Gene Trent opened a bar called Field of Dreams in Lockport, Illinois, and ran a softball league there for years. After five years, a Hollywood studio sent a cease-and-desist letter over the name. The owner had joked he hoped it would get Kevin Costner's attention.
As the funny thing, you know you're famous when people sue you. Okay, the little story to this. I'm in my hometown of Lockport, Illinois. You can Google it. And a buddy of mine that I grew up with lived right behind me, literally in the backyard on the other street. His name was Gene Trent. When we got older, he went away to college, come back, and he was like six years older than me. But when he came back from college, he decided he wanted to open a bar in town and called it Field of Dreams, you know. Oh, like the movie. Yes, 100%. After the movie. Field of Dreams made the baseball diamond on it, everything pitcher and blew his arm out in college. And he was a hopeful that didn't get to go. And so he ended up coming back home and just setting up softball leagues and getting all the local businesses to be in the softball league. And so he literally started the ball. The bar to have a softball team. And he just called it Field of Dreams. Right? So me and my dad, of course, went out there and played, and it was amazing for me and my dad because we were young enough and old enough in age to play together. And so we got to play two seasons together for Gene and stuff like that. But it only took him about five years. And he got a letter from the Hollywood studios and said, cease and desist. You got to change the name of your bar. Took him five years. It was 100% his intentions. He wanted. He wanted Kevin Costner to come walk in the bar and tell him to quit using the name. That was his goal. That's funny. That was his.
