Veterans Stadium
Veterans Stadium, also known as The Vet, or Veterans Memorial, was a multi-purpose stadium in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This particular ballpark was located in the South Philadelphia Sports Complex, at the corner of Broad Street and Pattison Avenue.
As of 1971, the stadium has a capacity of over 65.000 seats for football game, while it could also accommodate about 56.000 seats for baseball audiences. The stadium was home to MLB’s Philadelphia Phillies, and also became home to the Philadelphia Egles of the NFL, who played there from 1971, to 2003. In addition to that, the stadium also hosted various All-Star Games in the MLB season of 1996, before eventually hosting an annual series of Army-Navy football games, from 1980 to 2001. Plans to build this stadium date back to at least 1959, when the person who owned the Phillies at the time, RRM Carpenter JR. had the idea of building a new baseball venue for the team on a lot of land that was not located too far from the Garden State Park Racetrack, in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. Prior to that, the Phillies were actually performing and practicing at Connie Mack Stadium, but the venue was quickly becoming obsolete. It was actually built in 1909, and it started to show many signs of its age. In addition to that, the former facility simply was not equipped to cater to a modern audience. One of the biggest problems was a lack of parking spots, and the fact that the neighborhood in which the Connie Mack stadium was located was considered a declining area. If this wasn’t enough, the sale of alcohol at sporting events was actually forbidden in the state of Pennsylvania, right after 1959, when a ban was instituted. The team was considering a stadium in New Jersey precisely because of the fact that it was still legal to sell alcohol at sporting events there.
However, the Philadelphia Athletics moved to Kansas City, while the Warriors, another local team, actually moved to San Francisco. If the Phillies had also decided to leave for New Jersey, the city of Philadelphia would be left without a professional sports franchise that would draw a big crowd. This was one of the reasons why the city eventually approved the construction of Veterans Stadium, which was at the time, one of the most expensive sporting venues ever built in that capacity. Eventually, the stadium’s construction was finalized through the late 60s, and the team inaugurated it in 1971, playing the very first game on April 10th, against the Montreal Expos.
The stadium was mainly used for professional football and baseball. In addition to that, it was also open to various other sports, both on an amateur and professional level alike. The stadium also served as a venue to many large-scale entertainment events as well as public gatherings of various kinds. Eventually, the facility saw its demise in 2004, when it was demolished by implosion. The replacement for Veterans Stadium was the Citizens Bank Par, as well as another venue named Lincoln Financial Field. The actual former site is now home to a parking lot, which is serving the aforementioned facilities.