Youth Movement, a division of WAR that targeted
skinheads for recruitment, and included an Aryan
Youth Movement newspaper among his WAR publi-
cations.
Metzger also held the first so-called hate rock fest,
Aryan Fest, in Oklahoma in 1988. This event at-
tracted skinheads from throughout the United States
and served as a recruiting tool for Metzger and his
organization. Within a few years, the Aryan Youth
Movement successfully formed alliances with skin-
heads in a number of cities, including San Francisco,
California; Portland, Oregon; Tulsa, Oklahoma;
Cincinnati, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan; and New York
City. Metzger’s attempt to control the skinhead move-
ment was curtailed following the murder of an Ethi-
opian immigrant by three skinheads in Portland,
Oregon, in November, 1988. After the skinheads
pleaded guilty to murder, the Southern Poverty Law
Center brought a civil wrongful death suit against
the Metzgers on behalf of the victim’s family and
won a $12.5 million verdict. This judgment ruined
Metzger financially and effectively ended his recruit-
ment of skinheads through the White Aryan Resis-
tance.
Impact The racial skinhead movement in the
United States attracted alienated youth during the
1980’s. In 1989, the Anti-Defamation League esti-
mated there were three thousand activist skinheads
in thirty-one states. Although the movement was
small and decentralized, skinheads were responsible
for a large number of violent acts. Many of these
were crimes of opportunity that were carried out
spontaneously by skinheads. From 1987 to 1990,
skinheads were responsible for at least six murders
in the United States. In addition, skinheads commit-
ted thousands of other violent crimes, including
beatings, stabbings, shootings, thefts, and synagogue
desecrations.
Further Reading
Dobratz, Betty A., and Stephanie Shanks-Meile.The
White Separatist Movement in the United States. Balti-
more: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997. Anal-
ysis of the white separatist movement, including
skinheads, based on interviews, movement-
generated documents, and participant observa-
tion.
Hamm, Mark S.American Skinheads: The Criminology
and Control of Hate Crime. Westport, Conn.: Prae-
ger, 1993. Sociological analysis of the skinhead
movement and hate crimes.
Moore, Jack B.Skinheads Shaved for Battle: A Cultural
Histor y of American Skinheads. Bowling Green,
Ohio: Bowling Green University Popular Press,- Examines the roots of the skinhead move-
ment, both English and American, as well as the
ideas, activities, modes of organization, and role
of music in the movement.
Ridgeway, James.Blood in the Face: The Ku Klux Klan,
Ar yan Nations, Nazi Skinheads, and the Rise of a New
White Culture. New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, - Traces the evolution of the racial Right in
the United States, with a focus on racial organiza-
tions and their activities in the 1980’s.
William V. Moore
See also African Americans; Crime; Domestic vio-
lence; Gangs; Nation of Yahweh; Racial discrimina-
tion; Terrorism.SkyDome
Identification Major League Baseball stadium
Date Opened on June 5, 1989
Place Toronto, Ontario
When SkyDome opened in 1989, it was the world’s first
sports stadium with a retractable domed roof.
When the Toronto Blue Jays baseball team entered
the American League in 1977, they played their
home games in Exhibition Stadium, an old football
arena reconfigured for baseball. The team soon be-
gan plans for a new home that would become an ar-
chitectural and technological wonder: the world’s
first convertible indoor-outdoor sports stadium.
In 1965, the Houston Astros had opened the As-
trodome, a covered stadium that made every base-
ball game played in it an indoor event. The Blue Jays
wanted a ballpark that could be closed to protect
baseball fans from the often frigid early- and late-
season Canadian weather, but they also wanted to
allow fans to enjoy baseball outdoors on sunny after-
noons and warm evenings. To meet the team’s needs,
architects Rod Robbie and Michael Allen of the Sta-
dium Corporation of Toronto designed SkyDome, a
sports arena with a retractable roof that could be left
open during fair weather and closed during foul
weather. SkyDome opened for play on June 5, 1989.The Eighties in America SkyDome 879