via wikimedia
In March, after a protracted debate about the fate of the historic Tinker Field where Martin Luther King Jr. made his one and only appearance in Orlando in 1964, the city of Orlando scrapped plans to completely demolish the field to make way for renovation of the Citrus Bowl. It opted, instead, to only demolish some of the field and then give the rest "historic designation," with some kind of marker to be determined at a later date.
Now, after the grandstands have come down, that later date is here. The city is asking the community to participate in its process for deciding how best to commemorate the field's role in both baseball and social-justice history at a public meeting scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 1 at 6:30 p.m. at the Dr. J.B. Callahan Neighborhood Center, 101 North Parramore Ave. Even if you can't make the meeting, the city is soliciting feedback via an online survey, which you can take here.
Ideas suggested in the survey include life-size statues of baseball players, a monument, inclusion of seating from Tinker Field's original grandstands and a fence with timeline markers that lay out important points in Tinker Field history.
