinois
Salem, Illinois
Salem is a city located in the U.S. state of Illinois. It is the county seat of Marion County. The population was 7,485 at the 2010 census.Salem is the birthplace of William Jennings Bryan and his brother vice presidential candidate Charles W. Bryan, the G. I. Bill of Rights, and Miracle Whip salad...
, as the bus was en route from St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...
to Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio. Cincinnati is the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located to north of the Ohio River at the Ohio-Kentucky border, near Indiana. The population within city limits is 296,943 according to the 2010 census, making it Ohio's...
for another performance. Only a few of the 23 passengers escaped the burning wreckage, and two of them died later from their injuries, bringing the total fatalities to 19 or 20 (sources vary). The ghastly tragedy nearly put Seltzer out of business, but replacement skaters were signed and Roller Derby survived. As a tribute to those killed in the tragedy, the number "1" was permanently retired for all Roller Derby teams.
WWII era
In Los Angeles, Roller Derby was broadcast on the radio as early as 1939.Transcontinental Roller Derby rapidly grew in popularity as a spectator sport. Matches were held in fifty cities in 1940, for more than five million spectators, some of whom formed fan clubs and newsletters like Roller Derby News (later renamed RolleRage). Teams began to represent and compete in other U.S. cities, although some teams were actually the same traveling group that would just change names depending on where they were playing, and all were part of the Seltzer-owned Roller Derby league. The league's own estimates of audiences for 1941 were comparable, with four million Midwestern spectators in 20 cities being claimed.
The entry of the United States into World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
at the end of 1941 interrupted the sport's ascent; many skaters enlisted in the armed forces, crowds dwindled, and the fledgling league was reduced to one team skating mainly for the entertainment of soldiers. After the war's end in 1945, Seltzer successfully resumed growing the sport, although a 1946 attempt to bring it to New York's Polo Grounds
Polo Grounds
The Polo Grounds was the name given to four different stadiums in Upper Manhattan, New York City, used by many professional teams in both baseball and American football from 1880 until 1963...
failed due to twelve straight days of rain.
Television
At 8:30 P.M. on November 29, 1948, Roller Derby debuted on New York televisionTelevision
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
, beginning a 13-week run on the CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
-TV network, broadcasting at a time well before television was in widespread use. The first televised matches were between teams representing New York and Brooklyn, and took place at the 69th Regiment Armory
69th Regiment Armory
The 69th Regiment Armory located at 68 Lexington Avenue between East 25th and 26th Streets in Manhattan, New York City is a historical building which began construction in 1904 and was completed in 1906. The building is still used to house the U.S. 69th Infantry Regiment, as well as for the...
four nights a week, which was actually a reduction from the troupe's usual touring schedule that included a performance every day, sometimes with two on Sundays. Although few people owned TVs at that time, broadcasts could be seen on sets in bars and storefront windows. The fledgling medium allowed underwhelming audience sizes to be made to look like they had packed venues to capacity, leading spectators to turn out in droves for subsequent matches. Armory crowds began in the low hundreds, but were soon in the five to seven thousand range. Then in June 1949, Seltzer secured an appearance at Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden (1925)
Madison Square Garden was an indoor arena in New York City, the third of that name. It was built in 1925 and closed in 1968, and was located on Eighth Avenue between 49th and 50th Streets in Manhattan on the site of the city's trolley car barns. It was the first Garden that was not located near...
before a cumulative crowd of 55,000 over a five-day period.
Early stars of Roller Derby after its debut on TV included Ken Monte, Bert Wall, and the temperamental Midge "Toughie" Brasuhn. Skater salaries were about $
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
200 to $260 a week, established by a players' association.
Meanwhile, from 1946 through 1948, flat-track roller derby was enjoyed as an intramural sport
Intramural sports
Intramural sports or intramurals are recreational sports organized within a set geographic area. The term derives from the Latin words intra muros meaning "within walls", and was used to indicate sports matches and contests that took place among teams from "within the walls" of an ancient city...
at the University of British Columbia
University of British Columbia
The University of British Columbia is a public research university. UBC’s two main campuses are situated in Vancouver and in Kelowna in the Okanagan Valley...
in Canada.
For the 1949–1950 season, Seltzer opened franchise teams and formed the National Roller Derby League (NRDL). The NRDL consisted of six teams: the New York Chiefs, the Brooklyn Red Devils, the Jersey Jolters, the Philadelphia Panthers, the Washington-Baltimore Jets, and the Chicago Westerners. The Jolters played at Armories in Newark, Jersey City, Teaneck, and Paterson. The Westerners played in Chicago, but also in Columbus, Ohio and Miami, Florida. The Red Devils had no venue in Brooklyn, and were essentially a road team, often cast as villains. NRDL season playoffs sold out Madison Square Garden for a week.
Also in 1949, when the CBS contract expired, broadcasting was taken over by ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
, and games were televised live throughout the United States. The contract with ABC lasted until Seltzer negotiated its termination in 1951 over scheduling disputes.
Between 1949 and 1951, Seltzer's organization grossed $2.5 million, bolstered by Madison Square Garden appearances in 1950 and 1951 that set five-day records of 77,000 and 82,000, respectively. In this period, Seltzer also sold the Jolters to an outside syndicate. Skater salaries, negotiated by an informal players' union, were around $250 a week, with $35 and $60 bonuses for captains and player-coaches.
Increasing legitimacy
The players wanted to skate "phony" during this time period, but Seltzer believed the public would soon tire of exaggerated hits and falls, so he embarked on a campaign to legitimize the sport. He started a program encouraging the formation of junior Roller Derby leagues for children (although it's not clear whether any actually formed), he sought to add more teams nationwide (although it didn't happen until 1954), and he got the players to agree to a "no railing" rule. In a show of commitment, Seltzer invoked the rule to suspend star skater Midge "Toughie" Brasuhn, much to her chagrin, for allegedly shoving another skater into the track's outer railing, even though the play had been faked by the other skater. By the early 1950s, Roller Derby coaches were even betting on the outcomes of matches, another sign of legitimacy, according to Seltzer. Players later pointed to injuries and low-scoring games as evidence of legitimacy, as well, but even into the 1970s, Roller Derby players engaged in a degree of showmanship and staged theatrics for dramatic and comic effect.Jam On, Jam Off
After terminating the contract with ABC in 1951, Seltzer negotiated a deal with General MotorsGeneral Motors
General Motors Company , commonly known as GM, formerly incorporated as General Motors Corporation, is an American multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and the world's second-largest automaker in 2010...
to sponsor the broadcast of games on NBC. The deal fell through when, according to Seltzer, General Motors, fuming over an NCAA decision preventing them from sponsoring the broadcast of University of Notre Dame
University of Notre Dame
The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...
football games, lost interest in televising any sports at all. A handful of independent TV stations continued to broadcast games, but the loss of network broadcasting caused fan interest to plummet. Madison Square Garden no longer wanted to host matches, fan clubs disbanded, and Seltzer returned to pursuing real estate interests. At some point, Seltzer changed his residence to Encino
Encino, Los Angeles, California
Encino is a hilly district of the city of Los Angeles, California, United States. Specifically, it is located in the central portion of the southern San Fernando Valley and on the north slope of the Santa Monica Mountains...
(Los Angeles) a westward move that foreshadowed changes to come.
In July 1953, citing the effects of the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
and a dearth of venues, Leo Seltzer moved the Derby from New York to Los Angeles and created the L.A. Braves for their debut at the Rose Bowl
Rose Bowl (stadium)
The Rose Bowl is an outdoor athletic stadium in Pasadena, California, U.S., in Los Angeles County. The stadium is the site of the annual college football bowl game, the Rose Bowl, held on New Year's Day. In 1982, it became the home field of the UCLA Bruins college football team of the Pac-12...
. The Braves became the first international team when a tour of Europe was launched in 1953.
However, this was not the first time audiences outside the U.S. had seen the game played live. A separate organization, International Roller Speedway, known in some countries as Roller-Catch, formed in 1937 and toured Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, where they played at the Harringay Arena
Harringay Arena
Harringay Arena was a sporting and events venue on Green Lanes in Harringay, North London, England. Built in 1936, it lasted as a venue until 1958.-Construction:...
in London, and the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
. Roller Speedway was a modified version of the sport and normally featured two teams, representing Europe (the "home" team) and USA. The 1950 film The Fireball
The Fireball
The Fireball is a 1950 film starring Mickey Rooney and Pat O'Brien, and directed by Tay Garnett.- Cast :*Mickey Rooney ... Johnny Casar*Pat O'Brien ... Father O'Hara*Beverly Tyler ... Mary Reeves*James Brown ... Allen...
, starring Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney is an American film actor and entertainer whose film, television, and stage appearances span nearly his entire lifetime. He has won multiple awards, including an Honorary Academy Award, a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award...
, was based on the life of one of the league's stars, Eddie Poore, who skated under the name Eddie Cazar. Roller Speedway ceased operations in 1952.
In 1954, the Derby established the most fabled team in the history of the sport, the longtime champion San Francisco Bay Bombers. Stars on this team eventually included Charlie O'Connell
Charlie O'Connell (roller derby)
Charlie O'Connell is a retired roller derby player, considered the premier male star of his sport. He was inducted into the Roller Derby Hall of Fame in 1967, after his first retirement.O'Connell was born in New York....
, Joanie Weston, and Ann Calvello
Ann Calvello
Ann Theresa Calvello was a U.S. athlete and notable personality in the sport of roller derby.Ann Calvello graduated from Presentation High School in San Francisco, CA in June 1947....
.
In his keynote address at the 2007 roller derby convention RollerCon, Leo's son Jerry Seltzer
Jerry Seltzer
Jerry Seltzer was the second and final owner of the original Roller Derby league. The league and the sport of roller derby were created in 1935 in Chicago by Leo Seltzer, Jerry's father. Jerry assumed ownership of the league in 1959 and ran it until its demise in 1973...
revealed that at its peak in the 1950s, the National Roller Derby League had just 83 skaters spread among its six teams.
In 1958, weary of Roller Derby's off-air struggle — by this time, crowds at San Francisco's Cow Palace
Cow Palace
Cow Palace is an indoor arena, in Daly City, California, situated on the city's border with neighboring San Francisco, notable as a sporting arena.-History:...
had dwindled to two hundred or less — Leo transferred Roller Derby to his son Jerry. Jerry soon struck a deal with independent Oakland TV station KTVU
KTVU
KTVU, virtual channel 2 , is the Fox-affiliated television station serving the San Francisco Bay Area. Licensed to Oakland, California, the station has been owned by Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises since 1964, making it the largest Fox affiliate by market size that is not owned and operated by the...
to broadcast Roller Derby matches kinescope
Kinescope
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor...
d in a deserted garage.
In the 1960s
In 1960, KTVU switched to the visually and technically superior videotapeVideotape
A videotape is a recording of images and sounds on to magnetic tape as opposed to film stock or random access digital media. Videotapes are also used for storing scientific or medical data, such as the data produced by an electrocardiogram...
format for recording games for broadcast. One of Roller Derby's sponsors, a San Francisco auto dealer, got a Portland, Oregon
Portland, Oregon
Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...
TV station to broadcast an unedited tape of a match, in an attempt to advertise the dealership's new lot in the area. To his surprise, Jerry Seltzer received three hundred letters asking for Roller Derby to come to Portland, so he obliged and the Derby made an appearance before 9,000 fans. Realizing he had stumbled onto a promotional formula, he began syndicating videotapes of games to more independent TV stations, and followed up broadcasts with personal appearances of the Derby in each city. In 1961, forty stations carried Derby. Several years later, UHF
Ultra high frequency
Ultra-High Frequency designates the ITU Radio frequency range of electromagnetic waves between 300 MHz and 3 GHz , also known as the decimetre band or decimetre wave as the wavelengths range from one to ten decimetres...
TV stations, mostly independent and desperate to compete with older, network-dominated VHF
Very high frequency
Very high frequency is the radio frequency range from 30 MHz to 300 MHz. Frequencies immediately below VHF are denoted High frequency , and the next higher frequencies are known as Ultra high frequency...
counterparts, snatched up broadcasting rights for their areas. Although TV exposure was an important component of Roller Derby's revitalization, Seltzer didn't want to repeat the experience of mainstream professional sports organizations that had become dependent on TV; he used the medium only for exposure and publicity for the live matches, not a source of revenue for player salaries.
Jerry Seltzer also changed some of the rules. For the first time, skaters were required to wear helmets, and, at the behest of KTVU
KTVU
KTVU, virtual channel 2 , is the Fox-affiliated television station serving the San Francisco Bay Area. Licensed to Oakland, California, the station has been owned by Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises since 1964, making it the largest Fox affiliate by market size that is not owned and operated by the...
television announcer Walt Harris, he made the game more TV-friendly by making jammers' helmets easier to spot.
A more theatrical imitation called Roller Games
Roller Games
Roller Games was the name of a sports entertainment spectacle created in the early 1960s in Los Angeles, California as a rival to the Jerry Seltzer-owned Roller Derby league, which had enjoyed a monopoly on the sport of roller derby — and its name — since its inception in 1935. Roller Games...
was started in 1961 in Los Angeles featuring retired Roller Derby skaters who chose not to make the move to San Francisco. Owned by Bill Griffiths, Sr. and Jerry Hill, Roller Games was the only viable rival organization to the original Roller Derby and actually consisted of several separate leagues, including the (U.S.) National Roller Derby (NRD), soon renamed to National Roller League (NRL) since the "Roller Derby" trademark was aggressively protected by the Seltzer organization. The NRD/NRL consisted of the Northern Hawks (sometimes billed as the Chicago Hawks), New York Bombers, Texas Outlaws, Detroit Devils, Los Angeles Thunderbirds (nicknamed "T-Birds"), and Philadelphia Warriors (sometimes billed as the Eastern Warriors).
There were also several attempts in markets that failed quickly, with teams such as the Baltimore/Washington-based Mid Atlantic War Cats, the Florida Jets, and the Western Renegades. Roller Games also encompassed the Canadian National Roller League (CNRL) and Japanese National Roller League (JNRL). Some former Roller Derby stars found new fame in the Roller Games, and a handful of skaters simply went back and forth between the two organizations. After 1968, however, the Roller Derby to Roller Games defections were quite few; instead, a handful of Roller Games skaters returned to their roots and began skating for the Derby again.
1961 or so also saw the advent of a short-lived New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
area rival league, the American Skating Derby (ASD), promoted by Joe Morehouse and Mike O'Hara. ASD debuted two teams of ex-Roller Derby skaters — one team representing "New York" and the other representing Brooklyn
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
— at Long Island Arena
Long Island Arena
Long Island Arena was a 4,000-seat indoor arena in Commack, New York from 1959 until 1996. The Long Island Ducks of the Eastern Hockey League, a popular team in the small community, called the Arena home from 1959 until the league folded in 1973, one year after the New York Islanders came into...
in Commack, New York
Commack, New York
Commack is a census-designated place that roughly corresponds to the hamlet by the same name in the towns of Huntington and Smithtown in Suffolk County, New York, United States on Long Island...
, around April 1961, with plans to appear throughout the Tri-State Region. A league split later that year resulted in the formation of another league, the Eastern Skating Derby (ESD), which lasted until mid-1964 and skated only in New York, sometimes at the same venues as the ASD.
In 1962, Jerry, in partnership with his uncle Oscar Seltzer (who had founded the Roller Derby Skate Corporation
Roller Derby (brand)
Roller Derby Skate Corp is an American manufacturer and distributor of sporting goods, specializing in quad skates, inline skates, ice hockey skates, skateboards, skating accessories, and recently, through its acquisition of 360 Inc., sporting goods for water sports including body boards,...
in 1936), created the Dixie Devils, a "home" team for the Southern United States
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...
cities of Nashville
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
, Atlanta
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...
, Jacksonville
Jacksonville, Florida
Jacksonville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Florida in terms of both population and land area, and the largest city by area in the contiguous United States. It is the county seat of Duval County, with which the city government consolidated in 1968...
and Orlando
Orlando, Florida
Orlando is a city in the central region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat of Orange County, and the center of the Greater Orlando metropolitan area. According to the 2010 US Census, the city had a population of 238,300, making Orlando the 79th largest city in the United States...
. Ronnie Robinson
Ronnie Robinson (roller derby)
Ronnie Smith Robinson was an American roller derby skater and coach.The son of boxer Sugar Ray Robinson, Robinson grew up distant from his father, who divorced his mother shortly after his birth. Sugar Ray counseled him against following him into the world of boxing...
, son of boxer Sugar Ray Robinson
Sugar Ray Robinson
Sugar Ray Robinson was an African-American professional boxer. Frequently cited as the greatest boxer of all time, Robinson's performances in the welterweight and middleweight divisions prompted sportswriters to create "pound for pound" rankings, where they compared fighters regardless of weight...
, was designated the team's star player. Dixie Devils games had to be recorded with kinescope, when TV audiences had already grown accustomed to the relatively clean, clear appearance of videotape, and the result was disastrous; no loyal TV audiences were grown, fan attendance was low, and the venture folded after one month. Seltzer remained fond of the idea of regionalization
Regionalisation
Regionalization is the tendency to form regions, or the process of doing so.Regionalization can be observed in various disciplines:*In geography, it has two ways: the process of delineating the Earth, its small areas or other units into regions and a state of such a delineation.*In globalization...
, however, and envisioned his organization eventually becoming more like other sports leagues, with teams being independently owned and operated, and with the teams being associated with regions (South, Northeast, Mideast, Midwest, Central South, Southwest Plains, and West) rather than individual cities.
The ASD, ESD, and Dixie Devils, much like Roller Speedway, aren't remembered today by anyone outside the most dedicated fans and the skaters who participated in them. To the media, there was only one Roller Derby. From Jerry Seltzer's takeover in the late 1950s, the game reached new heights of popularity with a 120-station television network where taped games from the Bombers' home, Kezar Pavilion
Kezar Pavilion
Kezar Pavilion, located adjacent to Kezar Stadium, is an indoor arena in the southeast corner of Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California. The Pavilion, built in 1924, seats 4,000...
in San Francisco, were shown weekly. Television made fans of thousands and the Bay Bombers packed arenas from coast to coast on cross country tours, regularly selling out arenas such as Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden, often abbreviated as MSG and known colloquially as The Garden, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the New York City borough of Manhattan and located at 8th Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets, situated on top of Pennsylvania Station.Opened on February 11, 1968, it is the...
, Boston Garden
Boston Garden
The Boston Garden was an arena in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. Designed by boxing promoter Tex Rickard, who also built the third iteration of New York's Madison Square Garden, it opened on November 17, 1928 as "Boston Madison Square Garden" and outlived its original namesake by some 30 years...
, Kiel Auditorium
Kiel Auditorium
Kiel Auditorium was an indoor arena, in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. It was the home of the Saint Louis University basketball team and hosted the NBA's St. Louis Hawks, from 1955-1968....
in St. Louis and dozens more. In 1969, television viewership of Roller Derby peaked with approximately 15 million viewers each week.
Two other developments in 1960s Roller Derby were profit sharing and annual contracts for skaters; many skaters previously held day jobs to supplement their income, or were only employed as athletes for part of the year.
In the 1970s
The indoor record for Roller Derby was set at 19,507 at Madison Square Garden in 1970. The outdoor record was set at the Oakland Coliseum on July 4, 1970, at 28,314 for a game between the Bay Bombers and the Northeast Braves. The following year that record was topped again with 34,418 for a Bomber game at the Coliseum. Their rival, the Chicago Midwest Pioneers, broke that record with 50,118 fans in 1972 for an interleague game against the National Skating Derby's Los Angeles Thunderbirds at Comiskey ParkComiskey Park
Comiskey Park was the ballpark in which the Chicago White Sox played from 1910 to 1990. It was built by Charles Comiskey after a design by Zachary Taylor Davis, and was the site of four World Series and more than 6,000 major league games...
in Chicago.
At this point, the Bay Bombers home-team concept was duplicated with the New York Chiefs representing the Eastern U.S. and the Pioneers based in Chicago (but really everything west of Philadelphia). A one-season run in 1971 by the Cincinnati Jolter team in the Midwest (Ohio, Kentucky, and other areas) was not financially successful, and the team became a road franchise once again. The Bombers were briefly a Southwest team moved from the Bay Area, but potential new owners couldn't come to terms with the Seltzer family and so the Bay Bombers were returned home. (In an unusual move, the Chiefs were a "replacement" team for the Bombers during the period that franchise was supposedly based in Texas.)
In 1973, high overhead and other factors led Jerry Seltzer to elect to shut down Roller Derby. In a 2005 interview, Ann Calvello mentioned gas shortages during the 1973 oil crisis
1973 oil crisis
The 1973 oil crisis started in October 1973, when the members of Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries or the OAPEC proclaimed an oil embargo. This was "in response to the U.S. decision to re-supply the Israeli military" during the Yom Kippur war. It lasted until March 1974. With the...
as a contributing factor because teams could not travel. Some of the IRDL star skaters were recruited to skate for Roller Games' International Skating Conference (ISC), which quickly eliminated all Derby teams except for the Chiefs to again focus on the Los Angeles Thunderbirds. However, within two years, Roller Games' wrestling/circus-like approach doomed that organization; many Roller Derby skaters quit and fans deserted the arenas. Cultural historian Paul Fussell
Paul Fussell
Paul Fussell is an American cultural and literary historian, author and university professor. His writings cover a variety of genres, from scholarly works on eighteenth-century English literature to commentary on America’s class system...
, perhaps editorializing, attributed the collapse of the sport to the declining economic class of its fan base in its final years; fans were ultimately unable to support the sponsors that had been keeping the sport on television.
1970s–1990s revivals
Several attempts were made to revive the sport in the late 1970s through the 1990s.IRSL
The only reasonably successful of these was the International Roller Skating League (IRSL), operational from April 24, 1977 to December 12, 1987. IRSL games were held mostly in Northern CaliforniaNorthern California
Northern California is the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. The San Francisco Bay Area , and Sacramento as well as its metropolitan area are the main population centers...
, but a handful of games were skated in the Northeastern United States
Northeastern United States
The Northeastern United States is a region of the United States as defined by the United States Census Bureau.-Composition:The region comprises nine states: the New England states of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont; and the Mid-Atlantic states of New...
, the Midwest
Midwestern United States
The Midwestern United States is one of the four U.S. geographic regions defined by the United States Census Bureau, providing an official definition of the American Midwest....
, and Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. Many skaters from Roller Derby were in the IRSL, and some of the team names were the same as in Roller Derby.
Initially the league was composed of the San Francisco Bay Bombers, the Midwest Pioneers, the Brooklyn Red Devils and the Manhattan Chiefs. In 1979, the league was bought out and restructured by one of its owners, former San Francisco television producer Dave Lipschultz. At this time, two more teams, the Northeast Braves and Southern Jolters (later renamed the Southern Stars), were added, and the Chiefs were renamed the New York Dynamite and, eventually, the Eastern Express. A final team, the Northern Knights, representing Canada, was announced in 1986 but never competed. As before, most of the attention was centered on the Bay Bombers. After skating primarily in Northern California, a Midwest tour was launched in 1984, but flopped due to competition from baseball and football as well as weather related problems. In 1986, a tournament was carried on ESPN and the IRSL set up sporadic appearances in New York. ESPN dropped the contract in its pursuit of the more lucrative professional football market, and although talks were underway to broadcast IRSL matchups on USA Network
USA Network
USA Network is an American cable television channel launched in 1971. Once a minor player in basic cable, the network has steadily gained popularity because of breakout hits like Monk, Psych, Burn Notice, Royal Pains, Covert Affairs, White Collar, Monday Night RAW, Suits, and reruns of the various...
, the IRSL was unable to survive without television support. Lipshultz shut down the league after its last game at Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden, often abbreviated as MSG and known colloquially as The Garden, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the New York City borough of Manhattan and located at 8th Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets, situated on top of Pennsylvania Station.Opened on February 11, 1968, it is the...
on December 12, 1987. Around that time, Lipschultz and skaters were negotiating over how to keep it going. Lipschultz wanted to make it more like professional wrestling in an attempt to win over a fickle TV audience, but the players had different ideas. No agreement was reached, and potential sponsors lost interest.
The 1985 IRSL matches have been shown twice on ESPN Classic
ESPN Classic
ESPN Classic is a sports channel that features reruns of famous sporting events, sports documentaries, and sports themed movies. Such programs includes biographies of famous sports figures or a rerun of a famous World Series or Super Bowl, often with added commentary on the event...
's sports comedy show Cheap Seats
Cheap Seats
Cheap Seats without Ron Parker, commonly shortened to Cheap Seats, is a television program broadcast on ESPN Classic hosted by brothers Randy and Jason Sklar...
, as ESPN retains the right to air those matches.
American Skating Derby, promoting the game as Rollerjam!, formed in 1987 and played a spring season with two teams, the San Francisco Slammers and the Los Angeles Turbos. The name American Skating Derby was the same as the early 1960s New York-based league, but was unrelated. Composed of inactive Roller Derby and IRSL skaters, the 1987 ASD was formed primarily as a means to keep the game alive, and the two teams (with the Slammers being essentially replaced by the Bay City Bombers) skated around Northern California communities for high school charities. For the next decade, with sometimes as few as one game annually, the ASD attempted to keep the traditional game going.
RollerGames
RollerGames, created in 1989 by two television producers, David Sams and Michael Miller, and Roller Games owner Bill Griffiths, Sr., was a U.S. television show that presented a theatrical version of the sport of roller derby for a national audience. It featured a steeply banked figure-eight track, an alligator pit, and a number of skaters who had been in the Roller Games league, as well as younger participants. The six teams were the T-Birds, Violators, Bad Attitude, Rockers, Hot Flash, and Maniacs. The show only lasted thirteen weeks despite garnering over a 5 national rating during its prime-time debut, and was in the top 25 of all syndicated shows for the season—even beating the popular American Gladiators.
Announcers were Chuck Underwood, David Sams, and Shelly Jamison.
RollerJam
Knoxville, Tennessee
Founded in 1786, Knoxville is the third-largest city in the U.S. state of Tennessee, U.S.A., behind Memphis and Nashville, and is the county seat of Knox County. It is the largest city in East Tennessee, and the second-largest city in the Appalachia region...
television impresarios Ross K. Bagwell Sr. and Stephen Land, under the name Pageboy Entertainment, collaborated with CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
to stage another televised revival known as RollerJam
RollerJam
RollerJam was an American television series featuring roller derby that aired on The Nashville Network from 1999 to 2001. It was the first attempt to bring roller derby to TV since RollerGames....
or Roller Jam. Bagwell and Land recruited numerous stars from the Roller Derby of yesteryear, as well as newer stars from various athletic backgrounds, including nationally ranked speed skaters, to skate in the six-team World Skating League (WSL). Jerry Seltzer was named RollerJam "commissioner".
RollerJam games were televised out of "RollerJam Arena," situated on the grounds of Universal Studios
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
in Orlando, Florida
Orlando, Florida
Orlando is a city in the central region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat of Orange County, and the center of the Greater Orlando metropolitan area. According to the 2010 US Census, the city had a population of 238,300, making Orlando the 79th largest city in the United States...
. Initial teams, each consisting of seven men and seven women, were the New York Enforcers, the California Quakes, the Florida Sundogs, the Nevada Hot Dice, the Texas Rustlers and the Illinois Riot (Original names of the latter three teams were the Las Vegas High Rollers, Texas Twisters, and Illinois Inferno. These names were changed prior to the start of the first season). Despite strong funding and four seasons of broadcasts on The Nashville Network (TNN, now known as Spike TV
Spike TV
Spike is an American cable television channel. It launched on March 7, 1983 as The Nashville Network , a joint venture of WSM, Inc...
), the venture never became a "live" attraction. After MTV's takeover of the CBS Cable group, fabricated storylines and uncharismatic characters were being featured more than actual competitive skating. This did not go over well with many skaters nor die-hard roller derby fans. Two notable veterans from Roller Games, Rockin' Ray Robles and Patsy Delgato, were featured in the second season of RollerJam. When RollerJam was cancelled, many of the skaters found smaller leagues to skate in. 40 episodes of Roller Jam have been reversioned for UK television after successful televised seasons in other countries. Airing from October 2, 2006 on Challenge TV much of the narrative has been removed with sex and violence toned down for a family audience.
One major rule difference between previous leagues was the legalisation of in-line skates, which the WSL required for younger players in an attempt to push the league to younger players, more familiar with the in-line game, allowing for more precision skating over the traditional quads, allowing faster skaters to participate.
All-female, grassroots leagues
In 2000, Daniel Eduardo "Devil Dan" Policarpo, then an Austin, TexasAustin, Texas
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of :Texas and the seat of Travis County. Located in Central Texas on the eastern edge of the American Southwest, it is the fourth-largest city in Texas and the 14th most populous city in the United States. It was the third-fastest-growing large city in...
musician, recruited women to skate in what he envisioned would be a raucous, rockabilly, circus-like roller derby spectacle. After an organizational meeting and a disputed fundraiser, Policarpo and the women parted ways. The women then self-organized as Bad Girl Good Woman Productions (BGGW) in 2001, creating a new generation of roller derby, open to women only. Founders formed four teams, and staged their first public match in Austin in mid-2002. Shortly after, the league split over business plans: The Texas Rollergirls embraced flat-track play, while the BGGW league took the name TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls
TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls
TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls is an Austin, Texas based all-girl banked-track roller derby league. Founded in 2001, TXRD is one of several leagues considered responsible for the modern roller derby revival. It is skater owned and operated...
and went on to skate banked-track roller derby.
The revival then began in earnest, with over 50 similar all-female leagues in existence by late 2005, more than 80 by February 2006, and more than 135 by mid-August 2006. The sport's sudden growth in 2006 is attributed to its exposure via the Rollergirls reality television
Reality television
Reality television is a genre of television programming that presents purportedly unscripted dramatic or humorous situations, documents actual events, and usually features ordinary people instead of professional actors, sometimes in a contest or other situation where a prize is awarded...
show, which depicted portions of the lives of real skaters from the TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls. The show began broadcasting in January 2006, but was not picked up for a second season due to unsatisfactory ratings.
Leagues outside the U.S. began forming in 2006, and international competition soon followed. The first all-female Canadian league of fifty members, the Terminal City Rollergirls, was formed in January 2006 in Vancouver, British Columbia. The league appeared before an audience of 4500 on March 4, 2006 to participate in a game of "Last Woman Standing" ("Blood and Thunder") against The Rat City Rollergirls at the Everett Events Centre in Everett, Washington
Everett, Washington
Everett is the county seat of and the largest city in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. Named for Everett Colby, son of founder Charles L. Colby, it lies north of Seattle. The city had a total population of 103,019 at the 2010 census, making it the 6th largest in the state and...
. The first full, international bout in women's flat-track derby occurred in December 2006, when the Oil City Derby Girls (Edmonton, Alberta, Canada) hosted the Rocky Mountain Roller Girls (Denver, Colorado
Denver, Colorado
The City and County of Denver is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Denver is a consolidated city-county, located in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains just east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains...
, USA). By mid-2009, there were 425 amateur leagues, including 79 in Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
and Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
combined.
Although this revival of roller derby was initially all-female, some leagues later introduced all-male teams. Junior roller derby leagues associated with this revival also emerged and play under modified adult derby rules.
Mixed-gender, for-profit leagues
A handful of leagues, mostly mixed-gender, have origins in earlier incarnations of the sport and heavily promote themselves as professional due to their history, management, membership, style of play and marketing considerations. As of the mid-2000s, most of these leagues do not compete in regular seasons, but rather schedule infrequent special-event games, drawing from a relatively small pool of skaters to form the roster of two teams put together just for the event, or on one team that plays against a similar club from another league. Team names typically pay homage to memorable Roller Derby and Roller Games teams of the past.Increasing use of real names
In 2009, some roller derby athletes began using their real names, rather than stage names, in competition. Examples include Team Legit, a pickup team of star skaters from Northwestern USA flat-track leagues playing in a banked track tournament in June 2009, skaters Sarah "Killbox" Hipel (from Detroit Derby Girls) and Julia "Lucy Furr" Rosenwinkel (from Windy City RollersWindy City Rollers
The Windy City Rollers are an all-female flat-track Roller Derby league located in Chicago, the city where roller derby first emerged as a sport in 1937...
) now competing under their real names, and 13 members of the Denver Roller Dolls' travel team who began skating under their real names during their 2009 season.
In 2010, Race City Roller Derby of Charlotte, NC announced that all of its players will compete using their legal names.
Books
- Michelson, Herb. A Very Simple Game: the Story of Roller Derby. 1971.
- Deford, Frank. Five Strides on the Banked Track: The Life and Times of the Roller Derby. Little, Brown and CompanyLittle, Brown and CompanyLittle, Brown and Company is a publishing house established by Charles Coffin Little and his partner, James Brown. Since 2006 it has been a constituent unit of Hachette Book Group USA.-19th century:...
, 1971. ISBN 0-316-17920-5. - Coppage, Keith. Roller Derby to Rollerjam: The Authorized Story of an Unauthorized Sport. Santa Rosa, California: Squarebooks, 1999. ISBN 0-916290-80-8.
- Fitzpatrick, JimJim Fitzpatrick (athlete)Jim Fitzpatrick is an author, sports photographer, and former athlete in the sport of roller derby. Fitzpatrick, born and raised in San Francisco, California, skated for the San Francisco Bay Bombers, of the International Roller Skating League Roller Derby, the 1977–1987 revival of the sport...
. Roller Derby Classics… and more!. Foreword by Ann Calvello. Trafford PublishingTrafford PublishingTrafford Publishing is a publisher using print on demand technology, formerly based in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, and now based in Bloomington, Indiana, USA.-History:...
, 2005. ISBN 1-4120-6678-6. - Joulwan, Melissa. Rollergirl: Totally True Tales from the Track. Touchstone (Simon & SchusterSimon & SchusterSimon & Schuster, Inc., a division of CBS Corporation, is a publisher founded in New York City in 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. It is one of the four largest English-language publishers, alongside Random House, Penguin and HarperCollins...
), February 2007. ISBN 978-0743297158. - Mabe, Catherine. Roller Derby: The History and All-Girl Revival of the Greatest Sport on Wheels. Speck Press, 2007. ISBN 1-933108-11-8.
External links
- National Roller Derby Hall of Fame – Fan site and museum honoring Roller Derby athletes
- Banked Track Memories – Fan site with many historic photo galleries and links to similar ones
- Buddy Atkinson Collection, 1989–1994 – Information about a former professional skater's archive that was donated to the Center for American History at the University of Texas at AustinUniversity of Texas at AustinThe University of Texas at Austin is a state research university located in Austin, Texas, USA, and is the flagship institution of the The University of Texas System. Founded in 1883, its campus is located approximately from the Texas State Capitol in Austin...
- Jerry Seltzer Collection, 1942–1997 – Information about documents about the careers of Jerry and Leo Seltzer, donated to the Center for American History at the University of Texas at AustinUniversity of Texas at AustinThe University of Texas at Austin is a state research university located in Austin, Texas, USA, and is the flagship institution of the The University of Texas System. Founded in 1883, its campus is located approximately from the Texas State Capitol in Austin...