The community of Hoquiam has always been very showy of their heritage and rightly so because the people have always thought of themselves as hard working people who try their very best in almost everything they do and this has been true for almost all of their generations that call the Grays Harbor area at heir home. A part of this great heritage is the Olympic Stadium, no other place or building in all of Hoquiam can lay claim to what it stands for and what it stood for in all its years and that is it is for everyone and anyone who wish to stand for something together or make a stand in what they believe is the better in the contest of life, just like the games that are played within the stadium walls hundreds of times over.
The stadium opened its shingled external walls in 1938. The all-wood stadium seemed to be a daunting task if it was done by others but for this city that wood built from the ground up there was really no other building material that will share and display to the nation and to the world their abundance and mastery of lumber. It has been and still is a logging town, established in the 1850's the term "Hoquiam" translates from Native American tongue as "hungry for wood" for the towns namesake the river Hoquiam had this natural propensity to gather driftwood.
The city applied for a Civil Works Administration grant with the all wood design persistently present and in 1932, the grant was approved. 6 years later, with enough funds, a final architectural design that almost everyone agreed to and a whole lot of lumber, construction started of the all-wood Olympic stadium.
On November 24, 1938 the Olympic stadium in Hoquiam, Washington was now finally complete with more than 6 years of planning under its belt it only took under a year to construct from the ground up.
In 2005, again after much time has passed a local man, Congressman Norm Dicks prodded by his community constituents was able to secure through request a renovation grant that was awarded through the "Save America's Treasures" program. The good Congressman also supported the State Historic Preservation Office request to recognize the stadium as a National Registry of Historical Places grantee, which the old stadium got in 2006.
The Olympic stadium is one of the more extraordinarily built stadiums in the area with its truncated U-shaped design and angled corners, with one of its portions facing to the east to shelter players and fans alike from wind and rain from the Pacific. The outside is covered with cedar shingle sidings and the L shaped grandstand is sheltered from top to bottom which extends all the way to the right and going out into the outfield. The wood used is of old-growth fir heavy-timber frame with most of the trees felled maybe more than 100 years old. The seats are of course also made of wood and are in surprisingly good shape after sitting and bearing the weight of those countless who went by its entrances.
The Olympic stadium is presently home to the semi-professional football team the Grays Harbor Bearcats. In the 1990's the historic stadium was the base of operations for the now defunct Grays Harbor Gulls of the independent Western baseball League. This is testament to the resilience of the stadium and its continued contribution to the prestige and honor of the town and its people.
The people of Hoquiam and Grays Harbor in general know and love their sports and athletics and as such people do they make contest out of almost everything that they can compete about. Take the city's high school football team who has a football rivalry with twin city Aberdeen to the east that even goes farther than the history of the stadium itself. The heritage and historical Olympic Stadium also bears witness to more tame but not less quite events such as the Annual Grays Harbor Bluegrass Festival. The Olympic stadium, truly an American treasure. - 39815
The stadium opened its shingled external walls in 1938. The all-wood stadium seemed to be a daunting task if it was done by others but for this city that wood built from the ground up there was really no other building material that will share and display to the nation and to the world their abundance and mastery of lumber. It has been and still is a logging town, established in the 1850's the term "Hoquiam" translates from Native American tongue as "hungry for wood" for the towns namesake the river Hoquiam had this natural propensity to gather driftwood.
The city applied for a Civil Works Administration grant with the all wood design persistently present and in 1932, the grant was approved. 6 years later, with enough funds, a final architectural design that almost everyone agreed to and a whole lot of lumber, construction started of the all-wood Olympic stadium.
On November 24, 1938 the Olympic stadium in Hoquiam, Washington was now finally complete with more than 6 years of planning under its belt it only took under a year to construct from the ground up.
In 2005, again after much time has passed a local man, Congressman Norm Dicks prodded by his community constituents was able to secure through request a renovation grant that was awarded through the "Save America's Treasures" program. The good Congressman also supported the State Historic Preservation Office request to recognize the stadium as a National Registry of Historical Places grantee, which the old stadium got in 2006.
The Olympic stadium is one of the more extraordinarily built stadiums in the area with its truncated U-shaped design and angled corners, with one of its portions facing to the east to shelter players and fans alike from wind and rain from the Pacific. The outside is covered with cedar shingle sidings and the L shaped grandstand is sheltered from top to bottom which extends all the way to the right and going out into the outfield. The wood used is of old-growth fir heavy-timber frame with most of the trees felled maybe more than 100 years old. The seats are of course also made of wood and are in surprisingly good shape after sitting and bearing the weight of those countless who went by its entrances.
The Olympic stadium is presently home to the semi-professional football team the Grays Harbor Bearcats. In the 1990's the historic stadium was the base of operations for the now defunct Grays Harbor Gulls of the independent Western baseball League. This is testament to the resilience of the stadium and its continued contribution to the prestige and honor of the town and its people.
The people of Hoquiam and Grays Harbor in general know and love their sports and athletics and as such people do they make contest out of almost everything that they can compete about. Take the city's high school football team who has a football rivalry with twin city Aberdeen to the east that even goes farther than the history of the stadium itself. The heritage and historical Olympic Stadium also bears witness to more tame but not less quite events such as the Annual Grays Harbor Bluegrass Festival. The Olympic stadium, truly an American treasure. - 39815
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