Murray Cook is building the Field of Dreams, and they’re sure to come. In fact, baseball fans have been coming to fields built by Murray for over 40 years.
Salem native Murray Cook is the epitome of the American success story. He went from shining shoes and raking dirt as a kid to becoming one of the top professionals around the world in the design, construction and management of sports fields and ballparks .
Salem Municipal Field, now Billy Sample Field at Kiwanis Park, was the second home to Cook as a child. He started as a “gofer” and clubhouse boy for the Salem Pirates in early ‘70s and worked his way up to assistant grounds’ keeper in 1974, when the Salem team had future stars like Miguel Dilone, Mitchell Page and the late Alfredo Edmead, who was destined to become a star before a tragic accident took his life on the playing field in Salem.
Cook was promoted to head groundskeeper in 1975 at the age of 14 and quickly started making a name for himself. The field in Salem was always manicured to perfection and his hard work didn’t go unnoticed. By 1988 he was hired as the stadium manager for West Palm Beach Municipal Stadium in Florida, a 10 field spring training facility that was home to the Atlanta Braves and Montreal Expos. He plied his trade there for eight years before moving to Roger Dean Stadium, a 14 field complex for the Expos and St. Louis Cardinals.
In 1996 Cook was hired by Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando, Florida to design and manage their multi-field Sports Complex. By this time, Cook was receiving national and world wide attention for his expertise. He was chosen to supervise the fields for the Sydney Olympics in 2000 as the Technical Venue Supervisor, then for the Athens Olympics in 2004 as Deputy Competition Manager and the 2008 Beijing Olympics as Baseball Venue Operations Manager.
In the past 20 years Murray has been all over the world creating fields for big league and international baseball events, including Major League Baseball season openers in Sydney, Tokyo and San Juan, as well as creating a new stadium for the Braves and Marlins game at Fort Bragg in 2016. He’s been the Official Field Consultant for the MLB Office of the Commissioner for 25 years.
In addition to designing and constructing baseball fields he was chosen as the Official Turf Consultant for the National Mall in Washington, DC from 2012-14. A current project, constructing the “Field of Dreams” in Dyersville, Iowa, began in 2019.
Murray is now Division President of Brightview Sportsturf. With over 40 years of experience and venue design and management services in over 60 different countries Cook is recognized as the top consultant in his field. He has received numerous awards, including Sportsturf Man of the Year, Sportsturf Professional Field of the Year for his work in West Palm Beach in 1993 and in 2016 his field at Fort Bragg was deemed “Ballpark of the Year” by USA TODAY.
The Past President of the National Sports Turf Managers Association, Murray has been a key note speaker at numerous sports field clinics and National Conferences around the world and has written several guides on sportsfield design, maintenance and construction.
This year, the Salem-Roanoke Baseball Hall of Fame is lucky to have Cook as its’ speaker for its 29th annual Hot Stove Banquet and Induction ceremony. Four area baseball players and contributors have been selected for induction into the Salem-Roanoke Baseball Hall of Fame at the 29th annual hot stove banquet, scheduled for Thursday, January 30, 2020 at the Salem Civic Center.
A 2006 inductee into the local Hall of Fame, Cook has never forgotten his roots and is still a familiar face around the ballfields he served growing up.
