Constructed for track and field, the venue hosted myriad other events, including college football and minor league baseball.

[3] It featured an oval cinder track that was a quarter-mile long and fifteen feet wide with a 120 foot straightaway in front of the grandstand, as well as baseball diamonds and tennis courts.

[3][4] The grounds opened on June 13, 1891, with 800 spectators attending the New England Association of the Amateur Athletic Union's first championship track and field meet.

[6] On July 4, 1895, 4,000 people turned out for the annual Worcester-Suffolk games, which was headlined by a two-mile match race between Thomas Conneff and George Orton that was won by Conneff, and a mile-long match race in which New England's outdoor champion Jimmy McLaughlin defeated the region's indoor champion Jerry Delaney.

[9] The meet, held on May 24, 1893, saw athletes from Dartmouth, Brown, Bowdoin, Amherst, Trinity, Worcester Polytechnic, Williams, Wesleyan, and Vermont compete in fifteen events.

[11] At the 1898 meet, Jesse Lyman Hurlbut Jr. of Wesleyan broke the pole vaulting word's record by clearing 11 feet, 6.5 inches.

[18] On August 20, 1897, at the Memorial Hospital Athletic Games, Bernard Wefers broke the world record in the 110 metres hurdles.

[21] In 1898, the New England Interscholastic Athletic Association moved its high school championship from Holmes Field in Cambridge, Massachusetts to the Worcester Oval.

[29] On October 7, 1897, the Boston Beaneaters and Baltimore Orioles played an exhibition game as part of a two-day barnstorming trip.

[42] On September 8, 1899, cyclist Major Taylor won a half-mile open race with Nat Butler coming in a close second.

[45] The Worcester Oval closed in 1915 and remained dormant until 1925, when it was purchased by Bishop Thomas Michael O'Leary for use as an athletic field for Saint John's High School.