Veterans Memorial Stadium (Long Beach)

Last updated
Veterans Memorial Stadium
LBMemorialStadium1.jpg
Veterans Memorial Stadium (Long Beach)
LocationLew Davis St.,
Long Beach, CA
Coordinates 33°49′41.66″N118°8′10.13″W / 33.8282389°N 118.1361472°W / 33.8282389; -118.1361472
Owner Long Beach City College
Operator Long Beach City College
Capacity 11,600
SurfaceSprinTurf
Opened1950
Tenants
Long Beach City College
California Interscholastic Federation
Long Beach State 49ers football (NCAA) (1955–1976, 1983–1992)
Long Beach Admirals (COFL) (1967)
Veterans Memorial Stadium - Opened in 1950 Veterans Memorial Stadium (Long Beach).jpg
Veterans Memorial Stadium - Opened in 1950

Veterans Memorial Stadium (also known as Veterans Stadium, Vets Stadium or simply The Vet) is an 11,600-seat stadium located south of the Liberal Arts Campus of Long Beach City College in Long Beach, California. It is the home stadium to a number of local area high school football teams, as well as Long Beach City College's football team. [1] It was also home to Long Beach State's football team until the program disbanded in 1991. [2]

Contents

The stadium is also popular as a movie set for a number of Hollywood motion pictures. [3] It also hosted the 1985 and 1988 Motorcycle Speedway World Team Cup Finals.

History

Veterans Stadium opened in 1950, and was owned by the City of Long Beach for nearly four decades. The city used the stadium as a temporary location for Fire Station 19 (now located on Clark Avenue, a few blocks away). The fire station was housed at the south end of the stadium under the bleacher area, and the large door that was installed for the fire engine to exit can still be seen. The station itself (or living quarters area) is now used as an office for stadium personnel.

Two years before the Vet was opened, pro football came to Long Beach when the Los Angeles Bulldogs of the Pacific Coast Professional Football League became the Long Beach Bulldogs for the 1948 season. [4] The minor-league PCPFL was on its last legs by this time, and so were the Bulldogs, a legendary West Coast team that had fallen on hard times since the NFL's Los Angeles Rams had relocated from Cleveland, and the AAFC was formed with the Los Angeles Dons. After drawing just 850 fans for a Bulldogs game at Stephen's Field on the campus of Wilson High School in Long Beach on October 17, 1948, the Bulldogs promptly cancelled the rest of their schedule, and they and the PCPFL folded soon after.

Finally, in 1967, the Vet hosted a professional football team: the Long Beach Admirals were admitted to the Continental Football League as part of the league's expansion to the west coast. The Admirals drew only 2,475 fans for an exhibition game, and just 950 fans for their regular season opener, a 37-13 blowout loss to the Seattle Rangers. The team then applied for an immediate relocation to Portland, Oregon; after this was denied, the Admirals dropped out of the league and folded.

In 1987, Long Beach City College acquired Veterans Stadium from the City of Long Beach, and subsequently upgraded the stadium for use by local high school football teams.

One of the most memorable football contests held at the stadium involved Long Beach Polytechnic High School and Lakewood High School, which drew over 11,500 fans and gained regional television coverage. Veterans Stadium is currently the home stadium of the Long Beach Poly Jackrabbits.

Speedway

During the 1980s the stadium also doubled as a Motorcycle speedway venue. The speedway track was laid out over the stadiums existing 400 metres (440 yd) athletics track with additional banking in the corners to allow for faster racing. As well as hosting the World Team Cup Final in 1985 and 1988 (both won by Denmark with the USA finishing second), the stadium played host to numerous American Finals which were then qualifying rounds for the Speedway World Championship during the decade. Some of the riders to have raced at the stadium include Individual World Champions Bruce Penhall and Sam Ermolenko (USA), Erik Gundersen and Hans Nielsen (Denmark), Per Jonsson (Sweden) and Gary Havelock (England), as well as a host of top class riders such as Americans Shawn and Kelly Moran, Bobby Schwartz and Scott Autrey. Veterans is also the site where Dennis Sigalos ended his career with a badly broken leg following a crash in the 1984 American Final.

Rugby League

Probably the most historically notable football contest at this stadium involved a completely different code, rugby league. In 1987, after the three regular matches in the Australian State of Origin series between the states of Queensland and New South Wales, the two teams went to Long Beach for a fourth match, drawing an announced crowd of 12,439 to see New South Wales win 30–18. The canonicity of the match has been in dispute ever since. While all Australian authorities count the match for purposes of individual player statistics, not all of them include it in official team records. Sources in New South Wales, including the Australian Rugby League and its successor, the Australian Rugby League Commission, officially count the match result; those within the Queensland Rugby League do not.

In 2004, Veterans Stadium received another upgrade. A new SprinTurf playing surface replaced the old playing surface in time for the 2004 football season.

Soccer

Veterans Memorial Stadium hosted a match in the 1958 FIFA World Cup qualification; Mexico routed the United States, 7-2, in front of 12,500.

About Veterans Stadium

The basics

Veterans Stadium seats 11,600, and are on one side of the stadium, a grandstand facing east. 7,000 of the seats are aluminum bench bleachers, with the other 4,600 seats having fixed chairbacks. The field is surrounded by a nine-lane, 400-meter track.

Location

The stadium is located on Lew Davis Street between Clark Avenue and Faculty Avenue. It is three miles west of Interstate 605 (use the Carson Street exit) and two miles north of Interstate 405 (use the Lakewood Boulevard exit or the Bellflower Boulevard exit).

Technical information

The field is open at both ends and there is a practice field on the north side and a large parking lot on the south side. There are large locker rooms for both home and visiting teams in the stadium and a smaller room for game officials. There are lights for night play using metal-halide lamps on eight towers. Veterans Stadium also features a two-level press box (capacity 100) atop the west grandstand.

Spectator amenities include 4,000 surface parking spaces, two ticket booths with two windows each, three permanent concessions, and a combined message board and scoreboard.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Canberra Stadium</span> Stadium in Canberra, Australia

Canberra Stadium is a facility primarily used for rugby league and rugby union games, located adjacent to the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra, the capital of Australia. It is the largest sports venue by capacity in Canberra.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dignity Health Sports Park</span> Sports complex and stadium in Carson, California, United States

Dignity Health Sports Park is a multi-use sports complex located on the campus of California State University, Dominguez Hills in Carson, California. The complex consists of the 27,000-seat Dignity Health Sports Park soccer stadium, the Dignity Health Sports Park tennis stadium, a track-and-field facility, and the VELO Sports Center velodrome. It is approximately 14 miles (23 km) south of downtown Los Angeles, and its primary tenant is the LA Galaxy of Major League Soccer (MLS). The main stadium was also home to the Los Angeles Wildcats of the XFL in 2020. The LA Galaxy II of MLS Next Pro play their home matches at the complex's track and field facility. For 2020 and 2021, the stadium served as the temporary home of the San Diego State Aztecs football team.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum</span> Stadium in Los Angeles, California, US

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum is a multi-purpose stadium in the Exposition Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. Conceived as a hallmark of civic pride, the Coliseum was commissioned in 1921 as a memorial to Los Angeles veterans of World War I. Completed in 1923, it will become the first stadium to have hosted the Summer Olympics three times when it hosts the 2028 Summer Olympics; the stadium previously hosted the Summer Olympics in 1932 and 1984. It was designated a National Historic Landmark on July 27, 1984, a day before the opening ceremony of the 1984 Summer Olympics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Central Energy Trust Arena</span> Stadium in New Zealand

Central Energy Trust Arena is the current name of the 180,000 square metre publicly owned recreational complex just west of the Palmerston North city centre in the Manawatū-Whanganui region of New Zealand.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hindmarsh Stadium</span> Football stadium

Hindmarsh Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Hindmarsh, an inner western suburb of Adelaide, South Australia. It is the home of the Australian A-League team, Adelaide United.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Odsal Stadium</span> Sports stadium in Bradford, England

Odsal Stadium in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, is a multi-purpose stadium currently the home of Bradford Bulls Rugby League team and Yorstox Stock Cars who host regular monthly meetings of BriSCA F1 Stock Cars and BriSCA F2 Stock Cars. It has also been used by the Bradford Dukes speedway team, hosting the 1997 Speedway Grand Prix of Great Britain. The football team Bradford City used Odsal as a temporary groundshare following the Valley Parade fire while their ground was rebuilt. Odsal Stadium has also historically hosted baseball, American Football, basketball, kabbadi, show jumping, tennis, live music concerts, and international Rugby League matches over the years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Parramatta Stadium</span> Defunct sports stadium in Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia,

Parramatta Stadium was a sports stadium in Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia, 23 kilometres west of Sydney's central business district. The stadium was the home ground of several western Sydney-based sports teams, at the time of closure the most notable were the Parramatta Eels of the National Rugby League and the Western Sydney Wanderers of the A-League.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gilmore Stadium</span>

Gilmore Stadium was a multi-purpose stadium in Los Angeles, California. It was opened in May 1934 and demolished in 1952, when the land was used to build CBS Television City. The stadium held 18,000. It was located next to Gilmore Field. The stadium was located west of Curson Avenue, surrounded by Beverly Boulevard, Fairfax Avenue and Third Street. The stadium was used in a Three Stooges 1934 short Three Little Pigskins.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Olympic Park Stadium (Melbourne)</span> Former sports stadium in Melbourne

Olympic Park Stadium was a multi-purpose outdoor stadium located on Olympic Boulevard in inner Melbourne, Australia. The stadium was built as an athletics training venue for the 1956 Olympics, a short distance from the Melbourne Cricket Ground, which served as the Olympic Stadium. Over the years it was the home of rugby league side, Melbourne Storm and the A-League team, Melbourne Victory; throughout its life the stadium played host to athletics. Olympic Park Stadium was located in Olympic Park, which is part of the Melbourne Sports and Entertainment Precinct.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henson Park</span> Sports field in New South Wales, Australia

Henson Park is a multi purpose sports ground in Marrickville, New South Wales, Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sports in California</span>

California has 21 major professional sports franchises, far more than any other US state. The San Francisco Bay Area has six major league teams spread amongst three cities: San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose. The Greater Los Angeles Area has ten major league teams. San Diego and Sacramento each have one major league team.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sports in Los Angeles</span> Competitive physical activities in the Los Angeles metropolitan area

The Greater Los Angeles area is home to many professional and collegiate sports teams and has hosted many national and international sporting events. The metropolitan area has twelve major league professional teams: the Los Angeles Lakers, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Los Angeles Rams, the Los Angeles Clippers, the Los Angeles Angels, LA Galaxy, Los Angeles FC, the Los Angeles Kings, the Los Angeles Chargers, Los Angeles Sparks, the Anaheim Ducks, the Los Angeles Knight Riders of the MLC Major League Cricket, their Minor League Cricket affiliate SoCal Lashings, and Angel City FC of the National Women's Soccer League. The Los Angeles metropolitan area is home to nine universities whose teams compete in various NCAA Division I level sports, most notably the UCLA Bruins and USC Trojans. Between them, these Los Angeles area sports teams have won a combined 105 championship titles. Los Angeles area colleges have produced upwards of 200 national championship teams.

The Pacific Coast Professional Football League (PCPFL), also known as the Pacific Coast Football League (PCFL) and Pacific Coast League (PCL) was a professional American football minor league based in California. It operated from 1940 through 1948. One of the few minor American professional sports leagues that competed in the years of World War II, the PCPFL was regarded as a minor league of the highest level, particularly from 1940 to 1945, at a time in which the National Football League (NFL) did not extend further west than Chicago and Green Bay. It was also the first professional football league to have a team based in Hawaii.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Los Angeles Bulldogs</span> Professional American football team from 1936 to 1948

The Los Angeles Bulldogs were a professional American football team that competed from 1936 to 1948. Formed with the intention of joining the National Football League in 1937, the Bulldogs were the first team on the major league level to play its home games on the American West Coast. They were considered "the best football team in existence outside the NFL".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eureka Stadium</span> Sports stadium in Victoria, Australia

Eureka Stadium, known commercially as Mars Stadium, is an oval-shaped sports stadium located in the Eureka Sports Precinct of Wendouree, 2.9 km (1.8 mi) north of the CBD of the city of Ballarat, Victoria, Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Spec Martin Stadium</span> Stadium in DeLand, Florida

Spec Martin Stadium is a 6,000 seat football stadium located in DeLand, Florida. Spec Martin Stadium currently hosts Stetson Hatters football, DeLand High School Bulldog football and was the host of the Central Florida Warriors rugby league team. The stadium was known as DeLand Municipal Stadium from is opening in 1941 until it was renamed in 1973.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sydney Showground Stadium</span> Stadium in Sydney

Sydney Showground Stadium is a sports and events stadium located at the Sydney Showground in Sydney Olympic Park suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It hosted the baseball events for the 2000 Summer Olympics. The Showground, including the stadium, is operated by the Royal Agricultural Society of NSW (RAS), under lease from the New South Wales Government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Western Sydney Stadium</span> Stadium in Parramatta, Australia

Western Sydney Stadium, commercially known as CommBank Stadium, is a multi-purpose rectangular stadium in Parramatta, within the Greater Western Sydney region, approximately 24 km (15 mi) west of Sydney CBD. It replaced the demolished Parramatta Stadium (1986) which in turn was built on the site of the old Cumberland Oval, home ground to the Parramatta Eels since 1947. The current stadium opened in April 2019 and has a 30,000-seat capacity. The stadium is owned by the NSW Government and built at a cost of $300 million. The stadium hosts games across the major rectangular field sports in Sydney.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">BMO Stadium</span> Soccer stadium in Los Angeles

BMO Stadium, formerly Banc of California Stadium, is a soccer-specific stadium in the Exposition Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. It is the home of Major League Soccer's Los Angeles FC and the National Women's Soccer League's Angel City FC. Opened on April 18, 2018, it was the first open-air stadium built in the City of Los Angeles since Dodger Stadium in 1962. Constructed on the site of the former Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, it is located next to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and just south of the main campus of the University of Southern California. Los Angeles FC subleases the site from the University which has a master lease with the LA Memorial Coliseum Commission for operating and managing the Coliseum and stadium properties.

The Long Beach Admirals were a professional American football team based in Long Beach, California.

References

  1. "Veterans Memorial Stadium". lbcc.edu. Retrieved 2017-10-18.
  2. Woolard, John (December 11, 1991). "Football gets sacked at CSULB". The Long Beach Press-Telegram.
  3. "Most Popular Titles With Location Matching "Veterans Memorial Stadium". imdb.com. Retrieved 2017-10-18.
  4. The End of the PCPFL – Bob Gill, Pro Football Research Association (1983)