This story was excerpted from Mark Sheldon’s Reds Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.
It didn’t take long for Riverfront Stadium to become a memorable home for the Reds after it opened on June 30, 1970, following 58 years at Crosley Field. Two weeks after debuting, Riverfront hosted an All-Star Game, followed a few months later by a World Series.
Overall, the multipurpose facility was the site of two All-Star Games, five World Series, Tom Browning’s perfect game and plenty of other moments that remain indelible. The stadium, also once the home of the NFL’s Cincinnati Bengals, was demolished following the 2002 season, and the Reds moved into their current home at Great American Ball Park.
Cincinnati filmmaker Cam Miller lovingly refers to Riverfront Stadium as the “old gal,” and his newest release should capture that affection. Miller was the creative force behind the documentary “Riverfront Remembered,” a 30-minute film about the Reds playing at Riverfront Stadium.
“When I did the prologue, I reversed the footage of the implosion and set the stadium back in its place,” Miller said. “That was a very emotional moment for me. Even if it was for 30 minutes, I’m bringing the stadium back to life.”
The film’s premiere -- which sold out in two days -- is scheduled for Sept. 9 at the Reds Hall of Fame.
I recently spoke to Miller about “Riverfront Remembered.”
MLB.com: Riverfront Stadium was built in the era of “cookie-cutter” ballparks, with similarities to Atlanta, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and others. Those stadiums aren’t fondly remembered, architecturally. Why is Cincinnati’s version special?
Miller: Crosley Field, not many people are still around that have experiences there, but there sure are a lot of people who had experiences at Riverfront. As time marches on, you say, "You know what? She wasn’t all that bad." Of course, it was cookie-cutter. Of course, it was a concrete dump. But it was designed to be multipurpose. The aesthetics weren’t great, but if you grew up there, that’s what you know. Just like Three Rivers Stadium, Fulton County Stadium or the Vet, if you grew up going to those parks, you start to feel some type of nostalgia.
MLB.com: You’re featuring the stadium itself without a lot of game highlights and interviews. Why did you make that choice?
Miller: I wanted the stadium to be a character. We’ve seen -- and I’ve done them -- the 1970s Big Red Machine videos, we’ve talked about the 1990 team and all of these things. But those teams had a home, and it was Riverfront Stadium. When you walk into this theater or watch with the comfort of your own laptop or phone, I want you to feel like you’re walking into Riverfront Stadium -- circa 1987.
You’re watching batting practice or the grounds crew doing their thing, and you’re watching this little documentary on the Jumbotron about Riverfront. It has a scoreboard-esque feel. It’s almost like a silent film. In between, I peppered in -- scoreboard style -- the messages of what’s going on. There’s no narrator. I think the flow is very easy to watch. There’s a timeline to it, but there’s very much an “I just sat down in the Top Six seats with a cold beer in my hand and [am] watching this documentary before the Reds’ first pitch.”
MLB.com: In your trailer, I heard you essentially say the stadium wasn’t meant to be pretty but a worker. How did you mean?
Miller: It was a machine, which is so interesting. It was functional. It was bolted down along the Ohio River among the skyscrapers, factories and riverboats. It was a blue-collar stadium. It’s not a coincidence that the team Mr. [Bob] Howsam and the Reds built was a Big Red Machine. That team wouldn’t have worked at Crosley Field if it had stayed there. It just didn’t. Building a stadium for your players to just function in was an incredible feat.
It wasn’t supposed to be friendly confines of Crosley. Riverfront was functional. You got in, you got out, and then you left and went to a bar downtown.
It had multipurpose. You could have other events there. The blue seats rotated on rail tracks so it could be maneuvered for football. It was a gleaming crown in the city. The postcards sold of the skyline -- you saw that picture of a lit-up Riverfront Stadium. It was an iconic part of the skyline.
They’ll say it was terrible or smelled bad, but there was a history there. It’s important we share it with people who weren’t fortunate to get to go to that park.