Located against the breathtaking backdrop of the Pacific Northwest, historic Tacoma (Washington) Stadium High School is the home to unique athletic facilities. Among those is Wally Streeter Pool, an Olympic-sized swimming pool located 45 feet below the surface of E Street. In addition, its bowl-shaped football stadium commonly known as “The Stadium Bowl” overlooks Commencement Bay, which is part of the spectacular Puget Sound.

The pool is named after Streeter, who began his very successful career at Stadium High School in 1946 and finished at Tacoma (Washington) Mt. Tahoma High School in 1964. It was constructed in 1988 for about $5 million and is used for both swimming and water polo. The brick courtyard was then extended over the pool area to join the Industrial Arts Building.

Otherwise a dark facility, there are glass blocks on top of the pool area that let in natural light. The street itself is no longer open to traffic, so swimmers aren’t conducting workouts beneath cars and trucks on the surface.

The Stadium Bowl, which was recently chosen as one of the best high school football stadiums in the United States by ESPN, also has a long and unique history that goes back more than 100 years.

Designed by Frederick Heath, the stadium dates from 1910 and is in a location once known as Old Woman’s Gulch. Among the prominent individuals who have spoken there were Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, William Jennings Bryan, Rev. Billy Sunday, Gen. John Pershing and Babe Ruth. Louis Armstrong, John Phillip Sousa and his military band, and famous opera singers all performed in the Bowl.

Stadium High School is such a unique-looking building that even Hollywood found it. It was featured extensively in the 1999 teen-angst movie “10 Things I Hate About You” that starred Julia Stiles and the late Academy Award-winning Heath Ledger.