If Guiness recognized the figure, I find it hard to believe that it could be a "work".

I would say that the promoter would be the most credible source as to how many were there.

If the real figure was 78,000 then Summerslam 92 has it beat.

Could someone fill me in as to why Meltzer's authority is more credible than the builders/owners of these stadiums?? Why is his opinion valid, and the figures given by the stadiums themselves invalid?? Thanks.

Chances are the seats listed for the Silverdome today aren't the same number of seats that were available back in 1987. Stadium seating changes every so often, so it's likely that the number of seats there has changed a little over the years.

It seems like in order to believe the 78,000 figure, you have to accept a lot of unlikely stuff....

I'm guessing Meltzer corrected himself at some point later then?

As I pointed out earlier, why would the promoter downplay the success of his own event ? Why would he not go along with the mythical number ? His place in history would be assured by doing so. He'd be part of official history. But he didn't. Why ?

That's an excellent question. At times I use to believe it was 93,173 and now I believe it's less. First of all, here is what it says on Silverdome.com (The Pontiac Silverdome's official website):

The two highest attended events at the Silverdome were in 1987 when 93,682 people visited the stadium to hear Pope John Paul II conduct mass and 93,173 fans packed the stadium for Wrestlemania III in 1987.

Football, Soccer, Supercross, Monster Jams: 80,325
Political Rallies, Religious Crusades: 90,000
Concerts: 22,000 to 55,000

Some sources have said that this isn't the legit attendance for WM III. It was 78,000, some say under 80,000, but around that. Here is a picture if the WM III attendance "record" http://www.silverdome.com/wwf.JPG. Now I look at that, and look at the legit SummerSlam 1992 attendance which was 82,000 fans in Wembley Stadium, and I rarely see any difference.

Here is a detailed answer written by WV's co-webmaster Ryan Droste:

OK....this has been debated for so many years, but the number is definitely 78,000. I think Dave Meltzer was the first one to call this to peoples attention. Here's the facts as to why it was 78,000 (I'm writing this with Meltzer as a source). First of all you have to understand that the WWF back in those days routinely lied about attendance numbers on TV to make them bigger than they were. Zane Bresloff was the man whom promoted WrestleMania III for McMahon in Michigan. He and Dave Meltzer had a conversation on the phone years later about WrestleMania III. Bresloff was quoted as saying something to the effect of that the WWF has been quoting that 93,000 attendance number for so long, he thought they were starting to believe it themselves. Meltzer asked him whether or not 93,000 was the real attendance figure, and Bresloff said no. He later sent Meltzer a fax of the official statement from the building from back in 1987. This gave the attendance as being just over 78,000 with 2,3000 comps. Meltzer had never even questioned the 93,000 number before, and the actual gate (money made from ticket sales) was the same on the fax as the number given to Meltzer by the WWF back in 1987 when he didn't even question the 93,000. Meltzer also was doing an article on WWE history where he had to research attendance, and officials let him go through records of all of their major shows (all the stadium WrestleManias, SummerSlam '92, etc.) In almost all the cases, the attendance numbers he found on the official records were different from the announced attendance figure on TV. They recently started announcing figures that weren't as inflated and pretty much accurate, starting with their big Royal Rumble at the Alamodome in 1997. Meltzer asked Vince McMahon himself why they used to inflate the numbers, because the shows were sold out themselves and the real number was impressive enough. Why add a few thousand? Vince was quoted as saying what appears on television people should consider for entertainment purposes. This actually isn't exclusive to WWE, as other forms of sports and entertainment often lie about the actual attendance to make it sound impressive. Such companies I could name as examples would be Pride and K-1. So in conclusion, the reason the WWE gave this inflated 93,000 attendance number was because they wanted to proclaim and all time indoor attendance record, and they had to beat an attedance number done by the Pope, while at the same time having an attendance figure that nobody would ever beat.

Does it really matter anymore? It was 18 years ago, I think it's time to move on.

I think the real question is whether or not the building actually holds 80,000.

I think the real question is whether or not the building actually holds 80,000.

That's right! If the current website is correct, than the building holds 80,325 not including the floor..

So IF this is correct, there is NO WAY that the 78,000 figure (including the floor) can possibly be correct NO MATTER WHAT ANYONE SAYS!!


That is why I asked the question about adding 10,000 seats that no one could answer.

The bottom line is:

If the building actually holds 80,325, then the Melzter/promoter etc. number CANNOT POSSIBLY be correct!! *(unless they have added 8-10,000 seats which is retarded)

Is this difficult to understand? I don't think so..

The Silverdome got it wrong
The promoter of the event itself got it wrong
The head of the company running the event got it wrong (and the last two would know more than anyone how many fans they could get in)
The main promoter of the company running the event got it wrong