Venue Spotlight

Location: Los Angeles, California

Opening Day: May 1^st, 1923

Capacity: 78,467

Teams: USC Trojans, Los Angeles Rams

Construction Cost: 954,872

Website: https://www.lacoliseum.com/

The LA Memorial Coliseum was built in 1921 to honor LA veterans of World War 1.  The coliseum is located near the University of Southern California and has been home to their football team since the inception of the grounds. It has also been host to many major events, including three Olympic games (including the upcoming 2028 games) and the first Super Bowl ever. The likes of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr, the Dalai Lama, and Nelson Mandela have all stepped foot into this stadium, and in 1984 the venue became a National Historic Landmark. The stadium used to have over 100,000 capacity, but after replacing the old stands with individual seats in 1964 the capacity was reduced to approximately 93,000, which still makes it one of the larger stadiums in the United States. One of the coolest features of the coliseum is the Olympic Cauldron that was placed atop the east end of the stadium in 1934. The cauldron has been used for both Olympic games that have taken place in LA, but it is also lit during special events, memorial tributes, or triumphs. Most recently the cauldron was lit in remembrance of Laker legend Kobe Bryant. Opening next year in LA will be the new state of the art SoFi Stadium for the NFL’s Rams and Chargers, however, it will be hard to match the almost 100 years of history and aesthetic the LA Memorial Coliseum has provided to the city of Los Angeles.