Indiana - Days 27-30 - in camp

Middlebury KOA
Thursday, 27 through Sunday, 30 June 2019

By the time I got here I was already 10 days behind in my blog posts, and I also wanted to get things pulled together to be able to leave for Michigan.  So I figured I'd go sightseeing if I could but my top priority would have to be getting those things taken care of.  As it happens, it's taken these entire 4 days to do that.  Which tells me I'll need to develop a better system for staying caught up with everything.  Later.

Thursday the 27th
I'm still having a lot of trouble sleeping, what with the pains in my jaw and upper arms and so forth, so I woke up this morning - actually last night - at 11:30 and tried to go back to sleep until it was clear my mind was too awake and my body was too uncomfortable to stay in bed any longer.  So I was actually up at midnight, which turned out to be a good thing because at 12:30 a serious storm moved through, with plenty of thunder and lightning that scared both dogs.  So since I was up I could at least try to reassure them; they both crawled in under the table and lay on my feet.

Luckily, the storm moved on and was gone by the time of our first walk.  In fact, we ended up with a lot of hot sun today.

To try to avoid the ant problem that I seem to be just now overcoming (the Raid traps seem to be working - I see far fewer ants in the cabin now), yesterday I went to some lengths to keep my hoses off the ground.  Actually I might not have thought of it, but when I was first hooking up I saw several ant beds the hoses would have gone very close to and just didn't want to risk it.  After all the rain overnight, I'm really glad I did.

The campground should have been much more empty last night, since Wednesdays are always the slowest day of the week at any campground I've seen during this whole trip.  Instead, it was about 2/3 full.  A lot of them left during the day, but even more came in so tonight there aren't many vacant spaces.  But I guess that's to be expected on a Thursday.  Especially a Thursday in June.

I've mentioned before how long it stays light after I go to bed, and today I finally looked it up.  Today's sunrise here is 6:12 and sunset is 9:23.  Contrast with Austin where sunrise is 6:31 and sunset is 8:36.  A full hour difference, and most of it on the bedtime end.  And of course it doesn't get dark when the sun goes down - the farther north we go, the longer daylight lingers.

I turn out the light around 7:30, and then cover up my eyes to try to block out the sunlight pouring in from the skylights and through the window shades; when I'm lucky I get to sleep around 8:00.  Once I tried staying up till about 9:00, but I still woke up very early in the morning so I was just out more sleep than doing it this other way.  But you can see why I'm glad solstice has passed.

Friday the 28th
I took the dogs out around 4:00 this morning while it was still dark and for the first time we met someone out as early as we were.  It was a couple and their dog who had all gotten up early for a bathroom break, and when they were coming out of the lighted bathroom area they suddenly met us and probably couldn't really see us because of not having night vision back yet - we were all surprised, and my dogs started jumping around as usual, excited about the other dog, and Dexter was wearing the Gentle Leader, which pulls on his nose when he hauls on the leash, so the noise he made sounded a lot like a snarl, which really scared the couple (couldn't tell about the dog), who stepped double-time down the road toward their camper, looking back to see if we were following and what kind of wild animal I had on a leash.  I'm sure they thought I took my dogs out that early because they couldn't be trusted in polite society.  (Actually, that's half right.)  It was all very exhilarating.

locust bark

locust flowers

I learned in Vermont to identify locust trees by their bark.  I don't
remember that we had them in Texas, though that's probably just because I didn't know what to look for.  But I've been seeing them often on this trip.

Now I'm starting to recognize the flowers, too.  And they're wonderful.  They've got a beautiful fragrance that makes walks really pleasant.  There's a sort of grove of these here at this campground, and I've really been enjoying them.

Today on a walk I saw a young Robin who seemed to be learning to fly.  He was hopping along the ground, which Robins do a lot, and he hopped up on the edge of a metal fire ring and looked out over the small valley ahead of him.  Meanwhile, an adult Robin was sitting in the tree above him, giving a constant stream of instructions until finally the young bird took off and flew away over the little valley.  Looked just like every other parent/teenager interaction to me.  But very sweet.

Someone has brought in a brand of camper I haven't seen before, called a Flagstaff E-Pro.  It's parked in a camping site but I never see a vehicle or a person around it so don't know what's up with it.  It's one of those ultra tiny ones that looks like it has room for a bed and not much else.

See what I mean about tiny?

Saturday the 29th
I was up by 2:30 this morning.  My jaw is feeling better, thanks to the heating pad and the soft diet, but I'm not used to dealing with the heating pad during the night so it wakes me up pretty often.  And when I'm awake I can feel the various other pains and just generally feel like I'm my age.  I'm ready to feel younger again.

Anyway, I figured since I was up I might as well do something constructive with the time, so after I walked the dogs once, I went off to the laundry room, having taken the precaution yesterday of getting some more quarters.  It's a good thing I went early because I ended up using 3 of the 5 machines, for my clothes, sheets, and the dogs' towels.  When I went back to the RV, the dogs said great! it's time for another walk, so like a sucker I took them out again.

By the time I got back to the laundry room, there was another couple saying they'd figured they'd be the first.  Good thing I went back when I did because they needed one of my washers.  I put stuff in the dryers and went back to the RV where Gracie tried to convince me it was time for yet another walk.  Instead I gave them some breakfast, which Gracie isn't nearly as interested in as walks, but Dexter and Lily are.  When I went back to check on the dryers, there was yet another person doing laundry, apparently also thinking he'd be the first.  By now it still wasn't 7:00.  So losing sleep has compensations.

I've figured out that this campground isn't one where most people come intending to spend a lot of time.  I've been staying so much in state and private campgrounds, where people often live long term, that I expected that here.  And many KOAs I've been in are like that, but not this one.  I'm not sure why - trees, grass, swimming pool, catch-and-release fishing, rec hall, pleasant staff, clean grounds, well-maintained.  But only a few came in yesterday and are staying until tomorrow.  Sadly, one of those few is a weird family group not far from me, who are in a regular-sized camper that has the outside completely covered in silvery, insulating-looking material.  No windows at all, except for the non-opening one in the door.  And it appears there are at least 2 adults and 4 kids in there, plus a large dog.  They spend a lot of their time at the pool, and then go to the rec hall immediately behind me and play lots of games and shoot baskets, and then go hang out at their campsite - and in all of those places they make a lot of exuberant noise, having a whale of a time, and every bit of it terrifies Gracie.

Since this morning, every walk we've taken has included Gracie trying desperately to go somewhere else, sometimes because of kids, but other times for no reason I can figure.  When she gets like this she has no idea where the somewhere else might be, she just wants to go there.  Over the 3+ years I've had her, I've learned that most of the time I need to just insist that she go with Dexter and me.  She doesn't want to give up her walk, she just wants it to not include noise from kids.  Or the sight of kids.  And in a campground, that's nearly impossible.  I wish I knew what I could do to help her become easier with reality, but I haven't been able to figure it out on my own, and we still have 3 more years of traveling before we can have long-term professional help.  Such a shame what that first family did to her.

I saw a Robin carrying nesting material.  I guess now that the first crop is fledging it's time to start on the second round.

Many campgrounds advertise "buddy sites," which I only started hearing about last summer, but among some folks they're very popular.  They're 2 campsites (I've seen 3 together in a few campgrounds) that can be configured so the campers can park with their doors facing each other, instead of facing away from each other as is usual to give people some semblance of privacy out-of-doors.  (Most RVs these days have access to all their utilities on the driver's side, and the cabin door on the passenger side, which means campground utility hookups need to be designed for this.)  The 2 campers that have pulled into the sites just opposite mine are clearly benefiting from this buddy system.  They arrived at almost the same time and got their equipment set up right away, and are now being very buddy-buddy, sitting outside visiting.  Hope they keep their congeniality down after dark.

Sunday the 30th
I was making toast for breakfast (butter softens it and I've got to put some fiber in my diet), when the smoke alarm went off.  This was entirely unreasonable because I had every window and every skylight and the door all completely open so there couldn't possibly have been more air circulation, and the toast wasn't even beginning to burn, it was just toasting, and that smoke alarm is loud enough to wake an entire house, let alone a 24' RV of beings who are already awake.  This is by no means the first time it's gone off, but it's the most unreasonable time.  And every single time it makes me jump and leaves me feeling jumpy - gets my adrenaline going way too much, which would be fine if it ever went off when there was an actual fire, but that certainly hasn't happened.  And it scares the critters as much as it does me, especially doing Gracie no good at all.

We've got a carbon monoxide alarm that's set in under the table.  Sometimes during the night Gracie will set it off by lying up against it till it thinks there's no air left so it goes off.  It isn't even in the same ball park of sound with the smoke alarm, yet it's woken me up every time.  And sometimes when I go to turn it off, Gracie hasn't even heard it.  But I just resent the idea that it's necessary to completely shake up the entire population of the RV just to alert us to the possibility of smoke.  And anyway, there's never been any smoke when it goes off so I can't imagine what on earth is triggering it.  It's just set way way too sensitive, in my view.

When we were out for one of our early walks I spotted a car with Alaska license plates, parked next to 2 small tents, one including a terrier-type dog (based on its bark).  I'd figured it for 2 single people but happened to see them leave later and it turned out to be a family - 2 adults, 2 young teenage kids.  Don't know how they fit in those tents.

Turns out the buddy-buddy group across the street are half of another group, and they all got together a little while ago and gathered around the picnic table in the unused site next door to mine, because the table's under a nice shade tree while their campsites are out in the full sun, which is getting quite warm.  Nice that they've got the chance to get together, and nice that so far they've been quiet about it.  I'm guessing they all farmed off their kids for the weekend, because they all look the age to have school-age kids at home.  Probably need to gird up their loins for the family-oriented Fourth of July festivities.

all 3 of them, zonked out in the air conditioning

This campground has quite a few nesting boxes for birds, which almost all seem to be patronized by House Sparrows.  I saw one young sparrow following its dad around, fluttering its wings looking helpless hoping to be fed, and the dad would fly away to some other perch and the young 'un would follow it and flap some more.  Very sweet.

Over the last four days, I've managed to write 10 blog entries, make an appointment for Monday the 1st to get Lily's claws clipped, make an appointment for Wednesday the 3rd to get Gracie a haircut and both dogs a bath, find a grocery store and a liquor store in Michigan (where once again the laws are different about where and when various alcoholic beverages can be purchased), and map out a route to take me from here to all those places on Monday.  I did the laundry, took a shower, cleaned the windows, shook out the dog beds and swept the floor, rearranged some of the stuff in the cabin, and just generally took some of the pressure off that I'd been feeling.

I've been noticing lately that I've been feeling a sense of despair about the state of the world, and it's been increasingly coloring my view of everything.  I finally decided to take the advice my Momma gave me when something similar happened when I was in high school: stop watching the news.  Actually, I'm rarely able to watch the news, but I listen to it every chance I can pick up a public radio station and when I turn on my computer.  But a few days ago I decided to keep the radio off - just not listen to it at all.  And to ignore almost all the news that shows up on my computer, and to stop reading whatever I've succumbed to as soon as I feel my blood pressure go up.  Sure enough, just a few days of this and I feel much more positive about things.  I plan to keep it up for a while.  Maybe until the next election, at least.  We'll see.

Indiana - Day 26 - South Bend and Elkhart

Middlebury KOA
Wednesday, 26 June 2019

Remember I'd mentioned Lily's brief love affair with Aunt Alice's gloves?  Well, it hadn't occurred to me there might be repercussions so it was quite a surprise to me when I was wearing them to coil up the power cord and wiped a bug off my face - and got a faceful of cat hair.  Of course Lily's shedding a lot, and the gloves must have acted as a magnet for her hair, to be released when they found another surface - my face.  I kept feeling it on my face for a while after that, but it gave me a laugh.

today's route

Since I came to Indiana I'd wanted to see South Bend, but ended up missing it when I was in this area earlier in the month.  So I figured I could at least drive through some of the town, maybe get to Notre Dame (as in University of), like that.  Mainly I wanted to see it because of a bit in the wonderful old movie The Philadelphia Story.  Fairly early in the movie, Katharine Hepburn asks Jimmy Stewart where he's from, and he says a little town in Indiana called South Bend.  And she says, "South Bend!  It sounds like dahn-cing."  So I wanted to see.

And I mapped a route that would take me through the main part of town, over to the campus, and then on to Elkhart.

I should say all the photos today have come off the internet.  I was never in a position to take pictures without going to a lot more trouble than I thought it was worth, what with the traffic and trying to keep my bearings and all.

The drive northwest
In these country areas where I've spent much of the month, I often come to what I've come to think of as an Indiana intersection: a 4-way stop with fields at each corner and flat land running to the clumps of trees in the middle of sections of fields.  Like in the beginning of Hoosiers, Gene Hackman stops at one of those intersections and he gets out of the car to try to see which way to go but doesn't see anything but flat fields.  (I do too spend time on things other than watching movies; these 2 just happen to relate to Indiana.)

The small town of Markle has a happy face on its water tower.

Considering all the agriculture in this state, I've been surprised to find so much industry too.  A lot of car plants, chemical plants, and agribusiness-related plants.

I got stopped at a RR crossing right at the beginning of a train that had a lot of tanker cars on it.  After staring vacantly for a bit, I started to notice that some of the cars said what was in them, and it wasn't always good.  Several said they contained ethylene oxide (inhalation hazard! they said), and several had 50% sodium hydroxide.  But there were also many cars of corn syrup.  Several flatbeds were piled high with car or truck chassises (what's the plural?).  I'm spending a lot of time on this trip seeing how goods move in America, thanks to the semis and the railroads.

I passed a farm with one of those yellow caution signs saying "Percheron Crossing."

I drove about 20 miles along Route 9 and learned it's called Highway of Vice Presidents.  This was too obscure for me so I looked it up and learned we've had 5 US vice presidents from Indiana and 3 of them came from towns along Route 9: Thomas Hendricks from Shelbyville, Thomas Marshall from Columbia City, and Dan Quale from Huntington.  So regarding the 2 you haven't heard of: Thomas Hendricks was VP under Grover Cleveland, and Thomas Marshall was VP under Woodrow Wilson.  Marshall was also the only sitting VP who was the target of an assassination attempt (which I find seriously weird).

Whitley County Courthouse

Marshall's hometown, Columbia City, has a gorgeous courthouse.  It was built 1888-1890 in that style so popular for government buildings then.  But I gotta say this style of building looks much grander and more imposing than today's uninspired square brick public buildings.  Of course, back then stone carving and masonry weren't becoming lost arts as they seem to be these days.  I vote we bring back some of our old traditions.

And clearly Columbia City was the place to be right now because one of the blocks alongside the courthouse was blocked off for rides for a carnival.  Looked like a lot of fun is happening this weekend.

Down the road I passed through the town of Warsaw, "Orthopedic Capital of the World."  A claim sufficiently startling enough that I looked it up and learned that DePuy Manufacturing, the company that made the first orthopedic device in the world, is located there, and that several competitive firms have also located there (probably a skilled labor pool).  That first orthopedic device, by the way, was a splint made of wire mesh and/or wood, which just shows what a long way orthopedics has come.  (Even the spelling has evolved since I first learned to spell it.)

Warsaw also says it's the City of Lakes (not an exclusive claim but reasonable: it's located amid 3 lakes).

South Bend
My carefully researched and written-out route through town was derailed almost immediately.  I knew I was supposed to drive up Rt. 31, which would become Business Rt. 31/Michigan St., which appeared to be a main artery through town to Notre Dame and would give me a look at some of it.  The trouble was that I'd had a hard time convincing the online programs to let me go this route, so I didn't trust all the details - such as, how many miles to go to where.  So when I saw a highway exit sign saying Bus. Rt. 31/Michigan St., I took it, even though it came sooner than I'd expected.

Even then I'd have been okay, but I was supposed to go straight off the highway to get on it, and instead I turned right, thinking that was it, which it wasn't I discovered when I saw a street sign.  So then my top priority was finding a place to stop, walk the dogs, have some lunch and regroup.  I found a church parking lot with a little parking offshoot from its main lot, and we settled in there.  The regrouping consisted of looking at an aerial photo of South Bend, finding the lot corner we were stopped in (so small I almost didn't find it), and figuring out how to get to Bus. Rt. 31 and where it'd take me if I started here instead of farther in town.  Since I wanted to see South Bend, I figured this road was just going to show me more of it than I'd intended, so that's where we went.

But by then I'd lost track of the careful mileage between points (Michigan St. is packed with rotaries, for instance, so it was hard to figure out which ones my directions mentioned).  I ended up passing streets that I recognized the names of without knowing whether to turn on them and what I'd find if I did.  But I'd seen during the regroup that Bus. Rt. 31 would take me right past a lake on the edge of Notre Dame's campus, so I thought maybe from there I could see the famous dome of the administration building, which was what I was aiming for.

Driving through South Bend I saw a big sign proclaiming The World's Largest Chocolate Store.  Turns out the South Bend Chocolate Co. isn't the only one to make that claim, but I hear they've got a really big place.  Some other time I'd really like to stop and visit.

I passed several public buildings that let me know South Bend's been around for a while.

North Pumping Station

Morris Performing Arts Center

The performing arts center, built in 1922, was first used as a vaudeville house.

The pumping station, built 1912, still pumps water for the city's water supply.

South Bend Civic Theater

It took a while to find the information, but I am now able to report that the civic theater building was built in 1918 to house the First Church of Christ, Scientist; known for its dome and resulting amazing interior, it's been the home of the civic theater since 2013.

Main Building, built 1879

Michigan St./Bus. Rt. 31 went just where I expected it to go, but I wasn't able to see Notre Dame's dome (shown at right).  Even if I hadn't been distracted by the traffic and the other things I was seeing, I still wasn't likely to see it because I drove by a lot of trees that were probably planted by that lake by campus which would likely have screened the view.  Today was a bright sunny day so I thought that dome might be gleaming brightly enough to be seen from a distance.  And maybe so, but not from my vantage point.

On that west side of campus I passed by St. Mary's College and Holy Cross College.  I saw a sign at an entrance to the campus saying the University of Notre Dame was founded by the Congregation of Holy Cross, all of which left me to feel that Catholics seem to play a large role in this town.

I passed multiple signs directing traffic to the appropriate parking lots for football games.  Those signs seem to be permanent and not put up just for the games, which won't start for several more months.  They have separate parking areas based on the kind of seats people have bought and whether they're driving RVs - I'm guessing they've made special provision for RV parking because people use them for tailgating now.  Used to, tailgating meant pick-up trucks and people's car trunks.  Hard to keep up with the times, sometimes.

Of course I saw a Rockne Dr.

Mishawaka
I'd never heard of this small town immediately next door to South Bend, but its buildings tell me it's old.  Actually, I looked it up and learned it's only 2 years younger than South Bend (1831 vs. 1833).  These are some of the buildings I saw there.

Mishawaka High School

Beiger Mansion

The Beiger Mansion was built 1903 for the Beiger family (clearly wealthy) and is now used as an inn and for weddings.

The high school has 2 wings that you can't see in this photo; they're the same size as the main building, which was built in 1924.

Mishawaka 1st Presbyterian Church

The church was built in 1888 and has a bell tower that can be seen from the outskirts of town (I noticed).  

All this for a town that has only 48,000 residents.

Actually, Mishawaka has another claim to fame, which is the New York Central Toys and Trains Shop.  I saw it as I passed by and really wanted to stop, but it was already nearly 2:00 and I was tired and wanted to get to the campground.  Maybe another time.

Elkhart
Elkhart is another town I've wanted to see just because I've heard of it, though not from Katharine Hepburn.  I've known about it for many years as the center of the RV manufacturing world, including the one I bought.  I didn't know if I'd have a chance to go see any of its attractions before my month is up but did want to drive through town and get a view of it.

Once again the online routing programs didn't want to send me there, but I insisted and picked out a grocery store to go to.  So I did get a look at some of it but am not sure I'm much enlightened.  Actually, Elkhart seems to have 2 parts, as so many cities do: rich and poor.  At first I came through the old-and-tired part, where I saw lots of new building and renovations but also lots of decay, so it was hard to tell what's here.

Once I'd left the grocery store (where the clerk told me she loved living there, spent most of her life there except for a few years down in Florida) and kept driving east, I came upon the Elkhart River, which may be the town's divider (forget railroad tracks as a divider - there are too many of them).  Across the river, the road I was on continued to follow the river, which at first I thought was a lake.  But the lake kept going on and on, and then narrowed to river-size, which made me realize what I was actually seeing.  And all along it were beautiful houses and trees, all built before 1950 and many of that brown brick I see up here but not so much in Texas.  Really pretty area.

Later I saw something saying Elkhart's a happening kind of place, and I'm willing to believe it even though neither of the 2 views I had - of building and decay, and of riverfront wealth - seem to fit that description.

The final drive
I'd been making decent time on Rt. 120 - slowing for towns and up to 55 in rural areas - when suddenly all eastbound traffic began a stop-and-slow pattern that went on for miles and miles.  We'd move along slowly, then suddenly stop for no reason I could see.  This went on for a long time until finally I saw up ahead one of those signal cars that usually have a sign on them saying "follow me" for going through construction areas.  I couldn't read the sign and I couldn't see a construction area, and we kept on with the go-slow-and-stop-and-go-slow routine until then I noticed cars up ahead were pulling over to pass on the 2-lane road and I thought maybe the follow-me car had pulled over for folks to go around.  But that still wasn't it, I discovered when I got up there too.  The sign on the car said "wet paint - striper ahead."  It was warning us to avoid the paint the machine was putting on the road up ahead.  And what the stop-and-slow had been about was apparently people waiting until they could get to a place where they could pass both the signal car and the striper machine.  I found when it was my turn to pass that the striper machine was actually quite a way ahead of the signal car, which was making passing harder.  But if I were going to be in Indiana longer I'm sure I'd be glad to have the stripes painted clearly on the road.  It wasn't newly paved, it was just old enough that the striping had worn off.

I passed 2 houses with driveways guarded by stone statues.  One had one of those seated stone lions - but only one lion (don't know if they'd just wanted only one or if the other got broken - couldn't tell); the other house had 2 stone geese, one on either side of the driveway.  Actually, I'm not sure the geese aren't as much of a deterrent as a lion would be.  But I figure those folks have a sense of humor.

And so back to where I first started Indiana and back to the site I had before.  Felt comfortable after all those nights of moving around to a different place.

Indiana - Day 25 - Bluffton doctor

Bluffton KOA
Tuesday, 25 June 2019

I've finally had enough of the pain in my jaw that's been hanging around for at least 2 weeks now.  It keeps me awake at night and distracts me during the day and makes eating painful.  Yesterday afternoon I found an ENT doctor in Bluffton who could take me this afternoon, so I decided to stay here another night.

When it first started hurting, I thought I'd bitten my tongue.  Then I decided it must be one of my teeth.  But I never could track the pain down to either of these things so then thought it might be my jaw hinge.  Finally it occurred to me that what was right there at that hinge was my ear, so I decided I must have an ear infection.  Having never had one before, I couldn't be sure and it's not surprising that wasn't the first thing I thought of, but that was my uninformed diagnosis.

That wasn't the doctor's informed diagnosis, though.  She told me my ears looked just fine, my nose looked just fine, my blood pressure was high (nothing new) but my glands seemed just fine, so her conclusion based on where I said the pain was, was my jaw.  She called it TMJ, which meant nothing to me but turns out to stand for temporomandibular joint disorder.  She gave me a handout that said to stick to a soft diet for a while, use a heating pad several times a day, and "avoid excessive talk, long conversations or clenching teeth."

Which meant I had to stop talking to myself so much and try to notice when I was clenching my teeth.  Actually, I think this whole thing may have started with frustration or tension or stress - what with the dogs acting like idiots half the time, and ongoing pains in both my upper arms, and not getting enough time off to stay current with my blog, and the ANTS, it wouldn't be too odd for me to feel a little tense now and then. 

But I resolved to do what the doctor said and avoid foods that needed chewing for a few days and pull out my heating pad.

Back at the campground, the staff was as unaccommodating as they'd been yesterday and I decided to head back to the KOA I'd stayed in when I first got to Indiana.  I liked the campground and knew how I could be comfortable with the dogs there and knew it was only 2 miles from the Michigan border for when my month is up.  Being able to go and stay in one spot for several days in a row would give me some unbroken time to get things caught up, and maybe help with the jaw-relaxing instruction.  I called and they said they could fit me in and I could have the same site I'd had before, so that's where we'll go tomorrow.

Indiana - Day 24 - Berne and Ft. Wayne

Bluffton/South Ft. Wayne KOA
Monday, 24 June 2019

today's route

The drive north
I drove through the small town of Richmond - A Great All-American City, they say.

North of Lynn I came across another wind farm, with windmills spread out in many many of the farm fields in the area.

Passing through Randolph County, I saw an impressive building, labeled as the Randolph Co. Infirmary.  Of course I had to look it up.  Though there were previous incarnations of the Randolph County Poorhouse/Asylum/Infirmary, this particular building - the last - was built in 1899, and it was still being used until the poorhouse closed in 2008.

Randolph County Infirmary

The facility was originally opened in 1851 to house the mentally and physically disabled, single mothers, the elderly and orphans.  What you might call a mixed bag.  This official website is a little staccato and has some unintentionally funny parts, but it was more interesting than I expected.   www.hauntedrandolphcounty.com/history

North of Randolph I found another large wind farm.  I wonder how much of the electricity these farms generate is used in-state and how much is exported to other states.

Appearances can be deceiving: I passed through Portland and wondered what its economic base is, because it seems to be a prosperous small town with a past.  When I looked it up I learned its unemployment rate is slightly below the national average, but both its present and projected job growth are also below the national average, and every measure of income is substantially below the national average (e.g. average household income is $35,919 in Portland, $57,652 nationally).  It sounds like they have challenges ahead.

The price of gasoline I've seen over the last few days is usually in the $2.80/gal. range, but in Portland it's around $2.41, and a Circle K had it down to $2.35.  I would have thought it'd be lower in the larger cities and higher in the small rural areas, but apparently not.

We passed the town of Geneva, where there's a Red Gold tomato plant (they're hiring).  You know the logo.

Geneva calls itself the Land of the Limberlost, which is incomprehensible to a visitor like me but apparently refers to the nearby Limberlost State Historic Site.

Limberlost was once 13,000 acres of swamp and wetlands, a significant habitat for migrating birds and insects as well as multiple species of local plants and animals.  But from 1888 until 1910 a steam-powered dredge worked to drain the area, and for the next 80 years it was used as farmland.  In 1991, some of the locals started restoring the wetlands, and about 1,500 acres have been regained so far.

I'm seeing horse poop all along the road, which tells me I'm back in Amish country.  We passed a young colt with its mom in a pen near a house.  Farther down the road, Dexter pointed out another colt-and-mom pair in a field.  They're so cute.

Berne

the clock tower

As exhibit A for not taking an interstate, I offer the town of Berne, Indiana.  Berne (pronounced "burn") was founded by Menonites fleeing persecution in Switzerland.  The town centers around a block-sized park called Muensterberg Plaza, the main feature of which is its clock tower.  It was that tower that nearly brought me to a screeching halt and I real quick turned onto a side road to find a parking place.

close-up of clock

close-up of bell above clock

settlers monument

inscription re: settlers

info re: canton tree

Canton Tree

Across the street from the plaza is Berne's First Mennonite Church, in a much more magnificent building than I would ever have connected with Mennonites.

I learned the pronunciation of Berne and other information from a nice woman who was sitting in the plaza with some friends, minding her own business until I accosted her.  She told me that Berne is "very Swiss, very very Swiss."  I'm not quite sure what that means, but she sure is.  And her friends very kindly patted my dogs while we talked.

I'm so glad I took this route to Ft. Wayne.


Ft. Wayne
This town sits where St. Mary's River and St. Joseph River meet to form the Maumee River, which eventually runs through Toledo and dumps into Lake Erie.  That's a lot of rivers and, in 1913, the town nearly got flooded out.  With the kind of rain they've been having this year, and as full as the rivers are that I've seen, I'm wondering if they're at risk again.

Given the location, it's not a surprise that centuries ago, this was the site of the capital of the Miami Nation.  In 1680 a trading post was established here.  In 1794, after the area was traded back and forth between the French, the British, the Natives, and the Americans, the Americans finally grabbed it and built a fort (I think the 4th fort on this site) and named it after Gen. (Mad Anthony) Wayne, who had most recently made a grab for the land.  The town itself was platted in 1824.

It seems to be a mix of old and new.

Firefighters Museum

Grand Wayne (convention) Center

I saw a 3-story Queen Anne style house that was painted entirely purple.  I passed
an old house that had carving all around it with rounded lines that accidentally looked like it spelled MOM over and over.  Something like this:   MOMOMOMO

Ft. Wayne is the home of the world baseball academy.

Gas here is higher than in the rural areas, though still lower than in the Ohio R. Valley: $2.59/gallon.

I was waiting to turn right when I realized what was going by was a funeral procession.  There were no police escorts and none of the other traffic seemed to notice.  So different than funeral processions I'm used to in the South.

We stopped at a PetsMart (I was out of poop bags!).  We stopped at a Chase Bank (I was out of gasoline money!).  And we stopped at a Kroger, where one of the main things I bought was a death-to-ants product.  I looked at the sprays, but the cans told me to hold the spray 12" away from the target, which is only 5" above the table, and they told me it might stain the surface, which I hated to do just for ants.

I ended up with something called Raid Max traps, that seemed like a commercial equivalent of the borax-and-powdered-sugar thing I found on the internet - where you set out little containers that the ants would come and eat from and take the poison back to the nest to (eventually) kill everybody.  We'll see.  I'm tired of those little things that I didn't invite in in the first place.

Somewhere in all these stops I took the dogs out for a walk, and I guess the stop was long enough for Lily to make herself comfortable.  I don't remember any of my other cats sleeping all stretched out like this.

South to Bluffton
Between Ft. Wayne and Bluffton (about 20 miles), I passed a plant labeled Mitsubishi Chemicals, Advance Materials; and a General Mills plant; and Walmart Plant #7390; and some others I couldn't tell the names for.  The economy must be healthy around there.

As I drove into the KOA, I passed the dog park and saw a black squirrel chasing birds around the pen.  A Red-headed Woodpecker flew right in front of the RV.  And those were the only really positive things about this campground.  Usually KOA staff go out of their way to be friendly and accommodating, but I guess these folks didn't get the memo, or were having a bad day, or something because they could hardly have been more perfunctory about taking my money.  Oh well.  It looks like a nice campground.

Indiana - Day 23 - Levi & Catharine Coffin House and Hoosier Hill

Grandpa's Farm Campground, Richmond
Sunday, 23 June 2019

The people at last night's campground (Westward HO!) pointed out 3 families of ducks in the pond behind the campground.  They said these are Wood Ducks, and they come back every year to nest here.  The ducks very sensibly stayed on the opposite side of the pond and, though I did the best I could editing these photos, they still aren't at all clear.  And these ducks don't look a whole lot like I expect Wood Ducks to look like, but I couldn't find anything else in the bird book that they resemble more.  If anybody has any ideas, let me know.

the little ones are chasing each other around

this is how far away they were

close-up of a family

today's route

Recycling
It's been ages since I found someplace to dump my recycling, so I made a detour for Indianapolis to one of the public recycling deposit spots.

Turns out the recycle bins I went to were so jam-packed that people had been leaving stuff sitting on the ground beside it.  Some really bright person decided that carpet was recyclable and stuffed huge long rolls of it in and around the bins.  Considering that, I wondered what else was in those bins.

There were signs taped to the bin doors saying the area was under video surveillance and people should go to another recycle location or they'd be prosecuted.  So either local folks can't read or they didn't believe the signs.  As it happened, the bins were right behind a store and I saw security cameras that may well have taken in the bins area.  But none of that stopped me.  What did stop me was when I first took a look at the mess and thinking that recycling didn't include creating more mess.  It was when I parked to look up another location that I saw the signs and everything else.

But I was definitely in the minority.  While I was researching (and giving the dogs a short walk), many many others came by and almost all of them left their stuff.  I think only one other left without dumping.

There was another recycle location just a few miles away, so we went over there and some of those bins were nearly empty.

We pulled to the other side of the large parking lot (it was Sunday so nobody was patronizing the business nearby) and had some lunch and walked around a bit.  At this location just like the other one, many many people stopped by to dump their recycling.

We were in the south part of Indianapolis, so either the city isn't picking up recycling at people's homes or these people all lived in some other suburb.  Seems to me Indy's plenty big enough to have a better recycle program than bins around town.  But at least lots of folks were availing themselves of them.

Heading east
I saw a highway sign saying I-465, the ring road around Indy, has been designated the USS Indianapolis Memorial Highway.  I looked it up and learned that the USS Indianapolis was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine June 30, 1945 - near the end of the war.  Out of 1,199 crew, 316 survived, some found by an air crew 3 days later.  One of the survivors was present at the ribbon-cutting ceremony in 2011.

There was a lot of traffic on I-70 heading toward Ohio - did lots of Ohioans come to Indiana for the weekend?  As far as I know, there wasn't any big do happening in Indy.  There were lots and lots of semis too, so maybe people just thought it was a good day for driving.

I passed a sign telling me Wilbur Wright was born just down this road over here (near Millville).

The road surface got so rough I couldn't go any faster than 60, and the other traffic (that weren't carrying their houses with them) just whizzed on by me.

When we turned off the interstate and headed north into farming country, it was clear we were also heading into Amish country.  We ended up behind a horse and buggy, and that horse managed to do 10 mph uphill.  I know because I just couldn't bring myself to try to pass on a hill, and that particular hill kept cresting only to find another on the other side.  I was very impressed with that horse.

I passed a field that had some kind of lower-growing crop planted between rows of corn and wondered if the field were owned by Amish, and therefore didn't need to keep rows clear for machinery.

Levi and Catharine Coffin House
So if you don't remember this name, you'll wonder why I'm back at somebody's house when I've said so often I'm not interested.  But this house is different.  These are the folks who were so active in helping enslaved people escape to freedom on the Underground Railroad.  Their activities were general knowledge, and it was the bounty hunters who gave Levi the nickname "President of the Underground Railroad."  Levi was proud of that and bragged about it.  He owned the local dry goods store, half a block from their house.  In time, he also owned the local mill and a hog farm.

How they started
Levi (born 1798) and Catherine (born 1803) were both Quakers, originally from North Carolina.  They became sickened by slavery and, in 1826, moved north to Indiana.  There were many Quakers moving north for that reason, but most weren't active in trying to help.  For Quakers it was tricky: they absolutely believed slavery was prohibited by the Bible, but their religion also insisted they follow the laws of the government.  And at that time, it was against the law to assist the fugitives.  In fact, it had been federal law since 1793 that people were allowed to retrieve fugitives who had escaped to other states.  The Coffins looked at their religious teachings a little differently: there was no Bible text saying slavery was okay but there was definitely Bible text saying to love thy neighbor as thyself.

When they first arrived, they came with an entire North Carolina Quaker community, which brought with them 400 black people.  These folks had been enslaved and the Quakers brought them north to be free - but they weren't hiding them and they brought them legally: they'd acquired them gradually by a slave-owner's will or by an outright gift.  (I had a hard time with that sentence; I couldn't figure out how to explain the situation without using words for some people owning other people, which I can't stomach.)  Anyway, this community started out by bringing a bunch of folks to freedom.

The community
The town they lived in, now known as Fountain City, then called Newport, consisted primarily of 20-30 families of Quakers.  Few of them helped actively, but over time they all helped protect the Coffins in their activities.

For instance, when a bounty hunter would come to the Coffin house and try to search for fugitives, Levi would come out into the street and insist on a search warrant, while raising his voice to alert his neighbors, who would come out of their houses and act as witnesses - quite a deterrence to the bounty hunters.  This scrutiny mattered because the bounty hunters were allowed to kidnap with impunity.

Sometimes the neighbors would warn the Coffins that bounty hunters were in the area to give them time to make things look normal.

The women worked in sewing circles to make clothes for the fugitives who often showed up wearing only rags.  They would help to provide food to feed the extra folks coming through the Coffin home.  The local doctor would come to treat injuries.

The local folks paid a heavy price for this assistance, though.  The main Quaker church did whatever the Quaker version of being shunned is - they were kicked out of the main church for flouting the law.  Amazingly, this didn't deter the neighbors from continuing to assist the Coffins.

The house
Levi and Catharine expected to live in this house for the rest of their lives, so they designed it to suit their needs.  There were several unusual features about this house.  Almost every room has more than one way in/out (think about your own rooms and you'll see how unusual this is); it's easy to see why this feature might be handy if you're hiding people. 

door closed, bed moved: hidden room

this is the original brick floor

There's a hidden room upstairs, with a small door that was hidden by moving furniture in front of it.

The kitchen floor was covered with brick, unlike most kitchen floors of the time that were left as dirt. 

hidden up to floor line above

water table is unchanged

And, most important of all, there was a spring-fed pool inside the basement of the home, to allow them to get water for those staying in the house without going to the public water source, which would call attention to how much water they were using. 

This spring was found during renovation of the house; it had been hidden under feet of dirt and debris and was found only because local stories said it was there. 

sitting room

The master bedroom also has 2 closets, very unusual because closets were taxed at the time so were rare; but as far as I know the closets didn't play any role in the Coffins' activities.  There were 6 fireplaces in the house, and each needed to be cleaned and tended daily (imagine the work!).

The house still has its original ash floors; Frederick Douglass was one of those who visited the house and walked on these floors.

The house, shown below, has been painted its original red color - they would have painted the brick to keep it from wicking in the rain.

What the Coffins did

house is red; visitor center is white

The Coffin house sits directly on Route 27, a main road on the way from Kentucky to Canada.  They saw fugitives running up the road daily.  Those who were healthy enough to make the journey on their own didn't stop.  But at least once a week, people would knock on the door for help, usually in the middle of the night. 

These folks were almost always from Kentucky - they were rarely from farther south than Tennessee because few made it that far safely.  There were no bridges over the Ohio River before the Civil War, so freedom-seekers had to find someone to ferry them across, find a time and place of low water flow, or cross when it partly froze in the winter.

Catharine was usually the one who would get out of bed to let them in and help them.  She and Levi had each person choose a new name when they arrived so the Coffins would never know the prior names of those they helped.  They later estimated about 1,000 freedom-seekers came through their house.

shelf is where the fake bottom lay

On average, these folks would stay 2 days before being strong enough to move on.  Levi would hide them in a false bottom of his wagon and usually delivered them to a free black community farther north.  He never knew where they went from there.  Levi called it "the mysterious road."  He was often stopped by bounty hunters and would always insist on seeing a search warrant, which they never had.

Once bounty hunters had the roads covered when Levi was trying to get a man north.  Instead of his wagon, Levi got out the family carriage; they dressed the man in Catherine's clothes with one of those bonnets with a huge brim to hide the face; the man sat in the back of the carriage in the shadows and the bounty hunters assumed he was Catharine and let them pass.

The largest group of escapees to arrive at one time was 17 from Kentucky.  They nearly got caught by bounty hunters and the group scattered through the fields to hide.  After the bounty hunters left, they found each other again by whistling a prearranged song, and the whole group got back together again.

The courage and terror experienced by both parties to the escapes were remarkable.  There were 4,000,000 people enslaved at the time of the Emancipation Proclamation.  The Coffins estimated they'd helped 3,000 total during the 35 years they did this work - and they're widely known as the most prolific conductors on the Underground Railroad.  No one knows how many fugitives actually made it to freedom, but it's certain that most didn't.

Where the Coffins went from here

ad for Levi's free-labor goods

It occurred to Levi that if there was no market for slave-produced goods, then there would be no slavery.

In 1844, he began to buy and sell only free-labor goods, and went to Philadelphia, New York, and Canada to set up suppliers for his store.  Three years later, he was asked to run a warehouse in Cincinnati to distribute free-labor produced goods and, reluctantly, he agreed.  He and Catharine didn't want to leave their home and for years refused to sell it, thinking they'd return.  But they stayed in Ohio until they died and are buried there.

donated quilt dated 1834

Their house passed from one owner to another over the years.  Finally, in 1967, Sun Oil bought the property and decided this was a dandy spot for something or other, intending to tear down the house.  The local folks talked the State of Indiana into buying the house, and many contributed family pieces that dated from the Coffins' period, the Coffins having taking all their own things with them to Cincinnati.

A visitor center has been built next door with many exhibits about the Underground Railroad.

showing escape routes from slave states

Our tour group was so large and asked so many questions that the tour lasted longer than usual.  I'd been gone nearly 2 hours by the time I got back to the critters - glad I'd left some windows open for them because the day really got warm.

I took the dogs out for a walk around the neighborhood, and a couple of Amish boys drove by with a wagon and horse.  They were only about a half block away and both dogs just went crazy over the horse.  It took a while for them to settle down to keep walking.  I could see evidence of horses everywhere so there's clearly a strong Amish presence in the neighborhood.  Though I'm not sure how much "neighborhood" there is - farm fields begin immediately past the creek that runs along behind the Coffins' house.  I think the town must spread out in the area on the other side of the road.

Hoosier Hill
I was aiming for the farm field area, because the map told me Indiana's highest point was just a few miles from Fountain City.

Hoosier Hill (sort of)

I thought the sign was pointing at this "hill" so took this photo (saying the whole time, "you've got to be kidding").  Then I turned the corner and found another sign that pointed a little way further on.  Turns out there are clumps of trees like this in the center of farm fields all over this area, and they all look just like this.  The real Hoosier Hill, all 1,257' of it, must have been measured from sea level because it was indistinguishable from this one.  I also couldn't find a place to stop and take a picture of it from so decided that this would have to be illustrative.  The fact is, most of Indiana's pretty flat.

From there, my next campground in Richmond was about 20 minutes away, entirely on country roads.

Indiana - Day 22 - Clifty Falls and Columbus architecture

Westward HO! Campground, Gnaw Bone near Nashville (Ind.)
Saturday, 22 June 2019

I was getting us ready to leave this morning and would likely not have noticed the visitor to our campsite if Dexter hadn't pointed it out to me.

The photo on the left is clear but not a good angle.  The one on the right is a much better angle but fuzzy.  Take your pick.  I thought at the time that it was a turkey, though the tail didn't look right, but because the bird book mentions the iridescent body and white face, I'm guessing that's what it was.

It spent quite a bit of time foraging around our campsite, giving Dexter a lot of entertainment.  As we were driving out, we saw it again along the road and it obligingly flew across the road in front of us.  I understand they're very fast, but they seem so bulky it's hard to believe.

today's route

Clifty Falls
This state park was formed to protect the falls on Clifty Creek, which we visited when we left.  And we left early, because I'd seen in the state park information that there's an ADA-accessible trail to one of the falls viewing areas, and I wanted to take the dogs down there without worrying about other dogs.

It was drizzling when we left, and the clouds got even lower as we drove - for part of the drive it was so dark in the cab you'd have thought it was nighttime.  And despite the weather, someone came into the area right after us - but after a bit they drove away (I was relieved).  I waited, hoping the weather might lighten up, which it didn't, so I decided we'd just have to get wet to be sure of nobody else coming along.

Clifty Falls

ravine they flow into

info re: falls

If you look in the center of the photo on the left, you can see how far down the creek is - there are some rapids down there.

The falls drop farther than they may look from my inartful photo above, but I was afraid of slipping over the edge, and the dogs weren't helping my balance.  You can see from the sign that the falls were once much longer than they are now, they've been eroding the creek bed for so long they now have only a 60' drop.  But they're pretty.

There are 3 other falls in this park, the longest of which is 83' high, and there are numerous trails for closer viewing - I think one takes you directly under one of the falls.  Very pretty area and certainly popular.

On the road to Columbus
We got lucky - we missed being stuck in a downpour by less than 2 minutes.  We were wet enough from the drizzle, but at least not soaked.  Still, that's what we drove through for 45 miles.

Of course there was standing water in the fields we passed.

Jennings County Courthouse

I saw a pretty scene where a field of yellowish winter wheat stood next to a field of green corn plants.  The colors stood out in the grey of the rain.

We passed through the small town of Vernon and were impressed with the large county courthouse they have.


Columbus
I'd heard about the unusually high standard of architecture design and public art while I was still in Austin.  Then I found a transcript of a report Susan Stamberg did for NPR that explains how it came to be, and of course she does a better job than I could.   www.npr.org/columbus-ind-a-midwestern-mecca-of-architecture 

I went there because I'd heard that they had buildings designed by Eliel and Eero Saarinen and I.M. Pei (all beloved of crossword puzzle writers) and public sculpture by Henry Moore.  And they do have all that, and I saw it, though the rain made my view not so good.  But here are some of my photos and you can see.  Many of these buildings look old hat these days - to me, at least - but the point is they were designed a long time ago - some of them 50 years or more, and architects of today have caught on to the look.

I.M. Pei public library & Henry Moore sculpture

North Christian Church by Eero Saarinen

bell tower/1st Christian Church by Eliel Saarinen

You see how muted these photos are by the rain, and of course I couldn't always get good angles on them.  For much better photos and more information, this website is really good.   https://columbus.in.us/guide-to-the-architecture/

I took some other photos:

St. Peter's Lutheran Church

Breeden Realtors Office Bldg. on R, public parking garage on L

I couldn't take my own photos but I was really impressed by these public buildings:

Bart. County Jail (roof enclosure for inmate exercise)

Bartholomew County Courthouse

On my way into town we came to this bridge, which I don't see on that website above, but it must be part of the program.

bridge through the rain

detail of the bridge

We stopped for a stretch break at Mill Race Park in town that had a different form of the public art.  This color is now known as Columbus Red, by the way.

a picnic pavilion

this is a restroom

those are benches under the arbor

another picnic pavilion

These look so practical, and apparently are, even in Midwest weather.  So why are public facilities in most other places built of wood and built without aesthetics?  These may (or may not) cost more to build, but I'll bet they don't cost more to maintain.  Anyway, nice to know there are alternatives.

a piece of Nature's art - the overflowing Flatrock R. and a Great Blue Heron

And just opposite the entrance to the park was this piece of public art:

amazing, isn't she?

Cummins has an enormous presence in this town - their buildings are everywhere.

Coca-Cola has a bottling plant here.

Columbus seems to be a very pleasant and certainly attractive town.  I guess all it takes is vision and maybe some money.

From Columbus we had only a 10-mile drive to our next campground.