Thursday,June 29, 2017 I Section 4- arhicagomribune

ARTS+ENTERTAINMENT

A display tips Its cap to radio's role In the event. A ticket to the JulY12 Sox game helps set the stage. Mike Colbern's Sox jersey gives a feel for 1979.

JAMES C. SVEJ-ILA/PHOTOS FOR THE CHICAGO TRlBUNE Lance Tawzer, curator of the new Disco Demolltlon exhibit at the Elmhurst History Museum, has assembled an engaging look at the legendary 1979 event at Comiskey Park. Inside Disco Demolition those shirts.I bought that fromyour has been painted asmainstream cul­ Exhibitdissects '79 Contiskey promo stuntgone store.'' ture (roclcmusic) tryingto quash the wildly awry - andstraight into Chicago lore The event has entered T-shirtterri­ dance music (disco) firstchampioned tory in partbecause the deejay,Steve in Africa-American,n Latinoand gay BY STEVE JOHNSON universallyloved promotion;•Mike Dahl, is stillaround, now the afternoon clubs.

Chicago Tribune Veeck, then a young Wlrite Sox promo­ guy OD WLS-AM890, the flags.hip Dahl, in aninterview this week, tionsguy (andthe son of team owner stationof the Chicago White Sox, and rejected that line of interpretation,that Almost fourdecades ago, a strug­ Bill),said this week "Now I've become one of the most prominent Sox fansin the event was"racist and homophobic. gling major league baseball team, a the grandfather,not quite avuncular town. The military-stylehelmet be That's revisionist identitypolitics,"he young deejay and a musical genre col­ but kindof, of an interestingmoment in wore on the fieldthat d ay is on loan to said. But more on that later. lided to create a smallburst of anarchy time that everyone celebrates except the BaseballHall of Fame, Tawzer said. The latest example of the evening's in center fieldat ComiskeyPark theWhite Sox." It's lived on because it was such a lifeafter death is "Disco Demolition: Originally billed as "Teen Night," the "The Tribunesells the shirts!" said compellingcollision of cuJtures: the The NightDisco Died," the engaging eventsof July u, 1979, have entered Lance Tawzer,curator of a new exlubit tnbalismof sports, the tribalism of small exhibitionnewly opened at the Chicago lore as Disco Demolition, and about Disco Demolition,pointing to an music and the big businesses, a baseball Elmhurst museum that's earneda theyhave survivedin history when EJmhurstHistoryMuseum wall and a team and a radio station,tryingto .har­ Teputationfor taking big on topics in other promotionalstunts gone awry vintage-lookingshirt ($22) commemo­ nessthose powers forprofit. Chicago culture: beer-making,the have not ratingthe event with name, date and a And it continuesto resonate because Cubs-Sox rivalry,thePop eilinfomer- "What's most astoundingto me is on drawing of Comiskeyalbeit Parle, with new generationsinterpret itwith fresh the spot I was villainized. It was not a a peaceful outfieldscene. "You guys sell eyes. Most recently Disco Demolition Turn to Demolition, Page 6