Abandoned Newark Ironbound Stadium (Urbex)

Explored a very sketchy part of town to explore this once sports-centered athletic stadium. Various locals and teenagers seem to inhabit the place as a chill spot even though this property's soil is contaminated due to its previous use as an industrial site by Celanese that once stood here. It is one of the reasons that it fell to the wayside once contaminates were found in 1986 on a portion of the site during excavation for a community center next door. I didn't take any photos here due to the association of gangs and criminal activity in the overgrown back lot. One of the sketchiest places that I have ever explored. It even beat out a textile mill I visited the same day where locals and amateur explorers seemed to waltz around on the banks of the river next to the mill. In that place, the paths were enclosed on all sides with various weeds, grasses, and trees. Straight inner city jungle.

Update:

Around Nov 2019, the Ironbound Stadium is now the Eddie Moraes Stadium home to an all-encompassing athletic field for soccer, baseball, and football, an ice rink, and an indoor pool.

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🏟️ Did you play at Ironbound?

Did you play or watch a game on this field before it closed, or live on the block while it sat empty? Team photographs, league schedules, programs and newspaper clippings would all help. So would anything on the Celanese plant that stood here before the stadium, the 1986 excavation that found the contamination, and how long the field stayed in use after that. Full credit given to all contributors.

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🏟️ The other stadium, and more of New Jersey

Newark and Paterson left standing empty, plus the wireworks and the coal pier.

🏟️ Abandoned Paterson Hinchliffe Stadium | Urban Exploration The other stadium from that same day, above the Great Falls. One of the last Negro League ballparks, reopened in 2023. › 🏭 Colt Gun Mill & Allied Textile Printing (ATP) The textile mill from that same day, on the riverbank below the Great Falls. Shored up, fenced off, and promised a vista park. › 🧵 Inside the Abandoned National Silk Dyeing Co.: Paterson's Forgotten Textile Mill Inspectors counted more than 904 drums of chemicals at 6 Piercy St. A five-alarm fire gutted the oldest sections. › 🔒 A Life Sentence in Old Essex County Jail A few miles away in Newark: built 1837 to John Haviland's design, closed 1970, still fighting off the wrecking ball. › ⚙️ John A. Roebling's Sons Company Upper Works Flat Shop No. 1 lost its exterior wall in 2026. The mayor is salvaging the iron star plates instead. › 🚂 The Decaying McMyler Coal Dumper at Port Reading Big Mac, built 1917, tipped 25 railcars an hour with 12 men. It ran until 1983. ›

📍 The Ironbound Stadium stood on a former Celanese industrial site in Newark, New Jersey. It reopened around November 2019 as Eddie Moraes Stadium.