Field of Dreams

(This is the house that was used in the movie Field of Dreams. Maybe you recall the scene at the end of the movie when Kevin Costner's character is talking to his dead father. He asks the ghost-man if heaven exists and he answers "Yes. It's the place where dreams come true." There is then a shot of the Costner's character's wife and daughter on the swing on this porch and he replies, "Well, maybe this is heaven." Then, while watching the movie, your buddy, who always tries to act like a tough guy, starts to cry.)

Today was the fulfillment of a long-time goal. I got to see the site where one of my favorite movies was made.
It didn't disappoint.
You drive through Iowa and see nothing but farms. Farms to the left of you. Farms to the right of you.
Then you get off the highway and pass through the small downtown area of a place called Dyersville. Presently there are billboards and signs that all seem to have a baseball theme. Twenty years ago they were probably not there.
Past the downtown area it's back to farms. Farms, farms, farms.
And then you turn a corner and after the nearest farm there suddenly is... a baseball field. In the middle of the corn, exactly as it looked in the movie but a little worn with age, is a small baseball field just waiting to be played on.
When the movie was made the producers found the location and made a deal with the owners of two adjacent plots of land to build the field there. I imagine the look of the house was what they wanted.
When it was done the owners were initially going to tear down the field and replant the corn, but people urged them not to and they decided to keep it open. As the movie says, "People will come". And they do to this day.
Eventually, I believe, the split property of the field was combined into one deed and now the land is up for sale. Hopefully whomever buys it will keep it up as well.
It is free for visitors with only a small gift shop to make money along with donations. Not that I think they do bad business. I bet they make quite a bit from souvenir sales.
It's just a special place to be. It's baseball at its roots. Families show up and take some swings and tosses with their kids on the plush grass, or the infield which is more like clay, with a thin covering of small rocks, than dirt. You can walk out to the infamous corn and act like one of the "ghost players" coming out in the movie wondering where they are. Almost everybody does it.
(These are some shots of the field. In one of them you can see a family playing on the right field grass. The red building is the small gift stand. Matt is set to pitch on the flat mound in one of them.)

We took a picture of one guy who was there alone and wanted to show people himself stepping out of the corn.
We also tried to field the infield for a family taking swings, but the kids were young and didn't really hit the ball hard. But it was fun to see how much fun they were having, and we really enjoyed our time there.
Even if the movie may be oversentimentalized, there's something very true about how baseball can bring us back to many different times in our country's past. Baseball has survived. And families today still take a simple pleasure in playing and watching the game, regardless of how it has become big business at the major level. That's what the movie is about. Baseball is one vehicle through which families and American culture can be viewed.

As for the rest of Iowa, it's nothing special, although it's beautiful for a while. There's simply too much farm and I can't imagine living in a place with so few people.
It is strange to be able to see so many miles in the distance on the flat plains. I tried to capture it in photo, but got none that really show the expanse.
We're now outside Chicago, in Arlington Heights, IL, with my aunt Roz who is very excited to have us as company for a few days. We'll be calling this home base until Tuesday morning as we see two games in Chicago, one in Milwaukee and one in Detroit. Check back for updates.

(These photos fail to truly capture the empty expanse of most of Iowa.)