Memorial Stadium (Bakersfield)

Memorial Stadium is a double-decked concrete and steel stadium in northeast Bakersfield, California, near the Panorama Bluffs. It features a fast Bermuda grass football field with a high-centered crown that was renovated in 2014 and an all-weather track. Located at the corner of University Avenue and Mount Vernon Avenue on the campus of Bakersfield College (BC), it is primarily used for American football, and is the home field of the B.C. Renegades. The stadium holds roughly 20,000 people and was built in 1955. It is named to honor the war dead of World War I and World War II. A plaque at the finish line commemorates its dedication.HistoryMemorial Stadium was completed in 1955 before the remainder of the campus opened for students in 1956 when Bakersfield College would move from its original location at Bakersfield High School where it was founded in 1913, to the new campus in Northeast Bakersfield. Bakersfield College is the 2nd oldest junior college in California behind Santa Barbara City College. Ad hoc football squads were first created in the 1920s resulting in the moniker nickname "Renegades." Memorial Stadium would be the first structure to be completed at the new site. Football games were being played on site before classes were ever held on the new campus. In fact, during the first semester students were served lunches out of the concession stands because the cafeteria was still under construction.For its first 40 years, Memorial Stadium enjoyed huge success based on its attendance of Bakersfield College football games. Lasting into the early 1990s, it was unusual for a B.C. football game not to have 12,000 fans or more in the stands. Games have been televised live and on tape-delay in the past. Attendance was so large that the college's academic extracurricular activities were all funded by football ticket sales until the 1990s.