Kudos to readers of my column last Saturday, “There Used to Be a Barn Here.” I enjoyed your emails as well as your comments. I always read the comments. Most of you wouldn’t know that, but I do read you faithfully. No, I don’t respond to the comments because I feel like, well, I had my say and now you should have yours. I had my chance to vent and now you have yours. Not that we’re always venting. In fact, last week’s column prompted happy but also bittersweet memories of things — farms and barns — gone by. I especially appreciated the thoughts of Beverly Gunn, Kitty Myers, and “Wolfbane.” Kitty gave the name and address of a group in West Virginia called Barnwood Builders, which is saving and repurposing barns. Wolfbane added: “The National Barn Alliance has the mission to preserve and protect America’s historic barns. The organization provides resources and support to individuals and groups who are interested in preserving barns and other agricultural structures.” Terrific recommendations. Thank you both. Barns aside, the title of my column was inspired by a sweet, sentimental song by Frank Sinatra called “There Used to Be a Ballpark.” It’s a touching lament remembering things not there anymore, most notably those wonderful old ballparks. The songwriter, Joe Raposo, was said to be referring to the venerable Polo Grounds, where the New York Giants played until 1957, when they announced their relocation to San Francisco, following their long-time rivals the Brooklyn Dodgers to the West Coast. Once the Giants moved, the newly established New York Mets used the Polo Grounds for a short time in the early 1960s until their ugly Shea Stadium was erected. With that, the Polo Grounds met the wrecking ball. I know folks who watched many games there, including our late friend Charlie Wiley (who wrote of the Polo Grounds in this splendid Pearl Harbor remembrance). It broke their hearts to see the Polo Grounds destroyed, as it likewise crushed fans of places like the Brooklyn Dodgers’ Ebbets Field.  Ebbets Field was destroyed in 1960 and ultimately replaced by a hideous high-story apartment complex. The contrasting images of the lovely field of blessed memories versus the repulsive apartment-complex-be-damned must have made old Dodgers fans alternately vomit and weep. Obviously, my column on barns no longer there got me thinking about ballparks. It also got some of you thinking. A few of you emailed me. We started reminiscing about ballparks no longer there. For me, unfortunately, the ballpark of my youth wasn’t really a ballpark. It was a stadium. And stadiums sure as hell aren’t ballparks. Tragically, the idyllic parks of baseball’s Golden Age were bulldozed for 1970s monstrosities that reflected the ugliness of everything in the decade, from long hair to silly bellbottoms to sideburns and ridiculous “leisure suits.”  My birth town of Pittsburgh was one of many cities that blasted beautiful ballparks to smithereens in favor of massive stadia that resembled giant ashtrays and flying saucers rather than (to borrow a good phrase) a field of dreams. These were fields of nightmares. Actually, you dare not call them fields. They were filled not with grass but AstroTurf. And for some reason, they rushed to imitate one another in their ugliness, akin to the pretty girl who for some bizarre reason dyes her hair blue and shoves a bolt through her lip. Speaking of AstroTurf, the Houston Astros’ Astrodome was a paragon of repugnance for baseball. So was the Montreal Expos’ saucer-ish stadium, which was called Olympic Stadium, but would have been better labeled with the French word for “monstrosity.” And they were far from alone in their ugliness and sameness. I remember an excellent quote from Pittsburgh Pirates center-fielder Andy Van Slyke, who talked about stepping into the sterile, carpeted batters’ box and looking around with a moment’s uncertainty as to whether he was standing inside Pittsburgh’s stadium or in Cincinnati, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Atlanta, or wherever. They all looked the same, which is to say: hideous. Personally, as a Pirates fan raised in that era, it’s too bad that Three Rivers Stadium was the stadium of my youth. It actually hosted fabulous baseball in the 1970s with the “Lumber Company” team and also the 1990–92 Bucs. A fun debate we had was which Pirates outfield of the period was greater: the mid-1960s trio of Willie Stargell, Bill Virdon, and Robert Clemente; the mid-1970s trio of Al Oliver, Dave Parker, and Richie Zisk; or the early ’90s gang of Barry Bonds (pre-steroids), Andy Van Slyke, and Bobby Bonilla. Yes, some great baseball teams. The Pirates tied for the most division titles in the 1970s and won two World Series at Three Rivers that decade, in 1971 and 1979, both against the Baltimore Orioles. More than that, Three Rivers was home to the best football team ever, the 1970s Steelers. It was thus also home to Franco Harris’ hallowed “Immaculate Reception.” And yet, though it was the site of phenomenal football moments, the stadium was a terrible eyesore to football as well. And a sheer architectural disgrace to the game of baseball. (READ MORE from Paul Kengor: Remembering the Raiders–Steelers Rivalry of the 1970s) Ultimately, Three Rivers Stadium merited the wrecking ball in February 2001. You could have strapped me to the ball. Or maybe tied me to a missile and sent me soaring in like “Major Kong” in Dr. Strangelove, yahooing every second of my final descent. Worth the sacrifice, yes. Perhaps as a reward for our suffering, Three Rivers was mercifully replaced by a gorgeous, real ballpark, maybe the nicest in Major League Baseball: PNC Park. I was actually out in front in that effort. I wrote the first major articles in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette advocating for a baseball-only ballpark in the early 1990s. I did a bunch of talk shows. For the record, what I wanted, and what everyone in the Pittsburgh area longed for, was a field akin to what the historic franchise (founded in the 1880s) had prior to Three Rivers Stadium, namely: Forbes Field. Forbes was the home of the Pirates from 1909–70, with an unmatched history of truly remarkable moments, from Babe Ruth’s final three home runs to the single greatest hit in the history of baseball: Bill Mazeroski’s home run in the bottom of the ninth to defeat the New York Yankees in game seven of the 1960 World Series. (READ MORE from Paul Kengor: Remembering Bill Mazeroski and Baseball’s Biggest Home Run) It was heartbreaking when boneheaded “civic leaders” decided to destroy Forbes Field after the 1970 season. And in favor of what? The giant AstroTurfed ashtray that was Three Rivers Stadium. So, for Pittsburghers, the ballpark not there anymore — the type that inspired songwriter Joe Raposo — was iconic Forbes Field. One of baseball’s sacred shrines, its green cathedrals. All that remains of it today is part of the brick wall where Maz launched his shot in 1960. It stands behind Pitt’s law school and a grad school building where I took classes. Notably, inside that dreadful postmodern building, blandly named “Forbes Quadrangle,” rests the original Forbes Field home plate encased in glass. I would stand there on occasion and take a batting stance, imagining the likes of Honus Wagner, Pie Traynor, Ralph Kiner, Roberto Clemente, Willie Stargell, and — yes — Bill Mazeroski once doing the same. But alas, that ballpark isn’t there anymore. So, tell me, dear readers, what is your Forbes Field? I stand ready to read. Thanks, as always, for your thoughts. READ MORE: A Ballplayer Out of Another Era For the Love of the Game, for the Love of Country Remembering Bill Mazeroski and Baseball’s Biggest Home Run