ENID, OK - On this day, 100 years ago, 2,500 people gathered at 301 S. Independence to watch the cornerstone be put in place for Convention Hall. They listened to Mr. Edmund Frantz dedicate the new building saying “These exercises mark the culmination of twenty years of dreaming and planning. We are at last to have a Convention Hall, a great Auditorium, a place of assembly, a Memorial Building”. One hundred years later that dream still lives as Convention Hall continues to be a cornerstone of the Enid community and is busier and better than ever. Could anyone have imagined back on January 14, 1921 that one hundred years later Convention Hall would host on average 350+ events a year? In 2010, that dream was almost destroyed, but saved at the last minute, all of which is part of the beautiful one-hundred year story of Convention Hall.
In 1919 Enid Mayor Milton C. Garber proposed a bond issue to construct a building to memorialize the Garfield County soldiers in World War I. That building became Convention Hall. It took two bond issues to pass the project before construction started in 1919. It took two years to build Convention Hall at a cost of $465,000 and at the time of its construction had the largest seating capacity of any auditorium of its kind in Oklahoma at 5,000. The building architect firm was Layton, Smith & Forsyth and was constructed by Bass & Frankenfeld Builders.
The Chamber of Commerce was the first tenant of Convention Hall in 1921 quickly joined by several other organizations including the Argonne Post, American Legion and Battery A. 2nd Field Artillery. One of the first major concerts to be held in Convention Hall was on December 9th, 1925 when “The March King” John Phillip Sousa performed on stage. Others who have performed at Convention Hall include Irving Berlin’s Revue, Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova, Bob Willis and more recently Leona Mitchell and Kyle Dillingham.
The Tri-State Music Festival called Convention Hall home beginning in the 1930’s and still performs their Grand Concert in the Grand Ballroom annually each May. Oklahoma’s oldest high school basketball tournament, the Skeltur Conference Tournament played at Convention Hall from 1964-2009. It was also home to Enid High Basketball, Enid High Graduations and who doesn’t remember coming to Convention Hall to see a game of Donkey Basketball. In 1973 scenes from the movie Dillinger were filmed outside of Convention Hall and President George Bush spoke here in 1992 while campaigning.
In 1993 the basketball arena was dedicated and renamed Mark Price Arena after Enid native Mark Price who played high school basketball for Enid High at Convention Hall, collegiate basketball for Georgia Tech and professional basketball for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Mark Price Arena was home to the Oklahoma Storm from 1993-2007, a minor league basketball team in the United States Basketball League. The Storm won their only championship in 2002 under head coach Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
In 2009 Convention Hall was shutdown and in 2010 a bond was proposed to renovate it, which failed. Later that year there were plans to demolish the building, but a group called the Friends of Convention Hall organized and got a petition together with 4,000 signatures to save the building.
Renovations began in May 2011 as part of the Enid Renaissance Project. The renovation took a year and a half to complete at a cost of just over $7 million. Convention Hall reopened on November 16, 2012 and since then has been the premier meeting venue for Northwest Oklahoma. Currently Convention Hall hosts over 350 events annually including meetings, banquets, fundraisers, galas, conferences, trade shows and more! Convention Hall is part of the Stride Bank Center Complex, which is owned by the City of Enid and operated by Spectra Venue Management.
To kick-off the yearlong celebration of Conventional Hall is a 100th Anniversary Celebration Video produced by the City of Enid Media Center. Click here to watch the video. Stay tuned for more events as the year goes along and we’d like to hear from you about your memories from Convention Hall. We encourage you to share your photos and stories by emailing us at ConventionHall100@enid.org.
