Willie Keil’s Journey

On the last day of August 2024, we found a set of unusually informative point-of-interest display signs on the side of highway Washington 6, near the town of Raymond. Tucked in the southwest corner of Washington state, that is, out in sparsely populated Pacific County, which encompasses Willapa Bay. Reportedly about a quarter of the oysters eaten by Americans in any given year are from Willapa Bay. And how did I miss this?

The mound is inland some miles, and up top is the grave of Wille Keil. Willie Keil's Grave State Park Heritage Site

Officially it’s Willie Keil’s Grave State Park Heritage Site. Willie Keil was an Oregon pioneer settler in the 1850s, but a most unusual one, considering that he arrived in Oregon after he died. The three signs, installed only in 2020, tell the tale, if a little sappily on the third sign.

The Story of Willie KeilWillie Keil's Grave State Park Heritage Site

On November 26, 1855, Willie Keil, aged 19, was buried atop the hill in front of you after crossing the Oregon Trail inside a barrel of whiskey. Willie had fallen ill and died 6 months earlier and more than 2,000 miles away in Bethel, Missouri, just days before his family was set to depart. Willie’s father, Dr. Wilhelm Keil, ordered a metal coffin for Willie. It was placed inside a tightly banded wooden vat filled with Golden Rule Whiskey, produced by members of the Bethel Colony. Willie’s casket was placed at the head of the leading wagon and the colonists followed him across the entire trail.

Willie Keil’s JourneyWillie Keil's Grave State Park Heritage Site

Worth looking at in detail. Nice work. A map to evoke time and place, and detail a curious set of circumstances.Willie Keil's Grave State Park Heritage Site Willie Keil's Grave State Park Heritage Site

Willie Keil Lives Among UsWillie Keil's Grave State Park Heritage Site

In this untimely death, Willie Keil gained eternal life. Over time, he has grown up into a folk hero. As Willie’s story has been told and retold, distilling truth from fiction has become ever more difficult. The strange tale has come to symbolize the sanctity of a promise. Willie’s dying wish, the story goes, was to lead the wagon trail and his father assured him that he would – no matter what. Today, Willie lives among legends. And here, at the heart of the Willapa Hills, the spirit of the Pickled Pioneer” endures.

Bloomington Ramble ’24

Want good soft serve ice cream in an unpretentious setting? Look no further than Carl’s Ice Cream, a plain-looking shop deep in the heart of Bloomington, Illinois. Also, look for its anthropomorphic soft serve cone rising over the parking lot.Carl's Ice Cream Bloomington Carl's Ice Cream Bloomington

Yuriko and Ann had strawberry, I had chocolate. Carl’s in Bloomington – there’s also one in Normal, with an ice cream muffler man outside – was an early afternoon stop on Saturday. We spent part, but not all of the weekend, in Bloomington.

Something we (I) also had time to do was take a better look at the impressive three-legged communications tower in downtown Bloomington. It’s visible for quite a distance, and makes me wonder, why aren’t more communication towers this interesting?Bloomington Eiffel Tower. Well. Sort Of

Much of the day was hot, or at least very warm, and sunny, a prelude to heavy rains early Sunday morning. So Yuriko was content to stay in the car – with the AC running – when I took in a few closer views of tower.Tower Center Bloomington Tower Center Bloomington Tower Center Bloomington

Pantagraph articles about the tower are paywalled, but snippets poke through from search engine results:

In the last 30 years of telephone, radio and other network service, the Tower Center became a sort of landmark for downtown Bloomington, lovingly nicknamed the city’s “Eiffel Tower.”

Bloomington’s ‘Eiffel Tower’ changes hands after 30 years

The McLean County Center for Human Services Recovery Program is gaining a new home beneath the iconic 420-foot communications tower in Bloomington…

Another source tells me that the tower dates from 1989. The Tower Center is the two-story building under the tower, now belonging to McLean County.

After the rain cleared away, late Sunday morning was as toasty as Saturday had been, but more humid. I decided against a walkabout at the Park Hill Cemetery in Bloomington. It’s good to ration your time under those hot and copper skies.Park Hill Cemetery, Bloomington

Still, we drove around a bit through the cemetery. Not a lot of memorial variety, but not bad.Park Hill Cemetery, Bloomington Park Hill Cemetery, Bloomington Park Hill Cemetery, Bloomington

Now I can say I’ve seen Mike Ehrmantraut’s grave. But not that Mike Ehrmantraut, of course. The fellow offed by Walter White, being fictional, must have an equally fictional grave.

Adjacent the cemetery is the sizable Miller Park, which includes the Miller Park Zoo. We didn’t want to use our ration of intense sunlight at a zoo either, but in the park itself.Miller Park, Bloomington

When you see a steam locomotive in park (and its tender), you really ought to get out and look.Miller Park, Bloomington locomotive Miller Park, Bloomington locomotive Miller Park, Bloomington locomotive

Three million miles. So the train could have, with the right track, gone to the Moon and back a number of times, provided it took its own oxygen to keep that engine going.

And what would the display be without a caboose? Partly because that’s just a fun word to say.Miller Park, Bloomington caboose

Ignorant fellow that I am, I didn’t know the Nickel Plate Road, so I looked it up later. Once upon a time, it was a major regional RR, spanning northern Ohio, Indiana and Illinois.

Miller Park features a sizable war memorial.Miller Park, Bloomington war memorial

In its vicinity are some retired weapons of war, such as a captured German 210 mm Krupp Howitzer (in better shape than this one).Miller Park, Bloomington German Cannon Miller Park, Bloomington German Cannon

As well as a WWI tank. Created for that conflict, at least. An M1917 light tank. Apparently none made it to the front during the war, but were put in service for a few years after the war by the U.S. Army.Miller Park, Bloomington WWI Tank Miller Park, Bloomington WWI Tank

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen one of those on display. I’m reminded of my great-uncle Ralph. I understand — from my mother, and maybe even grandma told me this — that he was in a tank corps in France, with the American Expeditionary Forces. Such a posting is said to be fairly dangerous, and I believe it. Supposedly, Ralph was poised to go to the front at the time of the Armistice, which might well have saved him.

Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

This morning, about 30 minutes into May, I was in bed but not asleep yet, with the bedroom window open a bit, since it was warm enough to make that comfortable. I remembered that I hadn’t checked any weather forecast for May 1, and wondered whether it was going to rain overnight or during the day.

Almost immediately – really, within seconds – I heard rain falling. Light, but definitely rain. It lasted a few minutes. The only reasonable conclusion from such an event is that I’ve learned how to make it rain with my mind. I hope I use my power wisely.

Fairly early on the morning of April 15, I made a doughnut run in Hot Springs, Arkansas, seeking out a Shipley Do-Nuts store. I associate that chain and its wonderful doughnuts (cream filled, especially) with Texas, but Shipley is in other, mostly Southern states. There happen to be two locations in Hot Springs.

It couldn’t just be a doughnut run, though. On the way I stopped at Hollywood Cemetery, said to the Hot Spring’s oldest cemetery, though a precise founding date seems to be lost to time. The oldest stone is reportedly from 1856.Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

The cemetery is on a large, wooded hill.Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

Many – most – of its stones are aged and unkempt. It’s that kind of cemetery. Aesthetic decay. Not only do the dead return to the earth, but so do their memorials.Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

Hollywood is quite large for a small town cemetery, and since important doughnut matters called, I didn’t explore that much of it, such as the Confederate section that’s on the National Register of Historic Places. Still, one large memorial stood out, at least in the part of the cemetery I visited. Davies, it said. Cornelia A. Davies, who died at 28 in 1884.Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

Looks like that statue has a bit of a lean. Was it that way originally, or does it have a tumble to take in the near future? Otherwise the memorial is in good shape.Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

A young mother, I assume. Jesus comforts her children, perhaps.

If this isn’t a Victorian sentiment, I don’t what would be.Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

The entirety of such a cemetery is a momento mori. You’d think any cemetery would be that, but not always.Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs Hollywood Cemetery, Hot Springs

It isn’t written anywhere, as famously it is in Rome, but feeling is in the air at such a place as Hot Springs’ Hollywood: “What you are now, we once were; what we are now, you shall be.”

Potosi, Missouri

Sometime in late 18th century, Frenchmen came to a spot in the wilds of North America, which in later years would be southeastern Missouri, and began digging for lead in a place they called Mine Au Breton – Mine of the Breton, for Brittany native Francis Azor, who pioneered the effort in the area to extract the element. The name didn’t last, however. Since early U.S. sovereignty, it’s been Potosi, Missouri.

Still, the earlier name lingers in a small park in Potosi, which we visited on the morning of April 6 after leaving where we’d spent the night, Farmington.Mine Au Breton Heritage Park, Potosi, Mo.

A nice little park, a block from the town’s main thoroughfare, High Street. Mine a Breton Creek runs through it.Mine Au Breton Heritage Park, Potosi, Mo. Mine Au Breton Heritage Park, Potosi, Mo.

A small bridge crosses the creek at one point. You wouldn’t think such a bridge would merit a name, but the people of Potosi (pop. 2,500) clearly disagree.Mine Au Breton Heritage Park, Potosi, Mo.

Red Bridge. It even has a former name: Steel Wagon Bridge. Maybe more minor bridges should have names. Adds a little character to localities. Of course, if that caught on, most of them would be named after minor local politicos.Mine Au Breton Heritage Park, Potosi, Mo.

After the Louisiana Purchase was a done deal, Americans came to the area, but Moses Austin was already there, having cut a deal with the Spanish to mine there. Texas schoolchildren learn who he was, or at least they did 50+ years ago, when I was such a schoolchild. He’s the father of Stephen F. Austin, who was the Father of Texas. So maybe Moses is the Grandpa of Texas. My brother Jay suggested that we visit Potosi to see his grave, and since it was only a few miles out of the way, we did.

The grave itself isn’t one of the better-looking ones I’ve ever seen: a white, virtually unadorned slab under an uninspired protective shelter.Grave of Moses Austin, Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo. Grave of Moses Austin, Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo.

His wife Mary Brown Austin, daughter of an iron mine owner and mother of Stephen F., is there as well. We didn’t hear that much about her in school.

Moses Austin came to the area to mine lead – and escape debt back in Virginia — and apparently had a good go of it in the 1810s, though I suspect life wasn’t as good for the slaves that did the actual digging. Austin is credited with renaming the town Potosi, after the place in Bolivia, a silver mining center known as the location Spanish colonial mint, producer of countless Spanish dollars. Educated miners like Austin would have known it, anyway, and maybe he was thinking big. As in, dreams of silver. But lead would have to do.

Quite the go-getter, Moses Austin. “He & his 40 to 50 slaves & employees built bridges, roads, a store, a blacksmith shop, a flour mill, a saw mill, a shot tower, and turned out the first sheet lead & cannonballs made in Missouri,” the informative Carroll’s Corner posted.

Austin suffered reversals and ultimately lost his fortune in the Panic of 1819, and so schemed to take settlers to the underpopulated wilds of Texas, then part of New Spain — to escape his debts, among other things. He received a land grant from the Spanish Crown (that’s quite a story), and was set to go when death came calling, leaving the task to his son – who had to deal with newly independent Mexico for his grant. That’s another story, one far from modern Potosi.

Google Maps calls the cemetery along High Street, with the Austins’ grave, City Cemetery. A sign at the site says: Potosi Presbyterian Cemetery, Est. 1833.Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo.

It’s a mid-sized, old-style cemetery with some charm.Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo. Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo.
Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo.

With memorials broken and worn.Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo.

And others still waiting for that wear to happen. It will.Presbyterian Cemetery, Potosi, Mo.

High Street is the location of a handsome county courthouse (Washington County), the third on the site and a 1908 design by one Henry Hohenschild, a Missouri architect who did a number of public buildings. Remarkably, the same document tells us that Moses Austin (probably) designed the county’s first courthouse. Moses was one busy guy.Washington County Courthouse, Potosi, Mo.

There are a number of antique stores on High Street, and while Yuriko was off exploring them, I was buttonholed by two Jehovah’s Witnesses sitting with their material across the road from the courthouse. Or rather, I allowed myself to be buttonholed, so I could talk a little religion. Just like I did in Salt Lake City. Or religion-adjacent. I think the ladies, Mary and Kay I believe it was, were surprised that I knew about the sale of the JW HQ property in Brooklyn some years ago.

My Old Kentucky Home State Park

When John Rowan began work on a house for his family in north-central Kentucky in the 1790s, he called it Federal Hill. Finally completed in 1818 largely by slave labor, it stands today as the centerpiece of My Old Kentucky Home State Park in the outskirts of Bardstown, a handsome structure in a pleasant setting.My Old Kentucky Home State Park My Old Kentucky Home State Park

Besides surviving an 1801 duel in which he killed the other fellow, and beating the rap, Rowan went on to be an important politico in early Kentucky, including a term in the U.S. Senate as an antagonist to Henry Clay and the Whigs, being a Jackson man. He died in 1843, missing the later unpleasantness, and even the war the Mexico.

We visited around noon on December 29. We were the only ones on the tour, in contrast (later that same day) to the distilleries we visited. I hadn’t read much about the place before the visit, and vaguely assumed that there was some good reason that the property’s current name evokes the famed Stephen Foster song. It inspired him in the composition in some way, perhaps.

The house museum doesn’t exactly discourage this line of thinking. At the visitors center is this portrait of Foster.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

There he is, in a 1939 painting by Howard Chandler Christy, receiving the gift of composition from a muse – Euterpe, I suppose, muse of music and lyric poetry and, perhaps, the modern popular song. To the left of the muse’s wings (did muses have wings?) is the entrance of Federal Hill, and there are visual references to some of Foster’s other songs as well.

The Kentucky Colonels’ organization commissioned the painting for the world’s fair in New York that year, and “My Old Kentucky Home” had become the official state (commonwealth) song not too many years earlier. So I assume the Colonels wanted to emphasize a Kentucky connection with the famed song, aside from the fact that the name is in the title and opening lines.

An aside: I know that a Kentucky Colonelcy is an honor bestowed by the commonwealth, but I’m still a little surprised by some of the names on this list, such as Princess Anne, Bob Barker, Foster Brooks (well, he was from Louisville), Phyllis Diller, George Harrison (actually, all the Beatles, even Ringo), David Schwimmer, Red Skelton, and both Smothers brothers (RIP, Tom).

The museum (at least in our time) doesn’t explicitly claim that Federal Hill was an inspiration for the song, since the evidence for that seems to be gossamer thin. I’ve read conflicting reports about whether Stephen Foster, described as a “cousin” of the Rowan family – which could mean various levels of consanguinity in the loose definitions of 19th-century America – even visited Federal Hill from his home in Pittsburgh.

It is clear, however, that “My Kentucky Home” was inspired by Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and as such, sympathized with slaves separated from family members without pity or recourse. The song’s association with a particular mansion in Kentucky, namely this particular one, apparently came later – well after the Civil War. The idea seems to have been promoted by, among others, the last member of the Rowan family to own the mansion, an elderly granddaughter who managed to sell the property to the commonwealth in the early 1920s.

Can’t really blame her if she took a little creative liberty with the history of Federal Hill, since she probably wanted to live somewhere with less expensive upkeep. Also, such a thing would be firmly within the American (and entirely human) tradition of historical storytelling known as “making things up.”

Be that as it may, Federal Hill is well appointed inside with period items, and our guide, a young woman dressed antebellum style, knew her non-made-up stuff. She also sang the first verse of “My Old Kentucky Home” for us, in a pleasant and practiced voice, which I understand is part of all the tours. Of course, the first lines weren’t quite the Steven Foster original, being:

The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home/
‘Tis summer, the people are gay.

The Kentucky legislature mandated the change, at least for official renditions, after an embarrassing incident in 1986 when a visiting group of Japanese students sang the song, original lyrics and all, to the legislature.

Our guide mentioned, almost in passing, an horrific incident from the time of John Rowan. In 1833, the family, or many of them, ate or drank something contaminated with Vibrio cholerae, and three of Rowan’s children (he had nine), a son- and daughter-in law, a granddaughter, and his sister and brother-in-law all died of cholera in short order, as did a similar number of slaves.

Many of these Rowans are buried within sight of the mansion, and the visitor center, for that matter.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

Sen. Rowan himself joined them later, marked by the obelisk. The memorial behind his, with the grieving figure and lyre, is that of Madge Rowan Frost (d. 1925), the granddaughter who sold the property to the state.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

The park, in the form of its guided tour, and written material on signs, doesn’t ignore the enslaved population, as no historic property of this kind would do any more, possibly following the lead of Monticello. Sen. Rowan owned as many as 39 people at one time. A sign near the Rowan cemetery details what is known about them.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

But not their burial sites; that remains unknown. Likewise, their cabins, along with most of the other outbuildings, are long gone. Mostly what you’ll see at the state park is a picturesque mansion retroactively tied to an enduring song.

Cave Hill Cemetery, Louisville

Wrapping up a fun long weekend is always a bit of a downer, but so it goes. Rather than grind all the way north from Nashville on Monday, I decided to pause on the return in Louisville. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d spent any time there – 1990? – though I’ve passed through many times since then. This time, I got off I-65 and made my way to Cave Hill Cemetery.Cave Hill Cemetery

Cave Hill is a Class A cemetery. Or Class A+ or maybe A++. I ought to create an aesthetic rating system for cemeteries, but I think that would be a lot of work. Enough to say that Cave Hill has everything a top cemetery should have: a vast variety of standing stones, plain to elaborate, including a lot of funerary art and mausoleums and a scattering of odd memorials; historic burials of those notable locally and a few famed worldwide; a Victorian rural cemetery movement pedigree; hilly contour (in places where that is possible) and enough mature trees, bushes and flowers to count as an arboretum; water features; and a chapel or two.

By those criteria, Cave Hill is the complete package. Definitely in the same league as Bonaventure in Savannah, Forest Lawn in Buffalo, Hollywood Forever in Los Angeles, Hollywood in Richmond, Saint Louis No. 1 in New Orleans, Green-Wood in Brooklyn, Woodlawn in the Bronx, Bellefontaine in St. Louis, Laurel Hill in Philadelphia, Woodland in Dayton and Graceland or Rosehill in Chicago.

Bonus in early November: fall foliage.Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery

Funerary art, some relatively modest.Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery

Funerary art, more monumental.Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery

Structures.Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery

An oddity.Cave Hill Cemetery

Their ashes were probably scatted nearby. This stone is near a part of the cemetery called the Scattering Garden.Cave Hill Cemetery

Among scenes of fall, at least for now.Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery

Cave Hill sports a number of notable permanent residents, but two far outshine the rest in terms of posthumous fame. At least for someone my age; I can’t vouch for later generations, who may not realize that Col. Sanders was an actual person, not just a cartoon mascot for KFC.Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery

Even more famous worldwide, at least during the last half of the 20th century, was Muhammad Ali. At some point, he was thought to be the best-known person on Earth, or so I read. If not, he was in the running.Cave Hill Cemetery Cave Hill Cemetery

Even boxing-indifferent people like me knew him, since he was no mere prizefighter. Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.

San Fernando Cemeteries No. 1 & No. 2

Halloween snow today. Flurries on and off through much of the day, presaging a cold outing for those trolling for candy. Halloween Snow 2023

I doubt that the kids mind. Their adult companions trailing behind, on the other hand, might be a mite annoyed. Glad that part of being a parent is well behind me.

Early on Saturday morning I made my way to what I believe is the oldest Catholic cemetery in San Antonio, San Fernando No. 1, which is in a modest neighborhood just west of the King William district. Cementerio de San Fernando, to go by the entrance.San Fernando No. 1 San Antonio San Fernando No. 1 San Antonio

Overnight rain had left puddles and mud. I was the only living person among the old stones in soggy ground that morning.San Fernando No 1 San Antonio San Fernando No 1 San Antonio San Fernando No 1 San Antonio

The elements continue to wear away even the larger memorials.San Fernando No 1 San Antonio San Fernando No 1 San Antonio

Some Ursuline Sisters rest in the cemetery.San Fernando No. 1 San Antonio

Some signers of the Texas Declaration of Independence and a SA mayor or two are reportedly buried in the cemetery as well, but this was the only memorial of note that I saw.San Fernando No. 1 San Antonio

“Placido Olivarri is most famous for his service as a scout and guide for the Texas Revolutionary Army under Sam Houston,” the Texas State Historical Association reports. “His proficiency as a scout was so great that Gen. Martín Perfecto de Cos of the Mexican Army offered a substantial bounty for Olivarri’s capture, dead or alive… Following the Texas Revolution, Olivarri became a landowner and wagon train manager in San Antonio.”

San Fernando No. 1 reportedly started taking burials in 1840 – during the brief period of the Republic, that is. The newer San Fernando No. 2 (opened in 1921) is considerably west of the first one, but not hard to find, and still an active cemetery. There is a No. 3, but I didn’t make it out that way this time.

I arrived at No. 2 in the afternoon, once the skies had cleared. It too was muddy.San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio

Deep in the cemetery is a section for clergy.San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio

Some stones suggest 20th-century prosperity in San Antonio. Or at least, money for more impressive memorials.San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio

In the newer sections, more color.San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio San Fernando No 2 San Antonio

After all, the Day of the Dead is coming soon.

South Texas ’23: Kerrville & Bandera

Last Tuesday, my brother Jay and I drove from San Antonio to Kerrville, Texas (pop. 24,200) to visit an old friend of his, who has a separate small building in his back yard to house an extensive model train that he’s building. We got a detailed tour. Cool.

That was part of a larger trip that took me to Austin and San Antonio to visit friends and family. I flew to Austin on October 18 and returned from San Antonio today.

Rather than take I-10 west from San Antonio to Kerrville (though we returned that way), we drove Texas 16, which is mostly a two-lane highway that winds from exurban San Antonio and then into the Hill Country. Always good to drive the Hill Country, even on a rainy day. It was a rainy week in South Texas on the whole, but still quite warm for October. Had a few sweaty walks in San Antonio last week as well, more about which later.

Besides visiting Bob and his wife Nancy and his HO model train construction, we also stopped by the Glen Rest Cemetery in Kerrville (my idea). The recent rains had made it a muddy cemetery. Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, but also mud to muddy?Kerrville, Texas Kerrville, Texas Kerrville, Texas

A curious figure. At least for a cemetery.Kerrville, Texas Kerrville, Texas

Glen Rest – which is incorrectly noted as Glen Rose on Google Maps – dates from 1892, according to the Texas Historical Commission plaque on site. “Glen Rest Cemetery is the final resting place for many pioneer and historic families of Kerrville and the surrounding Hill Country,” it says.

En route to Kerrville on highway Texas 16 is the much smaller burg of Bandera, pop. 829 and seat of Bandera County. That means a courthouse, and we stopped to take a look.Bandera, Texas

The courthouse itself isn’t unusual, but it is positioned unusually. Instead of being the focus of a square, it’s simply facing the highway. So are a handful of memorials. This one honors “All Cowboys” because Bandera is “Cowboy Capital of the World.”Bandera, Texas

This stone oddity honors a Bandera pioneer named Amasa Clark, giving his birth and death dates as 1825-1927.Bandera, Texas Bandera, Texas

More about him is at Frontier Times magazine, which annoyingly doesn’t say when the text was written, who wrote it or where it was published. Internal evidence, along with the style of writing, puts it in the early 1920s, probably in a local newspaper. Clark came to the site of Bandera in 1852, not long after serving in the war with Mexico, and stayed until his death in 1927 as a very old man.

Also along the highway in Bandera is a strip center including a store the likes of which I’d never seen before. Neither had Jay.Bandera, Texas Bandera, Texas

We had to take a look inside.Bandera, Texas Bandera, Texas

I should have asked to woman behind the counter how long the store has been in business, or whether the man himself gets a cut, or some other questions, but I was in vacation mode, not interview mode. So all I know is what I saw, which was enough. For the record, and this is no surprise, Trump overwhelmingly carried Bandera County — 79.1% to 19.7% for Biden — in the 2020 election.

Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

Head west on Bluemound Road in Milwaukee – once an Indian trace, later an early paved road – and before long you arrive at Calvary Cemetery. The entrance is easy to spot, though my shot is from inside.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

It’s Milwaukee’s oldest Catholic cemetery, counting as a rural cemetery, as it was outside the young city in the 1850s. About 80,000 people repose there these days, including the first mayor of Milwaukee, Solomon Juneau.

I didn’t see his grave. But there were a lot of others, varying in style, age, condition and carved sentiment. The ground has contour and the trees are mature. Everything you need for a picturesque cemetery.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

Including some sizable art and a handful of mausoleums.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

That’s the stone of the Jung family, early Milwaukee brewers. What was it Jung said about beer being the royal road to the unconscious? No, that was that other Milwaukee brewer, Ziggy Freud. I believe they were rivals.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

A good number of priests are buried at Calvary, including some fairly recent internments, such as this long row of Jesuits.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

More Jesuits. A wall of Jesuits, with room for a few more.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

The cemetery was unusually busy for a cemetery, because it was on the Doors Open Milwaukee list. Not for the grounds or stones, but for the chapel atop the fittingly named Chapel Hill.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

“This cream brick Romanesque style chapel was designed by architect Erhard Brielmaier and built in 1899,” says Historic Milwaukee. “A noted designer of Catholic churches around the country, Brielmaier also designed the famous St. Josaphat on the city’s south side, under construction at the same time. The chapel is located on one of the highest elevations in the city with impressive views of Story Hill, Miller Park and the downtown skyline.”

A nonprofit, the Friends of Calvary Cemetery, is overseeing the long and expensive restoration of the chapel. Some decades ago, the Archdiocese had planned to tear it down, but fortunately preservationists prevailed. Members of the Friends showed visitors around the inside on Saturday. We had to sign a waver in case a piece of it fell on us.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

The crypt was dark and crypt-like.Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee Calvary Cemetery, Milwaukee

“Originally built intended for services, prayers, private contemplation, and as a mausoleum for clergy, only one clergy member was ever buried at the site,” Historic Milwaukee continues. “The structure has two levels: the upper level features the chapel, with its raised sanctuary and high altar, side altars recessed in twin apses, lofty vaulted ceilings, soaring arches and central dome; the lower level is the bi-level mausoleum containing 45 crypts. Reposing directly beneath the main altar is the body of Reverend Idziego Tarasiewicza, interred in 1903.”

Why just him? The authoritative answer seems to be, dunno. Go figure.

The Peshtigo Fire Museum & Fire Cemetery

You can drive from Sault Ste. Marie to metro Chicago in a day. It would be a long day, maybe eight or nine hours depending on traffic, construction, etc., but you can do it. I decided against such a long day, breaking the trip roughly in half by spending the last night of the drive around Lake Superior – which I was leaving far behind by this point – in Marinette, Wisconsin.

One reason: so I could enjoy a leisurely drive through the UP, including westward on Michigan 28 and then south on National Forest 13 through Hiawatha National Forest.

These are roads unlikely to make it on conventional best-drive lists, except for one that I might compile myself according to idiosyncratic lights, which might also include the Icefields Parkway, Lake Shore Drive, Alamo Heights Blvd., North Carolina 12 on Hatteras and Ocracoke islands, among others that come to mind. That the UP has two such favorite roads says something about the car-commercial driving to be had in the mostly forested UP.

Light enough traffic, at least on National Forest 13, that you can stand on the center line and take pictures at your leisure.

Another thing about NF 13: It took me to Pete’s Lake once upon a few times, and again on August 5, though I didn’t camp this time or experience a thunderstorm or yahoos yelling in the distance. It remains a sentimental favorite spot.National Forest 13

On the morning of August 6, I finally headed home, with one more stop in mind: Peshtigo, Wisconsin, a place that demonstrates, if nothing else, that the human mind is a creature of habit.

That includes me. I only mentioned the town in passing in 2006, when we stopped at the Peshtigo Fire Museum.Peshtigo Fire Museum Peshtigo Fire Museum

The building is a former Congregational church, on the site of a Catholic church that burned down in the firestorm of 1871 – which remains the deadliest wildfire in U.S. history, according to the National Fire Protection Association. Remarkably, the Maui wildfire is, for now, placed at fifth; modernity can’t protect us from everything.

“On the night of October 8, 1871, in Peshtigo, a lumber town about seven miles southwest of the Michigan-Wisconsin border, hundreds of people died: burned by fire, suffocating from smoke, or drowning or succumbing to hypothermia while trying to shelter in the Peshtigo River,” notes USA Today.

“But the fire also raged across Oconto and Marinette counties into Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, while another blaze burned across the bay of Green Bay in Brown, Door, and Kewaunee counties.”

No one knows exactly how many people perished in the Peshtigo fire — I’ve seen varying estimates, all in the low thousands — but it was certainly more than in the Great Chicago Fire, which happened the same day. Which one is mostly remembered? Chicago, of course, thus illustrating a habit of mind. Once a thing enters the tapestry of the popular imagination, it can crowd out similar events.

Peshtigo isn’t a large museum, but it is full of stuff.Peshtigo Fire Museum

The museum includes much information and a few artifacts from the fire, though naturally not much survived. The fire itself is illustrated not by photography, but artwork.Peshtigo Fire Museum

Two volunteer docents were on hand to spread the word about the fire. It’s the only distinction for modern Peshtigo, pop. 3,400 or so. One was a woman about my age, the other a woman about Ann’s age. Again, good to see young’ins up on their local history.

Speaking of that, the museum is actually more local history than the single incident of the fire, as important as that is. As such, there are many artifacts from the entire spectrum of the town’s history (including in the basement).Peshtigo Fire Museum Peshtigo Fire Museum Peshtigo Fire Museum Peshtigo Fire Museum

Next to the museum is the Peshtigo Fire Cemetery.Peshtigo Fire Cemetery Peshtigo Fire Cemetery Peshtigo Fire Cemetery

Including survivors of the fire.Peshtigo Fire Cemetery

Along with many who did not.Peshtigo Fire Cemetery Peshtigo Fire Cemetery

Too grim a note to end on. Not far south of Peshtigo is a roadside plaque I’d seen before, but not photographed.45th parallel Wisconsin 45th parallel Wisconsin

“The most obsessive of all of 45th Parallel markers are the plaque-on-rocks sponsored by Frank E. Noyes,” says Roadside America. “We know that he sponsored them because he put his name on every one.

“Frank was 82 years old, a faithful Episcopalian and 32nd degree Mason, and president, general manager, and editor of The Daily Eagle, a Wisconsin newspaper founded by his dad. For reasons lost to time, he became fixated on the intangible world of latitude in 1938 and put up plaques around his home town of Marinette to mark the halfway line.”

There are other such signs, of course, not of Frank Noyes origin, such as at the Montana-Wyoming border, as seen in 2005.

Except for bathroom and gas breaks, the Wisconsin 45th parallel proved to be the last stop of the nearly 2,000 miles around the lake.