Ballpark; Camden Yards and the Building of an American Dream

New York: Simon & Schuster, 1993. First Printing [Stated]. Trade paperback. Very good. Dick Sneary. 284, [2] pages. Illustrations. Index. Chapters include Opening Day; Once an Oriole...; Hizzoner and the Lion; To the Camden Station; America's Architects; The Warehouse; Legacies; Design Concurrence and the Woman of Steel; Red and Green, Working Men, Countdown, Opening Day, Index. Peter Richmond is the author of six books, including The Glory Game (with Frank Gifford), which was a New York Times bestseller. His journalism has been included in more than a dozen anthologies, including Best American Sportswriting of the Twentieth Century. He was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard, Class of '89. His writing has appeared in The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, The New York Times Magazine, and GQ. Named one of the "Ten Best Sports Books" by The Sporting News, Ballpark is the compelling story of how Baltimore's magnificent Camden Yards ballpark was born, and the effects it has had on the city, the team, and the whole course of stadium building across the country. It's both an examination of the city's psyche and a close look behind the scenes at our national pastime. This is a quintessentially American story of progress, movement, change, triumph, and of an eternal renewal of hope. The tale of the Baltimore Orioles' new home, Camden Yards, combines Richmond's love of baseball, interest in urban architecture, and disillusionment with organized sports in America. The volume provides insight on the evolution of baseball from America's "national pastime" to a distinctly commercial enterprise manned by surly millionaire players and an antagonistic, profit-driven cartel of owners. Richmond, who worked as a sportswriter for various newspapers, was a staff writer for Gentleman's Quarterly at the time of Ballpark's publication in 1993. In Ballpark, Richmond outlines Camden Yards's attempt to counter the public's jaundiced perception of baseball by evoking the sentiment and nostalgia of the sport's yesteryear. The stadium itself garnered accolades from urban planners and architecture buffs for its incorporation of a 1905 railroad warehouse into part of its design, while sports enthusiasts applauded its vintage ballpark layout. The Orioles' home is unique in its rejection of such modern developments as Astroturf, and its open-air, grass-turfed setting, reminiscent of the extinct Ebbetts Field in New York City, evokes a bygone era of baseball. Ballpark also discusses the more unsavory elements of Camden Yards's success story. Richmond points out why the Orioles' previous quarters, Memorial Field, were perfectly adequate and discusses the transparent reasons given for the costs of building a new park. He profiles the key participants involved in its development, including Edward Bennett Williams, a wealthy Washington, DC, attorney and power broker who purchased the Orioles in 1979. Urban officials and baseball fans feared the loss of the team to their rival city until another important person in Camden Yards's story—Baltimore's enthusiastic mayor William Donald Schaefer—took control of the situation. Schaefer, who went on to become governor during this period, spearheaded a proposal through community boards and the state legislature that would dissuade Williams from moving the Orioles out of the city with a tempting new ballpark. Maryland lawmakers approved the bill, which allowed the construction of Camden Yards to be financed by proceeds from the sale of lottery tickets. Another key figure was Janet Smith, an architect and urban planner hired to oversee construction. By most accounts Smith earned a legion of enemies in Baltimore through her attempts to take undue credit for every successful facet of the project. Richmond sketches Camden Yards's development from the planning stages (and subsequent controversies surrounding its location and design) to its full-house opener of the 1992 season, but a subtext of his tale questions the reasons behind the new park. Ballpark suggests that Camden Yards's manifestation represents the current state of baseball: a bit uncomfortable in its modern role as a profit-driven enterprise, seeking to redeem itself by injecting an element of nostalgia that will both reward fans and give credibility to its continued existence. Ballpark won favorable reviews from critics. Jonathan Yardley, writing in the Washington Post Book World, remarked that given the hype and unequivocal praise surrounding the new playing field, "Richmond has written a considerably more subtle and revealing book about the making of Camden Yards than we had any particular reason to expect." Yardley also noted that "on the subject of Baltimore and its beloved Orioles, Richmond is exceptionally good." Los Angeles Times Book Review writer John Schulian lauded the author's talents as "a stylish, insightful sportswriter," and remarked, "ah yes, sports in the '90s—and what a splendid job Richmond does of depicting them as the corporate fandango they have become."