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A brief history of Fenway Park
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Fenway Park
Fenway Park was built by Red Sox owner John I. Tailor and opened on April 20, 1912. It was named Fenway because it was located in the Fenway section of Boston. The park was constructed at a cost of $650,000.00, and had a seating capacity of 35,000. The field was made of blue grass. The first professional game was played there on opening day between the Boston Red Sox and the New York Highlanders, who later became the Yankees. The Red Sox won that day 7- 6 in 11 innings before a crowd of 27,000 fans. Occasionally, the Red Sox played their big games at Braves Field to accommodate larger crowds.
Fenway’s unusual shape was due to the fact that the owner wanted to keep nonpaying customers out of the park. There was a steep 10 foot embankment in left field that ran in front of the wall where fans were allowed to sit. The embankment was known as, “Duffy’s Cliff”, because the left fielder, Duffy Lewis, was so skilled at playing balls hit there. On May 8, 1926 fire destroyed the bleachers along the left field line. New owner john Quinn didn’t have them rebuilt because he couldn’t afford it.
Thomas Yawkey bought the park in 1933. Fire destroyed most of the park on January 5, 1934. Mr. Yawkey had it rebuilt at a cost of $575,000.00. The park reopened on April 17, 1934. Mr. Yawkey had several changes made to the new park. Concrete bleachers were built in center field, Duffy’s Cliff was leveled, the new seats were made of solid oak, and the 37 foot high wooden wall was replaced by one made of sheet metal. The manual scoreboard was installed on the wall in 1934. In 1936 a 23 and a half foot tall screen was added on top of the wall to protect the windows in buildings on Lansdowne Street. In 1947 the advertisements on the wall were eliminated. Mr. Yawkey had the wall painted green and it was dubbed,” The Green Monster.” The Green Monster had a ladder attached to it just above the playing field. It was used by the groundskeeper to retrieve baseball’s hit into the netting. A foul ball safety screen was put up behind home plate. It was the first of its kind in major league baseball.
In 1939 Ted Williams came to Fenway Park. In 1940 the bullpens were constructed in right field bringing the fence 23 feet closer to home plate for Williams, who was a dead pull left-handed hitter. The bullpen area became known as Williamsburg. There’s one lone red seat in the right field bleachers signifying the longest home run ever hit inside Fenway Park. On June 9, 1946 Ted hit a 502 foot home run there. The ball struck Joe Boucher on the head. It was rumored that Joe was asleep at the time. Appropriately enough Joe was from New York State. Sky view seats were installed in 1946, and lights erected in 1947.
An electronic message board was erected over the center field bleachers in 1976. In’ 88’ and’ 89’ stadium club seats were added above the grandstand behind home plate. In 2003 the monster seats were added atop the wall replacing the netting. The ladder on the wall remained, and is the only ground rule triple in major league baseball. The seating capacity at Fenway Park is now 38,808.
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