The Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in St. Marys has received a trio of donations to improve their fields and facilities.
In a release on May 12th, the Hall of Fame shared that the Jays Care Foundation, the Town of St. Marys and the St. Marys Minor Ball Association have all contributed to improvements to the site. The Jays Care Foundation recently announced that the hall is one of 14 recipients of funding through the Blue Jays charitable organization, the Field of Dreams program. The grant will allow the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum to replace the backstop on St. Marys Cement Field, build professional bullpens on King Field, install an infield irrigation system on three of its main fields and acquire bleacher seating.
The Town of St. Marys and the St. Marys Minor Ball Association are also offering support, which will allow the hall to purchase new tools and equipment for preparing the fields, expand their equipment and storage shed, improve lighting around the site and repair the outfield playing surface on Rotary Field.
"We are extremely grateful for the support from the Jays Care Foundation, the Town of St. Marys and the St. Marys Minor Ball Association," said Jeremy Diamond, Chair of the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame’s Board of Directors. "Thanks to their generosity, we can continue to enhance our site so it can be enjoyed by young ballplayers and their families in the future."
"The Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum plays a pivotal role in preserving this country’s deep and enduring baseball legacy and Jays Care is proud to support the future of the game through a second Field Of Dreams grant," added Robert Witchel, Executive Director, Jays Care Foundation. "We are pleased to invest over $50,000 to help refurbish both Cement and King Fields in St. Marys and create opportunities for a generation of children and youth to have fun and develop life skills through the game of baseball."
"This is very exciting for our community. We are honoured and humbled to be a recipient of the 2021 Field Of Dreams grant which will give us the opportunity to make upgrades at the Baseball Hall of Fame diamonds such as the Cement Field backstop, bullpen, irrigation and bleacher upgrades," stated St. Marys mayor Al Strathdee. "With this grant along with additional funding from the Town, we’ll also be able to complete a shed expansion, outfield resurfacing, parking lot lighting upgrades and more. This will provide the citizens of St. Marys and the surrounding area with an exciting chance to reconnect and socialize, which will be needed more than ever as soon as it is safe to do so."
Candy McEwan, president of the St. Marys Minor Ball Association, is happy that her organization is able to help the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
"The St. Marys Minor Ball Association is pleased to donate to the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum to support site improvements," said McEwan. "We are so fortunate to play on the beautiful diamonds at the Hall and look forward to continued upgrades of the site. We are very proud of our partnership with the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum and look forward to continuing to work with them in the future."
The Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum’s goal is to have these projects completed in 2022 and to hold a ribbon cutting celebration with the donors during the 2022 induction weekend.