“They thought we were putting a gas station in. They thought we were building a church.”
Dale LeMonds looks over LeMonds Field from beyond the outfield fence in Parker on Tuesday, July 11, 2023.
What he built was LeMonds Field, which features the same sod, dirt and warning-track mix as the Rockies’ stadium, plus several other cherished baseball artifacts that make the diamond seem straight out of Universal Studios. More than 5,000 yards of dirt were moved or trucked in during construction. And to keep his grass verdant, LeMonds installed a 10,000-gallon water-storage tank beyond center-field.
The heady right-hander then went into coaching, serving two seasons as an assistant at the University of Richmond. There, then-Spiders head coach Ron Atkins recalled LeMonds — who worked with hitters, catchers and outfielders and was the team’s batting-practice pitcher — as a key behind-the-scenes cog in the program’s record-setting 53-win season in 2002 that fell just short of Omaha.
In Parker, LeMonds also put up a cage in the basement and the family built a dance studio into the house — the latter catering to daughters Lucy, 18, who will soon dance at Florida Atlantic, and Chloe, 16. Outside the garage, a graffiti mural depicts the boys playing ball and the girls dancing. That all of it came after Dale and his wife, Lisa, pulled up stakes in Richmond 21 years ago with a few $20 bills and a beat-up pickup truck makes it all the more rewarding.
After buying the tractor, LeMonds became friends with Becky and Don Lansing, the former owners of the 193-acre farm that includes the field. The property, which hosted MLB games the past two Augusts in a stadium constructed adjacent to the movie set, is now owned by a group headlined by Frank Thomas.
Gabin LeMonds, 15, left, walks with his brother Bentley, 5, at LeMonds Field in Parker on Tuesday, July 11, 2023. It should also be of no surprise to Becky, then, that LeMonds is considering building a second diamond — this one full-sized — on a 20-acre plot he bought in 2015 that sits beneath the current field.
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