Yankee Stadium

As one of the world's most-prestigious addresses, Yankee Stadium has also been the home of scores of other sports, entertainment and cultural events. While the Yankees were on the road or out of season, the Stadium opened its gates to college and pro football, soccer, political assemblies, religious conventions, concerts and even the circus.

Boxing immediately found a home at Yankee Stadium with Benny Leonard winning a 15-round decision over Lou Tendler for the lightweight title three months after the gates opened on July 24, 1923. Until Muhammad Ali stopped Ken Norton on September 28, 1976, thirty championship fights have been fought at the Stadium, perhaps none more memorable than the one for the heavyweight title between Joe Louis and Germany's Max Schmeling on June 22, 1938. After suffering a knockout loss in the initial non-title encounter at the Stadium two years earlier, Louis now the heavyweight champ avenged his defeat with a stunning first-round KO in the rematch.

Football also became an immediate fixture at Yankee Stadium with the 1923 Army-Navy game inaugurating a rich history of collegiate and later professional football matchups. On November 12, 1928, with Notre Dame and Army locked in a scoreless game at halftime, the legendary Knute Rockne made his famous "win one for the Gipper" pep talk and the Fighting Irish went out and beat the Cadets, 12-6.

The New York football Giants also called Yankee Stadium home from 1956 through 1973 and, on December 28, 1958, played in what is widely recognized as "the greatest game ever played." With the NFL championship at stake, a crowd of 64,185 watched the Baltimore Colts tie the game 17-17 on a Steve Myrha field goal with seven seconds left. Eight minutes into professional football's first-ever "sudden-death" overtime period, the Colts' Alan Ameche crashed through from the one yard line, ending a contest that would help establish pro football as a major sport.

The Stadium was also an important stop for religious conventions with the conventions of the Jehovah's Witnesses the major outside activity each year. Beginning in 1950, the convention attracted as many as 123,707 people in a single day far more than any other Stadium event. On October 4, 1965 with the Yankees out of the World Series for only the third time in 17 years the Stadium hosted an event of worldwide significance. During the first visit to North America by a Pope, Paul VI celebrated mass before a crowd in excess of 80,000. Fourteen years later, John Paul II also made Yankee Stadium a stop on his tour of the United States.