League Park Cleveland

[PowerAlley21]

As a new member to these boards, I recently saw the impressive thread on the Yankee Stadium 3D model by Kaplanski. It was very similiar to the effort I put into Cleveland's League Park a couple years ago. Unfortunatly, I lost my entire project when my computer crashed last year. My back up files were corrupt and I was told I may have to pay upwards around $900 for somebody to attempt to salvage my old files (not guarenteed). However, I recently came across 3 test images I saved as I was putting in the finishing touches. I thought I'd post them here as it seems people here would appreciate the effort. Plans were first drawn in Autocad from the blueprints and then modeled in a 3D program called "Drawvision" (similar to Sketch-up). Clubhouse, concourses, ramps, and seats were all there. If I feel like starting over, I may try to have another model complete in time for the 100 year anniversary of the 1910 remodel. Along with these images, I included some reference photos of what's left of League Park today.

[PowerAlley21]

Here's a shot of the facade. The last 2 photos that acompany these images were taken when I visited the site of League Park in 1996. As seen in the first post, there have been some clean up to the old ticket building and 66th Ave wall since then.

[POLO GROUNDS 1957]

These are very nice good job. maybe one day you may consider doing Tiger Stadium and the Polo Grounds.

As far as League Park today the city has torn down those right field stands on the site. i cant understand why after all of these years. they kept the outer wall standing. they could have renovated those stands instead of tearing them down.

[Chevy114]

Wow that is so cool! Sorry to hear about the loosing of the files, I think we can all feel your pain about lossing important files!

[stlfan]

I was looking for pictures online of League Park and came across a blog page with awesome arial photos of the site as it pretty much presently looks. You can make out the outline of the old diamond and seating structure. I suggest you all check it out. You have to scroll down a little bit on the page.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://bp1.blogger.com/_1wEiilY8OEg/RpEB8vzUZvI/AAAAAAAAAHs/7j7WIFX0BMg/s400/LP4.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.historicballparks.blogspot.com/&start=7&h=399&w=400&sz=48&tbnid=L0GVvMezXNwgkM:&tbnh=124&tbnw=124&hl=en&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dleague%2Bpark%26gbv%3D1%26hl%3Den%26s a%3DG

[cgcoyne2]

Very nice work. Good luck on finishing it. I would love to see it. It would be nice to be able to see all the big name old ballparks for us "younger" guys. You know just not old enough to ever have gotten the chance to see the old ballparks

[aqib]

The last mayor was floating the idea of reviving League Park potentially to be the home of a minor league team but with the Lake County Captains (the Class A team) just 20 minutes down the road in East Lake I don't see that happening. I suppose as the various projects in the center of the city and University Circle/Cleveland Clinic could eventually meet right where League Park is. For non-Clevelanders University Circle and Cleveland Clinic are in the East 100th street area and League Park is approximately half way between the center of the city (what we call Public Square). There are a lot of projects going on in the Public Square area heading east and the Clinic is always expanding westward so the two may meet.

[Calif_Eagle]

I'm a native Clevelander and I loved / appreciated your first attempt at a League Park model. Very much hope you are able to finish the project one day and post some pix of it here. (I'd love to have a good quality replica of both League Park and Cleveland Municipal Stadium too!)

Very sorry to hear that you lost your files, I sure hope you are going to see it through. The start you had was amazing.

I wish there was a solid economic or financial reason for some group or individual to reconstruct a new League Park, a lifesize duplicate of the original, for use by some real team.

Does anyone think that if someone (investment group or corporation) chose say 8 cities with long baseball tradition and built (rebuilt) their old classic parks (major or minor league) as true as they could to the originals (without all the crap that owners seem to think modern day fans need thats extraneous to the game) that something like a vintage league from say the dead ball era of the early 20th century would have *any* chance of succeeding financially? I have always felt that it would, that the game itself is enough, but I am a purist.

(I will post the 2 preceeding paragraphs as a new thread also, I dont want to hijack this one.)

[PowerAlley21]

I came across this picture in the Comiskey Park thread. What caught my attention was the seat stantion in the second row. If you look closely at the seat directly behind the "Lady Friend", it is the same stantion design (but reversed) that was auctioned as a rare (and perhaps an only) League Park figural (see bottom pic below). Evidently, this design must of been of a standard template by the manufacturer that was installed in other ballparks, such as Comiskey Park. If anybody has other pictures of this same seat, (especially in other ballparks, please post them).

Hal Totten, Sox/Cubs announcer, at press row with lady friend, 1927
http://memory.loc.gov/ndlpcoop/ichicdn/n0839/n083948.jpg

From historicballparks.com: www.ballparkseats.com has the only known example of a figural seat from League Park....The lone figural side shown to the left is from the auction house Lelands. The sides were sold in several different auctions.