Braves Field 1949
Braves Field opened August 18,1915, with the Boston Braves defeating the St Louis Cardinals 3-1. Built by the Osborne Engineering Company, it was the first baseball stadium to seat more than 40,000 people. Billed as the largest ballpark in the world, the original dimensions were 402 ft. down each foul line and 550 ft. to center field, prompting Ty Cobb to say “Nobody is going to hit a ball over those fences”. The ballpark was built in four sections: a roofed single deck grandstand that extended past first and third base, two uncovered sections that extended to the foul poles, and a bleacher section that became known as “The Jury Box” that seated about 2,000 fans. In the 1914 World Series the Boston Braves played their home games in the then two-year-old Fenway instead of their own smaller and less inviting South End Grounds. In the following two years the Boston Red Sox would play their home World Series games in Braves Field, which held 5,000 more fans than Fenway Park, making three consecutive years where the World Series home games were played in another team’s park.

After the 1927 season Braves Field would go through constant renovations adding seats and changing the dimensions to the playing field, sometimes even during the season and almost on a yearly base until 1948. Just prior to the 1946 home opener the seats were repainted and by game time some sections had not dried, resulting in fans going home with green paint on their clothing. The Braves apologized and reimbursed more than 5,000 fans $6,000 in cleaning bills.

On September 21,1952, 8,822 fans, the second largest crowd to see a game since July 5th, were in attendance, unaware that this would be the last game ever to be played at Braves Field. The Boston Braves lost to the Brooklyn Dodgers 8-2, for their seventh straight loss. The total season attendance for 1952 was 282,000. Heading into the winter there were no indications that the Braves would move the team to another city.

As spring training approached Milwaukee, the home of the Braves’ top farm team began applying pressure on the Braves to give up their rights so the Browns could move there from St. Louis. The Braves announced that they had turned down $500,000 to move the farm team. Even as the signs began to point in that direction the Boston writers and fans believed the team was stalling Milwaukee until the Browns moved to Baltimore and the Braves could then say “No” to moving the team. But March 13 1953, Louis “Lou” Perin announced he would petition the National League for permission to move to Milwaukee. On March 18th the National League owners voted unanimously for the Boston Braves to move immediately to Milwaukee.

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