Tiger Stadium

UPDATED 6/2/09
The Detroit city commission voted today to tear down the remaining section of historic Tiger Stadium. A vote of 7-1 by the city's Economic Development Corp. appears to be the final nail in the coffin for those with slim hopes of preserving a section of the stadium.

UPDATE 2/26/09
Michigan senator Carl Levin has added an earmark to a bill currently before Congress. The earmark of $3.8 would go towards saving the remaining portion of Tiger Stadium. I loved Tiger Stadium, but I loathe using taxpayers money to save it.

UPDATE 1/20/09
The City of Detroit has approved of The Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy's plan for preserving a portion of Tiger Stadium. The group has until March 1st to come up with a plan showing how they will accumulate the $27 million needed to complete this project. Failure to do so will result in the complete demolition of Tiger Stadium.

UPDATE 10/23/08

The Detroit City Council voted this week to postpone the demolition of Tiger Stadium in its entirety. The Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy has paid $69,000 with another $150,000 in escrow. It will need to place another $150,000 in escrow by December 11th.

$15 million needs to be raised by March 1 to keep the preservation project going forward.

UPDATE 10/16/08

The Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy raised the necessary $219,000 last Friday, October 10th, to continue working towards saving a portion of Tiger Stadium. Now the Conservancy must raise millions of dollars to convert the remaining portion of the stadium into a sports museum. A large chunk of the money the Conservancy is counting on is federal funds and they are currently tied up in budget wrangling.

UPDATE 10/7/08

The Detroit City Council voted 5-3 to reject a resolution that would have authorized the immediate demolition of the historic ballpark. The Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy has $150,000 of the necessary $219,000 to avoid complete demolition of Tiger Stadium. The Conservancy says it will have the entire $219,000 by Friday, October 10th.

Old News

The Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy is still trying to save a portion of the stadium - the home plate area encompassing the two dugouts. They have to have a financial plan by November 1, in order to proceed with fundraising for their plan.

Who knew that this "rural looking" intersection of the 1890s would someday become The Corner?

A sketch of Bennett Park and how it looked in 1901. This was the first ballpark at "The Corner" of Michigan and Trumbull.

The park was named for former Detroit catcher Charlie Bennett whose playing career was cut short following a train accident that took his left foot and right leg at the knee.

Charlie Bennett was one of the most popular players from those early Detroit baseball teams.

New owner Frank Navin tore down the 8,500 seat Bennett Park to build one of the precursors of Tiger Stadium, Navin Field. Navin Field opened on April 20, 1912 (same day as Fenway Park made its debut) just five days after the Titanic sank.

Navin Field moved home plate to where right field was in Bennett Park and seated 23,000.

Note the street (Cherry Street) just outside the left field wall. It became the left field grand stand when Navin Field was upgraded in 1938 during its Briggs Stadium days.

Temporary bleachers were erected over Cherry Street in left field to pack in extra fans for the World Series and would become a permanent fixture when Briggs Stadium was upgraded in 1938 and Cherry Street was moved.

The Tigers lost the 1934 Series 4 games to 3 to the St. Louis Cardinals. The boys would bounce back the next year defeating the Chicago Cubs 4 games to 2.

Here we see Briggs Stadium all closed in with its 53,000 capacity and looking almost exactly like Tiger Stadium. About the only thing missing was of course, the name.

In 1936 the right field grandstands were double-decked which increased the seating to 36,000. Two years later, in 1938 the same was done to the left and center field grandstands to bring the seating up to 53,000.

Lights were finally added in 1948. Tiger Stadium was the second to last park to add lights. Wrigley Field was the last ballpark to add lights 40 years later in 1988.

With the addition of the lights the final construction of the Tiger Stadium that we know was complete and the stadium would be known as one of (if not THE) finest stadiums in baseball.

In 1961 (nine years after Walter Briggs death) owner John Fetzer gave the permanent name of "Tiger Stadium" to the Green Cathedral on "The Corner."

This picture is how Tiger Stadium should be remembered. Not as an empty deteriorating shell of its former self, but as a vibrant, fan-filled field that carried the hopes and dreams of its inhabitants on the backs of men like Greenberg, Kaline, Cobb, Cash, Trammell, and Horton.

From this satellite photo you can see that the playing field has seen better days. No longer manicured, watered, and fertilized, but abandoned, neglected, and vacant.

You can't see the trees growing in the stands or the wires hanging down from the pressbox in this photo. You probably don't want to. That is no way to remember an old friend.

I have fond memories of Tiger Stadium. We lived on the other side of the state so I didn't get to go to very many games there. The few times I did were just as magical and wonderful no matter how old I was.

Whether it was sitting in the upper deck along the first base line or the right field grandstands. I remember taking the church bus and a box lunch and saving my chocolate pudding for the long ride home after the game only to find that my older sister had snitched it and ate every last drop.

I remember going to a game against the Toronto Blue Jays and I believe Brian Moehler was pitching. This was during the lean years and I cannot remember if the Tigers won or lost. That wasn't the point.

I was watching a baseball game in one of baseball's last Green Cathedrals on a beautiful summer day. I had the obligatory hot dog (pulled from the depths of a case of hot water by the vendor) with the standard mustard and a chocolate ice cream to wash it down.

I tried to keep score but had never learned the finer points of doing so. I still have the pencil from that game even though the scorecard has long since been lost during one of the many moves that are made from childhood to college and then to adulthood.

That was also my first chance to fill out an official All-Star ballot as they were handing those out with the programs. Of course, being a lifelong Tigers fan I filled up the roster with Detroit players.

I remember parking over by Pine Street and walking across the pedestrian bridge over Fisher Hwy. There was always a guy near Cochrane Street selling brown paper bags of peanuts and claiming they were selling them for less than you could get them in the stadium. You know what? He was right.

Oh Tiger Stadium will not stand forever, but the memories, mementos, and pictures will live on forever.

I am reminded of the speech James Earl Jones' character makes in Field of Dreams. Here is an excerpt:

"The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it's a part of our past, Ray. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again."