Vanderbilt Stadium
| at Dudley Field | |
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| Former names | Dudley Field (1922–1981) |
|---|---|
| Location | Jess Neely Drive, Nashville, Tennessee |
| Coordinates | 36°8′39″N 86°48′32″W / 36.14417°N 86.80889°WCoordinates: 36°8′39″N 86°48′32″W / 36.14417°N 86.80889°W |
| Owner | Vanderbilt University Board of Trust |
| Operator | Vanderbilt University |
| Capacity | 40,550 |
| Surface | Grass (1922–1969, 1999–2011) Astroturf (1970–1998) Shaw Sports Legion 46 (2012–present) |
| Construction | |
| Broke ground | 1922 |
| Opened | October 14, 1922 (rebuilt 1981) |
| Construction cost | $1.5 million ($21.5 million in 2017 dollars) $10.1 million (1981 reconstruction) ($26.6 million in 2017 dollars) |
| Architect | Walk Jones and Francis Man, Inc. Michael Baker, Jr. Corp. |
| General contractor | Foster & Creighton |
| Tenants | |
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Vanderbilt Commodores (NCAA) (1922–present) Tennessee Oilers (NFL) (1998) Music City Bowl (NCAA) (1998) Nashville FC (NPSL) (2014–2016) |
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Vanderbilt Stadium is a football stadium located in Nashville, Tennessee. Completed in 1922 (then named Dudley Field) as the first stadium in the South to be used exclusively for college football, it is the home of the Vanderbilt University football team. Vanderbilt Stadium hosted the Tennessee Oilers (now Titans) and the first Music City Bowl in 1998 and also hosted the Tennessee state high school football championships for many years.
Vanderbilt Stadium is the smallest football stadium in the Southeastern Conference, and was the largest stadium in Nashville until the completion of the Titans' Nissan Stadium in 1999.
Vanderbilt football began in 1892, and for 30 years, Commodore football teams played on the northeast corner of campus where Wilson Hall, Kissam Quandrangle, and a portion of the Vanderbilt University Law School now stand, adjacent to today's 21st Avenue South.
The first facility was named for William Dudley, Dean of the Vanderbilt University Medical School from 1885 until his death in 1914. Dudley was responsible for the formation of the SIAA, the predecessor of the Southern Conference and Southeastern Conference, in 1895, and was also instrumental in the formation of the NCAA in 1906.
In 1922, after a 74.2 winning percentage during the 18-year tenure of Coach McGugin, the Commodores had outgrown old Dudley Field. The old field was re-christened Curry Field, in honor of Irby "Rabbit" Curry, a standout football player from 1914–16, who left Vanderbilt to serve in the American Expeditionary Force to Europe in World War I and was killed while flying a combat mission over France in 1918. The football team played two games on the renamed Curry Field before moving to New Dudley Field in 1922.
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