Canadian National Exhibition Stadium (commonly CNE Stadium or Exhibition Stadium) was a multi-purpose stadium, that formerly stood on the Exhibition Place grounds, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Originally built for Canadian football, the Canadian National Exhibition and other events, the stadium served as the home of the Toronto Blue Jays, of Major League Baseball, from 1977–1989. It also served as the home of the Toronto Argonauts, of the Canadian Football League, from 1959–1988. The stadium hosted the Grey Cup game twelve times, over a 24-year period.
Exhibition Stadium was the fourth stadium to be built on its site since 1879. The covered north-side grandstand was constructed in 1948, followed by a south bleacher section for football in 1959. When converted for football in 1959, the stadium seated 33,150.
When the 58th Grey Cup was played at the stadium in 1970, Calgary Stampeders coach Jim Duncan described the condition of the natural-grass surface as "a disgrace." In January 1972, Metropolitan Toronto Council voted 15-9 to spend $625,000 to install artificial turf. The vote passed despite five councilors changing their vote to oppose the motion, because the cost had increased from a previous estimate of $400,000. Two months later, contracts totaling $475,000 were approved to install the turf, with work to be completed by June.
The stadium was reconfigured again in the mid-1970s to allow the expansion Toronto Blue Jays to play there, with additional seating opposite the covered grandstand on the first base side and curving around to the third base side. It was the only major league stadium where the outfield seats were covered but the main grandstand was not.
In 1999, the stadium was demolished, with the site being used for parking until 2006. BMO Field, a soccer-specific stadium for Toronto FC, was built on the site and opened in 2007.
Read more about Exhibition Stadium: New Stadium, Facts and Figures
Famous quotes containing the words exhibition and/or stadium:
“Work, as we usually think of it, is energy expended for a further end in view; play is energy expended for its own sake, as with children’s play, or as manifestation of the end or goal of work, as in “playing” chess or the piano. Play in this sense, then, is the fulfillment of work, the exhibition of what the work has been done for.”
—Northrop Frye (1912–1991)
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race round the track of the stadium pupil.”
—Patricia K. Page (b. 1916)