Carson Park is a historic

park A park is an area of natural, semi-natural or planted space set aside for human enjoyment and recreation or for the protection of wildlife or natural habitats. Urban parks are urban green space, green spaces set aside for recreation inside t ...

located in

Eau Claire, Wisconsin Eau Claire ( ; lit. "clear water") is a city in Eau Claire County, Wisconsin, Eau Claire and Chippewa County, Wisconsin, Chippewa counties in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. It is the county seat, seat of Eau Claire County. It is the List of citie ...

. It is located on a

peninsula A peninsula is a landform that extends from a mainland and is only connected to land on one side. Peninsulas exist on each continent. The largest peninsula in the world is the Arabian Peninsula. Etymology The word ''peninsula'' derives , . T ...

created on an

oxbow __NOTOC__ An oxbow is a U-shaped metal pole (or larger wooden frame) that fits the underside and the sides of the neck of an ox or wikt:bullock, bullock. A bow pin holds it in place. The term "oxbow" is widely used to refer to a U-shaped meand ...

lake, Half Moon Lake, which was part of the former course of the Chippewa River. The park contains baseball, football, and softball venues, as well as the Chippewa Valley Museum.

History

The land that became Carson Park was donated in 1914 to the city of Eau Claire by heirs to

lumber baron A business magnate, also known as an industrialist or tycoon, is a person who is a powerful entrepreneur and investor who controls, through personal enterprise ownership or a dominant shareholding position, a firm or industry whose goods or ser ...

William Carson, and named in his honor. The park was opened the following year. Construction of a sports complex, including a baseball stadium, football stadium and tennis courts, began in 1935 as a

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; from 1935 to 1939, then known as the Work Projects Administration from 1939 to 1943) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to car ...

(WPA) project. The first game in the football stadium was played in 1936, and the first game in the baseball stadium was played in 1937. The baseball stadium was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 2003.

Baseball stadium

Carson Park Exterior Eau Claire Wisconsin

The Carson Park baseball stadium hosts the

Memorial A memorial is an object or place which serves as a focus for the memory or the commemoration of something, usually an influential, deceased person or a historical, tragic event. Popular forms of memorials include landmark objects such as home ...

(Old Abes),

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

(Huskies),

Regis Regis or Régis may refer to: People * Regis (given name), a given name (including a list of people with the name) * Regis (surname), a surname (including a list of people with the name) * Regis (musician), full name Karl O'Connor, an English ...

(Ramblers) and Immanuel Lutheran (Lancers) high school teams; the

Eau Claire Express The Eau Claire Express is a collegiate summer baseball team playing in the Northwoods League. Their home games are played at Carson Park, in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. After two straight losing seasons in 2005 and 2006, the Eau Claire Express achie ...

of the

Northwoods League The Northwoods League is a collegiate summer baseball wooden bat league. All players in the league must have National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA eligibility remaining in order to participate. The league is amateur, and players are not ...

; the Eau Claire Cavaliers and Eau Claire Bears amateur teams; and the Eau Claire Pizza Hut American Legion team. The left field wall is adjacent to the sideline of the Carson Park football stadium field. During the football season, temporary bleachers from the baseball stadium are positioned on left field with the front of the bleachers placed along the left field wall facing the football field. For the 2025 Eau Claire Express season, a 36' by 20' Daktronics video board (known as the "WNB Financial Video Board") was installed in the outfield scoreboard location.

Football stadium

Carson Park's football stadium is home of the

University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire The University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire (UW–Eau Claire, UWEC or simply Eau Claire) is a public university in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, United States. It is part of the University of Wisconsin System and offers Bachelor's degree, bachelor's and ...

Blugolds, as well as the

and

football teams. It also hosted the now-defunct Chippewa Valley Predators and Eau Claire Crush of the amateur Northern Elite Football League. The UW–Eau Claire Blugold football team began play in the stadium in 1937. A tornado that moved through Eau Claire on September 12, 1982, destroyed the press box at the football stadium. A larger, multi-level press box was constructed in the same location. A renovation to the football stadium's grandstand and separate concession/bathroom facilities took place in the late 1990s. As more teams used the football field, the condition of the field deteriorated. Beginning in the 1990s, the city attempted several alternative natural grass fields. A solution came in 2004 with the installation of a

FieldTurf FieldTurf is a brand of artificial turf playing surface. It is manufactured and installed by FieldTurf Tarkett, a division of French company Tarkett. FieldTurf is headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, and its primary manufacturing facility i ...

artificial surface. New turf was again installed in 2015. left, Stadium's end zone

Additional venues

The park has two museums. The Paul Bunyan Logging Camp Museum, which opened in 1934, portrays the town's lumbering history and contains seven authentic logging camp buildings. The Chippewa Valley Museum, opened in 1974, serves as a regional history museum. It contains an old-fashioned ice cream parlor; the one-room Sunnyview School, dating to 1882; and the Anderson Log House, a Norwegian log house built in about 1866, which are situated next to the museum in Carson Park. The park also has nature trails and offers other recreational activities. Half Moon Lake is the original home of the Eau Claire Ski Sprites, a

water skiing Water skiing (also waterskiing or water-skiing) is a surface water sport in which an individual is pulled behind a boat or a cable ski installation over a body of water, skimming the surface on one or two skis. The sport requires sufficien ...

show team, and the Eau Claire Horseshoe Club. Carson Park displayed the historic locomotive

Soo Line 2719 Soo Line 2719 is a 4-6-2 "Pacific" type steam locomotive built by the American Locomotive Company (ALCO) for use on passenger trains operated by the Minneapolis, St. Paul and Sault Ste. Marie Railway (" Soo Line"). No. 2719 was used to haul the S ...

from 1960 to 1996. From

Memorial Day Memorial Day (originally known as Decoration Day) is a federal holiday in the United States for mourning the U.S. military personnel who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces. It is observed on the last Monday of May. It i ...

through

Labor Day Labor Day is a Federal holidays in the United States, federal holiday in the United States celebrated on the first Monday of September to honor and recognize the Labor history of the United States, American labor movement and the works and con ...

, the Chippewa Valley Railroad Association operates the one-half mile, gauge Chippewa Valley Railroad, a

ridable miniature railway A ridable miniature railway (US: riding railroad or grand scale railroad) is a large scale, usually ground-level railway that hauls passengers using locomotives that are often models of full-sized railway locomotives (powered by diesel or pet ...

excursion in the park. The Buckshot Run starts and finishes at Carson Park and follows the

Chippewa River State Trail Chippewa River State Trail is a 26-mile urban-rural rail trail in western Wisconsin that follows the path of the Chippewa River. The trails runs from the spot of the confluence of the Chippewa with the Eau Claire River, at Phoenix Park in do ...

in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

References

External links

*
Carson Park baseball stadium
on visiteauclaire.com
Carson Park facilities
at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire athletics

Eau Claire Express page on Carson Park

Wisconsin National Register of Historic Places' Carson Park page

Paul Bunyan Logging Camp website

Chippewa Valley Museum website

{{Portal bar, Trains College football venues in Wisconsin Sports in Eau Claire, Wisconsin Minor league baseball venues Parks on the National Register of Historic Places in Wisconsin Works Progress Administration in Wisconsin Protected areas of Eau Claire County, Wisconsin Tourist attractions in Eau Claire County, Wisconsin Buildings and structures in Eau Claire, Wisconsin National Register of Historic Places in Eau Claire County, Wisconsin High school football venues in the United States 1915 establishments in Wisconsin Sports venues completed in 1936