An Oldie, but a Goodie

Exterior of Grainger Stadium, May-2011.

The seating bowl is typical of mid-century parks.

The Marlboro Man has been replaced by the logo mascot of the K-Tribe.

Chronological Tour: Stop 162

• Location: Grainger and East streets (off Vernon), Kinston, N.C. (map it using Google Maps)
• Opened: 1938 (stadium rebuilt 1951)
• Home team: Kinston Eagles, Coastal Plain League (1949-52); Kinston Eagles (1956-57, 1962-73, 1978-81, 1986), Expos (1974), Blue Jays (1982-85), Indians (1987-2011), Down East Wood Ducks (2017-24), Carolina League; Down East Bird Dawgs, Frontier League (2025-present)
• Capacity: 4,100

Rating: 3 baseballs

Doesn’t mean there aren’t any corporate tie-ins, though. In 1999, the owner of the Kinston Indians (henceforth known as the K-Tribe) owned the Bojangles restaurant chain as well as a small (two locations in Kinston) chain of Fifties-style diners with gas stations called RightWay (motto: “Eat Here ” Get Gas”). Both were promoted: the vendors wear RightWay shirts, and there’s a Bojangles stand in the picnic area down the right-field line. (I returned for a farewell visit in 2011 and both were no longer in effect. However, by 2018 the Bojangles chain was sponsoring a lot of promotions throughout the Carolinas.)

As for the park itself, it’s, well, old. It’s concrete, with a lot of wood. I heard people on my trip knocking the place, but I thought it had character. Not much to see, although the water tower in left field is painted with a K-Tribe logo. Or, again, it was in 1999; in 2011 the logo was a rather generic declaration, Kinston: All-American City. By 2018, with the new team in place, a Wood Ducks logo was painted on the tower.

A series of franchise shifts was announced in late 2010 which left Kinston without a professional team in 2012. The K-Tribe relocated to Zebulon to fill the gap left by the purchase of the Double-A Carolina Mudcats, who moved to Pensacola, Fla.

After five seasons, Grainger Stadium got its professional baseball back in 2017, when the Texas Rangers bought the High Desert Mavericks and that club was transferred from the California League to the Carolina League along with the Bakersfield Blaze. The new team in Kinston was known as the Down East Wood Ducks. I’m down with Wood Ducks, but not with Down East, which to me implies coastal eastern Maine; apparently the term has currency along US 70 as well.

One interesting feature at the park in 2018 was the ticket pricing policy: it varied by day of the week. Sunday through Wednesday were the cheapest, Thursday was two dollars higher, and Friday and Saturday were the most expensive, another two dollars higher than Thursday. By 2021, there were two prices: $7 for Sunday through Thursday and $12 for Friday and Saturday.

By 2023, the club had announced plans to relocate to a new ballpark in Spartanburg, S.C., which is slated to be ready for the 2025 season. This ends the tenure of the Wood Ducks at eight seasons. The independent Frontier League has announced that it will be expanding to Kinston (along with Pearl, Miss., which also lost an affiliated Minor League team) for 2025.