A Real Field of Dreams

In a recent blog post I mentioned some of the odd coincidences that I’ve experienced while researching, writing, and now promoting my book about Rock Springs Park in Chester, West Virginia. In fact, last month I posted a six-part series entitled, “Rock Springs Park: My Field of Dreams,” about a recent book talk and signing event for the Wellsville Arts Club. In it, I compared my experiences with that of Kevin Costner’s character, Ray Kinsella, who pursues his dream of bringing the past back to life by building a baseball field on his farm in Iowa after hearing voices. In a sense, I found myself also called upon to bring the past alive by writing a picture-history of Rock Springs Park.

On a trip to my alma-mater, Oak Glen High School, this week for another book talk, I was more than a little surprised to see a recently erected archway between the middle and high schools which reads, “Field of Dreams.” This brick archway is the dream of the Oak Glen High Class of 2011. Workers will put the finishing touches on the gateway this week. (Photo by Nancy Tullis of the East Liverpool Review)



As I was backing my Honda into a parking spot behind the high school library doors, I let out an audible, “No way! ‘Field of Dreams’? That is a sign.” Of course it is literally “a sign”, but for me it was just another in a long list of unusual coincidences that I’ve encountered while on this amusement park book quest. Moments like these lead me to think there is more behind it than simply my answer to author Toni Morrison’s call: "If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it." Something bigger is at work.


Toni Morrison

When I returned home and thought about that arch, shown in a rendering in the image below, I discovered this article by Nancy Tullis of the East Liverpool Review, who, coincidentally, also wrote the article about my book talk last summer in Chester. Nancy’s article dated last Monday, April 11, 2001 states, “The Hancock County Schools Board of Education will have a groundbreaking at 1 p.m. Tuesday in anticipation of the start of construction on the OGHS athletic complex to be paid with bond levy money (and) at 11 a.m. Saturday, the OGHS Class of 2011 will have a dedication-ribbon cutting for the completed gateway,” which means that I held my book talk event for the Sisters of Alpha Delta Kappa, an international honorary organization of women educators, on the same day as the groundbreaking. I had assumed, as I have never been to the middle school, that the arch had been around for some time, but it was just being finished THAT DAY! (Cue the “Twilight Zone” music) Joey Davis, president of the Oak Glen High Class of 2011, stands near the entrance to the Field of Dreams complex with a rendering of the proposed entrance archway the class has taken on as a legacy gift to the school district. (Photo by Nancy Tullis)

More next time on some of things I learned about Rock Springs Park at the actual book talk event held Tuesday evening , April 12 with the ADK Sorority Group.

Rock Springs Park book release celebrated

By NANCY TULLIS
ntullis@reviewonline.com








Joseph Comm, author of “Rock Springs Park,” signs a book for Patty Swiger at a signing event held Monday at the Chester Municipal Building. Prior to the signing, Comm talked about how his book came to be. (Photo by Nancy Tullis)

CHESTER - Standing along the first base line of his school playground in 1974, Joe Comm was abruptly pulled from a daydream when a kickball whacked him in the head.
"Comm, what are you doing out there?" his team mates yelled. "Get in the game."

Now a teacher of gifted children in Greensburg, Pa., Comm received a warm welcome Monday on his return to Chester for the launch of "Rock Springs Park," a book he authored in Arcadia Publishing's "Images of America" series.

From that first base line, Comm said he could reach out and touch the sun-bleached skeleton of the Cyclone, the once-mighty roller coaster of Rock Springs Park. The last run of the Cyclone was on Labor Day 40 years ago. The park was all but a memory during his boyhood in Chester, and its remnants raised many questions in Comm's mind.

He sought out the answers, and along the way, Rock Springs Park took on a life of its own.
Comm said he was known as a quirky kid - remembered by many people in Chester as that boy who wore his Halloween costume when it wasn't Halloween - and now he is a quirky adult. Being a teacher gives him the opportunity to spend the summer sharing his childhood memories and his quest to learn all he can about Rock Springs Park.

He said he wants to speak to school children and tell them about the park. He has shared the story of Rock Springs Park and his experience writing the book with his own students in Pennsylvania, and they were very receptive, he said.

"I wanted to write the book to show my own children what it was like to grow up in a small town," he said. "You could try anything, and get away with nothing."

He said he is often asked how he found the time to write a book, juggling family responsibilities in a household with four children, and his full-time teaching job.

"Well, I've been driving around for four months with a bathtub knob in my car because I haven't had time to get to the hardware store for a new one," he said.

He noted, however, that now that the book is published, he will spend part of the summer catching up on all those routine repairs and household chores. He said his love affair with Rock Springs Park, however, spurs him to talk about it incessantly, and he can sneak in Rock Springs Park references in any conversation.

Comm told the receptive crowd at the book signing, sponsored by the Chester Kiwanis Club, he hopes the book will be a springboard for others to share their own memories.

The audience had the chance to wander the halls of the Chester Municipal Building and view the hallways and the Memory Lane room crammed with pictures, souvenirs, yearbooks, and other memorabilia of Chester High School and Rock Springs Park.

Although he only saw the park after it was silenced, Comm said, "When I heard Rock Springs Park would be erased, it made me sad. I always had the hope that some rich guy would buy the park and save it for us."

Instead the park gave way to a new highway and a new bridge over the Ohio River.

The people who came to the book-signing have their own memories of the roar of the Cyclone, the strains of organ music from the carousel's Wurlitzer, and forging life-long friendships at the Virginia Gardens Dance Hall.

Displayed prominently in the Memory Lane room is a large painting of a night at the Virginia Gardens Dance Hall by local artist Jack "the Ripper" Owen of Chester.

Comm's book in hand, Jim Pryor said he and his wife went to the last dance in the Virginia Gardens Dance Hall. He said when he was in elementary school, Rock Springs Park was still operating, but dwindling.

"The bumper cars and the carousel were still there," he said. "We lived in the country, and back then, making a trip into town to Rock Springs Park was a big adventure."