Art at Harmon Field

If you continue on highway 176 and take the next right on Harmon Field Rd., you’ll see Harmon Field on your left. Turn left into the park and on the other side of the baseball field behind home plate is a statue of Harry Dallara. Dallara was a philanthropist, Bronx native, tire salesman, and baseball lover who played hundreds of games in Tryon in the 1950s. The statue shows Dallara holding a bat when he was 90. It’s the work of David Deming, an internationally acclaimed artist who’s made many pieces depicting sports legends. The statue is the focal point of the Harry Dallara Baseball Field, which was dedicated in the fall 2020 by the foundation that bears his name. 

If you go back out to Harmon Field Rd. and take the next left past the tennis courts back into the park, you’ll see the large back wall of Harmon Field’s open-air gym. On the other side of that wall is a mural inspired by 17-year-old Mason Lassiter of Tryon who loved playing basketball there. In fact, Lassiter loved the gym so much that he took on an ambitious project raising money to rehabilitate the gym as his high school senior project. Lassiter raised $11,000 before his sudden passing. After his death the community rallied to raise the rest of the money needed for the $40,000 renovation. The project included this mural on the only inside wall of the gym depicting the Blue Ridge Mountains with the outline of a basketball player. Asheville artist Dustin Spagnola completed it in 2020.