Road Trip 2016 part three Route 66 and more

Road Trip 2016—Part Three

Route 66
Ronald Reagan’s Childhood Home
Field of Dreams

By Jack Coll

On Tuesday morning we woke up in Kentucky after spending a late night in Cincinnati, Ohio watching the Reds lose to the Marlins. We didn’t plan on going to Kentucky during the road trip but it’s not the first time Donna found ourselves in a state we hadn’t intended on visiting and I’m sure it won’t be the last.
Tuesday was a travel day with a few minor stops and detours along the way, destination was Iowa.
Wednesday was a typical Jack and Donna day, GPS trackers, and cell phone directions make it a little harder to get lost in America nowadays but we still did just fine getting lost on our own. While inching our way across the map on the back roads in Illinois we crossed the famed Route 66, the mother highway wasn’t headed our way but we jumped on it anyway. It was a lonely stretch of 66 but we enjoyed the sounds of the wheels beneath us and the few roadside attractions Route 66 is famous for. After a couple of hours on 66 we righted the ship, and jumped back on a road in the right direction heading towards Iowa.
While traveling through Dixon, Illinois we saw a small sign for Ronald Reagan’s childhood home. Once again we abandoned whatever main street we were on to go check out Ronnie’s house. It turns out that the late President lived in Dixon as a boy. The home he lived in from 1920-1923 at 816 South Hennepin Avenue became a National Historic Site in 1982. It was a beautiful house complete with a gift shop selling everything and anything from his movie posters to eight by ten glossies of Regan and Nancy.
When I stood outside the house it was extremely picturesque, if you can visualize the neighborhood in the “Music Man” movie it would have fit in very well there.
Talking about the Music Man, Donna and I crossed state lines and found ourselves in Mason City, Iowa, home of Meredith Wilson, an international renowned composer and author of “The Music Man.” Well, if you happen to visit Mason City Iowa, you can go to “The Music Man” Footbridge, or visit “The Music Man” Square and drop by Meredith Wilson’s boyhood Queen Ann 1895 House. Donna and I visited none of the above. Not that we were not interested in visiting these happening hot-spots, just not interested enough.
Here’s the thing about Iowa, if you’re gonna go to Iowa you should time your trip for mid-to-late August and travel the back roads, Iowa has enough corn in that state to feed the world over about nineteen times. Think Lancaster times a gazilion! Another thing about Iowa, there’s more dirt roads in Iowa than you’ll find in Africa, many of the roads do have stones covering them but if you find yourself on a paved road you can travel for hours crossing every intersection that leads you onto one of these dirt roads.
As we started to settle into the corn-capital of the world and made a few stops here and there a number of people asked us about our accent, I thought they were kidding I didn’t understand what the hell they were talking about but they were very serious. Each time we told them we were from Conshohocken Pennsylvania just outside Philly. The reactions were the same, “Never heard of it!” or they would obliterate the name “Cons-hocken.”
We settled into our luxury suite Super 8 Hotel/Motel for the night in Dyersville, Iowa, home of the “Field of Dreams,” a baseball field cut out of a cornfield. The field takes its name from the movie “Field of Dreams,” the 1989 flick starring Kevin Costner and Amy Madigan along with other notables like James Earl Jones as Terrance Mann. The movies producers wanted the real life J. D. Salinger for the part played by Jones but Salinger threatened the production with a lawsuit if his name was even used.
The films casting crew originally wanted a man in his mid-40’s to play shoeless Joe Jackson played by Ray Liotta, but decided a younger Shoeless-Joe’s character would still have a sense of danger about him.
Burt Lancaster played the part of Archibald “Moonlight” Graham, they wanted Jimmy Stewart for the part of Moonlight Graham but Mr. Stewart was too sick at the time. Burt Lancaster turned the part down at first but changed his mind after a friend, who was a baseball fan, advised him to take the part.
I wonder how many fans of the movie “Field of Dreams” even realized that Ben Affleck and Matt Damon appeared as extras in the movie, next time you watch the movie look for them in the scene at Fenway Park.
The Field of Dreams was about 15 minutes from our Super 8 Hotel headquarters. We arrived early enough to head to the field after dropping a suitcase on the bed. The field was easy to get to, there was plenty of parking and no charge to walk or play on the field.
The baseball field, cornfield and house were everything portrayed in the movie, maintenance to the entire facility was perfect. When we arrived as you might expect we found families having a catch, pitching to batters and fielding balls on all parts of the field. Other family members were parked on the bleachers taking in the entire scene.
As a fan of the movie actually being at the field was something extremely special, you can’t help walking out to third base and taking in the scene of the infield, backstop, bleachers and the farmhouse.
I felt inspired enough to run the bases, OK, trot the bases.
A couple of other notes about the film:
The film was Burt Lancaster’s final film before he passed away.

Taken from the Field of Dreams Movie Site official Souvenir Program:
“Shoeless Joe,” from whom the movie “Field of Dreams” was derived, was a 25-page story written by author William Patrick Kinsella and was selected to appear in an anthology entitled Aurora. The extended script written by Kinsella contained no sex, violence, high-speed expensive car chases, and any and all that other stuff that sells a movie.

The Field of Dreams Program book takes a look at a couple of the players portrayed in the movie. Of course we all know about Joseph Jefferson Wofford Jackson who was born in the summer of 1887, America knows Jackson as “Shoeless Joe.”
I wonder how many people really know how Joe got the legendary nickname “Shoeless Joe Jackson.” The name by far is one of the best known nicknames in America even though the event giving him that name dates back more than a century.
The origin of this event dates back to 1908 when Joe was a member of the Greenville Spinners of the Class D Carolina League. The incident occurred on a hot and humid Saturday afternoon during a double header in Anderson, South Carolina. Joe had just received a new pair of spikes from his manager Tommie Stouch, and after pitching the first game, Jackson had worked up a few blisters on his heels from the new shoes. In the second game, Joe was placed in left field. When he came to the plate in the seventh inning to hit, he had discarded his burning shoes.
As he took his stance in the batter’s box, no one really noticed that Joe was standing shoeless in his stocking feet. However, after a sensational triple to the fence, while Joe was rounding the bases, an Anderson SC fan yelled out to him, “You shoeless son-of-a-gun.”
Joe Jackson was endowed with what would become one of the most famous nicknames ever: “Shoeless Joe.” Shoeless Joe ended his 13-year career posting a lifetime .356 batting average, third best in history and has remained one of the legendary ballplayers whom few have been compared to ever since.
The story I most enjoyed in the Field of Dreams Program Book is the true tale of Archibald (Doc) “Moonlight” Graham. As we all know and just explained “Shoeless Joe” Jackson was a real player in the National Baseball League back in the day, but what about the character known as Doc “Moonlight” Graham played by Burt Lancaster?
Well it turns out most of us believed this character was all Hollywood, including me, after all a movie character that nice was certainly made-up!
Well it turns out that if you ever visit the town of Chisholm, Minnesota, you’ll find that Doc Graham was even a better human being then portrayed in the movie!
“Moonlight” Graham did play in one major league game with the New York Giants. It was the last game of the season and the Giants had a 10-run lead, after eight innings. Manager John McGraw replaced George Brown in right field with “Moonlight Graham. The game ended in less than five minutes with three infield outs. Graham then left baseball to pursue his dream to be a doctor.
He settled in Chisholm, Minnesota one year after the 1908 Great Chisholm Fire. He spent six years practicing at Chisholm’s Rood Hospital before becoming a physician for Chisholm Schools for the next 44 years. He was known in the community simply as “Doc” Graham.
“Field of Dreams” included several quirks or habits of “Doc’s” that endeared him to the residents of Chisholm. He was a winker and he did always carry an umbrella on walks about town. His real life wife, Alecia, was fond of the color blue. Chisholm shop-keepers were happy to provide a variety of blue fabrics and accessories for him to choose from as he was a very generous man.
While he was the school doctor, his wife was a teacher. They were both active in the community. “Doc” is most remembered for his dedication to the children. He was the team doctor who was considered part of the team and often thought oranges were the cure for everything. When he rode on the team bus, the kids knew they would all be fed. He always had loose change to share and would provide glasses to those in need. He also pioneered mandatory blood pressure screening for children and is nationally recognized for his 13-year study on the effects of blood pressure on children.
Alecia did not always completely approve of his carefree spending habits. On one occasion, he invited the basketball team and coaches for a special dinner at one of the hotels and picked up the whole tab because Alecia was out of town. He wanted to do something for the athletes as they were very special to him. In his opinion, everyone could be an athlete, even if for only a half an inning.
There were some “facts” in the “Field of Dream” that were improvised to facilitate the story. He was not known in Chisholm as “Moonlight.” Most folks were unaware he had ever played ball as he wasn’t a reminiscent type of guy. Although the movie shows “Doc” walking down the street in 1972 (noted via a license plate), in reality he passed away in 1965. He was survived by his wife Alecia, who passed away in 1981. The couple never did have children of their own but devoted their lives to the town’s children.

The preceding information was taken from the Field of Dreams Movie Site Official Souvenir Program.
Should you ever visit the field be sure to pick up an edition of the program and learn all about the Lansing family and how their property became the movie site for “Field of Dreams.”
Visiting the field on Tuesday afternoon wasn’t enough for me so when I rolled out of my Super 8 luxury bed at 6:00 A.M. on Wednesday I traveled back to the field for an early morning visit. The field doesn’t officially open until 9:00 A.M. but with no gates preventing me from going in I strapped on my camera for a few shots with no-one on the field. I captured the early morning dew hovering over the cornfield, a few really nice shots of the sun rising up over the “Field of Dreams” farmhouse, and a few artsy shots of the backstop and field.
But what I enjoyed most was sitting on the third base side bleachers, all alone, and thinking about everything from baseball, to the under-privileged citizens in our country, our struggling veterans, family and the lord. (I had some very interesting questions for our Lord, I didn’t think there was any magic in that cornfield like so many others do, but if there was magic amongst the corn I wanted to capitalize on it while I was there).
After about an hour of sitting on the bleachers, and no sign of the Lord, it was time to go, the sun was rising, and I was on my way to Clearlake, Iowa. For most of my adult life I have wanted to visit the Surf Ballroom in Clearlake, where Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and J.P. “The Big Bopper” played their final concert, and visit the crash site in a farmer’s cornfield.
One last little story about our Super 8 Hotel/Motel visit in Dyersville. When we arrived early in our room, we had a bed, a table and one chair. Well Donna likes gong on the laptop at night dealing with the business, checking e-mails, catching up on the news and so-on. Me, well I like sitting in a chair at night, not really doing much of anything but I enjoy sitting in a chair. So with one chair in the room I headed out into the hallway to advise the Hotel manager we needed another chair because we paid full rate for the room which I think would include two chairs to sit-on.
So as I go out into the hall I see the room right next to us has the door wide open, but no-one was in the room. To clarify no-one had checked into the room, it was empty but the door was wide open. So I wander into the vacant room, (The room had beds and everything but it was un-occupied) and I notice that room had two chairs and since no-one was in the room I helped myself to one of the chairs so I would have somewhere other than the bed to sit-in.
When Donna and I returned from our “Field of Dreams” visit I ran into the hotel manager in the hallway and stated to him that we were short one chair so the door was open and I carried one of the two chairs from that room into our room so I would have somewhere to sit that night.
THE GUY GOES OFF! You shouldn’t have taken a chair out of that room, “what’s wrong with you.” I explained to him that I didn’t think anything was wrong with me, (yet there I was at a Super 8 in Dyersville, Iowa) “Now I have to go get another chair for the room because you were one chair short in your room.” I explained to him that I didn’t want to sit on the floor for the night so I didn’t understand the big deal. He walked away and gave me the “stink-eye every time I went through the lobby, I had Donna check us out the following morning.

Some dream of women
Or fast cars,
Others of Hollywood
And Movie Stars.
But I dream of a ball field
That’s graced with corn
The kind of field
Where memories are born.

Written by Scott Mahlmann
Taken from Field of Dreams Souvenir Program

Next we will visit Clearlake, Iowa, and the Buddy Holly crash site.