Slag Pile Field
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Slag Pile Field (officially West End Park) was a baseball ground located on land owned by the Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company (TCI) on 6th Street between 1st Avenue North and the Alabama Great Southern Railroad tracks. The park earned its nickname for the piles of furnace slag outside the outfield fences, which served as free seating for those who didn't want to pay to sit in the bleachers.
The field and a few wooden bleachers were leased, in 60-day terms, to the first owners of the Birmingham Barons, who played there from the mid-1880s until the completion of Rickwood Field in 1910. The park also hosted the Alabama and Auburn football teams in the early 1900s, and was the site of the 1902, 1904 and 1905 Iron Bowls.
References
- Barra, Allen (2010) Rickwood Field: A Century in America's Oldest Ballpark. New York: W. W. Norton & Company ISBN 9780393069334