Fenway Park has many birthdays, but one of them took place today, February 26. That's because one hundred years ago today the land upon which Fenway Park sits was acquired at public auction by General Charles Taylor of the Boston Globe Taylors for $120,000 The rough plans that architect James McLaughlin had been working on for more than a year now had to be configured to fit upon a specific building site.
Known as the “Dana Lands,” the property was part of a parcel that had originally been owned by attorney Francis Dana, a native of Charlestown, a leader of the Sons of Liberty, a delegate to the Massachusetts’s Provincial Congress in 1774, a member of the Continental Congress in 1777, and in 1778 a signer of the Articles of Confederation.
I tell this story and many many others you will find nowhere else in my next book due out this fall, the defintive story of Fenway Park, entitled Fenway 1912: The Birth of a Ballpark, a Championship Season and Fenway's Remarkable First Year
For more see my Fenway 1912 facebook page, or order a copy of Fenway 1912 at www.glennstout.net