Winter Sunset on the Missouri River

On the Missouri Side , facing Kansas (where else).

Have a great Holiday. I do hope if you somehow found this blog, you've had half as much fun reading it as I have doing it !

Rick

See Ya in 2010

Pictures -St Joseph

Sacajawea guarding the Casino.

The Bullet hole at Jesse James house.

Outside of Jesse James House

A cockfighting ring broken up. They put these around the cock's legs.

Christmas decorations on a train


old time speakers

Unused Hang mans gallows.

The Motel is no longer there, but they kept the sign.

Pony Express stables

Pony Express -Eastern Terminus and a strange place

St Josephs,Missouri

Date of Trip: December 5,2009

Trip are now weather dependent, as I watch a beautiful snow fall out of my window. I have to think this is the last one of what has been an amazing year. Last week the Trails were the story,Independence,Missouri, the shoving off point for so many going west. I managed to cover Lewis and Clark,Oregon,Santa Fe,California and the Mormon Trail.About 35 miles north is St. Joseph, home town of Walter Cronkite,Jesse James and the eastern point of the Pony Express. The Patee House serves as a Museum for the city and I shall write of it shortly. One of the exhibits in the Museum is a newspaper article from from January of 1864,It announces Lincoln is running for re election and just below it a famed actor named John Wilkes Booth was in town and convinced to give a performance of Shakespearean monologues. Probably the first and not last time the two names will be linked.

We came from the Pony Express Museum. It's a nice,very interactive place were you can sit on saddles and pump water from a well into a horses trofe. Lots of maps of the Trail,artifacts and a D.A.R. Museum outside marking the stable. It is worth noting 2010 is 150th anniversary of the Express brief run.

Next was the Patee House which I thought was going to be the Pony Express office, which it was , but was so much more.

-Lincoln stayed there in 1859

-Mark Twain stayed there

-William Seward gave a speech from the balcony

-Military trials after the civil war occurred there

-An episode of "Ripley's Believe it or not not" was filmed there.Jack Palance was there and someone kept his cigar butts

-Walter Cronkite was there, as his father the dentist has artifacts in the museum.

-Next door you can find the house Jesse James was shot, which had been moved from it's original location, the sign out front says "See the Bullet hole" and we did.

Downtown is wonderful statue of a Pony Express Rider. I'll warn you if want to eat anything other Taco Bell or Hardees, you might be forced to eat at the casino.We did anyway. We have missed something else along the way. I'm going to fill the next entry with pictures from Patee house. The last picture taken at the casino is a beautiful sun set on the Missouri River. The leaves on the trees are going and I couldn't help but wonder how soon snow would cover the ground, Ice fill the river and wonderful is this was the last day of 2009 that the river would flow .

This is probably the last trip of the year, but don't worry. I sat down with a sheet of paper and came up with 19 trips,mostly in the state of Kansas that can all be done in a day. Last year was Bleeding Kansas for the most part, this year Trails ,who knows what will catch my eye in 2010. I went to Fort Leavenworth,far Western Kansas, saw such oddities as the World Largest Ball of Twine,a giant shovel,a Monument of the National Park System that told the story of my family history . In this, Lincoln's 200th Birthday , Steps were he spoke have been preserved, and a hotel where he stayed stands. Last year I was enchanted by the story of the Harvey Girls, this year I saw the way of life,Conestoga Wagons, that the trains ended.

Last year I remembered talking to a gentleman who said "If take a pins and stick in a map at Emporia,Kansas and draw a circle 200 miles around it, you will find more US History than almost anywhere in the Country." The 13 Colonies may argue that point but between the Labor Unrest of the Amazon Women in Pittsburg ,the Trials,The Homesteaders,Fort Leavenworth,Bleeding Kansas,Brown v BOE,William Allen White,Harry Truman,Dwight Eisenhower and so many others. He makes a good case.

We remember Hays House where Custer and Jesse James dined. We remember the choice Chicken Annie's or next door Chicken Mary's. We remember the Casino in St Joe with the statue of Sacajawea in front of it. We ate well,saw some amazing and frankly strange things.

So Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. We put away the GPS and the smart phone,give K-tag a rest, read all the brouchures I picked up and plan and plot for 2010. See you on the highways.....

Shawnee Indian Mission

Date of Trip:November 28,2009 ,last stop of the day.

Somewhere buried in the suburban landscape,where what city you are in seems to change block by block is the Shawnee Indian Mission.Originally a large tract of land it has been shrunk and shrunk to where it now only occupies a couple of buildings, you have to walk across a busy street to get to one of them.

The history of the site is enormous, from frankly teaching Indian Children the white ways, and that is covered in the film we saw to the meeting house of the bogus legislator of Bleeding Kansas fame. Because in October we visited the Mission in Council Grove and because Council Grove is a long more interesting than the burbs,I enjoyed Council Grove more.Maybe I was just feeling the ghosts of Pro Slavery leader Rev. Tom Johnson and his son about the place. It is a nice little piece of land. Note for National Park Stamp collectors, you can get a Trails stamp here.

Lewis and Clark Statue in Case Park.

I'll just say this may be not newest favorite place in Kansas City.Beautiful statue,beautiful park. A place where true happened.

On the Lewis and Clark Trail

Date: November 28,2009

Case Park-Kansas City,Missouri

The words of the corp of discovery speak for themselves.Top left/center you see where the Kansas River heads West.

Tuesday June 26,1804

from the journal of Patrick Gass:

We embarked and set out at five o'clock in the morning; passed a creek on the south side, called Blue-Water. This afternoon we had some difficulty in passing a sandbar, the tow-rope having broke; but by the exertions of those on board, the boat was brought to shore without injury. We encamped on the south side on a point at the confluence of the Canzan, or Kanzas river with the Missouri. It was agreed to remain here during the 27th and 28th where we pitched our tents and built bowers in front of them. Canzan or Kanzas, is 230 yards and a quarter wide, and navigable to a great distance. Our hunters killed 4 deer, and a young wolf, and caught another alive. In the afternoon of the 29th we again proceeded on our voyage, and encamped on the north side of the river.

Monday-September 15,1806

from the Journal of William Clark:

we set out early with a Stiff Breeze a head saw Several deer Swiming the river soon after we Set out. at 11 A. M. passed the enterance of the Kanzas river which was very low, about a mile below we landed and Capt Lewis and my Self assended a hill which appeared to have a Commanding Situation for a fort, the Shore is bold and rocky imediately at the foot of the hill, from the top of the hill you have a perfect Command of the river, this hill fronts the Kanzas and has a view of the Missouri a Short distance above that river.

Pictures National Trails Center

Poster of the Chicago-Alton Line.Note the detail of the map of the route on the bottom of the lounger all the way up to her head.


This is an amazing photgraph, I wish was available in post card.A wagon train and a steam train meet.A Clash of techonological advancement that made the wagon trains die off.