"Get 30 games over .500 and you can break even the rest of the way."
--Ralph Houk, Detroit Tigers manager on how to win the pennant
Stadiums
Atlanta Fulton County Stadium
By Wikipedia
Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium was a baseball and football
stadium that formerly stood in Atlanta, Georgia. Completed in just 50
weeks, for $18 million, it opened in the spring of 1965 as Atlanta
Stadium. It was intended as the home of the soon-to-be-relocating Braves,
but court battles kept the team in Milwaukee as a lame duck for a year.
At
a glance...
Atlanta
Stadium
Facility
statistics
Location
Atlanta,
Georgia
Opened
April
12, 1966
Closed
October
24, 1996
Demolished
August
2, 1997
Replaced
Ponce
de Leon Park
Replaced
by
Georgia
Dome (Falcons, '92)
Turner Field (Braves, '97)
Owner
City
of Atlanta &
Fulton County
Surface
Grass
Construction
cost
$18M
Architect
Heery
& Heery and Finch,
Alexander, Barnes,
Rothschild & Paschal
Tenants
Atlanta
Falcons (NFL, 1966-91)
Atlanta Braves (MLB, 1966-96)
1966-68 Left 330 ft. Left-Center 385 ft. Center 402 ft. Right-Center 385 ft. Right 330 ft.
1969-72 Left 330 ft.
Left-Center 375 ft.
Center 402 ft.
Right-Center 375 ft.
Right 330 ft.
1973
only Left 330 ft.
Left-Center 375 ft.
Center 402 ft.
Right-Center 385 ft
Right 330 ft.
1974-96 Left 330 ft.
Left-Center 385 ft.
Center 402 ft.
Right-Center 385 ft.
Right 330 ft.
The new stadium had a lame duck of its own for that first season: the
Atlanta Crackers of the International League, whose previous home had been
Ponce de Leon Park at 650 Ponce de Leon Avenue. In 1966, both the NL's
transplanted Atlanta Braves and the NFL's expansion Atlanta Falcons moved
in. The Falcons moved to the Georgia Dome in 1992, while the Braves had to
wait until the Olympic Stadium from the 1996 Summer Olympics was renovated
into Turner Field to move out at the beginning of the 1997 season. The
stadium sat 60,700 for football and 52,013 for baseball.
The stadium was relatively nondescript, one of the many saucer-shaped
multipurpose facilities built during the 1960s. The stadium was long known
for the poor quality of the field of play – no one bothered to hire
full-time groundskeepers until the early 1990s, instead relying on a city
work crew.
The relatively high elevation meant that the stadium was relatively
favorable to long-ball hitters, giving rise to the nickname The
Launching Pad. That factor helped boost Henry Aaron's home run output,
and he reached the all-time record sooner here than he might have in
Milwaukee, even if the effects of County Stadium were more dramatic in the
1950s than in the 1960s.
Fly
to the Atlanta Fulton County Stadium!
If you have Google
Earth installed, click here
to be "flown" to the site of Atlanta Fulton County
Stadium. (If you do not have it installed, get
it from Google. It allows you to view virtually anywhere on
Earth in 3D using satellite imagery.)
One unusual feature of this stadium is the fact that, unlike most
baseball stadiums used for football where the football field is laid
either parallel to one of the foul lines or running from home plate to
center field, the football field here was laid along a line running
between first and third base. Thus, a seat behind home plate for baseball
would also be behind the 50-yard line for football. (It shared this
characteristic with the Oakland Coliseum).
The stadium was refurbished for the 1996 season because it hosted the
Olympic baseball competition. It probably looked better in many ways in
its last season than it had in its first.
Launching
Pad !
Outside Atlanta
Fulton County Stadium, circa 1973.
Primary
research by Jim Herdman & David Vincent
Courtesy of Retrosheet.
On October 28, 1995, the Braves defeated the Cleveland Indians on a one
hit, 8 inning performance by future Hall-of-Famer Tom Glavine to achieve
the only Atlanta Braves World Series championship thus far, despite many
National League East championships. Through the 2004 season, the Braves
have resided in three cities and have one World Series ring to show for
each.
While Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium was an immediate success upon its
opening in 1966, it was in decline by the mid-Super70s with some games
were attended by less than 1000 paying customers. In fact, the Braves drew
less than a million for eight straight years in the Super70s. Attendance
wasn't much better in the Awesome80s. Even during Dale Murphy's MVP
season, crowds rarely approached 25,000.
Rest in Piece(s)
Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium was imploded on August 2, 1997. A parking
lot for Turner Field now stands on the site, with an outline of the old
stadium, and a plaque marking the spot where Hank Aaron's historic 715th
career home run landed on April 8, 1974, in what was formerly the Braves
bullpen.
The Launching Pad's last bit of glory came during the 1996 Olympic
Games held in Atlanta.
Our sites have always been by you and about you. If
you check
our TV Forums or our Technology & Science forums, you'll find literally thousands of messages from fans
of 1970s TV shows, survivors of hurricanes or aircraft accidents, etc. from all over the world sharing their memories, asking
questions, making comments. Our baseball section is new, but don't let
that stop you from sharing
your memories of the first game you went to, your favorite player, a
now-forgotten stadium, etc. Of course you can also ask questions, post
trivia, tell the world what you think of Barry Bonds, or just read what
others are saying.
Logos and team names may be trademarks of their respective franchises or leagues. This site is not recognized, approved, sponsored by, or endorsed by Major League Baseball nor any sports league or team. Any marks, terms, or logos are used for editorial/identification purposes and are not claimed as belonging to this site or its owners. Any statistical data provided courtesy of Retrosheet (see credits).
Notice from Retrosheet:
The information used here was obtained free of
charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet. Interested
parties may contact Retrosheet at 20 Sunset Rd.,
Newark, DE 19711.
.gif)
.gif){kind=small}
.gif){kind=small}
Stadiums
(400).jpg&S=&L=0740&O=7/4/2009)
(180).jpg)
