The Fantasy Stadium
Our fascination with turning fiction into reality
The Fantasy Stadium
When I was 7 years old, my dad and I worked on creating our own APBA stadium.
We used Popsicle sticks, fake grass purchased from a hobby store (I think it was intended for model train enthusiasts), fake dirt, and a whole bunch of other odds and ends.
Neither of us are particularly adept with our hands. As a result, the project used up a lot of time and effort. I think we used it for the remainder of my father’s days in the old and forgotten Big Red APBA League. It wound up sitting on a shelf in his office for the next few decades, and I believe finally fell apart for good several years ago.
Sadly, I don’t have any photographs of the contraption. I do know that there was an old APBA Journal article that contained instructions on how to accomplish the task, though it’s going to take me a while to find it again.
I was reminded of all of this when I came across this article in the second issue of The APBA Journal the other day:
Now, you know you’ve really gotten deep into your hobby when you’re creating diagrams of where you want your ballpark to be located, complete with hand-drawn maps and extensive descriptions.
I suppose the modern equivalent would be the 4th Street Baseball 3D ballparks:
Dynasty League Baseball now offers something similar, in the tradition of the old Pursue the Pennant:
Apologies for the stock photos - I still need to save up my pennies to get copies of these for myself.
Of course, the problem with just sticking together your own stadium model is that it’s not quite the same as finding a suitable geographic location for the stadium. That takes extra work.
There are some games that do the work for you, of course. In fact, those of us who enjoy Football Manager will tell you that there’s nothing better than getting a message about the construction of a brand new stadium:
I just wish they would have had the courtesy to name it after me.