Durham Athletic Park
Durham, NC
Team: Durham Americans
Affiliation: None
League: Coastal Plain 
Completed: 1939
Vistied: 2002

In the film "Bull Durham", Annie Savoy (Susan Sarandon) called baseball her religion.  With that bein the case, Durham Athletic Park, the actual park used to filmed the movie, was her chapel.  Nowadays, though, this baseball sanctuary has changed "denominations" and has a much smaller congregation, but to diehard baseball (and movie) fans, it's still holy ground.  

When the Durham Bulls moved to the brand new Durham Bulls Athletic Park in 1995, this venerable old place was deserted.  Fortunately, it has been kept active since then by various amateur leagues, the latest offering being the Coastal Plain League, which offers summer collegiate ball.  The crowds are significantly smaller now (so much so that they removed the bleachers that used to stand along the outfield lines), but this is still a great place to see a game.  In fact, the small crowd (about 100 people) actually made this a more enjoyable experience for me.  The atmosphere is very relaxed, and I could hear the players' chatter, not only from the infield, but from the outfield as well. 

The stadium itself (or what's left of it), is a classic old place with the majority of the stands under a roof.  The first few rows are genuine box seats separated by bright yellow rails, and the rest of the stand consists of bench seating with backs. The bleacher sections down both lines that used to be present when minor league baseball was still being played here are now gone.   

The original Durham Athletic Park actually burned to the ground (along with a nearby tobacco warehouse) in 1939, but the current park was built just two weeks later.  There was actually no team in Durham for most of the 1970s, but the Bulls returned in 1980 to continue the long tradition of Durham baseball.  

Of course, the park is most famous for its role in the movie "Bull Durham".  I was surprised at how little the team tries to promote that connection.  There is no sign indicating that the movie was filmed here, no plaque indicating where Susan Sarandon sat, no displays documenting the filming of the movie, and no movie posters anywhere.  The one remaining aspect of that part of the stadium's history is that the Durham Bulls logo is still present in prominent places, but that may be because the teams who have played here subsequently have not had the budget to do anything about it.  

Still, this is a wonderful place for any baseball or movie fan.  If, like Annie Savoy, you consider baseball a religion, then you owe it to yourself to come "worship" here.   

Update: Sadly, as far as I can tell, the Durham Americans have disbanded and aside from softball and some amateur ball, there doesn't seem to be much going on here any more.  

The Americans' mascot, Slider