Cotton Bowl (Fair Park Stadium), 1930

Mark Lemmon
George Dahl, renovation, 1936
Chappell, Stokes & Brenneke, engineers, additions, 1948, 1949
Hellmuth, Obata & Kassabaum, addition, 1993

Constructed on the old racetrack infield, the original Fair Park Stadium was a concrete bowl, partially below grade, giving it a distinctly different presence in the middle of Fair Park than it possesses today.  With a seating capacity of 46,200, it was the largest stadium in the south.  The capacity was increased by the addition of upper decks in 1948 and 1949.

Credits: Excerpts taken from The American Institute of Architects Guide to Dallas Architecture, published in 1999 by the American Institute of Architects, Dallas Chapter. The editor of this book was Larry Paul Fuller. The Fair Park Introduction and entries were written by Willis Winters, AIA.

Permission to publish these excerpts was granted by The American Institute of Architects, Dallas Chapter, in October 2002.