CANTON, Ohio — In its 60-plus-year history, the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton has seen its share of expansion projects, but nothing quite like the "makeover" that is expected beginning this spring.
“Never a chunk this big and never really with this purpose in mind. All of those previous expansions were to create more exhibit space. This is to create community space,” HOF Chief Communications Officer Rich Desrosiers said.
“It’s going to be a huge project and we think what we can do through this project is make the Pro Football Hall of Fame a community focal point that its founders envisioned in the 1960’s.”
The first change will come to the outside mini-football field, which slopes down. Desrosiers said they plan to flatten and even out the field so visitors can more easily use it.
Then there’s the concrete space next door, where a few months out of the year, the Hall of Fame will set up a tent for events. But soon the plan is to put in an 18,500-square-foot event center complex that will sit between the field and the Nash Family Event and Conference Center.
“We have found the enthusiasm of using that has actually shown us that it’s undersized,” Desrosiers said.
He said the current center is used hundreds of times a year, but its space is limited to up to 350 people. The hope with this new center is to be able to host 900 to over 1,000 visitors, complete with a full kitchen so groups don’t have to rely on catering.
And then there’s the museum. Somewhere in the first couple of phases of the project, one of the first changes to greet visitors will be when you walk through the front doors. A new grand lobby will be 8,000 square feet, with a high-tech interactive exhibit space.
“Really getting people to kind of get in the spirit of visiting the Pro Football Hall of Fame and experiencing the country’s most popular sport from the moment they step out of the car,” Desrosiers explained.
But tearing down and throwing up new walls isn’t possible in many spaces of the museum.
“Our challenge is that we’re basically landlocked, so we need to reimagine the space that we have,” Desrosiers said.
They plan to put that reimagination to work inside the Black College Football Hall of Fame within the museum to expand its footprint. They also are working to figure out how to best use the space in and around the bust room, where 371 busts of enshrinees are on display. After the 2023 class, featuring Browns legend Joe Thomas, there’s only a few feet of space left to work with.
The project is expected to cost $75 to $80 million. The Ohio House passed a bill last week that would allocate $7 million to the project. That bill now heads to the Ohio Senate.
The rest of the money, Desrosiers said, would come from their own fundraising campaign and sponsorship opportunities.