A dream that began with the idea of relocating a nearly bankrupt theatre company to a permanent facility in a field in an industrialist's "backyard", has resulted in a cultural park in Alabama's Capital City, Montgomery, that rivals any in the world.

At first, local residents couldn't grasp the dream Winton M. "Red" Blount and his wife, Carolyn, had in 1983 for relocating the Alabama Shakespeare Festival to a state-of-the-art theatre facility. (This became the largest single private gift to the arts in the nation). "Build it and they will come," dreamed the Blounts, whose company tracked some of the most ambitious projects and products in the world.

The complex was built, and the Alabama Shakespeare Festival Theatre, now in its 14th year in Montgomery, attracts over 500,000 people annually to performances at the two-theatre facility. Recognized as one of the top five Shakespeare festivals in the world, the theatre complex is complemented by events and exhibits at the neighboring Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, also built in the park that is on the Blount property.

The Blounts kept dreaming, and soon the theatre project grew to become a multi-use cultural park. The first two lakes in the now 300 acre property quickly became venues for outdoor symphony and dance performances and weekend events: Scottish Highland, English Renaissance, African Heritage and other cultural arts festivals each attended by tens of thousands.

Recently, a new dream of a permanent outdoor amphitheater and a Shakespeare garden to complement the beautifully landscaped grounds filled with flowers and trees was augmented. This latest outdoor theatre facility, surrounded by traditional thatched roof structures, will be formally opened in June.

The Blounts have decided to continue building their dreams. Gradually, they have given more and more of their estate to the park authority and to the institutions located there under private/public partnerships entered into by the Blount family with the city, county, and state.

Subsequently, the Blount's bought adjacent land. Now, another multi-million dollar contribution means construction has started on a new park entrance, nearly two miles of new park roads, a bridge, additional parking, and another terraced lake. This area will also contain a fourth venue for outdoor performances. After this new phase is completed in the Spring of 2000, the Blounts plan to add an English-style village, complete with a Cotswold cottage housing gift shops, an English pub and restaurant. Other structures will include offices and meeting rooms for local arts groups plus an array of facilities to accommodate more than an anticipated one million visitors annually to the expanded park.

The Blount's dreams continue. On Wynfield, the family home and grounds located on 29 acres in the center of the Cultural Park, landscapers and contractors are also at work. Rose and azalea gardens and crepe myrtles are in their growing stages. A vast conservatory, with a full-service catering kitchen, is being built to host 300 for indoor receptions and 100 for seated dinner functions. This building will be set amidst new gardens adjacent to the Blount's Georgian-style home, originally built in 1965.

Surrounding the house are dozens of tall trees filled with thousands of tiny lights. Residents fondly refer to them, when lit on special occasions, as the enchanted forest.

Recently completed on the Wynfield grounds are a small private meditation chapel and garden. On the drawing boards are plans for a full horticultural facility, a new barn to house the array of Scottish sheep and horses, which roam the pastures of Wynfield. Eventually, the Blounts plan to make the Wynfield house and grounds available as a museum for tours of the home's exquisite collections of paintings, antiques and art treasures.

Elsewhere in the Blount Cultural Park, space has been reserved for a new performing arts center, should the community wish to build one, and for other theatres and facilities should various arts boards wish to pursue adding them to existing cultural institutions already there or those wanting to locate in the park. "There's plenty of land," says Blount. "Who knows what someone else will dream of next?

"Our dream now is to create a unique place that people can visit, see, and study the arts and culture that have shaped the millennium. We want to create a year-round place to cultivate a love of beauty: a paradise with sculpture, trees, lakes and flowers. We envision a place of information and inspiration available to the community for leisure, cultural and educational activities.

We're thrilled that Shakespeare in Love was voted Best Film by the Academy. Shakespeare and his works are, as they have been for nearly 500 years, an inspiration for the society and culture of all nations.

Coupled with the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts extensive collections of American and European art, its series of noted lectures, chamber music performances, and the vast array of other American arts-including sculptures and fountains now or to be located later on the property-we believe we have started something really great that people worldwide will want to come and share in the next millennium. It's not what you'd expect to find in this historic Southern City."

The Blount family is funding the current phase of the Cultural Park expansion. Other facilities, arts institutions which are housed in or use the park, and over 500 public events held in the park annually are funded by private and public partnerships by area businesses, the city, county, and state. The park triggered a cultural renaissance in Montgomery, now a metro area of 319,000.

In 1984 the greatest number of tickets for arts events ever sold locally was 1,500 seats for a national touring company which performed in a local high school auditorium. Today, Montgomery boasts several professional and amateur theatre companies, and still hosts touring groups. An outstanding community symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, and world-class performance series, professional dance companies, numerous galleries, art museums, international exhibits, lecture series, and public schools for the arts for students from kindergarten to the post-graduate level are now offered.

Changing from annual arts expenditures 20 years ago of only a few hundred thousand dollars, today the arts have a $50 million economic impact in Montgomery. The city's love for the arts attracts actors, musicians, dancers, artists-both professional and amateur, and instructors from around the nation and world, who participate in and see more than five hundred annual performances, many reaching sold-out crowds and running for months.

More than 31,000 tickets were sold for one popular festival theatrical production run last year. Attendees come from all 50 states and more than 60 foreign countries.

People, ranging from students to retirees, traveling from California to the Carolinas and from Canada to Mexico, come by the bus and carloads to attend cultural events. The park has spurred a rash of nearby hotels and restaurants for people who make a week or weekend of repertory theatre, arts events and historical attractions in the city. It is now common to see people of all economic situations sitting beside noted movie and theatre actors, executives enjoying a live theatrical performance, or listening to musicians who rush to Beijing and back for a local performance in one of the venues in the Cultural Park on their way to a competition in Moscow or Salzburg. In recent weeks in Montgomery, one could see and hear several rising musicians who have played Carnegie Hall and actors who have been on stages on Broadway or in Hollywood in addition to many local performers.