Ballpark: The Story of America's Baseball Fields

by Lynn Curlee, Lynn Curlee (Illustrator)

Overview

A vibrant visual history of America’s most famous ballparks from award-winning author-illustrator Lynn Curlee—now with a new look!

If you love baseball, chances are you love one particular ballpark. Boston fans wax poetic about Fenway Park, Cubs fans are adamant that Wrigley Field is the classic ballfield. Busch Stadium is a hit with folks from Missouri, and Yankee fans are passionate about the House That Ruth Built. Besides passionate fans, there’s one other thing all ballparks—from the Union Grounds in Brooklyn built in 1862 to the Baltimore Orioles’ Camden Yards built in 1992—share: having its own vibrant and unique history.

This baseball book like no other explores both the histories and the cultural significance of America’s most famous ballparks. Grand in scope and illustrations and filled with fascinating anecdotes about these “green cathedrals,” the picture book also explores the changing social climate that accompanied baseball’s rise from a minor sport to the national pastime.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781665968850
Publisher:	Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	05/06/2025
Series:	Lynn Curlee Wonders of the World
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	48
Product dimensions:	11.00(w) x 10.30(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	7 - 18 Years

About the Author

Lynn Curlee was educated as an art historian and worked as a fine artist for many years before he began to make children’s books. Three of his books, Capital, Liberty, and Rushmore, were chosen by the Barbara Bush Literacy Campaign as their Book of the Year in three consecutive years. Mr. Curlee has won numerous awards for his work, including but not limited to a Robert F. Sibert Honor Book (Brooklyn Bridge), Orbis Pictus Award (Rushmore), ALA Notable Books for Children (Liberty), and Bank Street Best Children’s Book of the Year (Parthenon). His other books include Ballpark, Trains, Mythological Creatures, and Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. He lives in Norwich, Connecticut, with his partner and two Great Danes. Find out more on Instagram @LynnCurlee.

Lynn Curlee was educated as an art historian and worked as a fine artist for many years before he began to make children’s books. Three of his books, Capital, Liberty, and Rushmore, were chosen by the Barbara Bush Literacy Campaign as their Book of the Year in three consecutive years. Mr. Curlee has won numerous awards for his work, including but not limited to a Robert F. Sibert Honor Book (Brooklyn Bridge), Orbis Pictus Award (Rushmore), ALA Notable Books for Children (Liberty), and Bank Street Best Children’s Book of the Year (Parthenon). His other books include Ballpark, Trains, Mythological Creatures, and Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. He lives in Norwich, Connecticut, with his partner and two Great Danes. Find out more on Instagram @LynnCurlee.

Interviews

A Conversation with Lynn Curlee

How long have you been writing and illustrating children's books?

LC: Before I began to make books, I did paintings which were exhibited in galleries. In 1991 I was invited to illustrate a storybook, Horses with Wings, by Dennis Haseley. After that, I began to write and illustrate my own nonfiction books. Now I am working on my eleventh book. I still show my paintings in galleries.

Why did you pick the topic of ballparks?

Many of my books have been about important places in America. As the national pastime, baseball holds a unique place in our culture, and the great ballparks are certainly important places. As a baseball fan, I also knew that it would be great fun to paint pictures of some of the most famous baseball stars of the past in action.

How do you research your books?

As a graduate student of art history, I learned how to do serious research in libraries, and I usually start there when researching a project. Of course, today we also have the Internet as a valuable place to find information. For books about important structures, I always try to visit the actual location if possible.

How did you research Ballpark?

I have attended games in several of the greatest ballparks, Yankee Stadium, Fenway Park, Wrigley Field, and Dodger Stadium. In addition to my usual research, I spent several months just thinking about the project by reading books, collecting photographs and going online to find information.

What takes longer, writing the story or painting the pictures?

After my research is done, I sit down to write the manuscript. When I really get going, I can write about one page per day. Of course, then I spend more days going back over the words to make changes that improve the text. So a book with twenty pages of text takes more than a month to write. At the same time I am writing, I am starting to plan the pictures. After the writing is done, I start painting. Each illustration usually takes between one and two weeks. Sometimes a very complex picture will take longer. The paintings for a big book might take eight or nine months.

What was the most interesting fact you learned about baseball?

I was particularly fascinated by the early history of the game in the nineteenth century. When I started research, I knew almost nothing about baseball in that period.

Do you have a favorite baseball team?

When I was about ten years old in the late 1950s the rivalry between the New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers was at its peak, and we watched it all on TV in black and white. I was always rooting for the underdog, so the Dodgers of the 1950s are my all-time favorite baseball team. Today I like to cheer for whoever plays the best baseball.

What is your favorite ballpark to visit?

This is a tough question, because each ballpark has its own aura and charm. Wrigley Field and Fenway Park have the wonderful old-time flavor, and Yankee Stadium has a steely grandeur. I have been there the most because I lived in New York City for years. But my favorite ballpark is probably Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, where I have also lived. On a beautiful game day in sunny southern California it can't be beat.

Does the construction of ballparks differ from other structures?

The first real ballparks were simply wooden horseracing grandstands built around an infield. Skyscrapers and bridges were the first structures to be made of steel and concrete, and this technology soon spread to all kinds of architecture including ballparks. Today ballparks and stadiums, with features such as retracting roofs, are often on the cutting edge of architectural design.

If you could be any player from baseball's history, who would you choose?

Another tough question! I would choose Cal Ripkin, Jr. He was a great player with immense personal dignity whose amazing career was full of genuine integrity in an era of big money sports and drug scandals -- a truly admirable role model who shattered one of the most famous records in all of sports. He seemed to bring a kind of joy to the game.

Editorial Reviews

Adding to an impressive and growing body of work about important places, Curlee here celebrates America's "green cathedrals," offering a fine survey of American history through the story of baseball. From early American bat-and-ball games to the present, every era has its story, from the Black Sox scandal after WWI, Babe Ruth and the Roaring Twenties, the Negro Leagues and the Great Depression, and on into the modern era of ballparks shaped like "concrete doughnuts" and the reaction to them in retro ballparks such as Baltimore's Camden Yards. The text is dense but full of fascinating history, and the glorious colors of the acrylic paintings effectively celebrate the ballparks and the players, stiff and formal as the stately cathedrals they inhabit. Double-page spreads featuring Ty Cobb and Jackie Robinson, majestic paintings of Yankee Stadium and Wrigley Field, and a diagram of Fenway Park add to the work's tremendous visual appeal. The volume arrives with the new season, and readers who need encouragement to get out to the ballpark will surely find it here. (bibliography) (Picture book/nonfiction. All ages)

Kirkus Reviews