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Howard J. Lamade Stadium
Howard J. Lamade Stadium is the field in South Williamsport, Pa., that has played host to the Little League Baseball World Series every year since 1959. Located off U.S. Route 15, the field replaced Brown Memorial Park in Williamsport as the tournament site, and is named for the late vice president of Grit Publishing who was a member of the Little League board of directors in the 1950s. In keeping with Little League regulations, the field at Howard J. Lamade Stadium is roughly two-thirds the size of a conventional major league field. The pitching rubber is 46 feet from home plate, while basepaths are 60 feet in length. The distance from home plate to all points of the outfield fence at Lamade Stadium is 225 feet. The complex, originally called Howard J. Lamade Memorial Field, was built in 1959 on land purchased from Lycoming College with funds donated by Grit Publishing. (Williamsport's Brown Memorial Park hosted the event from 1947 to 1958.) Plans for the field came from a student project at Pennsylvania State University and equipment and labor was supplied by the Williamsport Technical Institute (now the Pennsylvania College of Technology in Williamsport). It was renamed Howard J. Lamade Stadium when the original wood and steel stands were razed and a concrete stadium was constructed in 1968. Additional seating was added in 1972 and a state-of-the-art lighting system was added in 1992, the year that the first night games were played during the Little League World Series. The latest revision to the stadium took place in 2006, when its outfield fences were moved back from 205 feet (from home plate) to 225 feet. Also that year, the covered section of seating was extended over the majority of the bench seating down both lines, and more than 900 individual seats with backs were added to bring the total number of seats of that type to more than 1,500. It is estimated that more than 40,000 fans could be accommodated to watch games at Lamade Stadium, including those on the hills beyond the outfield fences. The actual stadium seats between 8,000 and 10,000 fans, but the exact number of seats available is not known since admission is free and most of the seating during the Little League World Series is on a first-come, first-served basis. Howard J. Lamade was instrumental in the early growth of Little League Baseball, and is the only person to have served on both the first corporate board of directors of Little League Baseball and the first board of trustees of the Little League Foundation (which was formed in 1956). After Lamade passed away in 1958 at the age of 67, his family donated funds to the Williamsport Foundation, used for the purchase and donation of the property in South Williamsport, where Little League's headquarters has been ever since. Little League Volunteer Stadium
When the Little League Baseball World Series expanded from eight to 16 teams in 2001, a second stadium -- Little League Volunteer Stadium -- was built to serve as the site for additional games required for tournament play. Situated next to Howard J. Lamade Stadium at Little League Baseball's headquarters in South Williamsport, Pa., Little League Volunteer Stadium was completed in 2001. It can accommodate approximately 5,000 spectators (including lawn seating beyond the outfield), and also features batting cages and an area for pitchers to warm up (underneath the stands behind the dugout on the third-base side of the stadium). Like the layout at Lamade Stadium, the field at Little League Volunteer Stadium is roughly two-thirds the size of a conventional major league field. The pitching rubber is 46 feet from home plate, while basepaths are 60 feet in length. The distance from home plate to all points of the outfield fence at Little League Volunteer Stadium is 225 feet (increased from 205 feet in 2006). Little League Volunteer Stadium is used for early-round games (in both the U.S. and international brackets) of the Little League World Series. Admission to and parking for games during the Little League World Series is free, with seating for games available on a first-come, first-served basis.
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