Ohio Stadium

• Ohio State Buckeyes (NCAA ) (since 1922)
• Columbus Crew ( MLS) (1996-1999)
• Ohio Glory ( WLAF ) ( 1992)

The Ohio Stadium is a football stadium in Columbus, Ohio. It serves as a venue for the football games of the NCAA teams Ohio State Buckeyes. The stadium was added to the National Register of Historic Places by the National Park Service on March 22, 1974.

The stadium also served as the home of the Major League Soccer team Columbus Crew of the founding of the League in 1996 until the opening of the Columbus Crew Stadium in 1999. With a capacity of 102 329, it is the sixth-largest sports stadium in the world. It is also used for concerts: U2, the Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd and Metallica played, among other things already in Ohio Stadium.

The stadium lacks a fixed pitch lighting. In night games, a temporary lighting will each be installed temporarily.

History

In 1913, the Ohio Field was not able to absorb the masses, who were attracted by the football games of the Ohio State Buckeyes. Therefore, a new building was up for discussion. 1918, therefore, designed by the architect Dwight Howard Smith, a horseshoe -shaped stadium. To finance the project was started in October 1920 to raise money and gave up in January 1921 commitments in excess of 1 million U.S. dollars, of which $ 975,000 were donated.

The stadium was built in 1922 at a cost of $ 1.34 million. The stadium with its original capacity of 66 210 had an astronomical size at this time. The first game in the stadium was on October 7, 1922 against the Ohio Wesleyan University, and brought 25,000 spectators. This left people worried because the stadium was half empty. The formal inauguration against Michigan on October 21, this concern put it back. The number of visitors is given as 72,000, but no one is really sure how many people made ​​it into the stadium. This brand was again exceeded in 1925 in the game against Michigan with 90.411 spectators.

1923 athletics track was built around the game field. The track and field team used the stadium for many years, until 2001, the Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium was opened next door. When Jesse Owens studied at OSU, he trained also in Ohio Stadium.

Following the 1999 season was increased to 101 568 with a 194 million USD refurbishment, the spectator capacity. For the first time from 1970 to 1990 and again since 2007, artificial turf is used in the stadium. Today's record number of audience was reached on 12 September 2009 106 033 spectators against the University of Southern California.