As wrecking ball hits Spectrum, a peek at Philly's history of sporting landmarks

NO MATTER what next occupies the southeast corner of Broad Street and Pattison Avenue, it will always be remembered as the place where the Spectrum stood.

Although the Spectrum's footprint will eventually be filled by Philly Live! - a proposed retail and entertainment complex - the landmark arena will be lost to time like so many other iconic sports venues that once drew thousands of fans.

As the wrecking ball starts to tear down the Spectrum today at noon, the Daily News takes a look at other stadiums and arenas that have been razed in the city over the last 60 years, and what has become of the once-hallowed grounds on which they stood.

* Baker Bowl, Broad and Huntingdon streets: It opened in 1887 as the home of the Phillies. The ballpark closed in 1938 and was demolished in 1950.

A two-story, white-painted brick building built by UPS on the site of the old National League ballpark now houses the transportation-maintenance office for the School District of Philadelphia.

A car wash sits at one end of the rectangular property, and the dilapidated Botany 500 building still stands up the block near Lehigh Avenue as it has since 1910, just outside where the leftfield fence stood.

* Connie Mack Stadium (a/k/a Shibe Park), 21st Street and Lehigh Avenue: America's first steel, fireproof ballpark opened in 1909 and was demolished in 1976, leaving behind a dumping ground full of weeds and debris.

What stands today is a sprawling, bright-red-brick church complex serving as a rose among a community of thorns in a neighborhood filled with blighted houses and decrepit factories.

The Deliverance Evangelistic Church moved there from Broad Street and Wyoming Avenue in search of more space at the request of its founder, the Rev. Benjamin Smith. Construction was completed in August 1992.

"We used to ride our bikes around Shibe Park, and they used to chase us out!" said Barry Neil, 62, of Olney. "It was great because it was right in the center of the city. That church that sits there now is real nice, yeah."

Shibe Park was built for Connie Mack's Philadelphia Athletics, which played in the city from 1901 until the franchise moved to Kansas City in 1954. The Phillies shared the stadium with the A's from 1938 until the A's moved, then purchased the stadium and played there until 1970.

* Philadelphia Arena, Market Street between 45th and 46th: The building fell out of popular use in the 1970s, due to the Spectrum's arrival in 1967.

The Arena, home to various professional basketball, hockey and roller-derby leagues, was under the Market-Frankford El.

Steve Hutchins, 52, used to go to the Arena to watch roller derby and basketball, and to ice skate when they opened it up to the public.

"I lived really close to there, and in a housing project across Fairmount Avenue," said Ron Sistrunk, who is in his 60s. "The area around the Arena is doing a lot of positive things with the nice housing. The area's really coming up."

The complex is adjacent to the former TV studio that was the home of "American Bandstand" in the 1950s and '60s, and is now known as the Ron Brown Commerce Center.

* Convention Hall and Civic Center, 3400 Civic Center Boulevard at Convention Avenue: It opened on the edge of the University of Pennsylvania's campus in 1931 and was home to the Philadelphia Warriors and later the Philadelphia 76ers.

Pope John Paul II, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa and Nelson Mandela all spoke there.

It was demolished in 2005, and the Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine, a part of the University of Pennsylvania Health System, opened on the site in October 2008 in a modern glass-and-steel tower.

* Veterans Stadium and JFK Stadium: The spot where the Vet stood is now a parking lot for Citizens Bank Park. Although a collection of flagstaffs and plaques mark where the 60,000-seat concrete bowl stood before its 2004 implosion, the lot carries on the 700 level's in-your-face attitude with plenty of tailgating and taunting.

The Wells Fargo Center, home to the 76ers and Flyers, occupies the space where the horseshoe-shaped JFK Stadium, demolished in 1992, once held more than 100,000 fans for various sporting events. It was dubbed Municipal Stadium when it opened in 1926 and renamed JFK Stadium in 1964.