Shea Stadium

... was built in the early 1960s.

At the end of the Second World War, Major League baseball in the United States was effectively confined to the Northeast and Midwest. In these regions, many of the largest cities had two teams – one playing in the original National League and one in the later arrival, the American League – but there were no teams west of St. Louis or south of Washington DC.

This all began to change in the 1950s, as baseball began to reflect the changing demographics and the arrival of commercial air travel. Teams began to relocate – lock, stock and barrel. At first they moved to other cities within the north–eastern homelands; the first to move, in 1952, was Boston Braves, which moved to Milwaukee. Two years later St. Louis Browns relocated to Baltimore, becoming the Orioles; and in 1955 Philadelphia Athletics ('the A's') moved to Kansas City.

By this time, New York City officials were trying to persuade Walter O'Malley, owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers, to lease a new stadium that they planned to build in Flushing Meadow. O'Malley liked the idea in principle, but he wanted the stadium to be in Brooklyn and he wanted to own it himself. The two parties failed to agree, and Los Angeles – almost 3,000 miles away, and very much out on a limb as far as baseball was concerned – spotted an opportunity to get itself a major baseball team. The city offered O'Malley what New York had refused – complete ownership of the facility; he wasted no time in leaving for southern California before any new or existing franchise could beat him to it.

You might think that the Jets would be delighted to have New York to themselves, but not a bit of it; owner Horace Stoneham feared that the loss of the local rivalry with the Dodgers would do his team no good at all in the long run. He considered moving to Minneapolis, but then secured a move to San Francisco, where the rivalry between the Dodgers and the Jets could continue – as it does to this day.

This was no doubt great news for California, but it left New York without a National League baseball team after the end of the 1957 season.

Robert F. Wagner Jr., the Mayor of New York, attempted to fill this gap by persuading one of the other six National League teams to move to the city, but his efforts came to nothing. Then in July 1959, New York lawyer William Shea came up with the idea of a third league, to be known as the Continental League (as it would include at least one Canadian team). The National and American leagues responded by announcing an expansion, offering places to the cities in which the Continental League was hoping to operate. One of these was (of course) New York, and the newly–formed New York Mets jumped at the chance to play in the National League. This was effectively the death knell for the Continental League.

One of the conditions attached to the Mets' invitation was the building of a new stadium, and Wagner was obliged to wire all National League owners and assure them that this would be done. The Mets played their first season, 1962, at the Polo Grounds – one of a group of baseball stadiums in Manhattan, which had been home to the New York Jets. Their new home was intended to be ready for the 1963 season, but following the inevitable delays it was on 17 April 1964 that the Mets played their first game at their own home.

The new stadium was originally to be named Flushing Meadow Park Municipal Stadium, but an ultimately successful movement was launched to name it in honor of William Shea – the New York attorney who brought National League baseball back to his home city.

It was on Sunday 15 August 1965 that the Beatles played the concert that would make Shea Stadium famous around the world – in front of a record audience of 55,600, taking Beatlemania to a new peak. Film footage shows many teenagers – and grown women – crying, screaming, and even fainting. The crowd noise was such that security guards can be seen covering their ears as the Beatles entered the field. It was so deafening that not even the Beatles themselves could hear what they were playing. Nevertheless, it was the first concert to be held at a major stadium, and it set records for attendance and revenue generation, demonstrating that outdoor concerts on a large scale could be successful and profitable.

The Beatles returned to Shea just over a year later, on 23 August 1966. The attendance record stood until 1973, when 56,800 fans paid to see and hear Led Zeppelin at Tampa Stadium. (By this time, of course, the Public Address systems for outdoor concerts had progressed considerably; one wonders which was actually louder – the Beatles' fans at Shea, or Led Zeppelin themselves at Tampa.)

Shea Stadium was designed to host American football as well as baseball; it was home to the New York Jets AFL/NFL team as well as the Mets. New York Yankees (MLB) also played there in 1974 and 1975, and New York Giants (NFL) in 1975. After the Jets left in 1983 to play at the Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, Shea was reconfigured for baseball only. But it was still not ideal – with the seating located further away from the playing field than at other major league ballparks. Preliminary plans for a remodel were announced as early as 1998, and the Mets also considered moving elsewhere.

These plans came to nothing, but in 2004, New York was shortlisted as a candidate to host the 2012 Summer Olympics. Its bid included a new stadium, adjacent to Shea. It was ultimately unsuccessful, but the Mets took over the stadium project, and construction started in July 2006. Citigroup, a New York financial services company, bought the naming rights, at a cost of $20 million a year for 20 years, and the stadium is known as Citi Field.

The new stadium opened in 2009, and Shea was then demolished. The place where Shea stood now provides parking space for Citi Field.