The Ballpark: History
The Quad City River Bandits and City of Davenport jointly produced a massive renovation to Modern Woodman Park in 2004. The entire structure and field of the original 1931 stadium were redone. Only the exterior facade of the old stadium remained, with the entire field, councouses and seating areas being reconstructed. The team also unveiled a $347,000 high definition video board which was installed at Modern Woodmen Park shortly before the Bandits hosted the 2011 Midwest League All-Star Game. The 2011 Midwest League All-Star game was hosted in Davenport, June 20–21. Davenport also hosted Midwest League All-Star Games in 1964, 1968, 1975, 1980, 1982, 1990, and 2006. .
The stadium experienced major Mississippi River floods in 1965, 1993, and 2001. As a result, the team played several games at North Scott High School and Brady Street Stadium in 1993. A few games were also moved to road games at other MWL facilities. The team played several games at Black Hawk College during the 2001 flood, and again moved to other MWL parks (mostly Clinton) until the flood receded.
The stadium is named for Modern Woodmen of America, a Davenport-based fraternal life insurance association. Previous namesake, John O'Donnell was the sports editor of the Quad City Times during the 1940s and 1950s. The ballpark name was changed in to John O'Donnell Stadium in 1971, and Modern Woodman Park in 2007.
The team's attendance record of 260,471 was set in 1994.
Read more about this topic: Quad Cities River Bandits
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“The history of the Victorian Age will never be written: we know too much about it.”
—Lytton Strachey (1880–1932)