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1982-1992, and after
The opening, at the record's grade: Fort Wayne's animatronic decade is fixed by fan-maintained sources, and this section prints it at exactly that grade: the Chuck E. Cheese locations record lists Fort Wayne, 711 Coliseum Boulevard, opened May 1982, former ShowBiz Pizza Place, and the ShowBiz record gives the day, 19 May 1982, opening with a Rock-afire Explosion show. No newspaper or house account of the Fort Wayne opening was found, and the date waits for one; what no source disputes is the form's local presence, because the store at that address outlasted both of its chains' names and operates as a Chuck E. Cheese today.
What it was: ShowBiz Pizza Place, founded in 1980 by Robert L. Brock with Creative Engineering, sold a child's birthday as a produced event: pizza, tokens, arcade cabinets, and a stage of life-size animatronic animals, Aaron Fechter's Rock-afire Explosion, performing on a loop. Fort Wayne's store opened into the form's high years, and for the city's children of the 1980s it defined what a birthday party was supposed to look like, as completely as the Roller Dome had defined the Saturday skate a generation before. After Pizza Time Theatre's 1984 bankruptcy the chains merged as ShowBiz Pizza Time, and between 1989 and 1992 every ShowBiz in the country passed through Concept Unification: the Rock-afire band was retired and re-costumed into Chuck E. Cheese characters, the bear giving way to the mouse, in the same rooms, for the same children.
Sources:
- Chuck E. Cheese locations list (the Fort Wayne entry: 711 Coliseum Blvd, opened May 1982, former ShowBiz Pizza Place, operating), fan-maintained and printed at that grade.
- ShowBiz Pizza wiki, Fort Wayne entry (the 19 May 1982 opening with a Rock-afire Explosion show), fan-maintained and printed at that grade.
- ShowBiz Pizza Place, chain history (the 1980 Brock and Creative Engineering founding; the 1984 merger into ShowBiz Pizza Time; Concept Unification completed by 1992).