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Last Updated: Dec 12, 2008 - 4:54:39 PM |
Only a small part of the East
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Nearly 20 years after the release of the film, Field of Dreams, visitors still flock to the site near Dyersville where a baseball field was cut from the corn. And still today, it is a place for dreams. Mitch Traphagen Photo
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Growing up in Minnesota only eight miles from the Iowa border, I rarely visited despite that close proximity. Kids in Minnesota farm towns didn’t look to other farm towns for excitement – instead we would, when we could get away with it, travel to Sioux Falls – or even more rarely, “The Cities.”
Somehow I went nearly four and a half decades before ever spending a night in Iowa. But I learned on that first night that there is something special about the place. It remained in my mind until my next visit – it was then we decided to trade the sunshine and insanity of Florida for the quality of life and the warm, friendly people of Iowa.
Through this occasional series, In Search of Iowa, I plan to visit some of the well-known – and lesser-known – corners of the state. It won’t be your run of the mill travel series – I won’t write about what I had for dinner or how many stars a mom and pop motel deserves. Rather, I will try to let you know how it feels to be there – and through both words and photos, how it looks. Perhaps you’ll get a few travel ideas of your own, or, possibly, you’ll just be able to travel vicariously in this day of high fuel prices. Hopefully in all cases, you’ll just get an enjoyable story.
For the first installment of the series, I will begin where I began in Iowa. My wife and I were traveling across the country in an old RV on our way north. Without much experience in the state, we had a few trepidations about what we would find. Obviously, we were pleasantly surprised.
DYERSVILLE, IOWA – No freeway runs through this small town. There are a few fast-food restaurants, but they tend to get heavy competition from the local diners. In Dyersville, most everything has a purpose. And for the people who come here, that includes a baseball field cut out of the corn.
Just a few miles outside of town, along a farm road, is a Dubuque County campground and park. As we drove up from Illinois, we talked about whether we really wanted to stay there. It is Iowa, after all, and the park could well have been a flat, barren wasteland.
It wasn’t. In Iowa we found a little slice of heaven.
Cut out of surrounding cornfields, the park was heavily shaded, tranquil and incredibly beautiful. Soon families showed up and large groups of children began playing with the water faucets or riding their bikes around the campground.
“I think camping is the last little bit of Americana,” Michelle said as a particularly large gaggle of children rode past our site.
Sony and Microsoft had nothing to do with the fun these children were having. And speaking of children, it was clear to us that Iowa will soon rule the world. The families with whom we shared this campground did not have just one kid, or even two – more often than not, there were three or four kids.
The sounds of laughter and joy rang through the park, punctuated occasionally by a small cry resulting from a skinned knee. We had absolutely no doubt that large marshmallows were stuck to the ends of sticks and roasted over campfires that night. The little park amongst the corn was a wonderful place.
And that Iowa could be heaven is not a new concept.
There is a movie, nearly 20 years old, which never fails to hit hard. In fact, it is the only movie I have ever seen that did - and still can - bring tears to my eyes. In the final scene of “Field of Dreams,” Kevin Costner has the opportunity to meet his father as a young man.
Costner’s character, Ray, regretted how they had parted and that his father never had a chance to meet his wife and daughter. He regretted saying no as a teenager when his dad asked him to play catch with a baseball.
In that ending scene, the two men meet on an empty ball field and exchange first names. Ray introduces his wife and daughter and they talk as they slowly walk along the baseline. They don’t acknowledge being father and son.
They shake hands again before parting, and Ray’s father walks off toward the magical edge of the outfield. Before he gets very far, however, Ray calls out to him.
“Dad, would you like to have a catch?”
Yeah, it’s just a movie, but it has so much of what I’m sure so many people wish for in life – a second chance when a second chance is simply impossible. The intensity of that scene is palpable – perhaps because the emotion is close to reality. I found out later the actor who played Ray’s father, Dwier Brown, actually lost his own father just days before filming. He flew from the funeral to Iowa for “Field of Dreams.”
It is all about baseball and dreams at the Field of Dreams movie site a few miles northeast of Dyersville. The site remains much as it appeared in the 1989 movie. The 92-year-old house is there, as are the wooden bleachers and, of course, the ball field cut out of the surrounding corn. Off to the side is a souvenir shop – it’s location discreet to the field itself.
While few visitors expect the ghosts of baseball players to emerge from the corn, the site is well suited to just sit back and dream your own dreams – or to remember. Well off the paved road, it is quiet and there is no high-pressure sales pitch – in fact, the only pitching is done by the occasional visitor attracted to the mound. It is a place to escape and remember your youth – and what is, what could have been, or, perhaps, what could be. There are precious few such places left in the world where a stranger is left to their own thoughts.
The first night I ever spent in Iowa was in this Dubuque County campground near Dyersville. Expecting a flat, barren wasteland, my wife and I found a home instead. Mitch Traphagen Photo
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The film, like the book it was based upon, is about dreams as much as baseball - from a young man able to redeem himself with his father to the real-life story (and lost dream) of Archibald “Moonlight” Graham. At the movie site, it seems that dreams may still be possible.
It was because of baseball that I heard the word “skullduggery” spoken aloud for the first and, I believe, only time. I was 13-years-old and was getting ready for a ball game. I knew a girl I really liked would be there and I decided that wearing Levi’s would be far more cool than wearing funny little baseball pants. I hid the pants somewhere in the basement and told my Dad they were lost. My normally laidback father didn’t agree with my idea of cool. That’s when he used the word skullduggery. I was so surprised I can still hear him say it today.
But I had hidden the pants well and stuck with my story about not being able to find them, and ended up playing in Levi’s. For all I know, those baseball pants are still hidden in the basement. But now I look back and wonder how I could have been so dense – I guess I could blame it on the disease known as Being A Teenager, but there was more to it than that.
Now, more than three decades later, I realize that I only played the game for my dad. I wasn’t good at it, but he would pick me up from practice and take me to the A&W for root beer afterward. I realize more now than I did then how much I liked that time with him. I also wanted him to be happy that I was playing the game. That makes the hidden pants all the more inexplicable.
My dad died less than two years after that incident. By that time I had traded playing baseball for playing a guitar. But I wish that I had a second chance to play catch with him. And at my age, I know I’ll never have a son who could give me the joy of playing catch – or give me the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to use the word “skullduggery.” It’s amazing how lacking something can be such a heavy burden.
Bruce Traphagen was a busy man – more often than not, it was well into the evening by the time he came home from work. But maybe, as I was the youngest of his four children, he realized life was about to change. I came home from school one day to find that, rather than going to work, he had stayed home to build me a go-cart. Later there was a fort in the backyard that we built together (actually, he did the work; he let me think I helped). And, of course, there were the occasional root beers at the A&W.
I thought of that as I looked out over the baseball field cut into the corn where a movie was filmed near Dyersville, Iowa. I came to this field of dreams not as a star-crossed movie fan but as a son looking for memories.
I found them.
The Field of Dreams Movie Site opens in April. It is located at 28963 Lansing Road near Dyersville. For further information visit the Web site at www.fieldofdreamsmoviesite.com or call 888-875-8404.
The campground, New Wine Park, is located five miles north of Dyersville off Hwy. 136. For information call 563-556-6745 or 563-921-3475.
© Copyright 2008 by The East Iowa Herald
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