Centene Stadium

Legion Park redirects here. For the ballpark in Raton, NM, see Legion Park (Raton).

Centene Stadium
Location	Great Falls, MT United States 47.516895; -111.259102
Building chronology
Built	1956
Tenants
Great Falls Voyagers
Former Tenants
Great Falls White Sox (2003-2007) Great Falls Dodgers (1984-2002) Great Falls Giants (1969-1983)
Capacity
3,800

Centene Stadium in Great Falls, MT, was the home of Great Falls affiliated baseball from 1963 through 2019. After that and the Coronavirus pandemic-canceled 2020 season, MLB's 2021 Minor League Reorganization made the Rookie-Advanced Pioneer League - including the Great Falls Voyagers - an independent circuit.

Baseball here actually dates to 1940, with a history that includes a great save story that has nothing to do with relief pitching plus a later and very thorough renovation.

The original Civilian Conservation Corps project opened as Legion Park in 1940. A Los Angeles Dodgers affiliation landed in 1953 was lost to ballpark deterioration 10 years later. Then, 100 baseball-loving business people pledged $1,000 each toward a renovation so extensive it seems today's stadium was "built" on the site of the one it "replaced". The new stadium was also called Legion Park until Centene Corporation, a managed care company, bought naming rights in 2007.

Affiliated baseball returned in the form of a partnership with the San Francisco Giants in 1969; the Dodgers returned in 1984.

A $2.2 million renovation - only a quarter of that on taxpayers - began in 2003 as they switched parents to the Chicago White Sox, originally using that nickname. Five years later, they became "Voyagers" - for the old Legion Park's famed 1950 UFO filming.[1]

All Great Falls professional teams from 1916 through 1963 played as the Electrics - except the 1949 and 1950 seasons as the Selectrics.

Centene has a capacity of 3,800 people.

Photograph Courtesy of (c) Eric and Wendy Pastore http://www.digitalballparks.com