Are you on a Mac (like I am) or a PC? Not that it should matter, I'd think, but maybe there's a weird character in one of the files that makes PCs unhappy?

On a PC

Beyer Stadium, Rockford
 

Hi all,

After a bit of a pause driven by various work and life things, I'm happy to point to Beyer Stadium, home of the AAGPBL Rockford Peaches.

Beyer Stadium Google Drive link

As usual, this one has a few anachronisms, though perhaps for different reasons than usual--the AAGPBL was constantly tinkering with various rules including the distances between bases and between the pitcher's mound and home plate. This model of course has the MLB/MiLB standard distances. I don't see that Beyer Stadium had any fences but i put in a chain-link fence if only for convenience. I couldn't find any dimensions so just put something in that seemed reasonable for CF and the lines and worked from there.

I ran an exhibition game and things seemed to work OK. As usual, let me know if something doesn't work, though as recently demonstrated that doesn't mean I can fix it. :(

I expect to stay at a slower pace over the next several weeks, but next in my queue are Ruppert Stadium in Newark, the Racine AAGPBL park, and another 1915-1920 era park (maybe New Haven or Providence).

thank you, thank you, thank you. I'll try this later tonight.

I will do a test of Beyer Stadium but it will be a while since I want to use the correct 1943 Rockford Peaches roster. I can even find some limited stats, so hopefully I can construct the 1943 AAGPBL teams.

Of course we can't get the skirts for the proper uniforms. Has anyone done uniforms (at least uniform colors and logos) for the women's league? If not, I will improvise some kind of apparel.

If I wanted to test Beyer in a hurry I suppose I could use teams from the early 1940s Class D Wisconsin State League men's minors but they had a few sluggers in the league which might wreck the way the women's league ballpark worked. Using actual stats for the 1943 women's team should help solve many problems with the park size such as homerun numbers.

As far as the rules are concerned, the league changed over time. It began in 1943 using a larger ball pitched underhanded from 40 feet with bases at 60 feet, but the final year of the women's league in 1954 used a regulation ball pitched overhead from 60 feet with bases at 85 feet. I understand the limits the game places on park creation so one will just have to imagine.

I will try to post on Twitch an AAGPBL game with correct rosters at Beyer on Twitch when I am ready. Hopefully, before Christmas.

Yep, this is a hitter's park according to the online widget--it's 300 to LF, 293 to RF and 350 to CF, home runs are inflated something like 40-50%. But obviously, folks should tinker with park factors etc. depending on their particular use case.

I'll also add one more screenshot showing the ticket booth and stairs way out in the left field corner, since I did make it and might as well get credit for it even if it never ever gets shown in-game. ;)

Very nice!

see this thread.
https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...57#post4847957

thats awesome. If you want i can measure the distances on Thursday, i think. Going to Rockford on Thursday and i will go here again.

If you're planning to go, sure--or you can see if there's someone there who knows what the original dimensions were. I'm not sure the current dimensions match what the ones they used were. Also, if the real dimensions were too small we'd have to enlarge them anyhow--a CF dimension of 300 feet puts the center fielder beyond the fence when a play starts. So I wouldn't have you go out of your way to do it. But it'd be easy enough to alter the dimensions to whatever size field you prefer.

i sent a tweet out to @AAGPBL & @RFDPeaches75 on Twitter to ask them if they know.

I wanted my test of Beyer to do justice to the AAGPBL and so I spent many hours of preparation prior to the YouTube video link found below of my game at Beyer. It really is a fantastic addition to the ballparks found at the OOTP Mods.

I wanted to set up a game between Racine and Rockford set in the inaugural AAGPBL season of 1943. Txranger was kind enough to provide a link to his AAGPBL jerseys, caps, and logos and so I decided to go the whole nine yards and set up the four teams in that 1943 season based upon real player names and real player stats.

I first created a four team fantasy league in commissioner mode and had the league based around the statistics of 1908 MLB which looked about right to me comparing things like league ERA and homeruns of 1908 MLB and 1943 AAGPBL. In other words, expect the play and strategy of the ladies this season to be similar to the deadball era.

The 1943 AAGPBL rules appeared to be mixture of fast pitch softball and baseball. Baseball additions were nine players instead of ten, runners allowed to lead off from bases, and the allowed use of baseball bats. Softball holdovers in 1943 included a larger ball pitched underhanded from 40 feet with the bases 60 feet apart.

The 1943 AAGPBL had all four teams playing 108 regular season games. Racine finished with 59 regular season wins and defeated Kenosha three games to none in the playoffs. Rockford's 48 wins was last in the league. The top hitter in the league that year for batting average was Gladys Davis of the Peaches at .332 while the top home run hitter was Eleanor Dapkus Wolf of the Belles with 10.

Starting with the fictional players and ratings I manually created the proper player names and based their player ratings on actual 1943 AAGPBL statistics but all fielders except for noted stars at their position were given average ratings since I could not easily find fielding statistics for that year. If date of birth was not found I made those players 25 years old with a birthday of October 5, 1917. Except for the rare cases like Racine's Kurys, almost all heights and weights of the AAGPBL players are not available and so I arbitrarily set the unknown at the 1940 women's adult average height at 5 foot 2 and 1940 women's adult average weight at 134. All pitchers throw right-handed and all batters hit right-handed if that fact is not known.

Here is the Youtube video of my Belles facing the Peaches at asrivkin's Beyer Stadium: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51iQ...el=kcstengelsr

I describe it there as:

"Jerseys, caps, and logos by txranger. Sounds by kcstengelsr. Manual changes from fictional players to get correct player names and all players have manually adjusted ratings based upon real 1943 AAGPBL stats.
Note: the game does not have female player models and skirts were not possible. play-by-play refers by default to he/him/his instead of she/her/hers. the game has pitching and base distances by default at major league standard and so 1943 AAGPBL distances were not possible."

It took me a lot of time and effort to eventually produce this video but Beyer Stadium by asrivkin was worth it. I next plan of completing the rosters and ratings of Kenosha and South Bend and I may do another video featuring the other two teams of the 1943 AAGPBL.

As hoped, I did finish the rosters and ratings of Kenosha and South Bend and so I have completed all four of the 1943 AAGPBL teams. Kenosha had 56 regular season wins and went on to lose to Racine in the playoffs. South Bend had 58 wins but did not make the playoffs as it was set for first half versus second half teams. It took some time to finalize my fifteen in number active women's rosters of the four teams (with about four on each team being pitchers) as some players that year moved around as the league wanted balance. I decided to also use balance to properly place those who had been on more than one team.

I do have South Bend hosting Kenosha on Youtube while using Rockford's Beyer Stadium by asrivkin. The game features two of the best AAGBPL 1943 pitching aces, those two being Margaret Berger of South Bend and Helen Nichol Fox of Kenosha. The Youtube link is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdUF...el=kcstengelsr

I personally learned quite a bit of things I did not know about the AAGPBL while doing this project so it was worth the time and effort. Here are just two:

1. You baseball historians probably are aware of the fact that fifteen year old Joe Nuxhall pitched for the Cincinnati Reds during the ballplayer shortage in 1944, but the 1943 AAGPBL had a surprising number of players under the age of eighteen with the youngest of all being South Bend's Dorothy Schroeder who had only turned fifteen less than two months before the opening of the season. Schroeder was a slick-fielding, light-hitting shortstop who was later in her career with an improved bat skill described by Chicago Cubs manager Charlie Grimm as worth $50K per year, "if she were a boy." Dorothy is also the sole and only one of these women who played through the complete 1943-1954 AAGPBL era. She also happens to be one of the rare AAGPBL players with known height and weight at 5 foot 8 inches and 150 pounds. The movie "A League of Their Own" does not hint that a good number of 1943 AAGPBL players were teenagers.

South Bend manager Bert Niehoff actually had a previous experience before the AAGPBL playing a woman while he managed a game. As skipper of minor league Chattanooga facing the New York Yankees in an 1931 exhibition he called for a relief pitcher and brought in seventeen year old lefty woman Virne Mitchell to face Babe Ruth. Ruth hammed it up with two wild swings and then was struck out looking. Gehrig followed and fanned swinging. Lazzeri tried a bunt and then Niehoff gave Mitchell the rest of the game off. A few days later Baseball Commissioner Landis voided Virne's contract, ending her career. The judge said that baseball for women was "too strenuous." Actually baseball did not formally ban women until 1952. Former major league second baseman and long time minor league manager Bert Niehoff had dealt with women before.

For now I have all four of the 1943 AAGPBL team I created using Beyer Stadium as their home grounds. When asrivkin completes the ballpark for Racine I think I will use the Racine park for the Belles and Kenosha and Beyer Stadium for the Peaches and South Bend.

Good work, asrivkin!

subscribed. I plan on watching some of the videos in an hour or so while i play OOTP.

Ruppert Stadium, Newark
 

Well, I thought I'd go at a slower pace, but apparently I'm not. :)

So here's Ruppert Stadium in Newark. It was home to the Newark Bears of the International League and the Newark Eagles of the Negro National League. There's a SABR article about it, if you're interested. A veritable who's who of baseball in the 1920s-1940s played here at some point, including an aging Babe Ruth in an exhibition game in the twilight of his career.

As someone who grew up in the NYC suburbs, I couldn't resist representing some of the brands my grandparents liked on the outfield walls. :)

The factory next door to the 3rd-base side isn't quite in the right place, but it at least adds some visual interest. I couldn't find any views out to the 1st-base side, but it looks on the maps like there was a chemical plant over there, so that's what I grabbed from 3D Warehouse.

Thanks to KCStengelSr, who served (yet again!) as playtester and fence tweaker! Let me know if you're having any problems and I'll see what I can do! As far as what's on deck, Horlick Field, home of the AAGPBL's Racine Belles, is pretty close to done.

Google Drive link to Ruppert Stadium

Thank you so much for Ruppert Stadium in Newark. The park is important for both the history of the minor leagues and for the history of the Negro Leagues. Publishing Ruppert Stadium has also achieved a milestone in the history of OOTP 3D Mods as for the first time ever one wishing to play a season of the major league Negro Leagues (1920-1948) now has available a published 3D Mods home ballpark for each of the teams in at least one season during the history of the Negro Leagues.

If one wanted to play the 1920 Negro Leagues season one would have a tough time placing teams in proper parks as only Schorling (South Side Park) in Chicago by silvam14, Washington Park in Indianapolis by asrivkin, and Inlet Park in Atlantic City by asrivkin have yet to be published at 3D Mods. It looks like the 1930 Negro Leagues season has five published parks available and the 1940 Negro Leagues season is missing any home park for two teams, but with Ruppert one now can give each of the 1946 Negro Leagues teams a home.

Having Ruppert now allows one to assign a home ballpark to each of the teams for actually THREE campaigns of the Negro Leagues (1945-1947). For example, if one wanted to play the historically important 1946 Negro Leagues (read asrivkin's link to the SABR article on Ruppert) one could assign teams to parks as follows using the records listed of the Negro Leagues at Seamheads:

1946 Negro National League
1. Newark Eagles. Ruppert Stadium by asrivkin.
2. New York Cubans. Polo Grounds 1940-63 by silvam14. The Cubans also used that season Yankee Stadium 1938-51 by silvam14 and Dexter Park in Queens which is yet to be created by anyone as far as I know.
3. Baltimore Elite Giants. Bugle Field by asrivkin.
4. Homestead Grays. Griffith Stadium 1921-51 by silvam14. The Grays also used that season Forbes Field 1925-46 by silvam14.
5. Philadelphia Stars. Shibe Park 1930-48 by silvam14. The Stars also used that season 44th & Parkside (also known as Penmar Park) in Philadelphia, but Penmar is yet to be created.
6. New York Black Yankees. Yankee Stadium 1938-51 by silvam14. The Black Yankees also used that season Polo Grounds and Dexter Park.

1946 Negro American League
1. Kansas City Monarchs. Blues Stadium 1942-54 by silvam14.
2. Birmingham Black Barons. Rickwood Field by silvam14.
3. Cleveland Buckeyes. League Park 1930-46 by silvam14. The Buckeyes that season also used Cleveland Stadium 1932-53 by silvam14.
4. Cincinnati-Indianapolis Clowns. Crosley Field 1942-57 by silvam14. The Clowns that season also used Victory Field (also known as Perry Stadium or Bush Stadium) in Indianapolis but Perry is yet to be created,
5. Memphis Red Sox. Russwood Park by asrivkin.
6. Chicago American Giants. Comiskey Park 1927-48 by silvam14.

Maybe someday creators will build on this set of complete Negro Leagues home parks but it probably would be easiest to start from the 1946 above list and gradually add parks missing for some years. For examples,
A. To give each of the 1948 Negro Leagues teams a home park (the last year credited as major league quality) the missing are Martin Stadium in Memphis (historically significant as then the only stadium owned by African Americans in the whole country) and Perry in Indianapolis, but Redwing Stadium in Rochester would also be handy as the Black Yankees played the bulk of their 1948 home games in Rochester.
B. To give each of the 1944 Negro Leagues teams a home park the missing are Martin in Memphis and Penmar in Philadelphia.

I want to thank asrivkin and silvam14 for providing the parks necessary for one to play at least one Negro Leagues season using OOTP. In 1946 the Newark Eagles defeated the Kansas City Monarchs in seven games for the NL World Series. I used Ruppert and along with the correct 1946 rosters from Seamheads I played a game at Ruppert and published it at YouTube for all to see. The link is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pwbx...el=kcstengelsr

Thank you asrivkin!

Horlick Field, Racine
 

Happy Holidays, all!

I've been spending some time finishing up my actual OOTP project (the Phillies surprised the Red Sox in the 1917 World Series, taking it in 5 games) but did manage to finish another park: Racine's Horlick Field, home to the AAGPBL's Racine Belles! According to Green Cathedrals, it also was the home field for the Chicago American Giants for a small number of games in 1945 and 1950.

Google Drive Link to Horlick Field

This was a fun one! A few good pictures from reasonable angles and a relatively restricted period of time. I also found a bunch of material including a run of Racine Belles yearbooks at the Wisconsin Historical Society. No pictures of the field, but fun to look through.

Even with that, there are still a few caveats. It took me a bit of extra care to get the field sized correctly (a perennial problem for me)--in this case the AAGPBL baseline distances tripped me up since I typically take it for granted that if I see the bases in a photo they'll be 90' apart. The ballpark dimensions in Green Cathedrals suggest to me that they _didn't_ take that into account. I also stuck in a scoreboard modeled after what Kenosha had, though I couldn't find any pictures with a clear view of the outfield. I used the park factors that OOTP gave me for a field of this size in Milwaukee, but you'll probably want to put in some different park factors depending on what you're using this for.

As usual, please let me know of any problems and I'll try to tackle them!

I have a game using Horlick up on YouTube with the park factors for Horlick all set at 1.000 and capacity set at 5000. The link for the game between the Racine Belles and Kenosha Comets set in the 1943 AAGPBL is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Edir...el=kcstengelsr

My game has lots of different things since I basically created the 1943 AAGPBL from scratch using the available actual statistics. I play-tested dozens of full 1943 seasons to get historical results which required tweaking the league settings for things like hits, extra base hits, strikeouts, walks, and steals. I added tinted photos of the actual 1943 AAGPBL players. I added custom sounds like the piano playing a tune from 1943 for the stretch, and I added some custom camera angles to Horlick. I hope people enjoy watching this game as I think my AAGPBL project now results in season-long statistics very close to the actual results. For example, do expect many stolen base attempts as that was very common in the 1943 AAGPBL.

Notes:
1. Some of you may be able to set your text reader to a female voice. I wanted to do so for this AAGPBL game and I was able to set my text reader/narrator to female for most purposes but for the OOTP game it always reverts to Mick David (Microsoft David). Some of you might have better luck getting a female voice.
2. The game text by default refers to he, him, his, and he's instead of she, her, hers, and she's. I suspect to get female reference that the OOTP Development Team would have to make some small tweaks to OOTP/data/text/english and then make the new file something like english_female.

Thank you asrivkin for Racine's Horlick Field. Playing the 1943 AAGPBL has been fun for me since not much baseball news has been going on since the lockout.

Asrivkin's link to those Racine yearbooks is also a jewel for anyone interested in the AAGPBL. I noticed that it lists heights and weights of the Racine players and those are not easy to find for most of the AAGPBL players. It also has fielding statistics which are not readily found in simple searches.

Assigning Horlick Field to Racine and Kenosha while using asrivkin's Beyer Stadium for Rockford and South Bend, one can imagine full replays of the 1943 AAGPBL. I have done dozens using my individual player and league ratings and typically Racine does finish with the best record with South Bend, Kenosha, and Rockford following in that order. However, sometimes I have seen South Bend win the playoffs and in fact all four of the teams have made my playoffs at least once in a couple of dozen replays.

Using both of asrivkin's AAGPBL ballparks, I have a YouTube video of one of the games from one of my season's Championship Series. It features the Racine Belles going to asrivkin's Beyer Stadium in Rockford to play the South Bend Blue Sox.
The YouTube link which includes a clear description of my whole process for this Game Four of this Championship Series is:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpHt...el=kcstengelsr
The other games of this Championship Series with the first two featuring asrivkin's Horlick Field in Racine can be found on Twitch by going to Twitch and searching kcstengelsr. However, my Twitch OOTP22 games only remain for fourteen days unlike the unlimited time for YouTube and so if you are interested you must check these out during this limited time from this posting. I must admit that all of my Twitch 1943 AAGPBL Series games ended up being nail-biters.

I would be willing to share my 1943 AAGPBL .lg and photos and other files with the OOTP community if I can get Mediafire working. None of this would have been possible without asrivkin's AAGPBL parks.

Want to try my version of the 1943 AAGPBL by downloading some of my Mediafire files, unzipping them, and placing them into OOTP22?

First, you need the .lg file. This will have the league set up with the settings and ratings I use. It also should have the four AAGPBL 1943 teams in uniforms made by Txranger. After unzipping, copy the folder and place this (Windows users) in documents/out of the park developments/saved games. I think this should work for those wanting to play the 1943 AAGPBL season if you in game then search and load a saved game, but others might know more about that as I am kind of new to this.
The .lg file: https://www.mediafire.com/file/wl783..._43lg.zip/file

Second, how about hearing sounds appropriate for the 1943, so no jet airplanes and other stuff more likely heard in modern baseball? How about a complete sounds file to place in Beyer Stadium and Horlick Field? It has eight different piano stretches from the early 1940's which will play at random along with all other era sounds like proper rallies and ambients. You might for example hear some choo choo train or trolley car. It is the largest of the three Mediafire folders and to use it, open and copy/paste the contents to Beyer and Horlick. (You could if you wish also use these sounds at major league parks set in the early 1940s, imagining that they have yet to employ a stadium organist.)
The sounds: https://www.mediafire.com/file/smvlf...ounds.zip/file

Third, I made color tinted photos of the 1943 AAGPBL players. To use, open the folder and copy and paste the contents into the game's photos folder.
The photos: https://www.mediafire.com/file/foobk...hotos.zip/file

Be sure to download asrivkin's Beyer Stadium and Horlick Field for best results. My .lg folder is set up with you unemployed, so become manager of one of the four teams, try your own strategy, and good luck. (Hint: for the most challenge, try being the manager of Rockford or Kenosha.)

Footnote: Since my 1943 AAGPBL sim seasons are based upon the actual 1943 statistics and since I do not know the proper 1943 park factors of Beyer and Horlick, I edit to set them both at 1.000 values for all factors.

That's...not what girls look like...:p

Good job, tho.

Bendix Field, South Bend
 

Hi all. Happy New Year!

I've spend the last month actually playing OOTP! Maybe I'll actually post in one of the other forums and talk about it. :)

I've also made a few more parks for the league I'm doing, though I think they're mostly of limited interest beyond that (not that that's stopped me before). I'll probably post 1-2 of them anyhow.

Of more broad interest, though, I also just finished Bendix Field, home of the AAGPBL South Bend Blue Sox from 1943-1945:

Google Drive link to Bendix Field

As with the other AAGPBL parks, there are a few anachronisms/inaccuracies. OOTP requires 90 feet between bases, while it was never 90 feet between bases in the AAGPBL, for instance. I also didn't get any images of the grandstand, and in fact I'm not even sure it is a grandstand rather than roofless. There are a few more images from their next park, Playland Park where they played starting in 1946.

Next for the AAGPBL will be the park in Kenosha. And as noted, I'll post a few others. :) As usual, let me know if there are problems and I'll try and fix them!

What a nice surprise is Bendix Field in South Bend, Indiana. I can now assign the park to the Blue Sox in my 1943 AAGPBL and with the park in Kenosha someday coming by asrivkin the complete set of the four 1943 AAGPBL ballparks will be available.

Using my actual real players based upon the 1943 statistics, txranger's uniforms, my version of their tinted photos, and my custom sounds and camera angles I playtested a game at Bendix Field with the 1943 Blue Sox hosting the Rockford Peaches. I placed it on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-Wv...el=kcstengelsr

I am once again doing a simulation of the 1943 AAGPBL season and going into this August game South Bend is in second place while Rockford sits at third in the four team league. The statistics shown in the game reflect how my rated players are doing with a bit more than a month remaining in the 108 game regular season schedule.

Note: if you are interested in the 1943 AAGPBL, check out page six here at asrivkin's Jazz Age page where I provided working links to download the 1943 AAGPBL .lg file, tinted player photos of the ladies in the league that season, and custom sounds appropriate for 1943. I tested those Mediafire links just today and they still work--they are absolutely free for your use.

Maier Park, Vernon
 

Hi all.

As I mentioned before, I've polished off a few fields since the start of the year but haven't posted them (yet?). I think this one could be of more general interest, though, so here you go:

Maier Park c. 1918, home of the PCL Vernon Tigers

One of the things I've enjoyed about making these parks is that I learn all sorts of neat history about places during the research and preparation phase. The history of Vernon in particular as a tiny independent enclave of drinking and carousing (and as an industrial dystopia) inside of an alcohol-free Los Angeles was one I never knew or suspected.

Anyhow, the Vernon Tigers were LA's second team in the PCL from 1909-1925, save for a couple of years when they were based in Venice (which was the only other place in the LA area that allowed legal alcohol sales). This park was used for Tigers baseball on most days, with the team sharing the Angels' park on Sunday.

If you're interested in more detailed history of the team, especially around 1919-1920, I'll point you to this article at the official site of Minor League Baseball as a start.

There's not a lot of photo documentation of the park, but I used what I could. There was an old insurance map. This is another of those situations where they stuck a park in-between a bunch of factories so the view isn't as pretty as it could be, but if the game drags on you can always head to Doyle's bar (the longest in the world, I'm told!) via a special entrance in left field!

Thanks a lot for historic Maier Park in Vernon, California. Everyone interested in the Pacific Coast League and historic old ballparks should download this beautiful effort.

The 1909-1925 PCL Vernon Tigers had an interesting history. I understand that in the greater Los Angeles area of the time only Venice, California and Vernon, California permitted the sale and consumption of alcohol. The Tigers did briefly try playing in Venice but the team struggled in Venice at the gate. Moving to Vernon seemed to do the trick for attracting fans.

For a brief time until 1920 the Tigers were owned by famous silent screen actor Fatty Arbuckle and they were informally then known as the Hollywood Stars. I understand that ballgames in Vernon were a popular pastime for the movie star community but then nationwide Prohibition began in 1920. Arbuckle sold his interest and the Tigers with Prohibition struggled. Starting in 1926 this PCL franchise played in the San Francisco area as the Mission Reds. The franchise returned to the Los Angeles area in 1938 and become known as the Hollywood Stars. The PCL had the Hollywood Stars in the league through 1957, the last year before the Dodgers arrived. (Footnote: the Salt Lake City team moved to Los Angeles starting in 1926 as the original Hollywood Stars but they moved to San Diego to become the Padres in 1936).

I had fun playtesting this ballpark, but I kind of wish that I had a Vernon Tigers team prior to Prohibition so that I could add for example beer vendors in my custom sounds folder for Maier. I did already have the 1925 season downloaded and I had already added Txranger's PCL uniforms. I had the Vernon Tigers playing in Washington Park (by asrivkin) and the Tigers did play there on Sundays (I guess one could not buy alcohol prior to Prohibition on Sundays even in Vernon). The Tigers mostly played home games in Maier Park and since asrivkin has made the ballpark for our community I manually added Maier as the place for the 1925 Tigers. I added custom sounds to Maier Park and playtested a game and placed it on YouTube.

See for yourself how Maier looks and plays. Here is a game set in the 1925 PCL with the Vernon Tigers hosting the Seattle Indians on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Hh0...el=kcstengelsr

As a personal note, I kind of wonder if the PCL prior to Prohibition sometimes was known for rowdy crowds. Imagine going to Maier Park with that huge bar area. Imagine Recreation Park in San Francisco (also by asrivkin) with its own booze cage area.

More fine work! The hsitroical share is a gold mine as well. Thank you.

Hanlan's Point Stadium, Toronto
 

Next up is the home of the OG Toronto Maple Leafs from 1910-1925: Hanlan's Point Stadium (aka Maple Leaf Park).

Google Drive Link to Hanlan's Point Stadium

This was the third park on this spot in the Toronto Islands, with the first two succumbing to fire. The park was on the grounds of an amusement park, as was the style with many other parks of the era, and some of the pictures show a roller coaster hugging the outfield wall. The park was the location of Babe Ruth's first professional home run, no doubt helped by the short RF fence (about which, more below). I added the roller coaster, the carousel, the "Circle Swing", and the skyline from the right period.

This was a more difficult park to make than usual, suffering from the paradoxical situation of having too much information available but not the right information or consistent information. With three similar but not identical parks built in the same place within a 15-year span, it wasn't always obvious what photos/maps went with what era, and an insurance map gave dimensions that were clearly bananas. Working from aerial and in-park photos was difficult because the surrounding amusement park would also change its appearance (including the roller coasters) and removed context clues. In the end I went with something more or less consistent with the evidence but that probably doesn't match any of it. The RF distance is 270 feet--short, but no shorter than the Polo Grounds. The LF distance is 375 feet, and left center is well over 500 feet--this is murder on righty pull hitters.

In any case, there are various histories available if you're interested, including a Wikipedia article and an archived web page on old Toronto amusement parks that includes some discussion.

Next up, I'm going to try to get ready for some barnstormers by tackling Rochester and Columbus, but I also have a few requests I'll try and get to!

Quick fix
 

Quick note--I see that I didn't include the animated crowd in the version of the park I posted above. I've fixed that, here's the new link in case you don't want to/can't make the fix to that problem:

New Google Drive Link to Hanlan's Point Stadium

That's a wonderful park right there! I'll definitely be downloading this one!

Oh boy, Hanlan's Park in Toronto is a real jewel and it is lots of fun playing a game there with plenty of interesting features.

I decided to play the 1920 Detroit Tigers with Ty Cobb hosting the 1920 New York Yankees with Babe Ruth. Imagine the in that first year of Prohibition that the Tigers moved some games across the border where beer was legal. I have the result on YouTube and you can see for yourself what Hanlan's looks like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9Mf...el=kcstengelsr

Thanks to asrivkin for this beauty. Period uniforms are by silvam14. Facegens by fancyskunk. I added custom sounds from my Mods/Sounds/Early to Hanlan's and made sure that a beer vendor was included. I also made a number of custom camera angles including one from on top of the rollercoaster beyond centerfield which was used once in this YouTube game.

I highly recommend downloading asrivkin's Hanlan's Park!

Simmons Field--Home of the AAGPBL Kenosha Comets
 

OK, after some time off for vacation and actually playing the game, I've got a few more things to post! First up is Simmons Field, which hosted the Kenosha Comets from 1948-1951. Unfortunately, the Comets' first field, Lakefront Stadium, has very little information available, which discouraged me from trying to model it.

Simmons Field, on the other hand, still exists and still hosts baseball. It's been renovated since the Comets' days, but there was a lot more to work with!

Google Drive link to Simmons Field

This gives home parks for all of the teams in the AAGPBL in its first two seasons, though as noted not all of the home parks are the ones used in 1943-1944. Next up for the AAGPBL will be Fort Wayne and Grand Rapids, though it might not be for a little while...

Asrivkin has achieved another milestone. First, he filled in some gaps for Pacific Coast League ballparks and if someone downloads asrivkin's, silvam14's, and eriqjaffe's combined contributions one can play in all of the classic mid-1940's PCL parks. Second, he filled in other gaps for Negro Leagues ballparks and if one downloads asrivkin's and silvam14's combined efforts one can find a home ballpark for all the the Negro Leagues teams for the years 1945-1947. And now with Simmons Field in Kenosha all four of the teams in the 1943 All American Girl's Professional Baseball League have "a ballpark of their own."

I placed on YouTube a 1943 AAGPBL game with the South Bend Blue Sox going to Simmons Field to play the Kenosha Comets, complete with my (ahem) custom 1943 AAGPBL pants and shoes. Here it is and you can read more about what I did at Simmons Field in the YouTube description:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7K99...el=kcstengelsr

Thanks again asrivkin.

I just tried the Drive link to Hanlan's Point, and it gave an error. Could it be re-uploaded possibly, please?

Hmm. The link in post 128 seems to work for me, it superseded the link in post 127. Here it is again:


https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ISV...ew?usp=sharing

If this still doesn't work let me know and maybe we can come up with a work around if need be...

There we go, that works! Thanks!

Kinsley Park, Providence
 

It's past time to post a few more parks that I've made over the past few months.

First up is Kinsley Park, Providence's home of baseball for...a bit of an indeterminate period. It is most famous for hosting the first night game in NFL history in 1929. It was built sometime in the early 1920s, after the Providence Grays left Melrose Park. It served as the site for barnstorming games--Babe Ruth didn't play here in the minors but did play here with Gehrig on their 1927 tour. It also apparently hosted a lot of soccer in the 1920s.

There is almost no information about this park online. What I'm posting, besides a screenshot of the behind-home view within OOTP, is a snippet of a Providence atlas from the 1920s and a closeup from an early aerial view that happened to catch the park near the edge of the frame.

Google Drive link to Kinsley Park

I've used it a few times, so it should be playable. I believe I set the crowd to be animated. The dimensions are guesses based on the map and aerial and a typical backstop distance. The interior is artistic license but should at least be period appropriate. :)

I placed on YouTube a game using asrivkin's new historical Kinsley Park. I chose to do an exhibition game set in 1930 between the Boston Red Sox and the Boston Braves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ST05...el=kcstengelsr

Thank you asrivkin for this fine historical ballpark!

Hilldale Park
 

I keep planning to post some more old parks and keep getting distracted. Let's see if I can pick up the pace a bit--I have Eclipse Park in Louisville (the minor league one, not any of the major league ones) and Neil Park in Columbus done, but earlier in the week I decided to take on another park from the early days of the Negro Leagues: Hilldale Park in Darby, PA.

Google Drive link to Hilldale Park

The Hilldale club used the park into the early 30s, but at least the field itself seems to have survived much longer--the overhead aerial photo below is from 1953, the oblique one is from the mid-20s. The field position relative to the grandstand is uncentered. I'll say I knowingly modeled it that way given what I could make out from pictures and maps. Sources say the big tree in right center field was in play, I tried to make the grid reflect that out there, but you might want to adjust it depending on what you need. Finally, while I usually try to put period and location appropriate ads on the walls, this seemed like it was pretty spartan (maybe because it was next to a cemetery?) so I left the walls blank.

Enjoy!

Thank you asrivkin for Hilldale Park in Darby, Pennsylvania west of Philadelphia. The Hilldale Club (informally known as the Darby Daises) were in a number of Negro Leagues now considered major league quality. Having a home park for Hilldale Club is good to have as many historic parks for Negro Leagues teams are yet to be created for OOTP.

One problem with OOTP23 which I hope eventually is fixed in OOTP24 is the fact that some major league quality Negro Leagues are missing for some years. For examples if one starts a 1928 season with Negro Leagues and minor leagues included you will not find the 1928 Hilldale Club of the Eastern Colored League and if one starts a 1929 season you will not find the 1929 Hilldale Club of the American Negro League. One will find the Hilldale Club if one starts a 1932 season as the complete 1932 East West League is included along with the extra Pittsburgh Crawfords.

When one gets a Negro Leagues going in OOTP you usually have to make some manual roster changes. I like to use Seamheads as my NeL source and I set up the starting lineups for the 1932 Hilldale Club and the 1932 Detroit Wolves. I played these two in a game using asrivkin's new Hilldale Park which you may watch on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acYo...el=kcstengelsr

The YouTube description of the game has more details about what was involved in setting up this Negro Leagues game.

One thing about the 1932 East West League that I learned recently is the fact that the park of the 1932 Detroit Wolves still exists and is being somewhat restored as a playable historic site:

https://www.mlb.com/news/historic-ne...SFN8fufw6HgJsU

Thanks for what you do for us, asrivkin!

Thank you, kcstengelsr, I appreciate it. :)

As I noted, I've got a few more older parks to post, I just need work to back off a little bit. ;)

And I've seen the great news about Hamtramck Park--I've been kicking around whether to do it as my next Negro League effort, or try to dig up enough information to do Mack Park (or Greenlee Stadium, among others). I know there's a request for Red Wing Stadium, too...

Well! This thread is newly stickied, so I guess it needs some new content! :D I have a bit of a backlog of parks I’ve made, though that includes several that I made for my league and don’t think there’s much general interest in. I’ll post what I think people want and then list what else I have in case there’s any demand.

For now, here’s Neil Park in Columbus. This is technically “Neil Park II”, built in 1905 on the same site as an earlier Neil Park, but reoriented and with a steel and concrete construction (the first such ballpark in the country!).

Google Drive link to Neil Park

Neil Park was home to Negro League and minor league teams throughout the first third of the 1900s. I didn’t find too many interior shots, but hopefully I got the c. 1920s vibe correct in any case. It’s right across the street from Fort Hayes, and the buildings beyond right field are based on what’s still there today (according to Google Earth).

Enjoy!

Thanks, I've been using many of your stadiums in my New England league. I'm in 1905 right now so these smaller parks are perfect. I also edit some textures to give the local feel. I think there would be interest in any stadiums you make

I always look forward to asrivkin's new creations and Neil Park is a worthy addition.

Actual MLB ballgames were played in Columbus, Ohio at Neil Park. The statistics for the Negro Leagues from 1920 through 1948 now count as official MLB numbers and for the one 1921 season the Columbus Buckeyes played in the eight team Negro National League and they played their home games at Neil Park.

When one creates a 1921 season with Negro Leagues included using OOTP23 he will find the eight teams of the Negro National League along with one independent 1921 Negro Leagues team--the Atlantic City Bacharach Giants (wrongly named in the game the New York Bacharach Giants). The Chicago American Giants had the best 1921 record in the NNL and the Columbus Buckeyes are included when the league is created for that season. One has to get into commissioner mode to tweak the NNL rosters and lineups to more properly fit those found at a source like Seamheads.

I set up a 1921 season, tweaked the rosters of the American Giants and the Buckeyes, placed the Buckeyes in Neil Park, assigned caps and jerseys by nopepper to the two teams, added my own custom camera angles and my own custom sounds (stretch song from 1920) to Neil Park, and gave each of the teams my own shorter pants with black shoes to fit the era. I played the resulting 1921 NNL game at Neil Park and placed it on YouTube for free viewing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIWW...el=kcstengelsr

Note: it sounds like nopepper is considering updating his historical Negro Leagues uniforms. i wonder if additionally team logos could be added for any of them?
Note2: i mentioned that creating a Negro Leagues with OOTP23 for 1921 gives a nine team league. now four of those teams have proper homes:
American Giants played in South Side Park by silvam14 (called Schorling then)
Indianapolis ABCs played in Washington by asrivkin
Bacharach Giants played in Inlet by asrivkin
and now
Buckeyes played in Neil by asrivkin

Thank you asrivkin!

Eclipse Park III (or maybe IV), Louisville
 

Thank you for the continued encouragement, micropterus58 and kcstengelsr! Whether I give every park its own post or just put the more niche parks in a folder and just point to it is TBD, but I do have Worcester and New Haven that I'll put here since they seem relevant to at least one person. :)

For today, here's Eclipse Park, which served Louisville from 1902-1922:

Google Drive link to Eclipse Park (1910s)

For nearly 50 years, Louisville baseball teams played in a facility called Eclipse Park. Whether there were three or four such parks is a matter of opinion centering on whether the version of the second Eclipse Park reconstructed after a 1899 fire counts as #3 or is still #2. Regardless, the final Eclipse Park stood in downtown Louisville from 1902-1922, and that’s what I’ve got for you at the link above. If you're interested, there's a lot of Louisville baseball pictures here: https://historiclouisville.weebly.co...all-parks.html

This Eclipse Park (which I’m calling #3 rather than #4) was home to the minor league Louisville Colonels, the independent Negro League precursor team Louisville White Sox, and the Louisville Brecks of the NFL (!!). Unfortunately, while there are a lot of photos of this park, few of them have a wide view. Still, I think between what's available and a Sanborn map I think it's reasonably close?

Enjoy!

A Relevant Aside
 

With Neil Park and Eclipse Park III, a bit of a funny set is completed.

I've attached a couple of screenshots from some research I ran across a while ago while working on making Omaha's Vinton Park. It's from an article from the Omaha Bee from...October 7th? 1917. At least I think that's right--there's no date on the top of the page, and the most recent articles on this page are dated October 6th.

In any case, there's a discussion about the way the ongoing World War might affect the minor leagues in the coming 1918 season, which is of local interest since Omaha played in the Western League, and it wasn't clear if that league would survive and/or if the Omaha team would move up or down a level.

What's of most interest to me here is that one of the drivers for Omaha's situation is what happens to the major leagues. There was some amount of intrigue going on with the American League in general at this point, which isn't mentioned in the article, but they claim in the article that Ban Johnson (president of the American League) thinks a third major league was on the way. The further claim, though not ascribed to Johnson, is that such a league would have teams in Providence, Baltimore, Toronto, Buffalo, Newark, Columbus, Indianapolis, and Louisville.

So, if anyone ever wanted to explore what an alternate history scenario would look like with three 8-team leagues at peace with one another in 1918, they now have correct parks to do it with. :)

Caveat Emptor for Eclipse Park--one user has reported the grid locations are messed up for the dugouts and some wall segments. They seem OK to me in the editor and during play, but computers are strange things.

If anyone else has trouble with players running through Eclipse Park walls, please DM me and I'll see if I can sort it out and post a new version. Thanks!

Had there not been contraction of late 19th century major league teams with Pittsburg doing some "pirating" of orphan players, Honus Wagner likely would have played in this park for Louisville.

Setting up a game for Youtube with this park using historical era teams faces the problem that Louisville during the stretch of Eclipse Park III was back in the minor leagues and OOTP23 seems not to include minor leagues which do not have at least one team affiliated with a major league team. For example I had already set up 1921 with "full" minors and Negro Leagues but only the Pacific Coast League and the Texas League were included in the minors as both of these leagues had at least one affiliation that season. Louisville's 1921 minor league team was in a league with no affiliated teams and so they were not included.

I decided to play the 1921 Chicago Cubs against the Cincinnati Reds, imagining that the Reds set up an exhibition game 105 miles down the road from Cincinnati in Louisville at Eclipse Park. Just for fun, I put both teams in uniforms resembling those used in the real 2022 Field of Dreams game (caps and jerseys by nopepper, I did the shorter pants with black shoes). Here it is free to watch on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbHb...el=kcstengelsr

Note: I was one who had my copy of Eclipse Park with some fences not lining up with the model and so I went into 3D Model of the park and moved some fences around. I think I did ok but notice something in the sixth inning near the Tea sign in right center field.

Thank you asrivkin for this fine ballpark. I love the bull out in left field foul territory.

Katy park file contains no .prk file.

Thanks for the catch! I'll update the link when I can, for now here's a screenshot of the Park Profile so you can enter the numbers yourself.

Atwater Park, Montreal
 

While I'm working on some other parks, I'll post some of my backlog. Here's Montreal's Atwater Park, which served various professional and amateur baseball teams in Montreal in the last decade of the 19th century and the first few of the 20th.

Google Drive link to Atwater Park

There were a few game-time images from inside the park, but they were bad scans of newspaper pictures hosted on the indispensable digitalballparks.com. There were some aerial photos (one of which I've included below), but they seem to date from the era after the grandstand came down and the field was only used for amateur use. So there was a lot of interpolating going on (including the townhouses across the street, which are probably way too pastel for that time and place!)...

Delorimier Stadium was built in 1928, I will eventually get to making that (unless someone else gets to it first!)...

I'll continue my tour of Canadian ballparks c. 1920 in my next post!