Danville's Athletic Park was probably used by the Danville Military Academy for much of the school's various forms of existence from 1890 to 1939, though the boys did have their own personal athletic field by at least 1922 [3] [4]. The site was primarily used for minor league baseball teams in and around Danville until the 1950s.

Overall, NC State had a record of 1-0 at this field, with the sole game being played as a non-conference away game.

  * Non-conference games

This playing field is one of the more obscure of the ones I've researched. I know a few things for certain about the field: in 1896, the University of North Carolina and Virginia played a baseball game at "the baseball park at the end of Main street" in April; a month later, the locals were getting a team organized [5] [6]. Because of the dearth of digitized newspaper coverage of the Danville area, this is the earliest game coverage I've found specific enough to identify the existence of this park. It is known, however, that these grounds were shared or abutted the area's first prominent fairgrounds. The city had thrown a handful of street or tobacco fairs on a periodic basis somewhat regularly since the 1880s, but did not apparently host one regularly until 1910 [7]. Unfortunately, the baseball park and fairgrounds were far enough away from city limits that they were not captured on a fire map until 1915, by which time they appear to have been merged.

The Danville Fair was held on these grounds until about 1924. The baseball team, however, moved to Stonewall Jackson Park starting in the 1920 season [8] [9]. In the meantime, the old Athletic Park started to become known as the "old baseball park" or the Schoolfield Baseball Park. In 1923, facing a growing crunch from out-of-town cars, the grounds of the park were used for additional parking [10] [11]. Though it's not entirely clear, it appears as if the Danville Fair relocated to a new spot between Whitmell St. (now Goodyear Blvd.) and Industrial Ave. (roughly here) before the fall of 1924 [12] [13], and relocaed again in 1934 to a spot between W. Main, Lockett, and Hawthorne St. (roughly here). The fair's final and most enduring location opened in 1941, when the grounds were moved to a spot along Riverside Drive (here); it remained in this spot until 1971, when the land was bought and the fair canceled after failing to find a new location to host events. The grounds became King's Shopping Center [14] [15].

Following the fair's departure, the Athletic Park became a more permanent athletic venue. It was "reconditioned" in 1934 by the addition of new bleachers; unfortunately, the stands burnt down shortly thereafter, forcing the park's temporary abandonment. The park was used off and on by semi-pro and high school athletics, in addition to the usual sort of stuff (circuses, boxing matches, etc.) until 1958, when the final iteration of the Danville Leafs folded; at that time, it was known as League Park. Then, the grounds were sold to make the Ballou Park Shopping Center [16] [17] [18].

Pictures of Athletic Park

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I struggled to find period pictures of football games at the field. While plenty of photos can be found showing the Danville Fair Grounds hosting either the WDVA Barn Dance or various dirt-track racing events, these all took place at the final location of Danville's Fairgrounds, now King's Shopping Center.