Former Detroit Free Press photographer J. Kyle Keener documented the final days of Tiger Stadium in 1999.
The best photographers look through a tiny viewfinder and see something bigger. That’s J. Kyle Keener.
A shade more than a quarter-century ago, the Free Press turned him loose to document the final days of Tiger Stadium.
He has moved on to other creative things, but back then, he shot more than 1,800 images, in and out of the ballpark. Our executive video producer, Brian Kaufman, found them not long ago while he was rummaging through some dusty files, and what you see here are some of the greatest hits.
The thing about Tiger Stadium was that it was more than a place where people played baseball. You can pick up basketball and football from television, but baseball tends to be a legacy, passed down through generations and soaked in through visits to an actual game.
That made Tiger Stadium a temple of childhood and family and memories and history, where you could point to the spot where Ty Cobb and Al Kaline stood, and where Cecil Fielder once tossed you a baseball.
The concourse was too narrow and some of the paint was peeling and once in a while, you got stuck behind an I-beam. Maybe you didn’t love the place quite as much on those days.
But I’ve seen the final days of other stadiums — Comiskey Park in Chicago, Municipal Stadium in Cleveland — and few wept at their demolition. No one rallied to save them, or formed giant rings of people to give them hugs.
We were blessed to have Tiger Stadium. And we’re blessed again, 26 years after the cheering stopped, because the Free Press had a visual poet named J. Kyle Keener — and Kyle had a camera.
Reach Neal Rubin at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Last days of Detroit's Tiger Stadium captured by J. Kyle Keener photos
Category: Baseball
