The East Orange Oval was an athletic field located at Brick Church in

East Orange, New Jersey East Orange is a City (New Jersey), city in Essex County, New Jersey, Essex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the city's population was 69,612, an increase of 5,342 (+8.3%) from the 2010 United States ...

. It was also the first known field used by the

Orange Athletic Club The Orange Tornadoes and Newark Tornadoes were two manifestations of a long-lived professional American football franchise that existed in some form from 1887 to 1941 and from 1958 to 1970, having played in the American Amateur Football Union fro ...

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

team. The field was also used for

track and field Track and field (or athletics in British English) is a sport that includes Competition#Sports, athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name used in North America is derived from where the sport takes place, a ru ...

events by the Old Brick Church of Orange, among other groups.

History

Called "Oval Park" by the City of East Orange it was home to the Orange Athletic Club later the Orange Tornadoes, played on the field before going on to play in the World Series of Football at Madison Square Garden in 1902. Oval Park was also saw

Negro League The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be used narrowly for the seven relativel ...

Baseball play, seeing the

Newark Eagles The Newark Eagles were a professional Negro league baseball team which played in the Negro National League from 1936 to 1948. They were owned by Abe and Effa Manley. History Formation The Newark Eagles were formed in 1936 when the Newark ...

New York Black Yankees The New York Black Yankees were a professional Negro league baseball team based in New York City; Paterson, New Jersey; and Rochester, New York. Beginning as the independent Harlem Stars, the team was renamed the New York Black Yankees in 1932 an ...

Brooklyn Brown Dodgers The Brooklyn Brown Dodgers were a Negro league baseball team from 1945 to 1946. Calling Ebbets Field home, they played primarily in the United States League and folded with the rest of the league in 1946. History Founding and first season ...

, Brooklyn Colored Giants, Baltimore Eagles,

Birmingham Barons The Birmingham Barons are a Minor League Baseball team based in Birmingham, Alabama. The team, which plays in the Southern League, is the Double-A affiliate of the Chicago White Sox and plays at Regions Field in downtown Birmingham. The Baron ...

Chicago Giants The Chicago Giants were a professional baseball team based in Chicago, Illinois which played in the Negro leagues from 1910 to 1921. History The team was founded by Frank Leland after he and his partner, Rube Foster, split up the Leland Gi ...

, and the

Asheville Blues Asheville ( ) is a city in Buncombe County, North Carolina, United States. Located at the confluence of the French Broad and Swannanoa rivers, it is the county seat of Buncombe County. It is the most populous city in Western North Carolina an ...

all use the site. Each year East Orange's Negro team would play it's all-white counterpart at the Oval, which used to have a concrete grandstand. The Park would be subject to a 6 million dollar renovation from 2023-2024 by Neglia Engineering which saw a walking trail, a new track and field, and a drainage system.

References

Old Brick Church Boys Win
{{Coord, 40.75964, -74.20215, display=title Orange/Newark Tornadoes Defunct American football venues in the United States American football venues in New Jersey East Orange, New Jersey