Qualla: Durham Athletic Park

Durham Athletic Park: Introduction

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Maria Miracoli, CC BY-SA 4.0. Kevin Costner stood at home plate in the late summer of 1987, the Carolina League season just ended, the lights of an old wooden ballpark angled down at him from rickety stanchions. Around him, a film crew transformed the Durham Bulls' creaky home into a movie set, and over the next year that footage would turn an unremarkable corner of north Durham into one of the most famous ballparks in the country. The DAP, as everyone calls it, sits on a block bounded by Washington, Corporation, Foster and Geer Streets - a footprint smaller than a city block, with a right field line of only 290 feet. It had been the Bulls' home since 1926. After Bull Durham hit theaters in 1988, it became a kind of accidental shrine.

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Image: Maria Miracoli | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham Athletic Park: A House Built for Tobacco Money

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kenneth C. Zirkel, CC BY-SA 4.0. Before the DAP, the Bulls played at Hanes Field on Trinity College's east campus, named for a Trinity graduate who would found the underwear company that still bears his name. They moved to Doherty Park in East Durham in 1913, then in the summer of 1926 to the brand-new park on C...

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Image: Kenneth C. Zirkel | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham Athletic Park: When Hollywood Came to North Carolina

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kenneth C. Zirkel, CC BY-SA 4.0. Ron Shelton's script was about an aging catcher named Crash Davis, a wild young pitcher named Nuke LaLoosh, and a literature-quoting baseball groupie named Annie Savoy. It was also, quietly, about the texture of life in a particular kind of American place - the bus rides, the che...

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Image: Kenneth C. Zirkel | CC BY-SA 4.0

Durham Athletic Park: The Long Goodbye

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Warren LeMay from Covington, KY, United States, CC0. On September 5, 1994, the Bulls played their last game at the DAP, losing 6-2 to the Winston-Salem Spirits in Game 1 of the Carolina League's South Division playoffs. The next spring they opened at the new Durham Bulls Athletic Park across downtown, and the old DAP began a long s...

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Image: Warren LeMay from Covington, KY, United States | CC0

Durham Athletic Park: Fenway in Miniature

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit monsieuricon from Montréal, Canada, CC BY-SA 2.0. Walk around the DAP today and you notice how small it feels. The current right field line stands 290 feet from home plate. Straightaway center is 398. The seats sit close enough that you can hear the catcher call signs. Old photographs from 1992 show a hand-painted sign welcoming...

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Image: monsieuricon from Montréal, Canada | CC BY-SA 2.0