Will Rogers, tall totem & lots of guns

Another day of exploring in the gently rolling green hills of northeast OK. We travelled to Claremore, a few miles north of Tulsa, and first stopped at the worlds tallest totem pole. A guy retired in the 40s, got bored and started to make things including this totem pole. He also made 400 fiddles from different woods, none had strings or played. He even made a wooden lawn mower powered by a battery & electric motor. The blades and rest of it was wood. We then visited the Will Rogers Memorial Museum where he and his family are buried. It's on a beautiful high piece of property (his own) overlooking the countryside and city. A lot of $$$ was spent on this museum! We enjoyed it, his rope trick B&W movies were outstanding! We then stopped at the JM Davis Gun Museum. He was a property owner & businessman who collected over 50,000 guns and related items during his life. Guns guns guns, rows and rows of guns guns guns. What we find interesting is the history and many of his guns were from outlaws and law officers. I have included a few pictures of some including the nooses & blindfolds used to execute bad people. See the 5 notches in Harry Reids pistol grip?

Ma Barker & her boys

Sunday was a stay put and relax day, although after a heavy overnight dew Judy just had to clean & wipe off the trailer. Today we went for a ride to Vineta for lunch. They have a well known restaurant on old route 66, Clantons, that has been written up in several food magazines and on TV food programs for their chicken fried steaks. I rate it so so and Judy's chicken fried chicken was much better. After lunch we went to Welch and waited for over 1/2 hour for a train stopped on the tracks in the small village. At least I got a cat nap in! We finally went up tracks and crossed the tracks to continue our cemetery hunt. We read that the Barker family was buried a few miles outside town off a dirt road in the Williams Cemetery. We have some interesting info sources for off the wall places. You youngsters don't know Ma Barker and her boys, they were bank robbers and kidnappers in the 1930s. Ma and one of her boys, Freddie, were in a shoot out in 1937 with some of J Edgar Hoover's G men, Ma & Freddie lost the gun fight and ended up here. Here's more info on Ma...http://www.trivia-library.com/c/biography-of-gangsters-arizona-clark-ma-barker.htm Hello Jean!!!! Hi BJ!!!!!

Cherokee Queen

Today was a nice relaxing day. Judy went to Curves this morning and did a little shopping on the way home. We went out for a late lunch at a local German resturant with Harold & Joan, neighbors also in a HitchHiker. Then this evening we all went for a relaxing boat ride on the Cherokee Queen on Grand Lake. It was a beautiful evening.

Bartlesville exploration trip

Today we travelled 170 miles round trip to see several attractions. We first got a picture of these 3 interestingly labeled water tanks. Then we visited the Tom Mix Museum in Dewey. In February we had seen where he was killed in a 1940 car accident in AZ. Mix's third of five wives was from Dewey, he was the town marshal and worked on a local cattle ranch before his movie career. We enjoyed the museum and watched one of his 1930's first talkies with Mickey Rooney when he was a young boy. We visited a replica of the Nellie Johnstone #1 oil well site, the first commercial oil well in OK. The name came from a young Indian girl who owned the land. While driving in Bartlesville we noticed a strange building that turned out to be Frank Lloyd Wright's Price Tower. Never heard of it but it's a unique 1956 19 story building. We then visited the Phillips Petroleum Museum, it was quite commercial. The company almost didn't exist, they barely had funding for 3 wells that were duds and somehow did a fourth well and it was the first of 80 successful oil wells. If you want to know how "66" was added to the company name drop me an email and I'll tell you! On the way home we visited the home with the bowling ball fence and yard. If you think MI has some bad gravel roads you should drive on Oklahoma's. Hey Devyn......I finally had a baconator today!!!!! Doubt I'll have another.

Exploring Grove

Wednesday Judy went to Curves and we got our first look at Grove, that's about all we did, other than me wumping her at gin rummy. She's still 60 points ahead of me. Today I debugged the front cap of our home and cleaned the truck up a little. After Curves we made a 60 mile drive around Grand Lake. One side of the lake looks to be pretty poor while the other side is not. The Pensacola Dam was constructed in 1940 by Franklin D Roosevelt's WPA to supply power to NE Oklahoma. You can tell it's not made to today's vehicles, it would have been interesting to meet another dually. There was quite a bit of water going over or through the flood gates from the reservoir. We also went through the Jay County Historical Museum and had lunch in the City Perks local downtown eatery.

Grove, Oklahoma

We had the toilet repaired this morning and left Chanute at 10:30; arrived in Grove, OK a little after 1. We are planning on staying here (it's a free ROD park) for 9 nights. On the 25th we'll move 100 miles down the road to a Corp of Engineering park to meet up with some friends. We have learned that the HitchHiker rally has been cancelled because of Ike. We are trying to put put something together for our Haulin' HitchHiker group.

Judy went to church this morning while I slept in a little longer. We went for a walk in the park and we got a picture of this strange goose. It has skin growing under it's chin like a turkey does. I sent a picture to Bill Teetz, an avid birder, and he believes it's a Swan goose introduced to the US from Asia. There are at least two in the park. Do you like the duck with a mohawk?

The truck received a good cleaning inside and out and Judy even washed the trailer windows.....both sides.....now that Ike has passed. The rain stopped during the night and was replaced by a strong wind. But....it's beautiful out now although chilly. This evening we played Mexican Train with Stacy & Sharon and Judy was getting into Stacy's sipping burbon!