The inaugural WrestleMania in 1985 launched an annual professional wrestling franchise that has continued for over forty years.
Key Facts
- Date
- March 31, 1985
- Venue
- Madison Square Garden, New York City
- Attendance
- 19,121 people
- Closed-circuit viewers
- Over 1,000,000 viewers
- Number of matches
- 9 matches
- Main event result
- Hulk Hogan & Mr. T defeated Orndorff & Piper
By the Numbers
Location
Cause → Event → Consequence
The WWF, seeking to expand professional wrestling's mainstream audience, organized a large-scale pay-per-view event blending wrestling with celebrity appearances, capitalizing on Hulk Hogan's popularity and the broader pop-culture moment of the mid-1980s.
WrestleMania took place on March 31, 1985, at Madison Square Garden before 19,121 fans and over one million closed-circuit viewers. Nine matches were held, with Hulk Hogan and Mr. T defeating Paul Orndorff and Roddy Piper in the main event, and celebrity guests including Muhammad Ali, Billy Martin, and Liberace.
The event's commercial success established the WrestleMania brand as an annual tradition, spawning more than forty consecutive follow-up events and cementing the WWF's dominance in professional wrestling's national and pay-per-view marketplace through the late 1980s and beyond.