June 27
We camped at Cowan Lake State Park in the middle of Ohio. We put up our screen tent (to have a retreat from mosquitos) for the first time, and it was a big hit with the kids. Although they insisted on running smack into its walls, WWF style, until it would get so misshapen it would nearly fall over.
We woke up pretty late. I got change for doing laundry from an RV neighbor. The man was carving a statue in wood, and he and his wife laughed telling me that they've been watching Tom and I dart back and forth filling requests from our children. Now the kids were in the swing set area across from the tent, and any minute now they were going to yell out for help or attention. I had to get the laundry in fast!
The couple were from a few miles away and came down to this state park with a beach and community center. The husband asked about our trip, and I told him about the book. "I have a great idea for a detective story," he said, "but I'm not much of a writer." "You need a collaborator. Maybe try advertising on Craigslist." I explained what Craigslist was, and the women wrote it down. They were very sweet. I wondered if they were so nice because they saw our Obama sign. I looked at the car and realized it was parked with the sticker to the back. I wonder if Tom did that on purpose. This part of the country did not vote for him.
When we drove off, the couple gave us the beautiful carving the man had been working on. He said it was an Ohio House built from Ohio wood. He presented it to Cole who promptly stuffed it in his Batman backpack along with boppy ding (fuzzy thing...a fuzzy square he loves) and All Bown Ki'y. That's an honor.
We looked high and low in Delaware, Ohio for the Rutherford B. Hayes marker. When I read that it was by the "BP" sign in the directions I thought it was an acronym for birthplace. "Odd," I thought to myself. A sweet, bustling (as much as little towns really bustle) town of very, very nice people, you'd think they'd take care of their own. But no, poor Rutherford has a plaque in front of a BP station. We paid the plaque it's due (Tom commented on the very fine notches on its corners), and we headed to Bun's for lunch. All class. The hot buns were great...
We didn't venture to Spiegel Grove, Hayes' fancy adult home, so the BP plaque was it. So long Rutherford, by all accounts an impressive and brave man.
On to Marion and the childhood home of Warren G. Harding. We went through the museum, but not his adult house either (our itinerary has to be restricted to childhood homes or we would be on the road until Christmas). The kids played in the rose garden. Cole marched Adeline and me around with sticks as a large train while Tom had museum time with George (it's the closest we can get).
We saw Harding's large, lonely memorial. It was commissioned, I assume, before the scandals in his administration were revealed (the Teapot Dome scandal being the most notorious). It would be protested as it was built. I didn't think too much of Hayes. He's not someone I would really respect, in person, I think. He seemed a bit like bureaucrat and a hail-fellow joiner (There were plenty of pictures of him in felt Shriners hats in the museum). Or maybe that's the unfair history that has been conjured. His memorial, with a tree growing above his and his wife's graves, surrounded by columns in a circle, stood silent in the summer heat.
Harding's BP was a tiny town called Caledonia. We saw a sign near a grain silo telling us that it was his birthplace, but we had to ask a local if he could show us the actual house (the lady at the museum said she thought it was the original house). A boy in his teens with a red empowerment shirt and black, untied, leather high tops showed us the way.. He didn't want to tell us directions but insisted on walking alongside the car as we drove, cheerfully pointing out Caledonia sights. "Are you new to Caledonia?" It was not as if a town of a hundred or two wouldn't notice a new family... but more that he couldn't really fathom the concept, we think, of passing through a town.
He was very nice and quite a character. He showed us the Wet Spot - the town bar. He pointed out the grocery store that has the best "fresh sides" (we had to ask) in the world, and he strongly urged us to buy some.
He showed us the sign we'd already seen when two girls in beach towels on bikes pulled up to gape at us.
One knew the house and pointed down a block. We waved goodbye and saw the house with marker. It had plastic siding and was obviously not original, though we took a photo just the same.
Unfortunately just out of Ann Arbor, we discovered that we did not have a half an hour to drive but three and half. Ford's childhood home and museum were not in Ann Arbor, Michigan, but in Grand Rapids. Tom's first itinerary mistake (the library is in Ann Arbor). We kept on driving and resigned ourself to a hotel.
Rooms were hard to come by and we ended up in a dingy smoking room with an extra queen bed dragged in for the boys. The room stunk, but we were all tired and slept anyway.
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