The seamy side of the Sunsphere
by Joe Tarr
As the days to the World's Fair opening ticked down in 1982, a lot of people started getting nervous.
With millions from around the world expected in Knoxville, the authorities realized that not all of them would behave themselves. Worse yet, they feared that the fair would attract not only spend-happy tourists, but the criminal element looking to sell them illegal goods and services, or otherwise cheat and rob them.
The police braced for an invasion of out-of-town hookers hoping to capitalize on crowds. Police agencies from around the country were warning Knoxville authorities that their prostitutes and pimps were heading here. A Memphis police sergeant told the Knoxville Journal in April 1982, "We've been getting reports on our streets that a lot of girls are heading towards Knoxville to work the fair. The prostitutes here do quite a bit of robbing and cutting and I know of some that packed up and headed for Knoxville."
Sheriff Joe Jenkins formed a special vice unit to target escort services. He told the Journal that hookers were "not only advertising but bragging openly about what they plan to do."
The fair may not have lived up to such lurid expectations. But those who were there say it provided plenty to shake up Knoxville.
Jane Fonda in a Hick Town?
The KPD was prepared not just for illegal sex, but for violence. "It's going to be a territorial war, that's what it's going to be," said Lt. Donnie Cameron, of the city's vice squad. "And I expect some of them [prostitutes] will be killed in the wars."
The rumors of crime were so great that Curtis Sliwa, director of the Guardian Angels vigilante group, was thinking about starting a chapter in Knoxville. "We've had about 18 separate serious inquiries from [Knoxville] but none from law-enforcement authorities," he told a journalist. "The calls have been from local businessmen, average residents and students at community colleges."
However, it doesn't appear that the Angels ever started a chapter here.
In Union and Anderson counties, rumors spread that a large group of Hell's Angels were going to take over the Point 19 campground on Norris Lake.
Meanwhile Phil Keith, who was then KPD's planning director, was preparing to deal with a large influx of protesters. "By having a World's Fair, it will be an international stage for the latest protest. I don't know exactly what it could be but we've been tracking several groups whose activities have been escalating. If Jane Fonda has anything to do with it we'll probably have some of it here," Keith told the Journal.
Either the law was well prepared or their fears unfounded, but the fair never produced the anarchy and debauchery so many feared. Some pickpockets made the rounds on the fair grounds, and a prostitute snatched $1,800 off of one man. There were also some protests, including during President Reagan's opening speech, but they were peaceful and orderly.
Overall, crime in Knoxville continued to decline—as was the national trend at the time. The Knoxville News-Sentinel reported that serious crime dropped about 11 percent in May 1982 compared to 1981. Only assaults rose, from 55 to 64. However, arrests skyrocketed from 411 to 1,486—suggesting that police were on heightened awareness or that minor crimes were way up (or some combination). For the entire year, serious crime dropped about 5.2 percent. Of the seven serious crimes—homicide, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, larceny, and vehicle theft—only larceny jumped, from 4,602 the previous year to 5,695 in 1982.
At least one 27-year-old prostitute from Deerfield Beach, Fla., found the scruffy city was no gold mine. Arrested on Magnolia Avenue, she told the Journal that a newspaper article enticed her to give Knoxville a try.
"I've been in a lot of jails but the one in this hick town is the worst. Down in Florida I was making over $1,000 a night off those college kids. They didn't know what to do with all the money but I sure showed 'em.
"But here in Knoxville I ain't makin' no money. The only thing I can get is $20 to $25 a trick. I'm going back to Florida to work where I can make some money to live on," she told the paper. "I can't believe the people in this hick town. In Florida I don't even have to make bond to get out of jail and here I had to spend three days in jail."
Blood and Bombs
There were two sensational crimes associated with the fair.
On a Sunday afternoon at the end of May, a maid walked into a room on the 13th floor of the Hilton Hotel on Church and Locust to find a ghastly scene. The body of 59-year-old James David Hartley was lying on the floor. Stabbed at least 27 times, his throat had been cut and he had been disemboweled. Blood was splattered all over the room, in spots as high as the ceiling.
Although the Hilton had been built specifically for the fair, Hartley doesn't appear to have been in Knoxville for it. Fired that week from his job caring for an elderly man, Hartley had visited several bars the evening before he died.
He paid for the room with a $100 bill, but wasn't rich. "He appeared to be a man down on his luck," KPD Lt. Jim Winston told the Knoxville Journal. "We found no luggage in the room. His socks did not match. He had a bus ticket for Charlotte." The papers described him as a "known homosexual." Hartley had apparently been refused alcohol at the Hilton's bar for being "loud and profane."
That night, Hartley had been seen with a man in a number of places, and based on descriptions, police soon had a suspect: 37-year-old Wade Hunter Jr. Earlier in the weekend, Hunter had apparently told a prostitute that he'd "cut the guts out of a queer before the weekend was over." And early Sunday morning after the crime, an unidentified man met Hunter at a bar on Central Avenue and gave him a lift. The motorist told police that Hunter confessed to the crime. "He told me that when a person is stabbed in the lung that the blood bubbles. He told me that the man he killed kept moving around but he told him to just lay there and be still and the angels would come and get him," the unnamed motorist told the Journal.
Hunter was caught in August in New Mexico. He confessed to the crime and was sentenced to life in prison in 1983.
A less gruesome but no less bizarre crime was uncovered on July 23. On that afternoon, people stood around gawking as police emptied out two rooms at the YMCA across the Henley Street from the fair. Tipped off by exterminators, the police found that Michael Gerald King—who worked as a parking lot attendant for the fair—had a stockpile of $30,000 worth of stolen computers, dynamite caps, Army field radios, camouflage clothing, tape recorders, infrared night-vision goggles, a .30 caliber semi-automatic rifle, a book on how to make bombs, and the security plan to a nuclear plant in Arkansas. His arsenal also included a number of chemicals, including the volatile ether oxide—which could have been used to make a potent bomb—as well as nitric oxide and sulfuric oxide. A photo album titled "Our Wedding" with a single picture inside—a black-and-white of actress Suzanne Sommers—was found in the room. The newspapers never recorded what King's intentions for the equipment might have been.
The 30-year-old King pleaded guilty to 19 criminal charges and was sentenced to 15 to 30 years in prison. Paroled in 1988, he was found dead in 1995 at an illegal dump off of Dutchtown Road. Covered with several bags of leaves, his body had a single gunshot wound to the head.
Too Drunk to Care
Many who worked at or attended the fair were oblivious to these crimes. "We were all too drunk to really care," says one.
Most people came to the fair to have a good time, and many did exactly that. Although some of them broke the law:
"As for the World's Fair, the only real memory I have of going was that the high school German teacher at the time was one of the hosts of the German pavilion," says Steve Woullard. "I believe most of us were 18 years old at the time, some 19, but she gave us free German beer and we got really drunk and were doing all sorts of German dances inside the tents. I remember the guys in the funny yodel outfits with the hats that had the feather stuck in it. Then again, we could have stumbled over into the Swiss tent. After about 10 shots of Jaegermeister, with German beer chasers, all Northern Europeans looked the same."
There was no shortage of drugs, either. One local man (who asked to remain anonymous), worked at a fair exhibit and sold marijuana to friends and acquaintances.
"You can hide a lot of things in a video tape case," he says. "I had clientele from Iran, England and Ireland. That I can remember."
He stuck to marijuana, but there were much stronger intoxicants to be found. "You've got to remember, this was 1982—there was a lot of cocaine at the fair. It wasn't bad for you back then; it wasn't addictive," he says, dryly.
He remembers the World's Fair being a neighborhood of sorts for anyone who had a season pass or worked there. There were bars all over the World's Fair. One of the most popular for those who worked the exhibits was the Downunder, located on the bottom floor of the Australian Pavilion.
The fair worker was sitting at the Downunder one night toward the end of the fair, drinking beer with some friends. Another man came up and asked if he wanted any Quaaludes. He said no.
Then a short while later, another man who had been dancing came up and asked if he knew where he could get some Quaaludes. He pointed to the first guy, "That guy's got some."
So the dancing man boogied away toward the dealer. But the dancing man turned out to be an undercover cop. A few minutes later, a friend whispered that a drug bust was underway. The worker quickly slipped out the door and made it back to his exhibit.
For the most part, the party went on without too much hassle, he says. He remembers the large parties that each pavilion would throw—inviting everyone who worked at the fair.
"That was how you'd end up hanging out with the Italian ambassador's daughter, and going back to their hotel room to steal more wine. You have to remember, all the people these countries shipped over here were college-aged," he says.
"I don't care what was said about the World's Fair—it was a blast. It was a six-month party for the world."
May 9, 2002 * Vol. 12, No. 19
© 2002 Metro Pulse
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