Ebbets Field - History

History

Ebbets Field was on the block bound by Bedford Avenue, Sullivan Place, McKeever Place, and Montgomery Street. After locating the prospective new site to build a permanent stadium to replace the old, wooden Washington Park, club owner Charlie Ebbets acquired the property over several years, starting in 1908, by buying parcels of land until he owned the entire block. This land included the site of a garbage dump called Pigtown, because of the pigs that once ate their fill there and the stench that filled the air. In 1912, construction began, and a year later, Pigtown had been transformed into Ebbets Field, where some of the game's greatest drama would take place.

Following an inter-league exhibition game against the New York Yankees on April 5, 1913, the park formally opened on April 9 against the Philadelphia Phillies. When the park was opened, it was discovered that the flag, keys to the bleachers, and a press box had all been forgotten. The press box was not added until 1929. Initially the seating area was a double deck from past third base, around home plate, and all the way down the right side. There was an open, concrete bleacher extending the rest of the way down the left side to the outer wall. There was no seating in left or center. The right field wall was fairly high due to the short foul line (around 300 feet) but had no screen or scoreboard at first. The ballpark was built on a sloping piece of ground. The right field wall made up the difference, as the right field corner was above street level. The left field corner was below street level, and there was an incline or "terrace" running along the left field wall.

As was the case of Boston's Fenway Park and Detroit's Tiger Stadium (two ballparks that opened one year earlier, in 1912), the intimate configuration prompted some baseball writers to refer to Ebbets Field as a "cigar box" or a "bandbox."

Ebbets Field was the scene of some early successes, as the "Robins" (so-called for long-time manager Wilbert Robinson) won league championships in 1916 and 1920. The Ebbets seating area was expanded in the 1920s, a "boom" time for baseball when many ballparks were expanded. The double deck was extended from third base around the left field corner, across left field, and into center field, covering the terrace and allowing right-hand hitters to garner many more home runs. By the 1940s, the big scoreboard had been installed, as well as a screen atop the high wall, which made right field home runs a little harder to come by. However, additional rows of seating across left field reduced that area by about 15 feet, to the delight of the sluggers.

After the early successes, though, the team slid into some hard times, which would continue for a couple of decades, until new ownership brought in first promotional wizard Larry MacPhail (in 1938), then, after MacPhail's wartime resignation, player development genius Branch Rickey (in 1943). In addition to his well-known breaking of the color line by signing Jackie Robinson, Rickey's savvy with farm systems (as with his prior work for the St. Louis Cardinals) produced results that made the Brooklyn Dodgers "Bums" a perennial contender, which they would continue to be for decades to come.

The Dodgers won pennants in 1941 (under MacPhail), 1947, 1949, 1952, 1953, 1955 and 1956. They won the 1955 World Series (the only world title in Brooklyn Dodgers history), and were within two games and a playoff heartbreak of winning five NL pennants in a row (1949–53) and matching the cross-town Yankees' achievement during that stretch. Ebbets also hosted the 1949 Major League Baseball All-Star Game.