Downs Field

Downs Field has been a major center of African American athletics and community life in Austin for more than a century. The site was donated to Samuel Huston College in 1914 and was used for its baseball stadium beginning in the late 1920s. It also served as home to the Austin Black Senators, a semi-professional team that played Texas Negro League clubs as well as African American college, barnstorming, and out-of-state teams. In December 1938, the property was sold to Austin public schools and converted into a football field and stadium for L.C. Anderson High School, the only high school for African Americans during segregation; there the school won the 1942 Prairie View Interscholastic League State Championship, and future Pro Football Hall of Famer Dick “Night Train” Lane played. In 1949, Downs Field was constructed at 12th Street and Springdale Road as a “separate but equal” alternative to Disch Field, named for Rev. Karl Downs, president of Samuel Huston College from 1943 until his death in 1948. In 1954, the City of Austin relocated Downs Field to this site, where the baseball field and wooden grandstands were built. It has been used by the Austin Black Pioneers, Greyhounds, and Indians, and remains the home field of Huston-Tillotson University.

Austin, Texas · United States