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century bridge
My dad was a civil engineer; his specialty was water- and sewage-treatment. It was not uncommon when we were on vacation that he’d drive us to a treatment plant that was of particular interest to him. (And: they held little to no interest to me.)
He also like bridges; once when I lost out on a summer job because of a late-spring bout of mono, he took me with him on a business trip as some sort of a consolation. Along the way, we stopped to look at a bridge that had recently been washed out in a flood. He told me about the design flaws that had put the bridge in peril. (And: that held little to no interest to me.)
Yet somehow I ended up here, getting myself quite interested in this bridge. It’s called the Rainbow Bridge (named before that term’s current connotation) and it’s 100 years old this year. It is only one lane wide and is a single-span design called a Marsh arch, after its designer James Barney Marsh. And, it’s the only surviving bridge of this design on the entire 2,448 miles of Route 66.
near Baxter Springs, Kansas
photographed 4.5.2023
skeleton
If you feel like visiting Blue Whale (Catoosa’s most famous landmark!) don’t forget to walk around a little bit to see the non-whale stuff. Like the ark*. Or the fiberglass things that may have been intended to look like mushrooms*, or this, uh, skeletal thing.
And definitely check out the restrooms.***
Catoosa, Oklahoma
photographed 4.5.2023
*Yes. An ark.
**They do not look like mushrooms.
***I’m not even kidding.
nine-foot road
I am going to guess that when you think about Route 66, it doesn’t look like this. I mean – there’s no fixed-up 1950s style diners, no quaint old gas stations, no official logo anywhere.
This is a relic of the road that’s known as the Sidewalk Highway because the main roadway was only nine feet wide. The author of the guidebook I’ve been using on this Route 66 adventure lamented the current road condition, saying it has “VERY ROUGH (rub-board) GRAVEL” (his emphasis*) and that it is only for the “die-hard.” But honestly, it didn’t seem that much worse than certain sections of the Oklahoma turnpikes that I paid actual money to drive on and that I am not at all bitter about.**
near Narcissa, Oklahoma
photographed 4.5.2023
*dramatic much?
**dramatic much?
chasing after every trend
A few years ago, on a really long road trip, I listened to some podcasts to pass the time. One of them was on the history of miniature golf courses; the hosts of the show said it was invented in order to keep the ladies off the “real” course at St. Andrews Golf Course, which of course everyone knows is THE golf course.
I am not real sure what the St. Andrews fellows thought they were protecting the course and/or the gals from, but what happened was that this new, simplified game took off and by the 1920s there were scaled down golf courses all over the place.
And that brings us to this out-of-commission miniature golf course on the edge of town.
Miami, Oklahoma
photographed 4.5.2023
the singer
I was attending a conference in New Orleans that had an after-hours event. I went to that because I was lured in by the promise of two drink coupons. It had been a while since I’d gone to a conference and I’d forgotten that “free” drinks mean crappy beer or shitty wine. So that part didn’t really work out all that well.
But what kept me there was the entertainment, provided by some young and very talented students.
New Orleans, Louisiana
photographed 4.12.2023
One Day | One Image 