Oct. 17, 18, 19
1,000 mile stare
How many of you have ever undertaken a solo 1,000 mile trip? Raise your driving gloved hand.
I had 1,000 miles to traverse from Iowa to Wayland, Tejas, and though my goal was (at least as I was headed directly to a Wayland) to stay off the super slabs – I was starting to think seriously about taking them to get through this longest of segments.
But, after not much thought I figured that staying true to the original thought that a large part of the trip was all about seeing the country differently was more important than saving time. I had looked “at the world through a windshield – watching it fly by me on the right” (thanks Commander Cody) enough times on the slabs and you may get a very similar view (it’s just miles of flatness in this particular area interspersed with the solely occasional highway service or close enough to see town/city exit) as you do from the boonie byways, but there is more flavor to be tasted on the little roads.
Besides, I don’t know how I didn’t notice this, but upon another look at Wayland, Illinois via Google satellite, I realized that there was only one house at this location. Now, I have time to meander, but it was a 240 mile round trip there and after some thought, I didn’t think it was worth the gamble that the folks who lived there would know the history of why that little dot in the field just east of their house (located at the junction of W. Union and White Oak cemetery roads) indicated that a Wayland had been there.
I have heard of a one horse town, but never a one house town. To that end, I will connect with the Schuyler County historian to find out the skinny. (The town is listed as being at the elevation of 666 feet so maybe too many devilish happenings scared folk away.)
Anywho, I redirected my trusty Microsoft Streets & Trips navigator to map out a lonely road route and in an instant I celebrated that Hannibal, MO was close enough to throw a frog at. So I jumped at the chance to finally stand on the streets of the town and its banks of Big Muddy where Samuel Langhorne Clemens took inspiration as a child.
You have to get through new Hannibal (cookie cutter franchise stuff again) to arrive on the streets Twain once trod. Two and three story brick buildings tell of their age and of the ornate detail once the norm of builders. However …
How the man would hate what is has become, well, signage-wise anyway. You couldn’t swing a huckleberry branch without hitting an establishment that held his pen name as a come-on-in attention-grabber – some using his headshot to further exploit this first great American author. (I tell the truth when I tell you I saw a freestanding Pepsi machine that held a head to toe photograph of Twain from his younger days that took up the whole of the machine’s front panel.)
But, as Twain said, “Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.”
Tents galore filled the main section of old downtown for a food fest of sorts which forced me to find side street parking. I got out in view of the bermed earth that separated the town from the Mississippi River. A quick climb and the river that was once the north/south interstate freeway lazily did its thing as a freight train slowly crawled northward along the park that held a Twain at the wheel statue as calliope music emanated from the docked replica paddle wheeler.
Had to dip my hand in the Mighty Miss and skidded down the berm to get to the gate into the park, where patience was needed as the train took its time clicking and clacking by. When the last car vanished after compressing the railroad ties gently into the ground, I was face to face with a distinguished looking gentleman. His hair all of pure white, as was his luxurious mustache and the bushy brows that framed, dare I say, sparkling eyes. His hands were thrust nonchalantly in the pockets of his impeccably tailored white suit.
And speaking of thrust; I am now at the stage of not being overcome much by having the world, the fates, the call-it-what-you-will, give me these moments of random synchronicity that I smiled back at his smile and simply, deferentially, said, “Sir” with a slight nod.
He returned my nod without a word and strolled off towards town. I can’t say that he disappeared into the festival crowd, or if he just disappeared. I can say that I will never use the term “Never the Twain shall meet” again without a resolute pause.
With the Hannibalistic mission complete (and a $4 key change with Mark’s visage to look upon me from its berth on my dashboard purchased at TwainTown), I was out of there so fast it would make a Pudd'nhead spin. It was 24 to H and onto U.S. 54 for the long haul across the rest of MO and into Kansas with no paying attention to what was behind me.
I also quickly left behind the level landscape and 54 became a, can’t really say hilly – more a gently rolling road with more trees along its curving length. Another older east/west route, 54 beats the Eisenhower Interstate system because it wasn’t laid out so methodically and does the rollercoaster thing by the nature of it simply being built from point A to point B without all the leveling thing – an au natural, organic go with the topography flow kind of ride that made me wish I was on a motorsickle. There were a couple of curves that held quite a number of yellow caution sings with big arrows that told you to pay attention lest you end up in the pasture.
And I saw many a small herd of them on the road with many a smile showing on the faces of the four-stroke cowboys and cowgirls. Oh, if wishes were horses, this beggar would ride with horsepower to spare.
Humansville, MO? Okay, I’ll bite – named for James Human who dropped roots in the area in 1834. Population – 946 at the 2000 census.
I blew through Nevada, MO (pronounced like tomada/potada) for lack of a non-threatening Mom & Pop motel and settled in at the 1st Interstate Inn in Ft. Scott, Kansas (Kansas border – 2,161.8 mile mark).
Day two of the 1,000 miles was just another example of how the road changes when you hit a state border. Now, Kansas (besides the allure of the “Wizard of Oz” – an all time favorite movie) has the advantage of having the rolling aspect to it unlike its kissing cousin Nebraska which is one of the, if not the flattest states around. (It’s so flat, that Nebraskans haven’t never used the phrase “going downhill” to describe anyone for lack of an understanding of the gravity of the expression.)
Slowing down through Eureka (just east of El Dorado), Alva, Waynoka, Sunset, etcet – gives you another thing you won’t see on the super slabs. As you 35 it through town, you see –folks mowing, raking leaves, walking hand- in-hand, jawing on the porch or front yard – you get to see everyday life in everytown America, just like in Wayland. You can imagine it might have been a joke that elicited the laugh you saw or wonder if it was politics that had the another guy gesticulating so wildly in the air while in his chair as the other two people looked quietly on in the yard.
You get to see daily life in a vicarious way that just reinforces to me that wherever you are, folks are just the same as wherever you came from. The accent might be a little different, the slang might be a bit quirkier than you are used to, but life is just the same.
Kansas started showing a change from crops mostly to lots more cattle farming and the pump jacks started showing up more frequently (there were a few in MO) to show that Texas T was a-flowin’.
As I hit Oklahoma (mile 2,460; where the wind comes …) the change was more subtle than at other borders. But more oil seemed present and there didn’t seem to be much of any cash crop farming going on. The first cowboy hat was seen in Alva, OK, the term “Cattle Company” outside of Pratt, OK and the first dead armadillo (rarely have I seen live ones) in between the two.
Like the other states in the Midwest, many a town may not have had a sign boasting of a sports team of late, but many, many, many had the blue signs at the edge of town that proudly hailed the accomplishments of its FFA clubs, a few debate team winners and even a math team or two who brought home the gold and bragging rights to their school.
I stayed at the MidTown Travel Inn in Clinton, OK. I’m not saying it was the worst I will stay in, but you might want to think twice about turning around and immediately checking out when your room has a flyswatter placed immediately in view when you enter it (got six of the buggers before I slept).
The third and last day on the road to Wayland was a quick one with the Tejas border (mile 2,678.5) crossed quite early that morning and first cactus sighting (prickly pear) was at 2,725. The auditory nerves were given a tingle when I hit the scan button quite near the border and one of the best things to come out of Texas, its singer/songwriters, delighted me for miles and miles with that unique Texas style music.
The Bite Me BBQ tickled me inside outside Wichita, but the now more prevalent petroleum smell assaulted me at times when I came across areas of multiple pump jacks as their grasshopper looking heads bobbed up and down bringing forth the black gold.
The sign, Wayland, was driven by at mile 2,820 after about 20 miles of FMs (farm road designation on the road signs) just after the Half a Ranch sign and it felt good to stop, smell the prairie air before I headed to Eastland to find a motel.
This posting (at 1,765 words) seems as long as the 1,000 mile stretch it took to get from Iowa to Tejas, but it was a whole lot easier on my butt to accomplish.
How many of you have ever undertaken a solo 1,000 mile trip? Raise your driving gloved hand.
I had 1,000 miles to traverse from Iowa to Wayland, Tejas, and though my goal was (at least as I was headed directly to a Wayland) to stay off the super slabs – I was starting to think seriously about taking them to get through this longest of segments.
But, after not much thought I figured that staying true to the original thought that a large part of the trip was all about seeing the country differently was more important than saving time. I had looked “at the world through a windshield – watching it fly by me on the right” (thanks Commander Cody) enough times on the slabs and you may get a very similar view (it’s just miles of flatness in this particular area interspersed with the solely occasional highway service or close enough to see town/city exit) as you do from the boonie byways, but there is more flavor to be tasted on the little roads.
Besides, I don’t know how I didn’t notice this, but upon another look at Wayland, Illinois via Google satellite, I realized that there was only one house at this location. Now, I have time to meander, but it was a 240 mile round trip there and after some thought, I didn’t think it was worth the gamble that the folks who lived there would know the history of why that little dot in the field just east of their house (located at the junction of W. Union and White Oak cemetery roads) indicated that a Wayland had been there.
I have heard of a one horse town, but never a one house town. To that end, I will connect with the Schuyler County historian to find out the skinny. (The town is listed as being at the elevation of 666 feet so maybe too many devilish happenings scared folk away.)
Anywho, I redirected my trusty Microsoft Streets & Trips navigator to map out a lonely road route and in an instant I celebrated that Hannibal, MO was close enough to throw a frog at. So I jumped at the chance to finally stand on the streets of the town and its banks of Big Muddy where Samuel Langhorne Clemens took inspiration as a child.
You have to get through new Hannibal (cookie cutter franchise stuff again) to arrive on the streets Twain once trod. Two and three story brick buildings tell of their age and of the ornate detail once the norm of builders. However …
How the man would hate what is has become, well, signage-wise anyway. You couldn’t swing a huckleberry branch without hitting an establishment that held his pen name as a come-on-in attention-grabber – some using his headshot to further exploit this first great American author. (I tell the truth when I tell you I saw a freestanding Pepsi machine that held a head to toe photograph of Twain from his younger days that took up the whole of the machine’s front panel.)
But, as Twain said, “Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.”
Tents galore filled the main section of old downtown for a food fest of sorts which forced me to find side street parking. I got out in view of the bermed earth that separated the town from the Mississippi River. A quick climb and the river that was once the north/south interstate freeway lazily did its thing as a freight train slowly crawled northward along the park that held a Twain at the wheel statue as calliope music emanated from the docked replica paddle wheeler.
Had to dip my hand in the Mighty Miss and skidded down the berm to get to the gate into the park, where patience was needed as the train took its time clicking and clacking by. When the last car vanished after compressing the railroad ties gently into the ground, I was face to face with a distinguished looking gentleman. His hair all of pure white, as was his luxurious mustache and the bushy brows that framed, dare I say, sparkling eyes. His hands were thrust nonchalantly in the pockets of his impeccably tailored white suit.
And speaking of thrust; I am now at the stage of not being overcome much by having the world, the fates, the call-it-what-you-will, give me these moments of random synchronicity that I smiled back at his smile and simply, deferentially, said, “Sir” with a slight nod.
He returned my nod without a word and strolled off towards town. I can’t say that he disappeared into the festival crowd, or if he just disappeared. I can say that I will never use the term “Never the Twain shall meet” again without a resolute pause.
With the Hannibalistic mission complete (and a $4 key change with Mark’s visage to look upon me from its berth on my dashboard purchased at TwainTown), I was out of there so fast it would make a Pudd'nhead spin. It was 24 to H and onto U.S. 54 for the long haul across the rest of MO and into Kansas with no paying attention to what was behind me.
I also quickly left behind the level landscape and 54 became a, can’t really say hilly – more a gently rolling road with more trees along its curving length. Another older east/west route, 54 beats the Eisenhower Interstate system because it wasn’t laid out so methodically and does the rollercoaster thing by the nature of it simply being built from point A to point B without all the leveling thing – an au natural, organic go with the topography flow kind of ride that made me wish I was on a motorsickle. There were a couple of curves that held quite a number of yellow caution sings with big arrows that told you to pay attention lest you end up in the pasture.
And I saw many a small herd of them on the road with many a smile showing on the faces of the four-stroke cowboys and cowgirls. Oh, if wishes were horses, this beggar would ride with horsepower to spare.
Humansville, MO? Okay, I’ll bite – named for James Human who dropped roots in the area in 1834. Population – 946 at the 2000 census.
I blew through Nevada, MO (pronounced like tomada/potada) for lack of a non-threatening Mom & Pop motel and settled in at the 1st Interstate Inn in Ft. Scott, Kansas (Kansas border – 2,161.8 mile mark).
Day two of the 1,000 miles was just another example of how the road changes when you hit a state border. Now, Kansas (besides the allure of the “Wizard of Oz” – an all time favorite movie) has the advantage of having the rolling aspect to it unlike its kissing cousin Nebraska which is one of the, if not the flattest states around. (It’s so flat, that Nebraskans haven’t never used the phrase “going downhill” to describe anyone for lack of an understanding of the gravity of the expression.)
Slowing down through Eureka (just east of El Dorado), Alva, Waynoka, Sunset, etcet – gives you another thing you won’t see on the super slabs. As you 35 it through town, you see –folks mowing, raking leaves, walking hand- in-hand, jawing on the porch or front yard – you get to see everyday life in everytown America, just like in Wayland. You can imagine it might have been a joke that elicited the laugh you saw or wonder if it was politics that had the another guy gesticulating so wildly in the air while in his chair as the other two people looked quietly on in the yard.
You get to see daily life in a vicarious way that just reinforces to me that wherever you are, folks are just the same as wherever you came from. The accent might be a little different, the slang might be a bit quirkier than you are used to, but life is just the same.
Kansas started showing a change from crops mostly to lots more cattle farming and the pump jacks started showing up more frequently (there were a few in MO) to show that Texas T was a-flowin’.
As I hit Oklahoma (mile 2,460; where the wind comes …) the change was more subtle than at other borders. But more oil seemed present and there didn’t seem to be much of any cash crop farming going on. The first cowboy hat was seen in Alva, OK, the term “Cattle Company” outside of Pratt, OK and the first dead armadillo (rarely have I seen live ones) in between the two.
Like the other states in the Midwest, many a town may not have had a sign boasting of a sports team of late, but many, many, many had the blue signs at the edge of town that proudly hailed the accomplishments of its FFA clubs, a few debate team winners and even a math team or two who brought home the gold and bragging rights to their school.
I stayed at the MidTown Travel Inn in Clinton, OK. I’m not saying it was the worst I will stay in, but you might want to think twice about turning around and immediately checking out when your room has a flyswatter placed immediately in view when you enter it (got six of the buggers before I slept).
The third and last day on the road to Wayland was a quick one with the Tejas border (mile 2,678.5) crossed quite early that morning and first cactus sighting (prickly pear) was at 2,725. The auditory nerves were given a tingle when I hit the scan button quite near the border and one of the best things to come out of Texas, its singer/songwriters, delighted me for miles and miles with that unique Texas style music.
The Bite Me BBQ tickled me inside outside Wichita, but the now more prevalent petroleum smell assaulted me at times when I came across areas of multiple pump jacks as their grasshopper looking heads bobbed up and down bringing forth the black gold.
The sign, Wayland, was driven by at mile 2,820 after about 20 miles of FMs (farm road designation on the road signs) just after the Half a Ranch sign and it felt good to stop, smell the prairie air before I headed to Eastland to find a motel.
This posting (at 1,765 words) seems as long as the 1,000 mile stretch it took to get from Iowa to Tejas, but it was a whole lot easier on my butt to accomplish.