Art Show at Naper Settlement

Parking in downtown Naperville on a sunny summer Sunday takes a little time, featuring as it does slow drives through a few full parking lots and passing by other lots that look full, while navigating the crooked grid of streets and keeping an eye out for a free flow of pedestrians.

I’ve been on worse parking treks. Before too long, we found a spot at Naperville Central High School, whose lot was open and no charge. To reach the riverwalk from there, you have to go around Naper Settlement, an open-air museum covering 12 acres and featuring historic buildings from the vicinity.

Unless you go into the museum, which we didn’t particularly want to, since we’d been there before. September of ’09, when we attended a pow-wow.

Then we found out that an art show was going on, with no admission to the grounds. So we popped in for a look-see.Naper Settlement Art Show Naper Settlement Art Show

“Since 1959, the Naperville Woman’s Club has presented a free art fair in the summer,” the Naper Settlement web site says. “The longest continuously running art fair in Illinois, this event brings a weekend of art and artistry to Naper Settlement in a free, fun, and family-friendly environment.” My italics.

Some nice work was for sale. We managed not to buy anything, remarkably enough.Naper Settlement Art Show Naper Settlement Art Show

In that first pic, he’s selling ceramic graters. Not something I would have thought of.

I was more interested in taking a look at the buildings, even though most of them were closed. The crown jewel of the museum, of course, is the handsome Martin Mitchell Mansion, which we toured those years ago. I didn’t remember much about Mitchell — just that he made money in bricks, many of which are evident in the house, and that his daughter was a dwarf who willed the property to the city.Naper Settlement Naper Settlement

The Daniels House.Naper Settlement

Hamilton C. Daniels (1820-97) doctored in 19th-century Naperville. Wonder whether, toward the end, old doc Daniels was still a miasma man or he came around to germ theory.

The Century Memorial Chapel.Naper Settlement

Formerly St. John’s Episcopal in Naperville, dating from 1864.

The museum also has some nice gardens.
Naper Settlement

Speaking of gardens, there was a special display of Victory Gardens. Boxes honoring the originals, anyway, and individual service members.Naper Settlement Victory Garden Boxes Naper Settlement Victory Garden Boxes

Something I learned from the signage: In 1943, seven million acres of Victory Gardens were planted, producing 40% of the nation’s fresh produce that year.

One more structure, though there are 30 all together on the grounds: the Murray Outhouse.
Naper Settlement outhouse

How many outhouses in the world are named? There have to be others, but there couldn’t be that many.

Along the West Branch of the DuPage River

Naperville, the second-largest Chicago suburb by population at nearly 148,000, has much to recommend a casual visitor, either in warm months or colder ones. (Way-far west Aurora, surprisingly, is number one at nearly 200,000 souls.)Naperville flag

Sunday was warm, but not hot enough to keep us from a stroll along West Branch of the DuPage River, which passes through downtown Naperville, and is in fact one of the village’s main amenities. The river is broad at that point.
West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville

But not that deep. A foot or two at most, yet deep enough for ducks and kayaks.West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville

The walkways along the river are fairly narrow.
West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville

Both banks are connected by wooden foot bridges.West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville

With small parks and other features on either side.
West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville

Including some artwork. Such as “Wall of Faces,” whose plaque says that it was “created by Naperville school children and molded by local artists to represent the casualties of September 11, 2001.” West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville
West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville

And a bronze Dick Tracy. I don’t think I’d noticed that before.
West Branch, DuPage River, Naperville - Dick Tracy bronze

It’s been there since 2010, so I just wasn’t paying attention. But why Naperville? I associate the comic policeman with Woodstock, Illinois, home of creator Chester Gould. The plaque explained that Dick Locher (1929-2017), who was one of Gould’s successors in writing and drawing the comic, lived in Naperville. In fact he was a multi-talented fellow, creating this statue as well.

Household Hazardous Waste Run ’22

There are five permanent places in the state that will take household hazardous waste off your hands, no charge beyond your taxes, according to this Illinois EPA site, plus collections that move from place to place.

One of the permanent facilities, the closest one to where we live (I think), is in Naperville, open on Saturdays and Sundays 9 am to 2 pm. That’s what took us to Naperville on Sunday. Mid-morning, I loaded the back of the car with a variety of chemicals previously found in our garage: cans and bottles and other vessels tucked away in open cardboard boxes so they wouldn’t clatter around too much.

The village of Naperville says that acceptable items include aerosol cans, automotive fluids (including oil, gasoline and anti-freeze), car batteries, fire extinguishers, mercury, paints and stains (oil-based only), peanut oil, pesticides, propane tanks, solvents, thermostats and “unknown hazardous substances.” That last one, I have to say, is pretty bold of the village.

Unacceptable: ammo, compressed gas (except propane), explosives, helium tanks, latex paint, paper or glass or wood — those three generally aren’t hazardous, unless some falls on you, or fuels an out-of-control fire — radioactive materials, sharps, tires, trash or alkaline batteries.

I had none of those. Of the acceptable ones, I had everything but car batteries, fire extinguishers, mercury, thermostats and peanut oil. Peanut oil? Apparently it gums up pipes in high concentrations. Also, I had no unknown hazardous substances, such as boxes one finds floating in the bay.

Since offloading your household waste down in Naperville is first come, first serve, I imagined waiting in a long line in my car, each car belching out auto emissions as they snaked slowly toward the pickup point, where masked state employees appeared and disappeared according to some schedule opaque to me. Hours might be lost to the process.

When we got there, exactly no other cars were ahead of us, and only one came in behind us. A man wearing a white clean suit — are there any other colors? — but not a helmet, asked were we were from, and I told him.

Then he and a partner, also be-clean suited, quickly examined everything in the back and removed everything but a single can, which in their opinion was empty, and could be put in regular trash. That was it. Took all of about two minutes, once the driving was done. Sometimes things work as they are supposed to, even when dealing with the state. Seldom is that written about or mentioned. So I’m doing that now.

Naperville is nearly a half-hour drive from where we live, meaning we weren’t about to turn around and go home right away, burning the gas just for that. So we spent the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon there. I’m glad we did, because otherwise I wouldn’t have made the acquaintance of an homunculus Charley Weaver.

More on that later. Enough to say now that someone my age just caught the tail end of Charley Weaver.

Regal Country Inn, 2017

Rain yesterday morning, cool temps in the afternoon. Cool morning today, pretty warm but not blazing hot in the afternoon. Saw a few fireflies last week. Harbingers of high summer, they are. Always glad to see them.

Has it been five years since our last visit to the UP? Apparently so. I wish I’d taken more detailed pictures of the place we stayed, the Regal Country Inn in Wakefield, Mich., which wasn’t remotely regal, more-or-less country, and certainly an inn.Regal Country Inn, Wakefield, Michigan

The motel was located on U.S. 2, which passes along the roof of the United States. 

The reason I should have documented the place better is sic transit gloria mundi.

Ah, well. Wonder whether the place fell victim to the pandemic or merely the slings and arrows of commercial fortune.

It was a pleasantly comfortable independent motel, owned by the fellow who greeted us at the front desk.

Bob, I’ll call him, because I don’t remember his name, but Bob fits. Bob gave me a discount for paying in cash. Good old Bob. Maybe our stay was off the books. I didn’t ask.Regal Country Inn

We stayed in a second-floor room, near an opening over the lower level and among a fair amount of bric-a-brac.Regal Country Inn, Wakefield, Michigan

His cutout was there, but as far as I know the place didn’t claim that the Duke ever stayed at the Regal Country Inn.

Jerome Huppert Woods

As forecast, temps didn’t break 80 degrees F. on Saturday. A good day to hit the trail.Jerome Hubbert Woods

A trail, anyway. The one we hit happened to be the Des Plaines River Trail, which parallels the river of that name, on a short section through Jerome Huppert Woods. The place might be named for this man, a casualty of WWII. How many Jerome Hupperts have there been? He was from Wisconsin, so that would be a little unusual, but hardly impossible.

The woods are a small slice of undeveloped land along the river. My guess would be that the Cook County Forest Preserve District was able to acquire most of the land along the Des Plaines because it is prone to flooding. A little further from the forest preserve land at that point, the suburb of River Grove surrounds the area, and it’s fully developed.

The reach the trail proper, you go along a connecting trail from a parking lot and recreation field to a short, graffiti’d tunnel under a road. Jerome Hubbert Woods

There’s enough undeveloped land in the area to support some large fauna, looks like.Jerome Hubbert Woods

I don’t look at the creature and think Bambi. Rather, I think, deer ticks, vector of Lyme disease. Best to keep your distance. Still, it was nice to see.

Recent rains seem to have created, or at least enlarged, a stagnant pond that isn’t visibly connected to the river.Jerome Hubbert Woods

Otherwise, lots of green. Lots of flowers. Lots of trees.Jerome Hubbert Woods Jerome Hubbert Woods Jerome Hubbert Woods

With views of the Des Plaines from time to time.Jerome Hubbert Woods - Des Plaines River

Along with abandoned structures.Jerome Hubbert Woods

Eventually, we came to River Grove’s River Front Park, where we turned around. Not before resting a few minutes in the park gazebo, though.Jerome Hubbert Woods

As always, nice to find a gazebo. Obscure suburban parks are better for them.

Colorado Plateau ’22 Leftovers

I’ve changed the name of this trip. What, doesn’t everyone name their trips? No? Anyway, Colorado Plateau ’22 is better than the ridiculous NV-AZ-UT 22, which looks like a part number in a tool-and-die factory.

But not quite all on the Colorado Plateau. Just outside Las Vegas, maybe five or so miles from where  that city finally peters out on I-15 toward Los Angeles, is Seven Magic Mountains.Seven Magic Mountains Seven Magic Mountains Seven Magic Mountains

Magic, maybe, mountains no, at least not in any literal sense. An art installation by Ugo Rondinone, a Swiss artist.

We only passed through Zion NP, stopping only for a few minutes on the side of the road.Zion NP Zion NP Zion NP

Near the entrance.Zion NP

At the entrance.Zion NP

A different entrance: Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. A small bit of the vastness of the place, more than 1.8 million acres.
Grand Staircase-Escalante NM

I knew that was a road I wanted to drive a little ways at least, to check out the views. My instincts were right.Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument

When we were nearly in Page, Arizona, we stopped for a few minutes at a viewpoint over Lake Powell. I was flabbergasted by how low the lake looks.Lake Powell 2022 Lake Powell 2022

And so it is. The lowest level since the lake was built. Lake Mead is low as well, so much so that (possible) mob hit victims have been discovered. Apparently the idea of draining Lake Powell to fill Lake Mead is being entertained by officialdom, I read, though it’s hard to know how seriously.

The cookers at Big John’s Texas Barbecue in Page.Big Johns Texas Barbecue Page Arizona Big Johns Texas Barbecue Page Arizona

Man, Big John made some mean ‘cue in those cookers.

The Lake Powell Motel, also in Page, where we stayed. For the second time. We were there in 1997. A one-minute walk to Big John’s.Lake Powell Motel

When we stayed there 25 years ago, the property was called Bashful Bob’s Motel. Sometime in the 2010s, new ownership changed the name and spent a fair amount renovating the interiors so that they are pretty nice two-bedroom apartments. Back in the late ’90s, the rooms were old, but pleasant. I wonder if I have the ’97 bill somewhere to compare rates. Maybe.

Also, it’s clear that the owners had to renovate to compete with the numerous chain hotels in the town. Bashful Bob didn’t a lot of that kind of competition in the old days, just  smaller properties, a few of which linger still in Page.
Red Rock Motel Page Arizona

The Red Rock started as housing for workers building Glen Canyon Dam, built in 1958 by the Bureau of Reclamation. Actually, I suspect Bashful Bob’s started out that way as well.

In Moab, Utah, we stayed at the Apache Motel. We found it a most pleasant place to stay, and with a touch of movie history to it.Apache Motel Moab Utah Apache Motel Moab Utah

Clean, comfortable, not particularly cheap or expensive, feeling very much like a ’50s motel, though with a few modifications. The motel doesn’t let you forget that the Duke stayed there when filming movies nearby. Other stars did too.Apache Motel Moab Utah

One more feature at Temple Square in Salt Lake City: the Handcart Pioneer Monument.
Handcart Memorial

More Mormons in metal: The centerpiece of the This is the Place Heritage Park, which is on a hill at the edge of the city, where B. Young reportedly told his followers This is the Place, as in, to settle. We dropped by for a short look.This is the Place This is the Place

At the base of the memorial are six figures depicting important in the history of this part of Utah who weren’t Mormons, such as a couple of fur trappers, a chief of the Shoshone, plus adventurers and explorers.

Including this fellow, John C. Fremont.
This is the Place, John Fremont

That’s my presidential site for the trip. Ran for president in ’56, after all.

High Desert Flora

Not quite all the places we visited in May count as high desert, but mostly that’s what we saw, including a wide variety of plants. I looked at them mostly for aesthetic enjoyment, since I’m woefully ignorant about natural history, and when I try not to be, the information mostly isn’t retained by the sieve of my mind.

Still, I know a Joshua Tree when I see one. These were outside Las Vegas. The further east you go from there, the fewer you see.Joshua Tree, Nevada Joshua Tree, Nevada

Smaller than many of the yuccas at Joshua Tree NP, but Yuriko, who hasn’t visited that park, was suitably impressed.

Moving on, flora at Zion National Park.

Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.Grand Staircase-Escalante NM

Owl Canyon, near Page, Arizona. Amazing the places life can cling.Owl Canyon, Arizona

Also near Page.
Near Page, Arizona

National Bridges National Monument.
Natural Bridges NM

Arches National Park.Arches National Park Arches National Park Arches National Park

Canyonlands National Park.Canyonlands National Park Canyonlands National Park

Salt Lake City.Salt Lake City flowers 2022 Salt Lake City - City Creek Park

The flowers were at Temple Square, near the Assembly Hall. The second image doesn’t look much like a city view, but it was, in City Creek Natural Area. The ground gets pretty steep pretty fast as you move away from downtown.

A 180-degree turn at that point, and you see this.Salt Lake City - City Creek Park

A nice change from desert scrub, though desert flora has its fascinations.

The Utah State Capitol

Back in August 2011, I wrote: “Among the National Statuary Hall Collection — each state gets to place two, except Virginia, which gets an extra one for Washington — I spied Ronald Reagan, Jack Swigert, Caesar Rodney, Kamehameha I, Dwight Eisenhower, Ephraim McDowell, Huey Long, Hannibal Hamlin, Samuel Adams, Gerald Ford, William Jennings Bryan, Po’pay, John Burke (of North Dakota), James Garfield, Andrew Jackson, Sam Houston, Washington and Jefferson. I looked in vain for Philo T. Farnsworth, since who wouldn’t want to see him?”

Yet when I saw the lanky statue of boob-tube inventor Philo T. Farnsworth in the Utah State Capitol last month, I was sure I’d seen him at the U.S. Capitol more than 10 years earlier. Memory’s that kind of trickster.Utah State Capitol -Philo T. Farnsworth

Philo’s among a number of Utahans honored in the capitol, both as statues and in paintings. Curiously, I don’t remember seeing Brigham Young there, who is (unsurprisingly) the other statue in the U.S. Capitol from Utah. Must have missed him.

Utah being a late-blooming state (1896), its capitol is an early 20th-century edifice, designed by Richard K. A. Kletting, a local architect who did a lot of Utah projects.Utah State Capitol Utah State Capitol

The capitol has an expansive lawn. When we were there, we watched a man throw frisbees and two dogs catch them in mid-air, again and again.Utah State Capitol

Speaking of tricky memories, before visiting the capitol this time, I wasn’t sure whether I’d seen it in 1980. I got a good look this time.Utah State Capitol Utah State Capitol Utah State Capitol Utah State Capitol

Detail inside the dome. Note the seagulls in the sky.Utah State Capitol Dome Utah State Capitol Dome Utah State Capitol Dome

Lots of nice detail in the building. Some allegories.
Utah State Capitol

Some display cases on the first floor depicting Utah history, including one calling the state “America’s Film Set.”
Utah State Capitol Film Set of America

One exhibiting beehive items.
Utah State Capitol Beehive

Beehives are worked into the architectural detail, too.
Utah State Capitol Beehive

Now I’m sure I didn’t see this place 40-odd years ago, because even after that long I’d remember such a magnificent capitol.

Temple Square

The wide balconies of the LDS Conference Center in Salt Lake City look over at the rest of Temple Square and its centerpiece, the Salt Lake Temple, which happens to be behind scaffolding right now. Not the first noteworthy place I’ve seen in that condition.
Temple Square Salt Lake City

On the morning of May 21, we caught the temple at a moment of reconstruction, or rather a few years of it: a restoration and seismic refitting that will continue into the mid-years of this decade at least. Standing there for about 130 years now, the church must have decided it was time, despite earlier renovations. The building next door is the handsome Joseph Smith Memorial Building, built as the Hotel Utah in 1911, now an event venue.

We started our walk around Temple Square that morning on the other side of the Temple. This schematic by the church was posted on site to let you know that much of the area is closed for the reconstruction.

The other side of the Temple.Temple Square Salt Lake City

There was more to Temple Square than I remembered. There was more to Salt Lake City, for that matter. Considering that the last time I visited was 1980, that isn’t much of a surprise. After that much time, you might as well be visiting for the first time.

Yet I remember parts of the first time fairly well: an overnight excursion from Logan, Utah, not far to the north, in the company of Tom Jones. He attended Utah State University in Logan in those days, and that June I took a bus from San Antonio and back to visit him and — of course — see that part of the country for the first time. Two years later, I visited again as part of a much longer trip, also by bus, but didn’t go to SLC that time.

Salt Lake Temple stands out in my memory of 1980, as it stands out in the heart of the city for reasons other than mere height. I’m sure it loomed even larger 40-plus years ago than now, when downtown wasn’t as populated by as many tall buildings as it is now.

I checked — you have to love Wiki, this is the kind of thing it excels at — and fully 21 of the 39 tallest structures in SLC were developed after 1980, and another two were completed that year. The Salt Lake Temple wasn’t the tallest structure in the city then either, a distinction it held only for about a year in the 19th century.

The Temple might be closed, but it’s closed all the time to non-Mormons anyway. In 1980, we visited the North Visitors Center, a multistory building full of murals depicting the church’s novel theology, culminating in 11-foot replica of Bertel Thorvaldsen’s Christus statue in front of a celestial background.

That building lasted from 1963 to last year, when it was torn down as part of the work at Temple Square. The statue will be located elsewhere in the square, though for now a smaller-sized model is on view at the Conference Center.

The first place we saw at the square was the Salt Lake Assembly Hall.
Temple Square Salt Lake City

Not a church building per se — or maybe it is — but in any case various LDS functions have been held there down the years since the early 1880s. A Gothic design by an early Mormon convert, one Obed Taylor. That’s a good old Biblical name that needs to be brought back, millennials. It’s not to late to name a kid or two of yours Obed (or Boaz, for that matter).Temple Square Salt Lake City Temple Square Salt Lake City

Impressive, but the Salt Lake Tabernacle is even more so, though its exterior reminds me of nothing more than a silver pill bug.
Temple Square Salt Lake City

“Brigham Young, who was the Church President at the time of construction, proposed the original design idea of a large dome building with no columns to interfere with the line of sight to the podium,” the LDS web site says. “Bridge builder Henry Grow used a lattice truss design so the Tabernacle roof was able to span its 150-foot width without center supports.” Temple Square Salt Lake City
Temple Square Salt Lake City

The building used to be used for mass general meetings of the church, but they were moved to the Conference Center in 2000. The Tabernacle Choir — known to the world as the Mormon Tabernacle Choir — still performs in the silver pill bug. While we were visiting, an organist noodled bits of a few tunes on 11,623-pipe organ, such as (naturally) Toccata and Fugue in D Minor. An epic sound.

“The current instrument – the fourth organ to sit inside the organ case – was built in 1948 by the Æolian-Skinner Organ Co. of Boston,” notes the Tabernacle web site FAQ. “One hundred and twenty-two pipes from the original Joseph Ridges organ and another dozen from the 1885 Niels Johnson additions to the organ remain in use today. The 10 largest façade pipes, which date back to the original Ridges organ, do play.”

The last place we visited at Temple Square was the impressively large Conference Center, which as far as I can tell is simply The Conference Center. At 1.4 million square feet, it’s a whopper, including its 21,200-seat main auditorium, where the church holds its biannual general conference and other major gatherings. Design by ZGF Architects of Portland, Oregon.Temple Square Salt Lake City Temple Square Salt Lake City

Though not the size of the Tabernacle organ, the auditorium organ is no slouch at 7,708 pipes. I have no way to judge whether the following Wiki statement is true, but I’m passing it along anyway because it sure sounds impressive: “This organ is internationally significant… in that it is the only organ in the world that has 2 registers of pipes extending down into the 64′ series, the 64′ Contra Trombone and 64′ Contra Gamba, which both extend 4 pipes down to GGGGG#, 13 semitones below the lowest note on a standard piano.”

The Christus statue formerly at the visitor center may be in storage, but a smaller replica is on view on one of the Conference Center floors, along with busts of LDS luminaries and murals of Jesus in the New World.
Temple Square Salt Lake City

Did I forget to mention the presence of Mormon missionaries in all of these buildings? Not skinny young men in white shirts and black ties, but pleasantly dressed young women, in pairs like the men, and from different parts of the world, according to their badges.

We were greeted by them in each building, and in the case of the Conference Center, each floor of the building. I chatted a few minutes with the first of these, in the Assembly Hall. I knew perfectly well they were missionaries, out to assess my interest in things LDS and put a fresh young face on this most successful sect of the 19th-century American effusion of creative religious enthusiasm. I’m no expert on Mormonism, but they probably found that I knew more about it — including the Golden Tablets, the early church goings-on in Nauvoo, the migration west — than most non-Mormons wandering in.

Before long, though, I was telling the first pair about how I like to visit religious sites anywhere I go, and recommended a few obvious ones to them, such as St. Peter’s in Rome, St. Paul’s in London, the Daibutsu in Nara and Borobudur on Java, but also not to ignore the smaller sites you happen across. Maybe not something they hear all the time from visitors, either. Yuriko had much less patience with the missionaries, and whenever I happened to speak with a pair, she usually was on her way.

The Road to Salt Lake City

On the afternoon of May 20, we drove from Canyonlands NP to Salt Lake City by way of U.S. 191 (including a short stretch of I-70), U.S. 6 and I-15. The reds and oranges of southern Utah were soon left behind for a more monochromatic sort of desert.Book Mountains, Utah

We stopped briefly in Green River, Utah (pop. a little less than 1,000), to find a bathroom and change drivers. I also spotted something unexpected in the small but green O.K. Anderson City Park.Green River Utah Athena Missile OK Anderson Park

An Athena missile casing, a relic of the nearby Green River Test Site, where the Air Force shot off 141 such missiles from 1964 to 1973, all aimed at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico (though one hit Mexico once. Oops).

“The program was developed to study missiles’ re-entry behavior and test anti-ballistic missile defenses through the simulation of the full flight dynamics of an ICBM within the confines of the U.S.,” notes the sign near Green River’s missile. Later (until 1975), the Air Force tested 61 Pershing missiles from Green River and trained U.S. and West German troops on their use at the site. Bet that was a plumb posting for the Germans.

Also in the park: a memorial to Bert Loper, whom I’d never heard of. A pioneer in whitewater river-running. Died at 79 on the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon doing exactly that.Green River Utah Bert Loper Memorial OK Anderson Park

Further north, we made a spontaneous stop in Helper, Utah. Originally a railroad junction, and supposedly named after helper engines kept there by the railroad, Helper thrived on coal mining for many years — it is, after all, in the aptly named Carbon County.

Main Street in Helper.Helper Utah Main Street

Mining still goes on in the county, but these days Helper seems to be evolving into an arts and tourist town, presumably having been discovered by hipsters from Salt Lake City, only 100-plus miles away. Mormon hipsters? Why not? With the way SLC is growing these days, it’s probably producing more hipsters than it needs locally, and so can export them to Utah towns with colorful histories.

But Helper isn’t going to forget mining. Not if Big John has anything to say about it.
Helper Utah Main Street Big John

The fiberglass miner has been standing in Helper since the 1960s. He’s in front of the Streamline Moderne municipal building, built by the WPA.
Helper Utah Main Street Big John

Main Street Helper has examples of both buildings renovated for our time —Helper Utah Main Street Helper Utah Main Street

— and those with that potential.Helper Utah Main Street Helper Utah Main Street

At one end of Main Street is a handsomely restored Conoco filling station.Helper Utah Main Street Conoco Helper Utah Main Street Conoco Helper Utah Main Street Conoco

A sign on the door says the place is listed on Airbnb, so you can stay there.

Helper is also home to the Western Mining and Railroad Museum, which was closed when we passed through town. But some of its exhibits are outdoors, on a small lot nearby: mining equipment.Helper Utah Railroad and Mining Museum Helper Utah Railroad and Mining Museum Helper Utah Railroad and Mining Museum

Further north from Helper, at a rest stop on U.S. 6 — Tie Fork Rest Area — is one of the more elaborate historical displays I’ve ever seen at such a place.Tie Fork Rest Stop Tie Fork Rest Stop

Go for the bathroom, stay to look at the locomotive and the other displays about railroading in Spanish Fork Canyon, which unsurprising involved hauling a lot of coal.

We made it to greater SLC in time for dinner at a place specializing in Korean-style fried chicken. We had a number of inexpensive options for dinner, because we were in a college town.

Provo, that is. We took a drive around the BYU campus, a sprawling presence at the base of the Wasatch Mountains: 560 acres with more than 300 buildings. Got the barest glimpse. At that moment, finding and feasting on Korean fried chicken was the priority instead. Travel is like that sometimes.