Busch Memorial Stadium

A multi-purpose stadium in St. Louis that hosted baseball, football, and soccer from 1966 to 2005.

Busch Memorial Stadium (Busch Stadium II) was a multi-purpose sports facility in St. Louis, Missouri, that operated for 40 years, from 1966 through 2005. Built as Civic Center Busch Memorial Stadium, its official name was shortened to Busch Stadium in January 1982.

Quick Facts

Nickname: Busch Stadium II; Baseball Heaven
Location: 250 Stadium Plaza; St. Louis, Missouri
Groundbreaking: 25 May 1964
Built: 1964–1966
Opened: 12 May 1966
Closed: 19 October 2005
Demolished: November 7 – December 8, 2005
Owner: St. Louis Cardinals

Lore & Background

The stadium served as the home of the St. Louis Cardinals National League baseball team for its entire operating existence, while also serving as home to the National Football League's Cardinals team for 22 seasons, from 1966 through 1987, as well as the St. Louis Rams for the 1994 and entire 1995 seasons. It opened four days after the last baseball game was played at Sportsman's Park. The St. Louis Stars of the NPSL and later NASL played at the stadium from 1967 to 1974; the team later used the stadium for select matches up through the 1977 season.

The stadium was designed by Sverdrup & Parcel and built by a joint venture of Grün & Bilfinger and McCarthy Brothers. Edward Durell Stone designed the roof, a 96-arch 'Crown of Arches'. The Crown echoed the Gateway Arch, which had been completed only a year before Busch Stadium opened. Its final event was the sixth game of the 2005 National League Championship Series on October 19.

The stadium was demolished by implosion on November 7, 2005 and part of its former footprint is occupied by its replacement—the new Busch Stadium (a.k.a. Busch Stadium III), located to its south.

Reader's Guide

The stadium opened on May 12, 1966, as Civic Center Busch Memorial Stadium. The 'Civic Center' part was rarely used, and most people called it simply Busch Memorial Stadium. The stadium's grass was replaced with AstroTurf in 1970. Anheuser-Busch bought the stadium in 1981 for $53 million and removed the 'Memorial' from the stadium's name, becoming simply Busch Stadium. Following Busch's last 1995 event—the Rams' October 22 game before the opening of the Dome at America's Center—the Cardinals retrofitted it into a baseball-only stadium. A large section of the upper deck outfield seats was closed, replaced with a hand-operated scoreboard and flags commemorating the Cardinals' retired numbers and World Series championships. The stadium's original natural grass field was restored, and the outfield walls were re-painted green from their original blue.