Costs to Build 19th Century Stadiums?
Hi All,
Does anyone know if there's anywhere that can give at least a little detailing on what the costs were to build a new ballpark in the 1870s/80s/90s? I was able to find out Brooklyn paid $13,000 in 1883, Boston paid $75,000 for a massive expansion in late 1880s, and that apparently by around 1900, Brooklyn paid a total of $100,000 to move its team into a new place, but that's very sketchy. Any help would be appreciated, even if it's just one or two more data points for when I want to edit team funds to deduct for giving them a new park. Thanks! |
Baker Bowl - 80,000
Sportsman's Park - 300,000 Might be a bit later then you'd like, most of these were 1910's: Fenway - 650,000 Hilltop Park - 200,000 Wirgley Field - 250,000 Ebbetts Field - 750,000 Forbes Field - 1 to 2 milllion Griffith Stadium - 100,000 |
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Ya that one was a bit WTF when I saw that. Like Ebbetts made sense, as ti was known for being opulant, but that? Wild.
Personally I'd dig around wikipedia more, seems to have decent resources for cost. |
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In general, I'd estimate the cost of a brand-new park in the 19th century at around $75,000. That would cover not only the construction of the stands but also the purchase of the land. Prices went up when teams replaced wooden parks with steel-and-concrete structures, which started in 1909 with Forbes Field and Shibe Park. |
A couple of points to remember about the wooden parks of the 19th century: (1) their seating capacities were fairly low; and (2) they burned down with alarming regularity. It was this fire issue which led to the (mostly) fire-proof steel and concrete parks of the early 20th century (which also allowed higher seating capacities).
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Compare that with the Skydome that took something like four years to finish. Crazy eh?
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It's amazing what one can achieve with cheap labor and lax building codes ;)
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Werent some of the early fields just basically converted cow pastures with roped fences?
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A good book on baseball parks is Phil Lowry's Green Cathedrals. A great web site resource—which includes overhead diagrams of ballparks in their various stages of growth—is Clem's Baseball. Another site worth a look is Ballparks.com. It not only has info on baseball stadiums, but also stadiums used for basketball, football, and hockey. |
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