You can become a founder of AleSmith's Tony Gwynn Museum

The Gwynn family and AleSmith Brewing Company continue to be hard at work in creating the Tony Gwynn Museum, and now they are inviting people to be part of the project. Yesterday they launched a fundraising campaign on generosity.com to help meet their goal of finishing construction in time for the 2016 All-Star Game, taking place in San Diego in July.

This project has been phased-out so that its construction can take place simultaneous to this campaign, allowing for completion in time for the aforementioned All-Star Game deadline. We want and need the help of Tony’s fans to meet that goal…but we’re not looking for handouts. We have amassed a number of rewards to give back to those who contribute their hard-earned money to help with this project.

Donation levels start out at $10 and run all the way up to $500, with different rewards for each level. These include special edition Tony Gwynn baseball cards (produced exclusively by Topps for this fundraising campaign), founders t-shirts and tank tops (in navy/white or brown/yellow), personalized founders bricks and tiles, early access to AleSmith's special release beers, and behind-the-scenes tours during the construction of the museum as well as early access to the museum upon completion.

The campaign hopes to initially raise $100,000 to cover the first phase of construction for the museum. After reaching that goal, they'll continue to collect donations in hopes of raising the full $500,000 needed to complete the entire project. If any additional money is raised beyond the costs of construction, it will go to the Tony and Alicia Gwynn (TAG) Foundation, which helps underprivileged youth.

In addition to the generosity.com campaign, AleSmith will hold two fundraising events. The first will be their Museum Christening Event this Friday, February 19th, from 4 to 10 pm, to celebrate the start of construction on the museum. Visitors will be able to see the site of the future museum as well as view some of the memorabilia that will be on display. Later this year they will also host the second annual Mr. Padre 5.5K event, from which the proceeds will go towards the museum. Both the Christening and the 5.5K will take place at AleSmith's tasting room in San Diego. And if you can't donate financially, you can also donate your time by being a volunteer for one of these events. More information about all of the above can be found on the generosity.com page.

We, the Gwynn family, want to honor Tony’s memory by constructing a museum celebrating his life and featuring more than 300 pieces of memorabilia spanning from his Little League days to his All-Star career to his final years coaching at San Diego State University. Once complete, the Tony Gwynn Museum will be 100% free-of-charge to visitors.