Parry Field is a former sports venue in Belmont, a suburb of

Perth, Western Australia Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth i ...

. The ground is best known for being the home of

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding t ...

team

Perth Heat The Perth Heat is a baseball team in the current Australian Baseball League and a foundation member of the Australian Baseball League. It is now the most successful team in ABL, winning 15 Claxton Shields. Australian Baseball League (1989–19 ...

between 1989 and 1997. The stadium was built in 1983 on the site of Belmont Oval which had been primarily used for soccer and

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 11 ...

. After the demolition of the baseball stadium, the land became known as Grove Farm Reserve.

History

The land was part of Grove Farm, which was founded in the early 1830s. In the mid-1950s, the land was transferred to the Belmont Park Road Board and placed in a trust with the stated land use of recreation. In 1955, Belmont Oval was officially opened at a rugby league match between Western Australia and France. In 1983, it became the first purpose-built

stadium in Australia. It named for

Kevin Parry Kevin John Parry (1933 – 26 November 2010) was a businessman from Western Australia, most noted for his backing of the Taskforce '87 syndicate which unsuccessfully defended the 1987 America's Cup in Fremantle, Western Australia. The defence c ...

, a local businessman and enthusiast whose fortunes failed soon after the opening. The stadium featured

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

-standard lighting, seating for about 2,200 people and standing room for 3,000 more. The stadium was demolished by the

City of Belmont The City of Belmont is a local government area in the inner eastern suburbs of the Western Australian capital city of Perth, located about east of Perth's central business district on the south bank of the Swan River. The City covers an ar ...

as part of the WA Building Better Cities Program. Councillors were influenced by complaints from local residents about fireworks, loud music and other pre-match festivities. On the other hand, baseball being far from a mainstream sport in Australia, its managers had been unable to recoup the stadium's high maintenance costs on a year-round basis.Joe Clark
A history of Australian baseball
' at Google Books. After the demolition of the baseball facilities the city council intended to develop the land, however the conditions of the trust led to a long delay, during which the land has been unused.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Perth Sports venues in Perth, Western Australia Baseball venues in Australia 1985 establishments in Australia Sports venues completed in 1985 1997 disestablishments in Australia Sports venues demolished in 1997 Defunct sports venues in Australia History of baseball in Australia Defunct baseball venues