Wrigley Field (Los Angeles)

Infobox_Baseball_Stadium
stadium_name = Wrigley Field
nickname =


location = Los Angeles, California
broke_ground =
opened = 1925
closed =
demolished = 1966
owner =
operator =
surface = Grass
construction_cost =
architect =
former_names =
tenants = Los Angeles Angels (PCL) (1925–1957)
Hollywood Stars (PCL) (1926–1935), (1938)
Los Angeles Angels (AL) (1961)
seating_capacity = 22,000 (1925)
20,457 (1961)
dimensions = Left Field - 340 ft
Left Center Field - 345 ft
Center Field - 412 ft
Right Center Field - 345 ft
Right Field - 339 ft
Backstop - 56 ft

Wrigley Field was a ballpark in Los Angeles which served as host to minor league baseball teams in the region for over 30 years, and was the home park for the Los Angeles Angels (now the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim) in their expansion season of 1961.

The park was built in South Los Angeles in 1925 and was named after William Wrigley Jr., the chewing gum magnate who owned the first tenants, the original Los Angeles Angels minor-league team. In 1925, the Angels moved from their former home at Washington Park (Los Angeles), which was also known as Chutes Park. Wrigley also owned the Chicago Cubs, whose home is a more famous park also named after him.

The Los Angeles Wrigley Field was built to resemble Spanish-style architecture and a somewhat scaled-down version of the Chicago ballpark (known then as Cubs Park) as it looked at the time. It was also the first to bear Wrigley's name, as the Chicago park was named for Wrigley over a year "after" the L.A. park's opening. At the time, he owned Santa Catalina Island, and the Cubs were holding their spring training in that island's city of Avalon (whose ballfield was located on Avalon Canyon Road and "also" informally known as "Wrigley Field").

Coincidentally, one of Wrigley Field's boundary streets was Avalon Boulevard (east, behind right field and a small parking lot). The other boundaries of the block were 41st Street (north, behind left field), 42nd Place (south, behind first base), and San Pedro Street (west, behind third base and a larger parking lot). Not only did L.A. Wrigley get its name first, it had more on-site parking than the Chicago version did (or does now).

For 33 seasons, 1925 to 1957, the park was home to the Angels, and for 11 of those seasons, 1926 through 1935 and 1938, it had a second home team in the rival Hollywood Stars. The Stars eventually moved to their own new ballpark, Gilmore Field, just west of the Pan Pacific Auditorium.

With its location near Hollywood, Wrigley Field was a popular place to film baseball movies. Among the most well known movies filmed there were "The Pride of the Yankees" and a movie version of the stage play "Damn Yankees". Even the "film noir" classic "Armored Car Robbery" had its title heist set at Wrigley. It later found its way into television, serving as the backdrop for the "Home Run Derby" series in 1959, a popular show which featured one-on-one contests between baseball's top home run hitters, which had a brief revival in 1989 when it aired on ESPN. Episodes of shows as diverse as "The Twilight Zone" and "The Munsters" were also filmed here.

L.A. Wrigley's minor league baseball days ended when the Brooklyn Dodgers of the National League transferred to Los Angeles in 1958. The use of Wrigley was studied by the Dodgers, but they opted for seating capacity over suitability as a baseball field, and instead set up shop in the Los Angeles Coliseum (which had a 251-foot foul line) while awaiting construction of Dodger Stadium.

In 1961, a new L.A. Angels club joined the American League as an expansion team and took residence at Wrigley for just the one season. The team set a still-standing first-season expansion-team record with 71 wins. Thanks to its cozy power alleys, the park became the setting for a real-life version of "Home Run Derby", setting another record by yielding 248 home runs. That 248 mark would stand for over 30 years. After the 1961 season, the team moved to Dodger Stadium, or Chavez Ravine as it was known for Angels games. The new Dodger Stadium also "took over" for Wrigley Field, as the site of choice for Hollywood filming that required a ballpark setting.

There were no more regular tenants after 1961, and the park was torn down in the mid-1960s. The site is now occupied by the recreation facility called Gilbert Lindsay Park. The park has a ballfield in the northwest corner of the property. The original site of the Wrigley diamond and grandstand is occupied by buildings and a parking lot.

Dimensions

The ballpark's dimensions were cozy but symmetrical, giving a nearly equal chance to right and left-handed batters in the "Home Run Derby" series. The only difference was that the left field wall was 14 1/2 feet high, whereas the right field fence was only 9 feet high.

Sources

*"Green Cathedrals", by Philip J. Lowry
*"Ballparks of North America", by Michael Benson
*"Lost Ballparks", by Lawrence Ritter

External links

* [http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=4&S=10&Z=11&X=1914&Y=18818&W=2&qs=%7clos+angeles%7cca%7c USGS photo of Gilbert Lindsay Park]

succession box
title = Home of the
Los Angeles Angels
years = 1961
before = First Ballpark
after = Chavez Ravinesuccession box
title = Home of the
NFL All-Star Game
years = 1938
before = First Stadium
after = Gilmore Stadium