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NJ's Hinchliffe Stadium, where Negro Leagues' greats played, a community resource once more
By
Amanda Rozon
Published May 22, 2023
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Mark Rucker/Transcendental Graphics, Getty Images
By
Amanda Rozon
Published May 22, 2023
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Paterson, New Jersey’s Hinchliffe Stadium — one of the few remaining stadiums that once hosted Negro Leagues games — has a second swing at life.
The art deco ballpark, located alongside Paterson’s Great Falls, is open for the first time in a quarter-century, after a $100 million revival saved it from condemnation.
Hinchliffe, built in 1932, was home to the New York Black Yankees and New York Cubans in the 1930s and 1940s, according to MLB.com. In 1933, the Black Yankees faced the Philadelphia Stars there for the Negro World Series. More than 20 National Baseball Hall of Famers played at Hinchliffe, as well.
Over the years, Hinchliffe hosted baseball, football, track, boxing and even midget car racing, according to a “Preservation Snapshot” feature by the state Historic Preservation Office. The Paterson Board of Education took ownership of the stadium from the city government in 1963. But over time, it fell into disrepair under the stewardship of the poorly funded school district, according to MLB.com. It eventually closed in 1997, becoming an eyesore and a target for vandals for years.
Hinchliffe Stadium, prior to its rennovation.
Duncan Kendall / New Jersey Historic Preservation Office
Now, officials say it’ll be a community resource for Paterson and the community beyond. The renovation — which began in 2021 with the support of state tax credits — includes a restaurant and museum space dedicated to local Negro League icons and other trailblazers who’ve played at Hinchliffe. As part of Paterson Great Falls National Historical Park, it’s the only ballpark in the National Parks System. The redevelopment also includes a parking garage and senior affordable housing development.
The stadium remains owned by Paterson schools, and will host district baseball and football games, including those between rival Paterson high schools, Eastside and John F. Kennedy, as well as community events. Eastside played its first ballgame at Hinchliffe Wednesday, taking a 14-2 loss to Don Bosco’s Ironmen.
Brian LoPinto — a Paterson native and founder of the nonprofit Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium, which had been lobbying for a restoration since 2002 — noted Paterson’s teams won’t be the only ones based out of Hinchliffe.
“How do you save a baseball stadium? Well, you play baseball in it,” he said. “And thankfully, this year the New Jersey Jackals will call Hinchliffe Stadium home.”
The Jackals, part of the independent Frontier League, have relocated from their previous home at Yogi Berra Stadium, at Montclair State University in Little Falls. They announced a six-year lease last year, in a move the Paterson Press reported caught school district officials off-guard at the time, raising questions about how the schools’ access to the stadium would work. However, 180 days a year remain reserved explicitly for the district.
Sports broadcaster and former professional baseball player Harold Reynolds, left, and Whoopi Goldberg attend the reopening celebration event at Hinchliffe Stadium ribbon-cutting Friday.
Kyle Mazza/SOPA Images/Shutterstock
“Not many cities can say that they have a professional baseball team playing in a historic stadium. Paterson can,” Mayor Andre Sayegh said on Facebook earlier this month.
In a ceremony Wednesday, Sayegh referred to Hinchliffe as “a game-changer” and “the real ‘Field of Dreams.’”
“To paraphrase arguably the most famous quote from that movie, ‘If you build it, they will come.’ We have built Hinchliffe Stadium back again. And we are here,” he said, according to an NJBiz.com report.
The mayor told The New York Times he’d love to draw major league teams for events at Hinchliffe, suggesting the New York Yankees and Mets might face off in the uniforms of the New York Black Yankees and New York Cubans. An MLB spokesperson told the Times the League was “continuing to evaluate the many opportunities in determining our special event schedule for upcoming seasons” — but Sayegh said the idea had been introduced to the franchises, and he’d keep lobbying for it.
The Jackals were at Hinchliffe Sunday for a home opener against the Sussex County Miners, taking a 10-6 win and capping off several days of activities celebrating the reopening. Local officials gathered for a ribbon-cutting Friday.
LoPinto, who played baseball at Hinchliffe in his youth, says saving the ballpark would not have been possible without the Black baseball icons that got their start there — including one New Jersey native.
Paterson East Side High School players gather and scream in jubilation prior to the first annual Mayor Andre Sayegh Silk City Baseball Classic at Hinchliffe Stadium in Paterson May 17.
Kyle Mazza/NurPhoto/Shutterstock
“One man rises above them all, and that's Larry Doby," he said. "And I'm just hopeful that as we move forward as a society that we can say ‘Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby integrated baseball.’”
Doby had been a multi-sport star for Eastside — playing baseball and football and running track at Hinchliffe — before joining the Newark Eagles of the Negro Leagues as second-baseman after a tryout in 1942, according to MLB.com. Doby, called the “Silk City Slugger” after Paterson’s own nickname, continued playing for semi-pro teams at Hinchliffe throughout that summer.
Doby later became the second Black athlete in Major League Baseball, and the first in the American League, when he signed with the Cleveland Indians in 1947. He and teammate Satchel Paige were the first two Black players to win a World Series championship, with the Indians in 1948.
“It's really invigorating. It really, really is,” Paterson native and Jackals owner Al Dorso said last year, in a story by MLB.com last year announcing his team’s relocation to Hinchliffe. “I loved the fact that we can try and help the community. It's going to be a great stadium. It's going to be a great field. I think it's going to be a great experience for people within Paterson and the outside community.”
— Louis C. Hochman contributed to this story.
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Amanda Rozon
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