Appreciating Pioneer Life

Tuesday, Aug 29…

Main Building Lobby

Today we visited the Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer, a collection of art, video, artifacts and a living history Railroad Town that preserve the legacy of late 19th century pioneers. The architecture of the main building is sleek, spacious and inviting. The artifacts range from a prefab jail cell w/ a porcelain-lined cast iron chamber pot to primitive electric devices such as curling irons and instruments for electro-stimulus therapy. All are beautifully displayed. We took our time, and I especially enjoyed the stories of 3 African-American pioneers – one a German-speaking barber, and the others a freed slave and his son, both doctors of mixed repute. 

Mail Carrier, c. 1900

Main Street, Railroad Town.
(RR Town is like a prairie Williamsburg)

NOTE: (We only visited 2 sections of this 200-acre site, the main museum bldg, and the antique machinery barn. Families w/ children would definitely want to see RR Town, which usually has docents in period costume interacting w/ guests.) Below are a couple pics from the antique machinery display.

Early 1900s thresher - the complexity parts is reminiscent of Rube Goldberg.

Early tractor & plow

After a quick drive through RR Town, we headed into Grand Island proper to find some lunch. Turns out The Farmer’s Daughter Café does a pretty good job. I skipped my usual Pepsi so I’d have a little room for a real chocolate shake from the Coney Island Lunchroom (1933). Greg & I shared this, but I was still way too full afterwards, so I needed (and took) a long walk when we got back to the MH. (I actually felt crummy the rest of the afternoon...  lesson learned???)

Postscript Pics from Greg...

(Again, just to clarify the size of these tractors. 😃)

Pretty fancy for a tractor.

BelatedBlogPics... Yesterday's post was so full I forgot to include a few pics from my evening walk Sunday. There's a nice park, splash pool, and skate park across the street from us, so I circled the (small) lake a couple times.

Gobbling Geese in Evening's Glow.
(it was prettier in real life)

(Not sure why she's here.)

A Rim of Ducks (and feathers galore)

Nebraska State Fair

Sunday, Aug 27 – Monday, Aug 28…

Sunday: Moving on to Grand Island (NE), where Greg will visit one of his mother’s cousins and we both will visit the Nebraska State Fair and Stuhr Museum.  It’s not a long drive, so no rush to leave early. Staying at the Elks Club in GI – nothing aesthetically pleasing about the location, but we have water & elec hook-ups and a couple nice neighbors (2 women, traveling together but each w/ her own dog and own rig). Greg found his mom’s 99-year-old cousin, who shared several memories of her childhood with Rosalie (Greg’s mom). Later Rosalie (98, and still pretty sharp) corrected some of the details. Other than that, it was pretty much just relax and check out info about the fair, which we’ll visit tomorrow.

Missouri River at Nebraska City

Platte River, near Grand Island. Here, as over most of its length, it's a muddy,
broad, shallow, meandering stream with a swampy bottom and many islands.

Monday is FAIR DAY!  A short drive brings us to the grounds and free parking. Tickets are a whopping $5, which includes probably a dozen performers. Only the midway and big-name evening concerts require separate tickets. 😃  We catch the end of a clogging demonstration, then join a small crowd on bleachers to watch Moto-Mania - 2 motorcyclists & an aerial artist, who eventually end up together in a steel cage, cycles zipping around the young woman standing calmly in the center. 

All about balance.

Cage about 20' diameter. Timing is everything.
(Aerialist hasn't joined them yet.)

The rest of the day includes 4-H exhibits (fabulous - every kid in America should be in 4-H), Raising Nebraska (permanent exhibits relevant to agriculture), the One Man Band & Son, the Birthing Barn (day old piglets and chicks hatching as we watched), a 3000-lb steer, caramel corn ice cream, lots of antique farm equipment, a ride on a (new & huge) combine, 600 quilts, and an accordion concert. Beautiful weather, no crowds (but lots of school kids, each class in matching T-shirts). 

All sorts of crops, lawn grasses & such out here. I finally learned that the "short
corn w/ a big ball of fuzz at the top" we've seen occasionally is actually sorghum.

4-H  Recycling Projects
(turn an unused item into something new & useful)

One-Man Band & Son. The son is
 playing a tubulum, designed &
built by his dad.

The variety of quilts is endless...

The center one was one of my faves (but I had a LOT of faves!)

A ton (literally) of steak...

 tiny chicks....

and a fluffy Angora rabbit.

 TRACTORS...

old ones →

very new ones

and occasionally a very personal one.

Sand artist working in the Raising Nebraska building. 

BlogThoughts... 1. Sometimes I enjoyed the school kids as much as the exhibits. When we were watching the Moto-Maniacs, a boy maybe 7 or 8 years old was 110% into the danger factor. I think I spent more time watching and listening ("Omigosh!" "Look at that..." ) to him than I did the act itself.  2. Inside the Raising Nebraska Bldg there was a free postcard kiosk. Not only were the postcards free, but if you addressed it and dropped it in the box, the fair folks added a stamp and mailed it for you. We sent one to Greg's mom.  3.The One-Man Band was absolutely my favorite thing of the day. He built the 9.1-instrument rig, and how he manages to coordinate leg and foot movements in addition to the guitar and either voice or harmonica is just beyond me. The son (15, I think) has been part of the act since he was 7. His "mallets" are flip-flop soles attached to cake spatulas. They're on the road 6 months of the year and love what they're doing. Check out marcdobson.com for videos and more info.

Postscript Pics from Greg...

(Erica, take note. I imagine quinoa has more fiber. 😃)

(gives you a sense of scale)

Swell lookin' Swine
(Trust me, the real sows we saw in the birthing barn
were not nearly so attractive!)

Small Town with Plenty to Do

Saturday, August 26…

Sometimes I feel like we’re cheating when we check off the states we’ve visited. Three days in Kansas City yielded about 90 minutes in Kansas. On the way to Nebraska City today the highway cut through Iowa for about 5 minutes. (And we didn’t have sex in either of those states – I think I mentioned back in Florida that another RVer told us you couldn’t count a state unless you’d had sex there.) Greg has family ties in Greely and Loup City (NE), so Nebraska City and Grand Island (tomorrow) are stops along the way.

Nebraska City is actually a town of about 7000 and, beyond laundering a load of whites, we didn’t have any particular plans. Turns out this little place is full of history. 

We started with the Museum of Firefighting, which was extremely well done. Our guide was at least as old as us and a veritable font of knowledge, also reminding us a couple times that everything we saw was still functional. His story began with one of the leather buckets from the earliest when a neighborhood bucket brigade was the only defense against fire. In 1861, the station purchased its first hand pumper (which was also pulled by by hand. The black hose was dropped into whatever water source was available (the town did have cisterns by then), and the smaller red hose (which could be extended) directed the spray.

(At some point the city got hydrants - can't remember when.)

(I should've taken notes - I think this engine is 1924.)

We supported the museum with a couple small purchases from the gift shop, then walked a block to the Kregel Windmill Museum. Kregel wasn't the largest or most innovative windmill mfgr, but the shop, built in 1903, has been preserved just as it appeared in 1939. Greg appreciated he mechanical details more than I could, but it was still quite interesting.

Office (the typewriter is tiny!)

This band saw was my fave item.

ELI was the Kregel brand name.

Our third stop, the Freighters Museum, was relatively short. Short video, photos and artifacts highlighting the major role this (now) little city played in westward migration and the resulting growth of cities and commerce in western territories. Interesting, but not riveting. Last stop was Arbor Mansion (officially Arbor Lodge State Historical Park at Arbor Day Farm), home of J. Sterling Morton, a wealthy newspaper editor. (One of his sons created the process that allowed salt to flow freely, even in rainy weather. Most of us probably have a box of Morton Salt in our pantry.) The home, now over 50 rooms, began as just 4. Sterling Morton & his wife also planted dozens (100s?) of trees on the prairie property, which eventually led to him being the founder of Arbor Day. 

Coach and travel accoutrements circa 1870s.

Mrs. Morton's  bison fur coat .

Descendants of those 1 million trees.

I'll close with two very different aspects of 19th century prairie life. I think the tooth extraction sign came from the Freighter's Museum. The Tiffany window graces the ceiling of the sun room at Arbor Mansion.

 " Full set of teeth on rubber for $5" - what a bargain!

This ceiling was part of the last renovation, done
by the sons when they inherited the property.

Truman Day

Friday, August 25…

So yesterday’s tour gave us a cultural overview of Kansas City. Today we’re off to Independence (basically a suburb of KC) to take in some history at the Truman Library. All I really know about Truman is relevant to the bombing of Hiroshima. (My earliest brush with actual politics occurred in 1956 when Eisenhower campaigned in Chestertown, MD – pop 5000 – and for a few moments was about 10’ directly in front of me. Republican nominee Adlai Stevenson was talking about extending the school week to Saturday, so all us kids were sporting I LIKE IKE buttons.) Anyway, Greg and I were quite impressed with Truman, who served nearly 95% of FDR’s 4th term. Talk about a learning curve!

Home Office (replica).  Lots of books, lots of chairs, lots of personal mementos.

Replica of Truman's White House office. To me, that double-sided desk speaks
volumes regarding his respect for others.
(more on this in BlogThoughts below)

Truman home 1919-1972

Truman and Bess Wallace were schoolmates from early childhood, but their family backgrounds were worlds apart. What Truman lacked in money and education, however, he made up for in integrity, hard work and persistence. When (after a 9-year courtship) she finally agreed to marry him, they moved into her family home. Truman didn’t actually gain ownership until his mother-in-law died in 1952. When his 2nd term as president ended, he and Bess returned to this house, oversaw needed renovations, and lived reasonably quiet and ordinary lives until their deaths. For a more detailed account, see www.nps.gov/nr/travel/presidents/harry_truman_nhs.html

BlogThoughts... Back to Pendergast. He ran the Democratic Party in Kansas City, and in 1922 he asked Truman to run for a judgeship in Jackson County. Truman won the election, and his reputation for hard work and honesty ultimately benefited Pendergast as well. After Truman’s election to the U.S. Senate, however, he knew many senators still saw him as “Pendergast’s man” and began to (successfully) distance himself from “Boss Tom.” When FDR chose Truman as his running mate in ‘44, it was a smart political move but he had no real interest in Truman per se and virtually ignored him after the election.

Amen. (Truman was a reader.)

One last political thought. I commented earlier that I was impressed with the double-sided desk in Truman’s Oval Office. To me that signified an attitude of partnership. Then I got curious and wondered if the desk was Truman’s personal choice or just “the” Oval Office desk. Turns out it was commissioned by Teddy Roosevelt and used by half a dozen other presidents, but only Truman placed a second blotter across from his own.

Parting shots...

"Spiderweb" ahead!

Practical, I suppose, but still a bit creepy.