Richie Ashburn Field

Tilden, Nebraska is the home of Richie Ashburn Field, set inside the community park near downtown Tilden. The field is named in honor of the legendary Major League Baseball All-Star and Hall of Fame inductee, Richie Ashburn, who was born and raised in the small, Northeastern Nebraska community. Ashburn, a long-time representative of the Philadelphia Phillies, both as a player and later as part of its broadcast team, spent his youth excelling as a ballplayer in Tilden and surrounding communities.

Richie Ashburn Field has minimalist features and few amenities. A small-enough to miss sign, nailed to a wooden pole at the entrance of the park, features an image of Richie Ashburn in his batting stance and Phillies ballcap. The words “Richie Ashburn Field” surround the image. The infield playing surface is made of dirt and sand. There is no raised pitcher’s mound. The grass outfield, framed by temporary fencing, serves multiple purposes, doubling as the high school football field in the fall. Goal posts stand just beyond the left and right field fence. Above ground dugouts with wooden benches sit behind chain-link fencing. The backstop is covered with wood planking at its base, presenting a unique challenge to catchers retrieving scalding passed balls and wild pitches. A set of bleachers, modest and aging, are perched behind the home plate and first and third base perimeter fencing.

Richie Ashburn Field is a small-town ballpark with old school charm, closer in style to neighborhood sandlots of a bygone era than the modern, well-tended and often artificial ballyards of the modern age. There are no bells and whistles. Here the game can be played in its purest form. However, a park honoring a legend of the game, a Major League Baseball Hall of Famer, can do more to live up to that Hall of Fame standard. Improvements and upgrades would only serve to honor the man whom after the field is named.