[humming of musical notes]
- The small town of Ithaca
lies in the heart of southwest Wisconsin's Driftless Area.
[humming of musical notes]
It's home to
some of the Midwest's most beautiful scenery.
The perfect place for a Richland County boy
to carve out his own field of dreams.
[crack of a bat]
- There you go!
- Brad and Rhonda Louis were high school sweethearts.
Their oldest son Jaxon had two loves: playing baseball ...
- He was hitting off the tee as soon as he could walk.
[crack]
- ... and watching baseball.
- I was a big Brewers fan so I started him out.
Maybe I brainwashed him a little bit too.
- Jaxon's room is
a journey through Milwaukee Brewers' history.
From balls to bat to bobbleheads,
it's obvious there are few fans more fervent than Jaxon.
- I'd have the Brewer game on and Rhonda would come out
and go, "Why are you watching the Brewers?
Doesn't he want to watch cartoons?"
I said, "Watch. I'll flip it."
I flip it to a cartoon
and he'd want the Brewer game back on.
- He'd start crying until we switched back to Brewers.
[laughing]
- The beauty of baseball is that it's open ended.
[crack of a bat]
The game continues as long as you keep circling the bases.
[cheers]
There's no clock.
No time limit.
Baseball had always brought the Louis family together
even when time was the one thing Jaxon didn't have.
[long notes on a piano]
- Jaxon was seven years old and it was April of 2013.
We just found out we were expecting our fourth child
and Jaxson started having headaches.
- He'd bury his head in the corner of the couch
and he just wouldn't --
he just sat there and he just --
you knew something was ...
[together] ... was wrong. Yeah.
- They took Jaxon to the hospital.
They hoped it was anxiety or migraines.
It wasn't.
- They did a CT scan and found a tumor in his brain.
- Jaxon was diagnosed with medulloblastoma, brain cancer.
He began chemotherapy and radiation treatments in Chicago
every day for seven weeks,
followed by six more months at UW-Madison.
- It was horrible.
To walk away that first day and leave him in that room
cause of course you can't stay in that room
with the radiation or anything.
- And then they would strap me down to the table
and they would put me in.
- To walk out that first day and they were like, "Okay,
you go to the waiting room."
It was so hard to leave him there, see him strapped in.
Yeah, then knowing that he was going through that every day.
[soft guitar music]
- Back home, the community rallied around Jaxon.
Fundraisers were held and friends provided support.
One of Jaxon's friends shaved his own head
so Jaxon wouldn't feel alone.
Others carried a stuffed animal around school
to remember their missing classmate.
He'd even get a boost from his favorite baseball team.
The Brewers invited him to a game at Miller Park.
- We were in the dugout until about 10 minutes before the game
so it was so much fun.
- While this whirlwind enveloped the Louis family,
they were referred to Make-A-Wish.
- Their Wish Granters came right to our house and they --
- They talked to Jaxson.
- Yeah, they talked to Jaxson.
Just make a wish.
Just whatever your wish is and we'll go from there.
- One day, Brad found a story about a Vermont man
who created a replica of Boston's Fenway Park.
- My eyes just lit up.
- And he's like, "Can we do something like that?"
- And that's how Jaxon ended up with a baseball stadium
in his backyard.
- It's a smash! It's fair!
Off the top of the wall!
- Make-A-Wish and the Brewers brought Miller Park to Ithaca.
Behold Jaxon's Brew Crew Park.
- We have a quarter inch scale of Miller Park, pretty much.
- Decked out with a jumbotron, scoreboard,
and of course, Bernie Brewer's slide.
- It's similar.
I mean it doesn't have the retractable roof.
[laughing]
[crack]
- It's every young baseball fan's dream.
A replica of his favorite ballpark
just beyond his back door.
But Jaxon's wish wasn't just to build a baseball stadium.
- That community support, he saw all that.
He witnessed that and he just knew that now ...
- Yup, that's what he's going to do too.
- That's what we do when somebody's sick.
We gotta raise money for somebody.
- We gotta help them out. - Yeah, we gotta help'em out.
[uptempo music]
- If you build it they will come.
And in Richland County, they do.
[crack of a bat]
Every June, Jaxon's Brew Crew Park
hosts a weekend wiffle ball tournament.
- The smash to the shortstop!
- The proceeds go to G.R.A.C.E.,
[crack]
Greater Richland Area Cancer Elimination.
A charity that provides support to local cancer patients.
- They're going through what I did.
And I know the community helped me
so I wanted to help the community too.
- It's low key and the families have so much fun.
And they're always out there laughing.
People are just enjoying themselves.
So it's nice to sit there and watch that.
- In its first three years,
the tournament raised nearly $30,000 for G.R.A.C.E.
Jaxon's wish was a home run.
In January 2017, Brad and Rhonda would get their wish.
Jaxon went in for a checkup and his doctor delivered good news.
- He came in and after the MRI and he said -- what is it?
Four years?
- Mm, hmm. Four years since diagnosis.
- Since diagnosis.
And he said with -- he goes, "Everything looks good."
And he said, "There's probably this big a chance
of that thing coming back."
So I mean he said, "You're sitting ..."
- We're in a good spot. - We're in a good spot.
So that was a good feeling.
[crack of a bat]
- Today Jaxon is cancer-free and still circling the bases.
- I can keep up with my friends better now
because I have a little more energy than I did at treatments.
[humming of musical notes]
- Baseball is measured in innings.
Life is measured in days.
The Louis family has learned to make them all count.
- I think it sounds a little bit cliché
but it really does make you appreciate everything
you have because you never know.
[humming of musical notes]
- On the last night of the tournament,
everyone gathers around the infield
to launch lanterns into the southwest Wisconsin sky.
It's one final show of small town solidarity
made possible by one young man's remarkable wish.
- Very humble.
Very humble little kid.
Little boy. He really is.
[humming of musical notes]