In sports, it gained the nickname, the "Madhouse on Madison", and a feature during events was the playing of the largest Barton pipe organ ever built.

With or without the Black Hawks, Harmon then spent $2.5 million and borrowed more funds from friends, including $600,000[8] from James E. Norris, in order to build the stadium.

[9] The building used Art Deco flourishes, including flattened columns, long vertical windows, relief sculptures of various athletics and medallions of wrestlers adorned the walls above entrances.

However, the system was fairly rudimentary by modern standards, and was memorably given to filling the arena with fog during late-season basketball and hockey games.

[13] Harmon reached an impasse in getting the Black Hawks as a tenant, although both sides wanted the team to move to the Stadium from the Chicago Coliseum, which was much smaller.

[16] After Harmon was ousted, dynamite was placed at the home of James Norris when Sidney Strotz, treasurer of the Stadium was attending for dinner.

[23] By court judgment, control of the Stadium changed hands to Norris and Wirtz for a total of US$250,000 (equivalent to $5,555,825 in 2023), of which $150,000 went for back taxes, $50,000 for reorganization expenses, and $50,000 for new working capital.

In addition to the close-quartered, triple-tiered, boxy layout of the building, much of the loud, ringing noise of the fans could be attributed to the fabled 3,663-pipe Barton organ.

In October 1996, a year after the stadium was razed, a propane tank explosion melted and destroyed both pipe organs, excluding the console.

In the Stanley Cup semifinals of 1971, when the Blackhawks scored a series-clinching empty-net goal in Game seven against the New York Rangers, CBS announcer Dan Kelly reported, "I can feel our broadcast booth shaking!

The dressing rooms at the Stadium were placed underneath the seats, and the cramped corridor that led to the ice, with its twenty-two steps, became the stuff of legend.

It also became traditional for Blackhawk fans to cheer loudly throughout the singing of the national anthems, especially when sung by Chicago favorite Wayne Messmer.

Longtime PA announcer Harvey Wittenberg had a unique monotone style: "Blackhawk goal scored by #9, Bobby Hull, unassisted, at 6:13."

Then-public address announcer Tommy Edwards would introduce the team's starting lineup, accompanied by spotlights amid a darkened stadium, and the playing of "Sirius" by The Alan Parsons Project.

This trademark introduction would continue under Edwards' successor Ray Clay, and soon became synonymous with the Bulls' 1990s dynasty with Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and head coach Phil Jackson.

The Blackhawks were swept in their finals by the Pittsburgh Penguins, losing at Chicago Stadium, while the Bulls won the second of their first of three straight NBA titles on their home floor against the Portland Trail Blazers.

It was difficult to read how much time was left in a period of play on the main game timer's large face, as each minute of play was marked by a longer line on every third "seconds" increment on the central main dial, due to the minute hand's twenty-minute "full rotation" timing capacity for one period of ice hockey.

That clock eventually was replaced by a four-sided scoreboard with a digital clock, first used on September 21, 1975, in Blackhawks preseason play,[30] crafted by the Day Sign Company of Toronto, much like the one used at the end of the 1960s (and constructed by Day Sign Company) to replace the nearly identical Bulova Sports Timer game-timekeeping device in the Boston Garden, and then in 1985 by another, this one with a color electronic message board.

The Stadium was also one of the last three NHL arenas (the others being Boston Garden and the Buffalo Memorial Auditorium) to have a shorter-than-regulation ice surface, as their construction predated the regulation.

CNN televised the demolition, showing devoted Blackhawks and Bulls fans crying as the wrecking ball hit the old building.

A pavement plaque with the words "Chicago Stadium – 1929–1994 – Remember The Roar" is located behind a statue of the Blackhawks' greatest players on the north side of the United Center.