'Field of Dreams' site in Iowa sold
A group of investors that includes Wade Boggs bought the iconic film property and plans to turn it into a youth baseball complex.
The 193-acre Iowa baseball field made famous by the 1989 Kevin Costner film "Field of Dreams" has been sold to an investor group that plans to build a baseball training and tournament complex.
The investors, who include baseball Hall of Famer Wade Boggs, plan to keep the famous field and farmhouse already on the site. Purchase price was $3.4 million.
Go The Distance Baseball had been trying to buy the property, which had been offered for $5.4 million, since mid-2010, but the closing was delayed by neighbors’ complaints and a lawsuit over a zoning change.
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The company plans to build a $38 million youth baseball complex called All-Star Ballpark Heaven, starting with 12 fields and 60 team clubhouses by 2014, with plans to double in size by 2017. The investors also plan a community center, auditorium and banquet facilities, according to an article in The Chicago Tribune.
Denise Stillman, president and CEO of the company, told The Tribune that she and her husband, Mike, saw “Field of Dreams” on one of their first dates. "I'm just really excited about what lies ahead," she told the newspaper. "We've got so much work to do to get the field ready to open again April 1. That's when the tourist site opens."
The Field of Dreams Movie Site, owned by Don Lansing, who grew up in the two-bedroom farmhouse, is open for tours April 1 through Nov. 30 and draws about 65,000 visitors every year. It’s about 25 miles west of Dubuque, Iowa. He and his wife, Becky, plan to continue working at the site.
"My family's farm has been part of the landscape for more than a century," Lansing said in a news release. "I have been honored to care for it my entire life and know the Stillmans and their group will care for the movie site like I did."
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About Teresa Mears
Teresa Mears is a veteran journalist who has been interested in houses since her father took her to tax auctions to carry the cash at age 10. A former editor of The Miami Herald's Home & Design section, she lives in South Florida where, in addition to writing about real estate, she publishes Miami on the Cheap to help her neighbors adjust to the loss of 60% of their property value.
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