BallparkTour - Former ballparks of Philadelphia

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Citizens Bank Park - Veterans Stadium

• Former Philadelphia ballparks - Page 1 •
Page 2 - Veterans Stadium

Shibe Park
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Known as Connie Mack Stadium after 1953

Tenants: Philadelphia Athletics (AL 1909-54); Philadelphia Phillies (NL 1927, 1938-70); Philadelphia Eagles (NFL1940-57); Philadelphia Stars (Negro National League, exact years unknown)
Groundbreaking: 1908
First American League game: April 12, 1909
First National League game: May 16, 1927 (Phillies returned July 4, 1938)
First NFL game: September, 1940
Last American League game: September 19, 1954
Last NFL game: December, 1957
Last National League game: October 1, 1970
Demolished: June, 1976
Capacity: 23,000 (1909); 35,000 (1925).

Architects: William Steele and Sons
Construction: William Steele and Sons
Owner: Philadelphia A's (1909-54); Philadelphia Phillies (1954-61); J. Schleifer Properties (1961-76)
Cost: $315,248 (1909)

Dimensions:
LF foul line: 360 (1909), 380 (1921), 334 (1922), 312 (1926), 334 (1930)
Left-center: 393 (1909); 387 (1922); 405 (1925); 387 (1969)
Center field: 515 (1909), 502 (late, 1909), 468 (1922), 448 (1950), 440 (1951), 460 (1953), 468 (1954), 447 (1956), 410 (1969)
Right-center: 393 (1909), 390 (1969)
Right-center, left of scoreboard: 400 (1942)
RF foul line: 360 (early, 1909), 380 (1921), 307 (1926), 331 (1931), 331 (1934)

Fences: Left field to left-center: 12 (4 screen above 8 concrete, 1949); center field, small section: 20 (1955), 8 (wood, 1956), 3 (canvas, 1969); right-center scoreboard: 50 (top of black scoreboard, 1956), 60 (top of Ballantine Beer Sign, 1956); right field: 12 (concrete, 1909), 34 (22 corrugated iron above 12 concrete, 1935), 30 (1943), 50 (1949), 40 (1953), 30 (1954), 40 (1955), 32 (1956).

Hosted All Star Game: 1943, 1952
Hosted World Series: 1910, 1911, 1913, 1914, 1929, 1930, 1931, 1950

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A Brief Philadelphia Ballpark History

Read a more in-depth history of Baker Bowl

Philadelphia pro-baseball has taken many twists and turns before arriving at Citizens Bank Park. The first Phillies' park was its most unusual. Called Recreation Park, it was located on an odd-shaped lot bordered by Columbia and Ridge Avenues and 24th and 25th Streets. The field had been used for baseball as early as 1860. During the Civil War, it was occupied by a Union Army cavalry. Later, amateur and professional teams played there until the late 1870s when the field was neglected, and part of it became a horse market.

By the time Al Reach was awarded the Phillies franchise in 1883, he had purchased the site, rebuilt the playing field, added a three-section wooden grandstand and named it Recreation Park. The park had a total capacity of 6,500. What made Recreation Park particularly strange, were the dimensions of the playing field. It was 300 feet down the left field line and 331 feet to straightaway center. But sticking out into Ridge Avenue, the park reached 369 feet in right-center before closing drastically to 247 down the right field line. After holding their first spring training at Recreation Park, the Phillies opened their maiden season there, losing to the Providence Grays, 4-3, on May 1, 1883. The Phillies remained at Recreation Park for four seasons, but in need of a park to accommodate larger crowds, finally moved out after the 1887 season.

The Phillies moved into a brand new stadium at Broad Street and Lehigh Avenue. Oficially called National League Park, it was informally called Huntingdon Street Grounds and Philadelphia Base Ball Park, it was built at a cost of $101,000. The original park seated 12,500. Soon after its construction, National League Park was being hailed as the finest and most modern stadium in the nation. Using brick instead of wood for the outside part of the structure, it included two 75-foot high turrets at either end of the 5,000-seat pavilion behind home plate and a 165-foot high turret at the main entrance at 15th and Huntingdon Streets. Sheds for 55 horse-drawn carriages were located under the grandstands. The park also had some highly unusual features, foremost of which was the high outfield wall that extended from right to center field. Just 272 feet down the right field line through most of the years (originally, it was 300 feet), the wall was notorious for turning pop flies into home runs and screaming line drives into singles.

National League Park opened on April 30, 1887 with the Phillies defeating the New York Giants, 19-10. In 1894, a major fire destroyed much of the park, and it was rebuilt using mostly steel, a radical new technique in stadium construction. Capacity was increased to 18,800, and clubhouses were installed in center field. The Phillies clubhouse contained a swimming pool. Over the years, the park repeatedly made the news. A balcony collapsed in 1903, leaving 12 dead and 232 injured (Read About It). In 1913, William Baker bought the team and renamed the park after himself. The Phillies won the National League pennant in 1915, and in the second game of the World Series at Baker Bowl, Woodrow Wilson became the first president to throw out a ball to open a Series contest. Always known as a hitter's paradise, Baker Bowl deteriorated badly in the 1920s. It eventually reached the point where the stadium was falling apart. It was called all kinds of insulting names, and became the laughingstock of baseball.

After calling Baker Bowl home for 51 1/2 years, the Phillies played their last game there on June 30, 1938. The park, which was also the home of the Philadelphia Eagles from 1933 to 1935 and the site of numerous other sports activities, came to an end in 1950 when its few remaining parts were torn down. When problems had occurred at Baker Bowl, the Phillies had also played briefly at the University of Pennsylvania's Varsity Grounds (1894), the Philadelphia Athletics' Columbia Park (1903) and at Shibe Park (1927). On July 4, 1938, the Phils made Shibe Park their regular home, losing the first game of a doubleheader with the Boston Bees, 10-5, and winning the nightcap, 10-2.

When the Philadelphia Athletics were created in 1901 as one of the clubs in the newly formed American League, the team had an immediate need for a ballpark in which to play its home games. Athletics’ Manager Connie Mack found a suitable vacant lot and took out a 10-year lease on the property. Bordered by 29th Street, Columbia Avenue, 30th Street, and Oxford Street in North Philadelphia, the new ballpark was christened Columbia Park and would serve as the home of the Athletics through the 1908 season.

Hastily erected at a cost of $35,000, Columbia Park had a seating capacity of only 9,500. Wooden grandstands extended on either side of the field from home plate to first and third bases. Open bleachers continued from the grandstands down both foul lines. While the Athletics drew well, the little wooden ballpark’s meager seating capacity didn’t hold enough people to suit Mack or team President Ben Shibe. The ballpark’s gates had to be shut often when all the seats had been sold, leaving thousands of fans on the outside. This was especially true during 1902 and 1905 seasons when the Athletics won American League Championships. Envisioning high profits based on larger crowds at a bigger ballpark, the A’s abandoned Columbia Park after the 1908 season, moving to the newly constructed Shibe Park.

Shibe Park, which had been built at a cost of $315,248 on a 5.75-acre site that had been vacant lots, woods, SPCA kennels, and the notorious Philadelphia Hospital for Contagious Diseases, had been home to the Athletics since it opened in 1909. Named after the Athletics principal owner, Benjamin Shibe, and located at 21st Street and Lehigh Avenue, it had originally seated 23,000 (10,000 in the grandstand and 13,000 in the bleachers, plus an aditional area in centerfield that was often used for standing-room patrons and could accomodate up to 10,000 standees. When first opened, the park was described as a palace - with rusticated bases, composite columns, arched windows and vaultings, ornamental scrollwork, and a fabulous French Renaissance tower with cupola that housed the offices of team Vice President John Shibe and A’s Manager Connie Mack. Shibe Park in Philadelphia and Forbes Field in Pittsburgh both opened in 1909 and both were revolutionary - They were th first 2 ballparks to be constructed entirely of steel and concrete. They truly were the first "modern' ballparks.

The park was expanded through the seasons to increase capacity. Originally, the grandstand wrapped around home plate from 1st to 3rd base. Bleachers continued from the bases down both foul lines. The first structural changes at took place in 1913, when a grandstand was added in left field. In 1925, all of the remaining grandstands were double-decked. Mezzanine sections were added in 1929 and 1930 bringing the final capacity to 35,000. Until 1935, fans sitting atop the building roofs behind the 12 foot right field wall could watch the game (ala Wrigley Field). In 1935, the A’s got tired of people doing this (just like the modern-day Cubs who have threatened to build a screen) and decided to raise the wall higher - eventually to 50 feet.

By the time the Phillies arrived, Shibe Park had been the scene of seven World Series. In the ensuing years, it would also be the site for two All-Star Games (1943, 1952), the first American League night game (1939) and numerous other noteworthy events. Shibe Park was the home field for the Phillies when they went to the World Series in 1950. In 1953, the park's name was changed to Connie Mack Stadium in honor of the Athletics' owner-manager.

The A's left town, heading for Kansas City, after the 1954 season, leaving the the Phillies as the sole baseball occupants of the park. During football season from 1940 to 1957, it was used by the Eagles. All the while, alterations continued on the park's interior, including the addition of an electric scoreboard purchased from the New York Yankees in 1955.

After 32 1/2 seasons there, the Phillies left Connie Mack Stadium after the 1970 season. Several subsequent fires heavily damaged the park, and eventually it was torn down in 1976.

Fans pack Shibe in 1950 to watch the "Whiz-kids" (left). The proximity of Shibe Park and Baker Bowl can be clearly seen in this photo from the early 1940's (right).

Philadelphians cram Shibe Park (left) on its opening day, 1909. What a difference a century makes - Can anyone today imagine being allowed to sit atop the scoreboard or perched on the wall as those folks did? I guess insurance liabilities weren't the same as they are today. Shibe Park in 1931 (right).

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Baker Bowl
Formerly, Huntingdon Street Grounds and National League Park

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Tenants: Philadelphia Phillies (NL 1887-1938); Philadelphia Eagles (NFL 1933-35)
1st National League game: April 30, 1887
Destroyed by fire: August 6, 1894
Reopened with temporary seating: Summer, 1894
New grandstand opened: May 2, 1895
Last National League game: June 20, 1938
Demolished: 1950

Capacity: 12,500 (1887); 18,800 (1895); 20,000 (1929)
Architect: Al Reach
Owner: Philadelphia Phillies
Cost: $101,000 (1887)
Current use of site: Deliverance Evangelistic Church

Dimensions:
LF foul line: 335 ft. (1921), 342 ft. (1926)
LF alley: 375 ft.
Center field: 408 ft.
RF alley: 300 ft.
RF foul line: 272 ft. (1921), 281 ft. (1924)

Fences: Left field: 4 ft. (1895), 12 ft. (1929); center-field clubhouse: 35 ft. (with 12 ft. screen on top, 1915); right field: 40 ft. (tin over brick, 1895), 60 ft. (40 ft. tin over brick, topped by 20 ft. screen, 1915).

Hosted World Series: 1915
Hosted All-Star Game: Never

See our In-House Article on the History of Baker Bowl

See our In-House Article on the Baker Bowl Balcony Tragedy

Philadelphia's Old Ballparks (Baseball in America) by Rich Westcott - highly recommended!

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• Notes, facts & features •

Baker Bowl

Nicknamed "the Hump" because it was on an elevated piece of ground that had a railroad tunnel underneath the outfield.

Swimming pool in the basement of the center-field clubhouse prior to World War I.

Extra seats added in front of the fence in center for the 1915 World Series led directly to the Phillies losing the Series’ last game.

During Prohibition the outfield wall liquor ads were boarded over with grimy blank boards.

May 14, 1927: During a game between the Phils and Cards, a section of 10 rows in the RF stands at Baker Bowl collapses from the weight of the crowd and hundreds of fans fall on those below. There are many injuries, but the one death that occurs is caused by the crowd stampede, not the stands collapsing. Philadelphia is leading 12–4 in the top of the 7th—4 runs coming on Russ Wrightstone's 2nd grand slam of the year—when the tragedy occurs, and the game is called.

July 4, 1934: When Dodgers manager Casey Stengel comes out to the mound to remove P Boom Boom Beck from the game in Philadelphia's Baker Bowl, the frustrated Beck turns and fires the ball at the tin wall in RF. Dodgers OF Hack Wilson, not paying attention to the happenings, hears the ball, hurries to retrieve it, and fires a strike to 2B to prevent the imaginary runner from advancing.

May 30, 1935: Babe Ruth plays only the first inning of the opener of a doubleheader between Boston and Philadelphia at Baker Bowl. After going 0-for-1, he removes himself from the lineup. It is his final ML appearance. The Phils win 11–6 and 9–3.

June 30, 1938: The Phillies play their final game in the Baker Bowl, losing 14–1 to the Giants.

Shibe Park

When the New York Yankees upgraded to a state-of-the-art (for that time) electronic message-scoreboard after the '56 season, they sold their old, smaller electric scoreboard to the Phillies who installed it in right field in 1957 (see Shibe Park color photo at top of page). One of the last scores recorded on the board in Yankee Stadium was Don Larsen's Perfect game in the 1956 World Series.

In 1956 the backstop screen was replaced with Plexiglass.

Home plate was moved to Veterans Stadium in 1971.

Damaged by fire on August 20, 1971.

Torn down in June 1976, while the All-star game was being played at Veterans Stadium.

Now the site of the Deliverance Evangelistic Church.

September 26, 1911: At Shibe Park, the A's clinch their 2nd straight American League pennant, defeating the Tigers, 11–5.

June 15, 1925: In Shibe Park with the Indians leading 15-4 after seven innings, many fans leave and miss one of the greatest rallies of the century. The A's score 13 in the eighth for a 17-15 win.

April 8, 1934: The Phillies and A's meet in a City Series game before 15,000 fans at Shibe Park for the first legal Sunday baseball game ever played in Philadelphia.

May 16, 1939: A crowd of 15,109 watch the first American League night game played at Shibe Park, with Cleveland beating the A's 8–3 in 10 innings.

February 13, 1953: The Athletics change the name of Shibe Park to Connie Mack Stadium, in honor of their longtime owner and manager.

September 26, 1964: At Shibe Park, the Braves and Phillies set a major-league record by using 43 players in a 9-inning game. The Braves' 25 match the 9-inning high mark for National League clubs. Eight of the 25 are pitchers, tying a league mark, but still the stumbling Phils drop their 6th in a row 6–4.

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