Palmer Little League volunteers revamp dormant Busbey Field

PALMER — Under the water tower in downtown Palmer, Harley Busbey Memorial softball field has sat dormant next to two other active ballfields for decades. With volunteer labor from Palmer Little League board members, Busbey Field is getting a makeover this fall in hopes that it will be ready for competitive play next spring.

“We’ve been wanting to fix this field so our kids can play there. We have a lot of majors and juniors little league girls that could be utilizing that field and it’s just been left dormant for as long as we can remember so we’ve been talking about it long enough we just decided we are going to try and get it done,” said organizer Dave Sutton.

Sutton coached his daughter Jenna at every level of Little League and through her time at Palmer High School, and has remained active with softball in Palmer even now that his daughter has moved away to attend college. Sutton has been talking to the Palmer Little League board about the need to renovate the field for nearly a decade, allowing both the Busbey Field and Ken Soule ballfield adjacent to be used for softball at the same time.

“I’m so excited about this I can’t sleep at night. It’s hard to go to bed because I’ve got so many things rolling around in my head about the things we need to get done, but it just really would be exciting to see this project get finished and to have girls actually playing there next spring, said Sutton. “That’s the goal, get it done so they can play there next spring.”

The previous dugouts at Busbey Field were literally dug out of the ground and inside the fencing and field of play. The dugouts would often carry ice late into the spring and fill with water and sometimes trash during the summer months. The basepaths have long been rutted and overgrown, and fencing was only installed at four feet high when regulation fields require six foot tall fences and a skinned, grassless infield dirt. Sutton and a crew of dedicated volunteers including Mike Alley, Woods Miller, Matt Hartman, Rob Meyer and Vice President of Softball Frieda Schoon assembled in early September to pull fence posts and demolish the dugouts. With the Palmer Public Works Department allowing Sutton to borrow equipment and help from Bolander Excavating, the old dugouts and fencing have been removed and work to complete the project is expected to be finished late this fall.

“Wasilla has a new field and Redington has a brand new field and Houston has their own field and basically Colony and Palmer are at the mercy of wherever they can find a

field to play on the high school level, but it’s the girls from 6th grade up to high school that don’t really have a place to play and so this field is vital,” said Sutton.

Last year, 96 girls participated in Softball at Palmer Little League as part of nine different teams at various levels. Even though registration dropped overall at Palmer Little League by nearly 150 ballplayers as a result of COVID-19 caution, Palmer Little League remains the place to play for softball players in the Valley. Palmer Little League President Dave Combs praised the work of Sutton and Alley who have been instrumental in the volunteer demolition of the old structures at Busbey Field.

“That’s what it comes down to is volunteers getting it done,” said Combs. “This is going to be able to be used by both Colony and Palmer, 100 percent, and that’s the main reason why we’re doing this right now is so it’s ready in the spring for them to be able to use it.”

Sutton is grateful that volunteers have been willing to put in the effort to renovate the field. Sutton hopes that Palmer Little League can host tournaments with three softball fields all inside of city limits, furthering the game under the water tower.

“We’re hoping the other organizations in the Valley will step up and help us finish it,” said Sutton. “Projects like these don’t happen w/o the good hearted people of the Valley.”