Yankee Stadium (1923-2008) (New York City, New York)

Yankee Stadium was a stadium located in The Bronx, and served as the home park of Major League Baseball's New York Yankees from 1923 to 1973 and, after extensive renovations, from 1976 to 2008. Its architect was the Osborn Engineering Corp. of Cleveland. The stadium hosted 6,581 Yankees regular season home games during its 85-year history. It was also the home of the New York Giants football team from 1956-1973. The stadium's nickname, "The House That Ruth Built", originated from Babe Ruth, the baseball superstar whose prime years coincided with the stadium's opening and beginning of the Yankees' winning history.

The venue was constructed for $2.4 million between 1922–23 and was built and financed by the Yankees, who had been sharing the Polo Grounds with the New York Giants baseball team for 10 years. Yankee Stadium opened in 1923, and at the time, it was hailed as a one-of-a-kind facility in the country for its size. Over the course of its history, it became one of the most famous venues in the United States. The condition of the facility worsened in the 1960s and 1970s, prompting its closing for renovation from 1974-75. The renovation significantly altered the appearance of the venue and reduced the distance of the outfield fences. The Yankees played the 1974 and 1975 seasons in Shea Stadium, sharing the venue with the New York Mets. The original stadium held 58,000 but quickly jumped to its high capacity of 82,000 by 1927. From then through the 1970's its capacity was gradually lowered back towards 56,000.

After years of speculation that the team would build a new ballpark to replace Yankee Stadium, construction on a new facility began in August 2006 with a groundbreaking ceremony across the street in Macombs Dam Park. This all but sealed the fate of Yankee Stadium, and the team played their final two seasons in the stadium in 2007 and 2008 while the new venue was being built. After the final game in the Stadium's history was played on September 21, 2008, public tours of Yankee Stadium continued thru November. Demolition began in March 2009 and was mostly completed by mid-2010. A 10 acre park complex called Heritage Field will be constructed on the old Yankee Stadium's footprint, replacing parkland that is now occupied by the new Stadium.

www.nytimes.com/2008/09/19/sports/baseball/19sandomir.h...
archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.167530/page/n223/...


www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OkSW5qV7jQ&list=FLWwR7X6ZR...
Categories: stadium, historical layer / disappeared object
Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yankee_Stadium_(1923)
Nearby cities:
Coordinates:  40°49'37"N 73°55'40"W

Comments

  • This is THE PLACE....Imagine going here and knowing all the things that happened on this same field in the past century. Knowing it will be gone soon is sickening!!
  • This is one of the greatest stadiums of all time. It's a shame that it's going to be knocked soon. So many great players have called this stadium their home field such as: Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe Dimmagio, Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford, Roger Maris, Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, and many others. The list goes on and on and on. I think this stadium should be considered a national landmark.
  • Yankee Stadium is the best stadium ever! So many legends have played there.
  • RIP Yankee Stadium, you will be missed. I'm still upset with myself for not getting to say goodbye last season. My best memory from this legendary field was a game in late 1995, I had seats in RF - Don Mattingly's last homerun at the stadium landed 2 rows in front of me. He was my favorite Yankee of all time, I was 12 years old. If I would have caught that ball I coulda died a happy man right there.
  • Stadium fenced in as demolition continues.
  • To me, this will always be the REAL home of the Yankees. This place should be preserved as a museum or something and made a National Historic Landmark, not torn down like some piece of crap rickety building that's ready to collapse at any moment. This is baseball's shrine and should be treated that way.
  • The fact that NYC, the Bronx borough and the Yankees will allow this stadium to be torn down without AT LEAST saving Gate 2 as an entrance way to Heritage Field is a disgrace. Without a part of the old stadium to visit, there is little reason for a visitor to even go to the Bronx. They surely cannot afford tickets to the shiny, new ballpark without a soul. Once Jeter, Mariano and Posada retire, the Yankees and NYC will wish they had kept part of that link to the past across the street.
  • It's all a money grab, follow the money trail folks, how in their right minds could they knock down a cathedral like Yankee Stadium and turn the sacred ground into a park? The new stadium across the street should not be called Yankee Stadium, just like the new Mets' stadium is not called Shea.
  • They should have at least saved the playing field like they did when they took down Tiger Stadium in Detroit, but they didn't. The field that's there now is NOT the same field all the greats played on.
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This article was last modified 1 year ago