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Neale Stadium

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Neale Stadium was an outdoor college football stadium in Moscow, Idaho on the west end of the campus of the University of Idaho from 1936-68. The stadium was named for Mervin G. Neale, the UI President from 1930-37, and was the home field for the Idaho Vandals of the Pacific Coast Conference (and later the Big Sky). The Kibbie Dome currently occupies the site, in the same east-west configuration.

Neale Stadium was an earthen horseshoe bowl, opening to the east, with wooden grandstands along the sidelines only. The scoreboard was located at the west end, on the rim of the unseated bowl, and the stadium included the quarter-mile running track, and was unlighted. (photo)

There were no locker room facilities at the venue, the teams dressed in the Memorial Gymnasium well to the east. Similar to the current Kibbie Dome, the press box was above the south sideline's grandstand and the elevation of the playing field was 2610 feet (795 m) above sea level.

The wooden grandstands were condemned for structural reasons before the 1969 football season. Idaho used WSU's Rogers Field in nearby Pullman, Washington for their limited home schedule in 1969 (two Palouse home games), and was planning to do the same in 1970, with four games scheduled there.

A suspected arson early on Sunday, November 23, 1969, destroyed the previously condemned (and idle) Neale Stadium. [1]

Less than five months later another fire, also a suspected arson, at Rogers Field in April 1970 destroyed the south grandstand and press box of that wooden venue. This forced both WSU and UI to play their home football games in 1970 at Joe Albi Stadium in Spokane. The two teams met in the so-called "Displaced Bowl" in September, handily won by WSU. [2]

Vandal football returned to campus in 1971, as the new concrete "Idaho Stadium" opened, built on the site of Neale Stadium. Astroturf was added in 1972 and three years later the stadium would be enclosed to become the Kibbie Dome.

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