Shea Stadium Site — Queens, New York

Shea Stadium in Flushing, Queens, was the site of the Beatles' concert on 15 August 1965 — the first large stadium rock concert in history, attended by approximately 55,600 people and documented in a celebrated concert film. The size and pandemonium of the Shea concert established a new template for the scale at which popular music could be performed and experienced, and the screaming of the audience — so intense that the Beatles could not hear themselves play — demonstrated both the extraordinary power of their cultural phenomenon and the practical problems that would eventually lead them to stop touring entirely in 1966. The concert opened with the Fab Four arriving by helicopter.

Shea was the home of the New York Mets baseball team, and its large open bowl was repurposed for rock concerts throughout the 1970s and 1980s — the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, and Billy Joel (whose two sold-out Shea concerts in 1982 became a live album) all performed there. The stadium deteriorated over the following decades as it was replaced by Citi Field, the Mets' new ballpark built adjacent to the old site. Shea was demolished in 2008-2009.

Citi Field now occupies the footprint adjacent to the original Shea site. A small portion of the original Shea footprint has been preserved as a car park area in front of Citi Field, and various markers acknowledge the stadium's history. The Beatles' 1965 concert site is not specifically marked, but the general location is documented and is noted in Beatles tourism guides. The Mets' ticket office incorporates some Shea Stadium artifacts.