The Parade Ground was the center of activity at Fort Ward – both Coast Artillery and Navy eras – for both outdoor drills and recreation, where soldiers might be marching in formation one day and playing baseball the next. The expansive ground was presided over by the fort’s most prominent buildings: the Administration building, the gymnasium/post exchange, and the enlisted men’s barracks, with the tiny firehouse tucked into a corner between them.

During World War II, the field was the site of towering “rhombic” radio antennas for communications. These were big, tall poles with wires strung across the top to snatch signals out of the air from across the Pacific.

In between the wars, in the early 1930s, Fort Ward held summer camps for disadvantaged youths from Seattle. So you would have seen kids playing in the Parade Ground, just like today.

The barracks sat where the marshy detention pond is now across Parkview Drive, at the intersection with Radio School Road. The building features prominently in many old pictures of Fort Ward. It had two wings, and living space for 109 soldiers.The barracks succumbed to neglect and was torn down in the 1980s, but identical buildings can be found and explored at Fort Worden in Port Townsend. The barracks at Fort Columbia, Wash., is now a museum with excellent displays and many rooms restored as they were when occupied by Coast Artillerymen a century ago.

The Parade Ground was preserved from development and dedicated as a public park in 2002, and is now a popular neighborhood hub for pickup ballgames and family fun.

Baseball on the Fort Ward Parade Ground, ca. 1915. Note the firehouse in the background, today a private residence.

Baseball on the Parade Ground, viewed north to south.