About 500 years ago, the Arikara tribe moved from Nebraska to what is now North Dakota. The Arikara are historically a Pawnee tribe. The organizers of the powwow thought it would be appropriate to also invite the Arikara to participate. This year and hopefully in future years. The Arikara helped the Pawnees build an earth lodge on the powwow site in Kearney earlier in the year.
I am on the American Legion Color Guard and we were asked to do the flag ceremonies at the opening and closing of the powwow.
After that came the traditional dances. Very colorful.
The following week, we drove up to Hot Springs, South Dakota to attend the bi-annual family reunion of Elaine’s siblings and their offspring. On the way to South Dakota, we stopped and stayed with a high-school friend of Elaine’s, Jane Huewe Wahlstrom, who lives in Chadron, Nebraska. While in Chadron, we toured the Museum of the Fur Trade, located on the site of James Bordeaux’s 1837 trading post. In October or November of each year of its operation a caravan of carts would bring trade goods from Fort Laramie. The trip took about 4 day s to complete.
The goods were traded mainly for buffalo robes, about 1,000 each season, which were then transported to eastern USA. The museum includes actual items traded, plus historical displays of the era. A flintlock gun cost 5 buffalo robes (hides), a knife = 1 robe; 1 pound of gunpowder = 1 robe; a wool blanket = 3 robes.
The firearms display contains the largest and most complete collection of trade guns; i.e. made especially for the Indian trade.
The cactus were in bloom – such beautiful flowers in a harsh setting.
While Chadron is definitely far off the beaten track, should you ever have reason to be near there, this museum is a must see. I couldn’t believe that I had never heard of this museum. The contents are fabulous.
Our journey to the reunion took us through a very unpopulated area that is usually bereft of much rainfall. The spring of 2010 was an unusually wet season and the grass was very tall. The area is often a very burnt brown grassland by late June. Not this year. You travel for about an 100 miles, without seeing anything but grassland; even fences are rarely seen. What we did see were many large prong horns (aka antelope), enjoying the grasses that will go unharvested by man.
The reunion was held on the grounds of the Hot Springs Veteran’s Home, a facility founded to care for aging Civil War Veterans. It’s mission continues to care for aging veterans of subsequent wars. Here is a photo of the 11 living children of Joe & Irene Spielmann.
Anne flew to Rapid City, where we picked her up and did some touring of the Black Hills. The Hills have the tallest peaks east of the Rocky Mountains, and are generally covered in Ponderosa Pine. Unfortunately, the pine beetle is making inroads and the area made become denuded of these stately trees, as has much of Colorado in the past few years. The area has abundant wildlife, as you can see. Best viewing of wildlife is in Custer State Park (71,000 acres) and Wind Cave National Park. The burros are not native, but were once used to haul tourists up some mountain trails. They are very friendly and may be closely approached unlike the other wildlife, especially bison, which can be very unpredictable and dangerous.
Additionally, it has some well known attractions such as the “under construction” Crazy Horse monument (the sculptor took the job in 1939 and his children continue the yet unfinished privately-funded project) and Mount Rushmore (begun in 1927 and completed in 1941).
A week after returning home, we flew off to Hawaii for 2-wweks on the Big Island. Joining us were our great NZ friends, the O’Callaghan’s and Anne.
We lazed away the days at the beaches and enjoyed swimming and snorkeling at various picturesque sites:
Anne rented a Jeep and treated us to a visit to the peak of Mauna Kea (13,900 + ft). Megan O’Callaghan came with us. Megan is a lawyer in London. At 9,000 ft level there is a visitor center, where you spend a couple hours getting used to the high altitude. A short walk takes you to a place where the rare silver –sword grows.
A partially unpaved steep and winding road takes you to the summit, where we viewed the various observatories and watched the sunset. I did a short walk at the summit and became dizzy after only a minute or so. Slowly, I returned to the Jeep and let myself get used to the rarified atmosphere before getting out again.
The wind constantly howls at about 50 mph and the temp at sea level was 88 degrees, while it was only 42 at the summit.
On our return to Nebraska, we stayed two nights in Omaha, as Elaine had a conference that she attended on one of those days. On our free time, we visited the “Bodies” traveling exhibit. No pictures were allowed. The exhibit consists of various organ systems of the human body made from actual cadavers. I know it sounds macabre, but it is very educational and very respectfully done. I asked one of the docents where the bodies came from. Like just about everything nowadays, they come from China.
The Omaha and Council Bluffs, Iowa area were the wintering quarters of the Mormon move from Nauvoo, Illinois and other places to Utah in 1846. There are several sites that commemorate this historic event.
The headquarters of the Union Pacific Railroad, one of America’s largest is in Omaha. They have their own museum (relocated to Council Bluffs, Iowa a few years ago). Well worth a visit.
The Union Pacific was the westbound railroad that met at Promontory Point, Utah with the Eastbound railroad completing the first transcontinental railroad of North America in 1869. Several golden spikes were driven in the rails to celebrate the occasion. I often wondered what ever happened to the golden-alloy spikes (pure gold would be too soft to drive into the railbed). They were promptly removed after the ceremony and distributed to the railroad big wigs. On display is one of the spikes.
My Brother David came to visit in late July though early August. While with us, we visited the Happy Jack Chalk mine in Scotia, Nebraska. The mine operated from 1877 to the end of WW II. The chalk is not of the blackboard variety, but was primarily used as an filler ingredient in paint. It is a quick but interesting tour, & claims to be the only USA chalk mine that you can tour.
We spent several days swimming at a local swimming hole at Fort Kearney. Then we drove to the Sioux Falls area for a sad task, the placing of Tom’s grave marker in Colman cemetery in the Spielmann family plot. It has been over a year since we lost Tom. We miss Tom.
South Dakota, continued to receive high rainfall, with the result being a very impressive Sioux Falls.
During the late summer, I repainted our house in a burnt orange, with dark brown trim after our handyman had replaced some of the siding that was in poor condition. This kept me busy for a few days.
The Nebraska City (3 hrs southeast of Kearney) Apple Festival is held during the 3rd weekend of September. Elaine & I bought some hot apple pie and ice cream, some cider and some apples. From there, we toured the Arbor Lodge State Park, home of J. Sterling Morton’s mansion. Morton was an early settler of Nebraska Territory (1854).
Starting with a log cabin on the site, as his fortune grew, so did his mansion. Morton was the man who came up with the idea for Arbor Day in 1872. In 1885, the State Legislature declared the 1st arbor Day. Morton turned to politics and was Acting Territorial governor (1858-61) among other offices and was the first US Secretary of Agriculture under Grover Cleveland (1893-96). One of J. Sterling Morton’s sons was the founder of the famous Morton Salt firm (he took over an existing saltworks and renamed it). In 1923, the house and grounds were donated to the State of Nebraska and remains so to this day. The mansion and grounds are open to tours.
As summer left us, it was back to piano lessons, which I enjoy immensely among our other pursuits.
In October, Elaine & I helped at our local National Guard and Army Reserve families Halloween Party. Arrgh!!
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