Ballpark: Baseball in the American City

An exhilarating, splendidly illustrated, entirely new look at the history of baseball: told through the stories of the vibrant and ever-changing ballparks where the game was and is staged, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning architectural critic.

From the earliest corrals of the mid-1800s (Union Grounds in Brooklyn was a "saloon in the open air"), to the much mourned parks of the early 1900s (Detroit's Tiger Stadium, Cincinnati's Palace of the Fans), to the stadiums we fill today, Paul Goldberger makes clear the inextricable bond between the American city and America's favorite pastime. In the changing locations and architecture of our ballparks, Goldberger reveals the manifestations of a changing society: the earliest ballparks evoked the Victorian age in their accommodations--bleachers for the riffraff, grandstands for the middle-class; the "concrete donuts" of the 1950s and '60s made plain television's grip on the public's attention; and more recent ballparks, like Baltimore's Camden Yards, signal a new way forward for stadium design and for baseball's role in urban development. Throughout, Goldberger shows us the way in which baseball's history is concurrent with our cultural history: the rise of urban parks and public transportation; the development of new building materials and engineering and design skills. And how the site details and the requirements of the game--the diamond, the outfields, the walls, the grandstands--shaped our most beloved ballparks.

A fascinating, exuberant ode to the Edens at the heart of our cities--where dreams are as limitless as the outfields.

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• K: A History of Baseball in Ten Pitches
• Ten Innings at Wrigley: The Wildest Ballgame Ever, with Baseball on the Brink
• Ballparks: Yesterday & Today
• Ballparks Then and Now
• Ultimate Baseball Road Trip: A Fan's Guide To Major League Stadiums
• Incredible Baseball Stats: The Coolest, Strangest Stats and Facts in Baseball History
• The Baseball Maniac's Almanac: The Absolutely, Positively, and Without Question Greatest Book of Facts, Figures, and Astonishing Lists Ever Compiled
• For the Good of the Game: The Inside Story of the Surprising and Dramatic Transformation of Major League Baseball
• The Glory of Their Times: The Story of the Early Days of Baseball Told by the Men Who Played It (Harper Perennial Modern Classics)