Return to the Past

We drove to the center of Kansas to the little community of Otis where Don and I began our teaching careers. We stopped at our house and visited with the man that lives there now. Except for having the porch rebuilt, it looks much the same as it did 33 years ago when we left there.
School was still in session so we just drove by. I regret that as we learned later, there are people working there that we knew. However, it was Don's building and his call.
In the afternoon, we visited a couple that taught with us from 1972-77. We had a wonderful time catching up. As they live in the area, they know so many of our former students and filled us with success stories. After having dinner with them we drove on to a motel.
Today we went to a museum then drove south of the freeway to Monument Rocks which is a rock formation that sits on the flat prairie. It was formed when this was ocean. About 8 miles of the road was dirt so the car is filthy. Found a quilt shop where we had lunch.
Tonight we are in Golden, Colorado where we had dinner with our niece, Mercedes, and her boyfriend, Kellen. Dinner was very good and adding to the fun was the closed off street for the young trick or treaters.
We have about 1250 miles to go until we are home. The Rocky Mountains were a welcome site as we approached Denver this afternoon.

Moving West

As we left Cumberland, WVA we drove through the mountains and one road proved to be quite the switchback laden road. When I saw the sign that I posted for the third time, a picture had to be taken!
We spent Monday night with Don's cousin, Rob, and his wife Theresa just out of Columbus, OH. Rob's sister lives near there so we got to visit her also. It is always good to catch up with family.
Our next stop was in Cincinnati where Don's Hoffmann grandparents used to live. We wanted a picture of their house and found it without any trouble thanks to Garmin. Took the necessary pictures and we are sitting there figuring out how to get to the cemetery which was the next stop we heard sirens going off. We asked a person walking by what they were for and were told "tornado warning." Great. We turned on the radio, but of course don't know where any of the counties are that they are talking about. It is windy and quite warm. We decide to drive to the cemetery and see if we can find his grandparents and great grandparents. Although we have the lot numbers we quickly discover that we need more information.
We go to the office and while we are there, the heavens open. It is blowing like crazy and the rain is coming down monsoon fashion. We got all the information we needed from the very helpful staff and were able to wait out the worst of the rain. Armed with maps and directions we went looking in three different lots. We found all of the graves and photographed them.
Last night's stay was in Fishers, Indiana which is just north of Indianapolis with Kevin and Camille Talbot. It was nice to relax on their screened porch before home cooked food and Boise State football. Catching up with Camille and getting to know her family was great.
They gave us many options of things to do in Indianapolis, but we chose to get on the road. Today we used two tanks of gas and went through Illinois and Missouri and ended or day in Lawrence, KS. Our only stop really was in Effingham, IL for the requested Black and Blue--its a wine. It was a long, boring day.
Hoping for a little more fun tomorrow as we revisit Otis, Kansas where we lived and taught for 5 years. I was looking up former students in the white pages and they are 50-51--my how time closes that age difference gap!

The Last Two Days

The title will enable me to get up to date and it is in a sense the last two days. We are far from home, but tomorrow we begin the journey back to Lake Stevens and because we are visiting along the way, it is somewhat scheduled. It has been a great adventure and we are glad that we chose to do this. At the same time, we are ready to return to our real lives.
Now to the adventures of the last two days. Yesterday we drove through the Shenandoah Valley then went to the top of the ridge and drove through the National Park. Great views--fall color was in many places gone. We stopped at Luray Caverns and had an amazing walk through the caves.
Today we drove north to Harper's Ferry. Harper's Ferry is at the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomoc Rivers. We knew about John Brown, but much more happened there. During the Civil War, it changed hands 7 times. It was hard to keep track of who was in charge. Meriwether Lewis built a boat and gathered all the supplies for the expedition in Harper's Ferry. When they were all assembled, they were transported to Pittsburg to the Ohio River. I always assumed that he assembled the supplies in St. Louis, but that was not the case.
A little further north is Antietam which we missed on the way south. We and a quite large group met with a ranger and we did a driving tour of the battle field. We looked like a funeral procession. We got a very good sense of the battle as it unfolded through the day in September, 1862. I felt like I was in an intense history class. Again the toll of human life is staggering. The photo is the Burnside bridge. Imagine 700 Union soldiers trying to get over the bridge with the Confederates at the top of the hill shooting at them. Several hours later, they did get across and drive the Conferates off of the knoll.
All three battlefields that we visited look pretty much like they did when the battles were fought. The park service has done extensive research to make them authentic down to the placement of the cannons. Speaking of cannons, we learned today that they had quite a long range.
If anyone reading this thinks they might like to visit Civil War history, we have quite a supply of literature to share. Next year marks 150 years since the beginning of the war and all the states involved are planning special events to honor this time in history.

Monticello

Monticello was the fifth president's home that we have visited. This place is amazing in its design and use of space. We toured the gardens. They maintain a 1000 foot garden space for vegetables. Instead of feeding the family and slaves, now the produce goes to the visitor's center restaurant and to the employees. The views from this mountaintop are beautiful. When Jefferson lived there, no big trees blocked the views as they do now. He used to take his spy glass out on the porch and watch them building the University of Virginia down in the valley. You can see the dome of UVA in the distance.
It is hard to tell from the photo, but coming off each end of the house are large open porches. They come out probably about 100 feet then turn and run straigt back for hundreds of feet. Under this "porch" was hidden the daily business of the house. The two sides are connected by this same underground passage under the house. There is a wash room, an ice house, the kitchen, stables for guest horses, and the all important beer cellar and wine cellar. The wine cellar had a dumb waiter to the dining room for wine delivery during a meal. We noticed that the kitchen was much more modern than Washington's was--a few years newer, but much of Jefferson's ideas came from his time in France.
He is buried on the grounds and his descendents continue to use the cemetery. Jefferson was deeply in debt when he died so the furnishings of the house and the slaves were sold to pay off his debts. Over time the house furnishings have come back. He did free the four Hemming children that are believed to be his. Many of his slaves were taught skills by the white workers that he had in the building process. When he left the presidency he spent the last 17 years of his life at Monticello, never leaving the state and rarely leaving the mountaintop.

Mount Vernon

We started at the Manasss Battlefield where there were two battles a year apart. They are more commonally known as Bull Run after the creek that is near by. Both battles were won by the Confederates. There was a civilian casualty in the first battle. An elderly woman was in her farm house and it basically got blown up. Her grave is on the battlefield.
Having seen the sites of enough carnage, we opted for Mount Vernon. It was a beautiful warm day and walking around the grounds and touring the buildings was a great way to spend the day. What a beautiful view of the Potomoc from the veranda. The tomb containing President and Mrs. Washington and about 20 relatives is on the ground. Interesting in front of the tomb are two monuments to his relatives that inherited and lived at Mount Vernon. Don noticed that the one for John Augustine Washington and the initials, CSA. Need to do some research, but on the surface it looks like he was on the confederate side. He also didn't earn any points with us when we read that the Ladies Association(like historical society) bought the plantation in 1860 and the pillars in the front of the house were being supported by boat masts. He let them start repairs before he moved out. So much for him preserving the legacy.
We stopped at the gristmill and distillary that he had built, providing two new revenue means. They could roll the barrels of flour and whiskey out the back, put them on rafts and float them to the Potomoc and from there ship all over the world.
I wanted to buy a little bag of flour, but it needs to be refrigerated so that was out. Washington was a forward thinker when it came to agriculture and using the land.
The internet last night was not the best, not letting me post.

Gettsburg

We chose to do the auto tour for the Gettysburg battlefield. We bought the CD's at the museum store and set off on the 24 mile drive around and through the 3400 acre battlefield. The landscape is pretty much like it was in 1863 when the Confederates and Union soldiers fought for three days in July. Lining most all of the 24 miles are monuments that have been erected in honor of a certain brigade or a certain regiment from a particular state. I found myself several times looking out across the battlefield and seeing in the distance rows of these monuments. Couldn't get a picture to capture it though. As the narrator tells the story of the battle you can envision soldiers coming out of the tree line. Each day the battle moved across the valley. It wasn't until the third day that the Union gained the upper hand. There are 400 and some cannons on the battlefield many of them in the position that they would have been during the actual fighting. What I can't envision or comprehend are the thousands that died there; in some places completely covering the ground. The tour ends at the National Cemetery with the rows and rows of markers and in one area just square markers with numbers of those unknown. There is a monument to all the soldiers in the spot where Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address.

Today we went to the Hall of Presidents. There are wax models of each president and they give a brief history of what happened during their time in office. Another part of this museum is 1/3 size models of the first ladies and inagural gowns. What I learned that there were quite a number of presidents who had daughters or other relatives serve as First Lady. Some had ill wives or their wives died while they were in office.
The last tour we took was to Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower's home which is next to the battlefield. It is a working farm and you can walk the grounds and the rooms of the house. It was the only home they ever owned. His military career took them all over and they lived in 37 different houses during their marriage!
Tonight we are in Manassas and will tour that battleground tomorrow.

Amish Country and Chocolate

Yesterday we drove through a pretty part of Pennsylvania. The landscape is dotted with farms covering the valleys and hills. We stopped in Intercourse, PA which is an Amish community to shop and admire their crafts. Earlier in the day we visited a huge antique mall and did find a bowl and pitcher that I have been looking for.
Hershey, PA was next on our list. The light poles in the town have Hershey Kisses on the top, alternating between chocolate and silver wrapped--cleaver. We took the tour complete with singing cows and of course had to purchase some of their product!
Things will be more serious tomorrow as we hit the Civil War trail. The building is the capitol in Harrisburg, PA

Philly

South of Newburgh we stopped to see Washington's Headquarters along the Hudson during 1782-1783. We tried in vain to find the encampment, but neither us or Garmin could find it. The photo is of Washington's headquarters. Apparently he had stayed there with the people that owned the house prior to the war. The husband had died and the wife moved out so he could use the house then moved back in. One thing the video said that we don't think much about in the west is how everyone's lives were disrupted during the war. The boat traffic was mainly transporting of soldiers and it was so nice to get back to the business of living and doing normal activities.
Saturday night we stayed in Stroudsburg, PA after a stop at the visitors center to load up on maps and brochures. We spent a good portion of the evening planning our tour of southern PA.
Yesterday we headed for Philly. As it was Sunday, we drove all the way to parking by the visitors center. We had signed up for a trolley tour so we did that. Lunch was at the Hard Rock Cafe which was our first experience in one of their cafes. There was Jimi Hendrix memorbilia on the wall next to our table. Across from our table was a picture of Paul Revere and the Raiders and a tri-fold black hat that they wore. This was donated by Mark It is sobering to read about all of the bodies buried there which is just across the street from Independence Hall. We toured the Hall which our guide calls the Statehouse which was its original intent. No pictures of the exterior as it is wrapped in scaffolding. Next up was a stop at the liberty bell.
Philly does not do history as well as Boston. I recommend that anyone coming to visit skip the trolley tour as it goes places that you really don't need to see if you are there to do history. They would do much better to have a tour that went to William Penn's home and the crossing of the Delaware and to Valley Forge. They have added to the Liberty Bell building. It is on the site of the house where President Washington lived when the capital was in Philly. There is a little sign on a post that says this used to be the smoke house site. A part of history has been lost.
Today we are starting on a trail that will involve Amish country, Hershey's chocolate, antiques and the PA civil war trail.

Connecticut

We just drove through the northern part of Rhode Island--took about 45 minutes! The last two days we stayed in Bristol, CT. The picture is that of Mark Twains home in Hartford, CT. This is where he wrote Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn in this house. I always imagined him sitting on a porch overlooking the Mississippi River as he wrote--he was overlooking the Park River. Harriet Beecher Stowes home is right next door.
The big rain was coming in last night so yesterday we did a color loop into the northwestern part of the state. We found waterfalls, a covered bridge and beautiful color. We spent quite a bit of time at the Ag-machine museum which is about 11 buildings filled with tools, old tractors, steam engines, a mining history/artifact display. It was quite impressive.
The rains came as promised and today it got windier as the day progressed. We went to the Carousel museum in Bristol this morning learning about carousels which it seems were everywhere in this part of the country. They also had a two room fire history museum. This guy had these two rooms of stuff in his basement--hats, lanterns, hoses, clothing, pumpers--it goes on and on.
We headed out of town for Waterbury and antiquing. We found lunch then followed the garmin into what was to be shop after shop. We became suspicious when the houses were run down and there were young guys sorta hanging out. Further looking, and Ann had mistaken Woodbury for Waterbury! Woodbury didn't yield anything useful either.
Tonight we are in Newburgh, NY which is along the Hudson River.

We drove a little south of Boston to Quincy/Braintree to visit John and Abigail Adams's home as well as John Quincey. If ever you come to Boston you can take the red line to the Quincy station and that is very close to the visitors center.
If one wants to go into the homes you must take a tour. They belong to the National Park Service. The tickets are $5 and a trolley takes you to the two sites. From reading history and from pictures that you see, the Braintree homes are in the country. In their day they were surrounded by their farm land. Now the city surrounds them. They are in the same place as they have always been and some of the structure is original, but of course work has had to be done to maintain them. The houses were close together to share a well and for protection. When you see a photo of these two houses ( which I don't have) John was born in the house on the right and John Quincy the house on the left. The picture that I posted is the birthplace of John.
When John and Abigail returned from Europe a in 1784 they had been living in large homes and couldn't quite see themselves in the little birth homes so they bought a larger home which he named Peace Fields which is where they lived the rest of their lives as did the next 3 generations. The house is larger now than when they moved in. They added an addition then years later their grandson added yet another. The house is furnished with things from all three generations. When John was president, the president bought the furnishings for the White House so some of that is in this house. Victorian chairs that they had in France are in the parlor. Some of the dishes that they used in the White House are in the china cabinet. It is a beautiful home, rich in history. John Quincy wanted to have a library built to house his father's books as well as his own. When his son married into money, he built a separate stone library. It is like the old libraries that you see with the ladder to the second story of books. It used to be the presidental library, but now all of the presidental papers and letters and John's books are in the Boston Library special collection area.
One stop that isn't on the tour is the churh where the two presidents and their first ladies are buried. It's next to the visitors center. The church is made of stone quarried from the Adams farm and John Q. oversaw its building. There is a crypt in the basement.
A little south of Quincy at Bridgewater was our next stop this time trying to learn more of Don's history. We went to the city clerk's office and she had a book that directed us to the proper cemetery. Armed with a map we found the cemetery and with a little looking found the grave markers of two more older generations of the Hoffmann/Lewis family. We were surprised to find anything because when you get back into the 1700's so many of the cemeteries are abandoned.
Today we tour Rhode Island--it is a bitty place

Boston

I have neglected my postings. Often when we get back from dinner, I'm to tired to write, post pictures, etc. Need to catch up or will forget what we have done. The last I left you, we were going to make a color loop in western Mass. It was a nice drive, but many of the trees had already lost their leaves. The next day we made another loop on our way to the Boston area. It was much better and we stopped two different times in parks to take a walk and enjoy the scenery.
We have stayed outside of Boston the last three nights. On Sunday, we went into Boston on the train and met Keith Thomas ( one of Alan's classmates)The three of us walked the Freedom Trail. This trail is a red line beginning at the Boston Commons, wandering through the older part of Boston connecting the major buildings of the early colonists and Revolutionary War. The photo is the Old North Church where William Dawes and another guy climbed the 14 story steeple to hold out to lamps to show Paul Revere and his messengers that the British were coming. It ends across the Charles River at the Bunker Hill monument and finally at the USS Constitution. My legs had gotten jelly like by the time we got to the old ship so I sat while the guys toured the boat. So much of our beginning history is in this city. Great day and a great tour guide!
Yesterday we went to Lexington and Concord. We started in Lexington at Buckman Tavern. We learned about the life of tavern owners as well as the history of the beginnings of the Revolution. This is where troops gathered waiting for the British to come. It is right across the street from the Green where the troops met for the first time. Shots were fired, not by command but by accident. Eight men died and they are buried on the Green.
The road between Lexington and Concord is called Battle Road and they have a trail that you can walk that has stops where important things happened. Don walked part of the trail and I picked him up at the Hartwell Tavern. The fighting along this trail took place as the troops were coming back from Concord on the way back to Boston.
In Concord, we went to the North Bridge where the "shot heard round the world" was fired that marked the beginning of the Revolution. Listening to people it sounds like the re-enact the start of the war every April 19th. Very close to the bridge is the house that Ralph Waldo Emerson's grandfather built and Emerson and Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote here. Whoever was living there at the time watched the fighting from their windows.
Took in a lot of history in the last couple of days. Learned so many details and will have to figure out a way to share them.

Thursday was to be devoted to genealogy work. We started by going to city hall which by the way was built in 1885 and has a 5 story clock tower. It is red brick and has a couple of spires also. We found a woman in the planning office that drew us maps of where the many cemeteries are located. She gave us a name of the caretaker at the Aspen Grove cemetery which proved to be the best advice of the day. We found him working, but he went to the office with us. It was soon determined that none of the relatives were in that cemetery, but he had a file of index cards for the Ware Center cemetery. I would give him a last name and he would pull out the cards and let me find the ones that I was looking for. Armed with the lot and section numbers we drove the few miles to the Ware Center meeting house and cemetery. The Hoffmann relatives that probably helped build the structure and surely attended many meetings there. It was closed, but it would have been nice to sit and ponder that further.
We walked the short distance to the cemetery and begin looking. We found the Lewis lots first. Milton and Maria Lewis, Don’s great-great grandparents. Next to them are Milton’s parents, Abner and Eunice Lewis. Next was Maria’s parents Thomas and Susanna Snell.
David Grey and his wife Harriet Converse were the fourth graves that we found. I was particularly glad to find this one as there as been some confusion as to what Harriet’s last name was. Their daughter Sarah married Milton and Maria’s son William E. William and Sarah would be Don’s great grandparents. Later in the day, I began to wonder if Harriet Converse’s parents are also there. If time permits and we can find the caretaker, we might solve that mystery. We are very grateful to my friend Maggie for suggesting taking chalk to go over the engravings. Without it we would never have been able to read the stones. Jason and Ryan we are going to have a big box of chalk for you when we get home.
Feel very good about today. Tomorrow we are going to make a big color loop. The word out there is because of the lack of moisture this is not shaping up to be a Wow kind of color year and that is certainly what we have found also.

Maine Coast

The last two days we have been exploring the Maine Coast. I was going to post and do pictures two night agos, but sleep got in the way. I curled up under a quilt to watch the football game and woke up at the beginning of the 3rd quarter! Too bad that happened because tonight I don’t have a connection that is worth anything so am typing in Word.
We drove from Bangor ( pronounced Bang gor) to Bar Harbor. It is a nice little harbor town, but the cruise ship was in so the streets were crammed. We continued on our way doing a loop around the island then over to Belfast for the evening. There are outer islands in this area so there isn’t wave action along the shore. Felt quite pampered last night with an ocean facing room.
On Tuesday we drove further down the southern coast of Maine. We saw a couple of abandoned forts. One was Fort Bass Harbor which termed the War of 1812 that unpleasantness between the Americans and the British. The other was by something head Lighthouse just south of Portland. Hear the coast is rocky and the waves are crashing just like our image of the Maine coast was. Also in Portland, we visited Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s boyhood home which now is in the downtown area.
We found a couple of quilt shops today . In Rockland we had a picnic of lobster rolls and wine at their waterfront park. We wandered into an antique store. Decided if I hope to find a pitcher and bowl I had better start looking. They didn’t have one, but we found a beautiful silver tray big enough for the tea service for $38.00! Has to be the find of the trip.
Rochester, New Hampshire is our stop tonight. We are going to Ware, Mass. tomorrow for 3 days. Leafing and genealogy are on the agenda. I am posting this from Amesbury, Mass in their library. It is a two story old building, very charming.

Mt. Washington and beyond

Under blue skies, we drove north to the White Mountains. You must pay to drive up Mt. Washington, but we thought it would be fun as well as scenic. We picked up the CD and were told we could only go half way. When we got that far, they opened the road to the top so we were the first car up on Saturday. It was 25 degrees on the top and the wind was screaming. It was very hard to walk to the visitors center. From there you can see a white horizontal sliver that is the Atlantic Ocean 100 miles away. It is a narrow winding road, privately maintained and in much the same place as it was when it was made in 1865.
We have found that different terms are used for certain things. For example they use the term "notch" when we would say "pass" as in a mountain pass. A rotary is a roundabout. Everywhere the last few days are signs warning of moose. One such sign had flashing ember lights because it was a high incident area. We have not seen any moose on the road or otherwise.
The photo is of a lake in Northern Maine.
Tonight we had dinner with my god-daughter who attends the University of Maine. It was a pleasure to visit with this confident young woman.

Vermont

We stayed in Burlington, Vermont for three nights partly because of the weather and partly because there is much to do in the area. The first day we drove north making a big loop up to Newport, down to Stowe and back to Burlington. While the skies were gray, we noticed that the amount of color had increased. The northern part of Vermont is very rural with farms nestled next to the hills. The grass they use in their pastures is very green, looks like our lawns in the spring. It makes a nice contrast with the fall foliage.
We spent some time in Stowe going in and out of shops and checking out some of the architecture. From there we stopped in Waterbury at the Ben and Jerry Factory. We skipped the tour and headed for the ice cream. Just down the road from there is the Old Cider Mill featuring fresh pressed cider and cider doughnuts and of course the Vermont syrup and maple products. Got our Vermont fix.
The 29th was heavy rain caused by the tropical storm coming up from the south. We drove a short loop out on to the islands in Lake Champlain. In the afternoon we went to the Shelburne Museum which as 37 buildings housing a variety of exhibits. Some of the houses are period homes and are restored to the era they represent. Others have different exhibits. You can admire the uniqueness of the building while viewing the display. Ansel Adams photography was on exhibit. In the round barn was a quilt display done by quilters who had a family member that had Alzheimer’s. The fracturedness of the designs sends a powerful message. The steamboat, Ticonderoga is there—what a fancy boat it was in its day. After the fact, we met a guy at breakfast that used to ride the Ti as it is called, when it was on Lake Champlain. One other exhibit that was so amazing was carvings of a circus parade. It is all done to scale even to the length. Most parades were two miles long and this display is 524 feet and so is the building. There was another circus scene that was all carved by one man over the course of 40 years. It is a three ring circus scene complete with a full audience—thousands of pieces.
Friday we started by finding a knit shop and a fabric shop then drove to Montpelier which is the capital of Vermont. We stopped at the capitol building and got in on the last tour. They were sending nonessential people home because of the threat of flooding. We had an excellent tour of this amazing building built in 1837. It had to be rebuilt because of fire, but much of the furnishings are from the original. It is a beautiful building, all marble and granite. It has many paintings including the only copy of the Standing George Washington. The original is in the White House. You may remember that Dolly Madison rescued that painting when Washington was burning. When the statehouse was burning, men went in and rescued the copy also.
In Bath, New Hampshire we stopped at the oldest general store in the country. They make some cheese and pepperoni, smoking some in their smoker outside. Right behind the store is a covered bridge. Because of the high water there was a news team there doing a live segment.
Tonight we are in the White Mountains and just got back from a two hour dinner at the 1785 Farmhouse. It was good, but they seem to think that dining should be an event—us not so much.