Foursquare Church builds their field of dreams
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POLSON — “If you build it, he will come,” is the famous line from the baseball movie “Field of Dreams.” So far Shoeless Joe Jackson hasn’t shown up at the new ball field in front of the Foursquare Church, but lots of Polson kids will play ball there. Practices and games have already started on the field.
The field came about because pastor of the Foursquare Church Greg Perkins said, “I just really felt God told me to do it because we had an empty lot out here we can’t really do much with.”
Perkins knew there was a “huge need” for more ball fields, from t-ball all the way up, in the community so he shared his vision with church and community members. It’s been a six or seven year process.
First the area needed to be leveled so the church put up a sign saying they needed fill dirt. Paul Iverson was building hangars at the Polson airport at the time so he sent trucks full of dirt and followed the trucks with graders to smooth the dirt, saving thousands of dollars.
The building crew left the backfield open and used portable outfield fencing so the space could be used for soccer or football if necessary. Church members will maintain the field, too, Perkins said, because even though the field is on church property “it’s not for our church, it’s for the community.”
Volunteers raked out rocks, wrote grants, talked their friends into helping, installed irrigation, planted grass and put up fences, They donated countless hours of labor as well as funds and in-kind gifts, such as fencing material, etc. Perkins named just a few volunteers who went over and above, Clint Chowning, Dan Rausch, Dave Rensvold and Whealon Construction.
“The facility we’ve actually built between grants, etc., only cost $18,000,” Perkins estimated, although he said donated labor would have cost probably $200,000.
Last summer volunteers put in the irrigation and finished fencing, Perkins said, and the field was beautiful.
“We didn’t want to build junk,” Perkins said, “We wanted to make it the nicest one in town.”
