I will download my pics from the camera tomorrow (hopefully I'll stop a little earlier and not fall asleep watching the news and weather!) Will post some pics of today's travel tomorrow.
Tonite was to have been in Miami OK but the best plans often
go awry. Tonite is in Bexter Springs
KS.
Started the day out leaving Muskogee, fueling up for $2.05
per gallon – didn’t need much, but at that price I had to “top off” the
tank. Took the Jefferson Hwy out of
Muskogee, drove thru Spalding Park, once a rest stop and nite lay over for the
travelers on the road. Then on to Bacone
College to check again for the monument to Milly Francis – still couldn’t find
it and I guess everyone was in class, I didn’t see a soul wandering the campus.
Then off to Fort Gibson and the cemetery. The cemetery is beautiful – if rows and rows and
rows of white markers can be beautiful.
I had taken some flowers for the graves of Sam Houston’s Cherokee wife, Tiana,
and a woman from Boston that passed as a soldier to ‘get even’ with the lover
that left her at the altar. Vivia Thomas
was also given the honor of being buried at the cemetery. But, more of my plans went down the drain –
that section of the cemetery was undergoing headstone maintenance. So I left the flower I had taken with me on
the grave of a soldier on my way out the gate.
Fort Gibson is undergoing renovation. I did get to see some of it and drove around
the perimeter. WOW! What an undertaking they have going. I was fascinated at the air conditioners
hanging from the windows of the old log fort buildings. Obviously not of the era of the fort, but for
the comfort of the workers doing the renovation!
From Fort Gibson, headed north on HWY 16, another remnant of
the old highway. Passed through Okay, OK
– once home to a factory that manufactured trucks -- the town took its name from the OK Truck
Manufacturing Company. A drive down the
historic old town of Wagoner, on to Chouteau, OK and then a visit to the Katy train depot in
Pryor Creek. Interesting sign at a
couple of car dealerships in Pryor – Free tornado shelter with a purchase! Can’t beat a deal like that if you live in
Oklahoma!
Next stop Vinita – had planned on having lunch at an old
diner in town and taking in the “art deco” architecture of the main street –
however, it seemed I arrived on Will Rogers Day – the same day the rodeo came
to town, the same day the kids were all out of school so they could ride their
bicycles and horses downtown in the parade!
So, I bid farewell to Vinita and took the posted re-route/detour around the
edge of town. Totally missed getting
back on the right highway so pulled into a parking lot to check my map. Police officer asked if he could help – sure,
I’m headed to Miami, where’s the road?
He got me off on HWY 2 – wrong road – oh, it went to Miami, but I failed
to tell him I wanted the Ribbon Road from Afton to Miami.
I’m really getting good at back-tracking! After a switch
back or two, I got to Afton, found the Ribbon Road – took it for about 10
miles, couldn’t handle the dust and turned around and went back to the PAVED
highway. I had been told the Ribbon
Road (last vestige of the really original Rt 66) was a single lane paved road
with gravel shoulders. Don’t know what
happened to the PAVED part, but it was hot and dusty and I wasn’t in the mood
to deal with a dusty country road.
Ahhhh….Miami, my planned spot for the nite. WRONG – it was way too early to be pulling
into a motel, I hadn’t even had lunch yet - so I decided to move on to Baxter
Springs KS. Enroute to Baxter Springs,
I took a cruise down a few side streets in Commerce OK to visit Mickey Mantle’s
birthplace.
Only one motel in Baxter Springs – one of those with the
inside hallway – WOW, I hate these kind of places – I want to pull up to my
door, unload and toss the stuff in the
room and reload in the AM in the same easy way.
Don’t want to be dragging suitcases, CPAP breathing machines,
nebulizers, and oxygen down any hallways!
But, after cruising on to the next town, Galena KS, with a Mom-Pop older
motel, and a No Vacancy sign, I came back to Baxter Springs and roughed it
getting into the room. At least the
iced machine is close to my room and it works – so I have plenty of ice
tea. Nice room, if you like the smell
of wet plaster, has a refrig and microwave, free internet, nice TV – NO COFFEE
POT and I’m not walking back out to my truck to get mine! And the darn room costs me more than the last
two nites together. GEEZ!
I really do love to travel!
One interesting thing I’m going to miss now that I’m out of Oklahoma, I
loved the signs telling me I was entering or leaving the various Indian
Nations. I also learned that Muskogee
is a Port City – an Inland Port – the Port of Muskogee. It sets on three rivers and there are barges
headed in all directions. It also has
more railroad tracks and trains than any one city needs!
Bacone College, opening
in 1880, is Oklahoma's oldest continuing center of higher education. With the help of the Baptist Home Mission
Society, Professor Almon C. Bacone, a missionary teacher, started a school in
the Cherokee Baptist Mission at Tahlequah, Indian Territory. Seeing the
need to expand, an appeal was made to the Creek Tribal Council for 160 acres of
land in Muskogee. The land was granted,
and in 1885 Indian University was moved to its present site. In 1910, it was
renamed Bacone Indian University and was later changed to Bacone College.
Classes from first grade through 4 years of College met in Rockefeller
Hall, a 3-story building made possible by a $10,000 contribution from John D.
Rockefeller. "Old Rock," as it came to be called, served as
classroom, dormitory, dining hall, chapel, teacher quarters and administration
building.
Along with the standard educational programs found in most colleges
and universities, Bacone has a few programs unique to their beginning as an
Indian School. It has a Division of Indian
Studies offering degrees in Tribal Law and Criminal Justice, American Indian
Studies and programs at the Center for Tribal Languages. Bacone College continues to be funded by the
Creek Nation.
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