Today in Baseball History: Fenway Park opens

On this day in 1912 two new ballparks had their grand openings: the Red Sox’ Fenway Park in Boston and Tiger Stadium in Detroit. On this date in 1916 the Chicago Cubs played their first game at Weeghman Park — renamed Wrigley Field in 1926 — as well.

What a day for ballpark history, eh?

We’ve talked a lot about the Tigers lately, and we mentioned Weeghman/Wrigley in the Federal League post from last week. I’m sure will give both of those places some longer treatments later as well, so let’s focus today on Fenway, shall we?

The Red Sox, then known as the Boston Americans, began play as a charter member of the American League in 1901. Their park: a rickety wooden structure located at Huntington and Rogers Avenues in the Roxbury section of Boston. The site was previously a temporary location for carnivals and traveling circuses and, as such, it was commonly called the Huntington Carnival Lot. It was described at the time as “no more than an expansive wasteland made up of heavily weeded bumps and lumps.” There was a pharmaceutical company nearby and, if the wind was just right, you could smell chemicals. So that was promising.

Some remarks on a rather familiar ballpark- and one that, indeed, has a great atmosphere to it from the outside, though I’ve never been in town during baseball season with time on my hands.