Photo © Steven Cukrov | Dreamstime.com
After years of discussion and planning, construction of a youth baseball complex near the movie site for Kevin Costner’s 1989 Field of Dreams is finally underway. The first phase of the facility is expected to include four diamonds, plus concessions and restroom buildings with designs inspired by traditional Iowa corn cribs.
According to the Telegraph Herald of Dubuque:
Musco Lighting, headquartered in Oskaloosa [Iowa] is leading development of up to 10 fields near the movie site and providing a significant in-kind contribution for the project, for which a capital campaign also has been launched by the site’s owner, Dyersville Events Inc.
The local nonprofit purchased the site last year from its former ownership group, Go the Distance Baseball, and continues to work with Travel Dubuque to manage the movie site.
Musco Lighting has been involved with the Field of Dreams since 1988, when the company installed lights around the site for the filming of the movie, according to Casey Scheidel, director of facility development at Musco.
Musco is currently working on lighting for the permanent baseball stadium adjacent to the movie site, for which construction is expected to conclude next year.
Now, Musco is taking the lead on constructing a planned youth sports complex just north of the movie site and permanent stadium, which will include space for up to 10 baseball and softball fields.
Major League Baseball’s “MLB at Field of Dreams” game — which took place during the regular season in 2021 and 2022 and featured Musco lights — had been halted since 2023 due to construction at the site. In August, however, reports began circulating that the event will resume, with the Philadelphia Phillies and Minnesota Twins meeting amidst the cornfields next August. League officials confirmed that, as of Aug. 25, that is only “a tentative plan.”
John Sutter, vice president of Travel Dubuque, recently told a Cedar Rapids-based broadcast news outlet that MLB’s inaugural game at the Field of Dreams between the New York Yankees and Chicago White Sox in 2021 generated an estimated economic impact of $6.8 million.
“It brings a tremendous amount of attention to the state and the region and the county of Dubuque and the City of Dyersville,” he said. “Everyone is always looking forward to having an event like that again. It fills all the hotels in the area, brings a lot of attention and really shines the spotlight on us so we can be a showcase for the whole state.”
Initial plans for the youth baseball complex, reported by SDM in 2021, called for 21 fields, with fundraising ongoing. The original name was “Ballpark Heaven,” taken from Field of Dreams’ famous line: “Is this heaven?” “It’s Iowa.” Go the Distance Baseball also wanted to build a boutique hotel, player dormitories, an RV park and an amphitheater on the site.
Now, plans call for the first four-field phase to be completed by next August, and the master site plan includes a fishing area, a playground and a walking path. All told, the completed complex is expected to cost about $20 million, according to the Telegraph Herald.
“Previous iterations of this project were really complex ... and we wanted to strip down the complexity of the amenities to ensure that we keep the simple feel of the Field of Dreams. We want it not to be commercialized,” Scheidel told the newspaper, adding that the new complex will be separated by a ridge of corn and will not be visible from the movie site.
“We will start on the west half of the complex first and continue through the east half, through the help of philanthropy and partnership,” Scheidel said. “Musco has committed to the design and build of this complex, and we’ll keep moving through it until we get it done.”
According to the newspaper, “Musco’s in-kind contribution is serving as a key leadership gift for the Field of Dreams’ continued development, [but] Dyersville Events also is in the midst of the ‘quiet phase’ of a $110-million capital campaign to support the youth complex, the permanent stadium, the preservation of the Field of Dreams movie site and educational programming for youth who utilize the complex.”
The Telegraph Herald also noted that more than 600 teams from 28 states are expected to play games in Dyersville, as well as nearby Worthington, Peosta, Farley and Dubuque this year, with skills camps and other events happening at the movie site.
“When you go out there on a Friday or Saturday for one of these [tournaments], you get goosebumps watching the kids and the families participate,” Dyersville Events board chair Nate Runde said.
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