Showing posts with label MISSOURI. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MISSOURI. Show all posts

MARK TWAIN AND HANNIBAL (MO)

I used to play the Wordle Unlimited Game nearly every day and had over 2150 games played with a 98.37% win record.

Then my computer had a major malfunction and erased all my online Wordle data, which left me so disheartened I ceased playing. That was nearly a year ago now.

A little over two months ago I decided to return to playing just the daily Wordle Game.

Now after two months my record is a PERFECT 68-0 and today's word nearly stumped me.

I think if I wouldn't have guessed ROVER for today's puzzle and lost, I could have very easily quit playing again.

Wasting no time, shortly after getting set up, we headed up to the Gift Shop and purchased tickets to go tour the Mark Twain Cave.

MARK TWAIN CAVE

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In 1890 they created this pedestrian friendly entrance to the cave using dynamite.
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The cave consists of numerous passageways laid out like a city street grid pattern.
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Some of the passageways are 100' tall.
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There are estimated to be 250,000 signatures adorning the cave walls.
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The signature in the center of this photo has been authenticated to be that of
Samuel Langhorne Clemens (aka Mark Twain), the great American writer and humorist.
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Clemens was known to explore the cave while he lived in Hannibal betweens ages 4 and 18.
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Here is one of the passageway intersections.
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Not sure who this is supposed to be but other artwork can also be found on the cave walls.
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Here our tour guide, Bobbie, shares more Mark Twain stories relating to the cave.
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There are few cave formations to be found in this cave, but here are the best.
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OK, time to find our way out of this maze of a cave.

WEDNESDAY - For our second and final day here in Hannibal, MO we're going to tour the boyhood home of it's most famous historical resident, Samuel Langhorne Clemens (aka Mark Twain).

For a small fee you'll be able to take a self-guided tour of several historical buildings that are featured in Mark Twain's famous books, namely The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

THE MARK TWAIN BOYHOOD HOME

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This model of a sculpture that never was made is found in the Interpretive Center.
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Next door is the modest boyhood home of Tom Blankenship (aka Huckleberry Finn).
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I'm not sure why the pathway brought us in through the back door?
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This is the front door facing the street, complete with the address.
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This huge stone wall was erected between the rear of Mark Twain's home and a lumber yard
as a fire break in the event there was a fire at the lumber yard.
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Inside of Mark Twain's Boyhood Home.
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The front of Mark Twain's boyhood home in Hannibal, MO.
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Right across the street is the childhood home of Laura Hawkins (aka Becky Thatcher).
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In keeping with the Mark Twain theme of this visit we ate lunch at the Mark Twain Dinette.

After lunch, while we were still in the parking lot for the Interpretive Center, I asked one of the volunteers who was taking care of some yard maintenance if the lighthouse I saw way up on the hill above town was accessible to the public.

He said, "Sure! You can either walk up the several dozen flights of stairs using the public pathway over there (pointing) OR you can drive up to a little known 2-car hidden parking lot right at the back of the lighthouse".

I thanked him and then climbed into ROVER and started our drive up to the lighthouse.

In front of the lighthouse is the regular parking lot for the public,
but there are still several flights of stairs if you start from here like Tricia did.

I drove all the way up to the base of the back of the lighthouse
and took one of the two parking spots I found there.

The front of the Mark Twain Memorial Lighthouse.

This is the rear view of the lighthouse.

Now that the in-town sightseeing for today is complete, it's time to go and fill ROVER's gas tank with $3.05 Missouri gasoline before we cross the bridge into Illinois tomorrow where gasoline is reported to be $3.86 for the same gallon of gas. OUCH! Multiply that by our 36-gallon tank and that's a pretty big chuck of change.

The same volunteer also told us the best view of the Mississippi River and the town of Hannibal is from a location called Lovers Leap just outside of town.

It's on the way back to the campground so we drove up and took a look for ourselves.

They had a cool metal art piece for lovers to hang a padlock with their names on it.
As you can see in the background some people still chose to place their padlock on the fence.

Lovers Leap is where legend tells us a pair of young indians from opposing tribes
leapt to their deaths instead of living separated by the elders.

The view of the Mississippi River and Hannibal from the south.

There's the lighthouse hidden up among the trees.

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PERSHING STATE PARK (MO) ★

SUNDAY - Boy did I get into trouble for saying the reason we didn't have any travel day pictures for the previous post was because Tricia was too busy knitting the whole time because according to her there was nothing to see.

Well today she didn't knit a stitch, but she did manage to snap eight very boring photos of the country side we traveled though as if to prove her point.

I did find Photo #8 just "a little bit" interesting.

It reminds me of the opening scene from the 1980s TV series Dallas, where you see a long view of the driveway leading up to their Southfork ranch house.

A short time later we arrived at Pershing State Park here in Laclede, MO. which is the birthplace of John Joseph Pershing (September 13, 1860 – July 15, 1948), nicknamed "Black Jack", who was "General of the Armies of the United States" during World War I and the only soldier to ever hold that rank.

Pershing would later become a mentor to the generals of World War II, including George C. Marshall, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Omar Bradley, Lesley J. McNair, George S. Patton and Douglas MacArthur.

MONDAY - Today we have some sightseeing to do here in Laclede and the nearby surrounding communities of Sumner and Meadville.

First up is visiting the boyhood home of General John J. Pershing in Laclede. You'll find it on the corner of Worlow Street and Pershing Drive. The entire block is now a State Historic Site that includes the boyhood home, a school and a church.

No tours were being offered during our visit...

...so we didn't have access to the home's interior.

The lot next door included a Memorial Garden...

...complete with a 10-foot tall bronze statue of "Black Jack" Pershing.

Next up on today's tour is a visit with Maxie, the World's Largest Goose. You'll need to travel to the small community of Sumner, MO which claims to be the "Wild Goose Capital of the World".

Sumner sits along a migration path that sees a large number (around 100,000) of wild geese land in the local lakes each year.

Our final stop for the day is another State Historic Site, the Locust Creek Covered Bridge.

"Locust Creek Covered Bridge was built in 1868 on a budget that amounts to a little over $100,000 present day. White pine and iron in a Howe-truss structure created the spot for fishermen and romantics.

John J. Pershing, a World War I general, visited the bridge often in his youth. Its interior is carved with initials and sweet nothings. According to local residents, the bridge was a place to profess your love. The romance of the Locust Creek Covered Bridge spun tales until it was bypassed in 1930, when the course of the creek changed after World War II. It then became a dry creek bridge, resting on nothing but mud and silt.

Luckily in 1968, the state of Missouri acquired the bridge and taxpayers funded the repairs, turning it into the state historic site it is today. In 1991, the bridge underwent another renovation, it was elevated six feet to keep the wooden floor off the creek bed." - Taken from Atlas Obscura website

Today you'll have to park you car and walk the ¼-mile to the bridge's original location.

Next stop for us? Hannibal, MO! Does anyone know of someone famous who grew up there?
HINT: Maybe one of our older and more "well-read" followers will know the answer.

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