Remember the iconic movie Field of Dreams? “If you build it, they will come.”
Well, this Thursday night on the famous baseball diamond surrounded by cornfields in Iowa, the Chicago White Sox, and the New York Yankees will be battling it out. While the game will be exciting, the event’s also bringing attention to farmers throughout the country because the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) is an official partner to MLB for the game. NCGA President John Linder says thanks to the Field of Dreams movie, corn and baseball go hand-in-hand.
“When you think about the kind of consistent ties across many different sections, you really realize that with its history, corn, and baseball is a longtime staple. So, there’s such an opportunity to bring people together, and focus back on what do corn farmers do and how they relate to the consumers. So, it’s just a good optic, a good opportunity, a real good venue to carry a message forward,” Linder said.
He gives a lot of credit to the movie for being such a well-known film throughout the U.S. and shining the spotlight on farmers. “When you look at this being played in a cornfield in Iowa, that just makes a corn farmer’s heart sing. But it’s so relatable to anybody that loves baseball because the movie made it such an icon to put corn and baseball together. The visual is pretty amazing,” he said.
Linder goes on to explain that the game this week is a great opportunity to share the story of farming and promote the work that producers put into feeding the world. “Consumer outreach is always a top priority for farmers,” Linder said. “So, I think this is a nice place to carry that message forward, but education is part of what we do because if we’re not telling our story, how can anyone really know the good things we do and what impacts we can have so that future generations can enjoy this planet as well as we do today.”
You can check out the game on Thursday night, August 12th at 6 p.m. CST on FOX.
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