Glenview Naval Air Station Museum

A couple of weeks ago, I sought out a place I’d learned about online but had never seen before: the Glenview Naval Air Station Museum. Hadn’t seen it before and almost didn’t find it while looking for it. Having spent years admiring the activity that occurred at the Glenview Naval Air Station, I had expected something more impressive, but what I found was a tiny cubbyhole that was all but hidden at the back of an otherwise unremarkable parking lot, next to Chuck’s Auto Repair. It seemed rather underwhelming, and almost insulting, for the once might military base.

However, I soon learned that, while it seems unprepossessing, it’s absolutely worth a visit—and maybe a little more attention than it has received. (Visitors are the life blood of every museum.) Because here, it’s the history that makes it big, not the building. A lone docent, Irving, long-retired airplane mechanic, was a wonderful combination of enthusiastic about the tale and indignant about how overlooked the museum has become, and shared an endless flow of stories. The tiny space wouldn’t take much time to study, but try to allow yourself at least an hour, as there is a wonderful 40-minute movie (narrated by Bill Kurtis) about the importance of Chicago and Lake Michigan during World War II. Because before there was Top Gun, there was Glenview Naval Air Station.

Lake Michigan, being virtually an inland sea, would become the training ground for the thousands of pilots —because where else could you train flyers to land on aircraft carriers without any chance of a German or Japanese submarine attack. (And in case you always wondered how Navy Pier got its name—now you know.) The film also covers salvage efforts to save the hundred planes that ended up at the bottom of the lake, where the ongoing threat is being consumed by zebra mussels. (Because there is no real museum here, the salvaged planes all end up in Kalamazoo, Pensacola, or D.C.) But the film was stunning to be reminded just how much of the nation’s military might passed through this area. Really remarkable. Also a fair number of interesting and worthwhile artifacts in the museum itself. Absolutely worth a visit. And if you know anyone with a few extra million dollars, they could certainly use a real museum. Open on Saturday and Sunday, 1-4.

https://www.facebook.com/Naval-Air-Station-Glenview-Museum-139960772688126/

And in case you can’t get to the museum but would still like to see the movie, it is available on DVD—and buying it helps fund the museum. https://www.heroesondeck.com/

Pursuing Midwestern History

I haven’t posted in a while because I’m wildly busy working on a new book. This one is about the astonishing history of the Midwest and all the places one can “visit” — from living-history venues to museums, large and small, to many other historic sites. I’m having great fun driving around the region, enjoying the remarkably beautiful forests of northern Wisconsin and Minnesota and vistas across (and fish from) the Great Lakes. I’ve been exploring charming historic inns in Ohio and Illinois, fabulous museums in Nebraska and Kansas, forts in North Dakota and Michigan, reenactments in Indiana, French settlements in Missouri, German farms in Iowa, archaeological digs in South Dakota–though in reality, every state has a fabulous array of all of these things. Older states may have a few more places to visit (and a few more people to support those places), but there is no state that is not a delight. This is a remarkable region with a history far more important than most people realize. So I’m loving getting to both “see” and write about it.

But you don’t necessarily have to go far to visit a bit of Midwestern history. Historical societies in the region actually started up in the 1800s, and most towns or counties (depending on population density) have both societies and museums to display a society’s work. Within half an hour of my home, there are a dozen historical societies, housed in a wide range of buildings (from an entire town square, with church and schoolhouse, to a warehouse to a few large old homes). Just do an Internet search with the name of your town or county and the words “historical society” or possibly “museum”–and then go relive your home’s past, or possibly learn about a place you’ve just arrived. Bigger cities have bigger museums and state capitals usually have museums that cover the whole state. Everybody has history.

Here as an example: This is the DuPage County Historical Museum in Wheaton, IL. This museum offers a charming collection that traces details of local history, from farming to fashion, in a beautiful building that itself reflects the period in which it was built (1890)–and which also has a fascinating history (it was the first public library in Wheaton and one of the first libraries in Illinois to adopt the Dewey decimal system for cataloguing books).

A Surprising Museum in Ohio

Serendipity: the finding of valuable or agreeable things not sought for. Travel just seems to multiply the likelihood of experiencing serendipity.

In Ohio doing some research, driving toward the hotel, I saw a sign that read “Welcome Center and Fulton County Museum, 1 Mile.” This place wasn’t on my radar at all. However, I was leaving the next morning and had nothing else planned while there, so I thought I’d give this place a try.

What a surprise. This was not a huge museum, but it more than made up in splendid detail, insightful presentation, and brilliant planning what it lacked in size. And who knew so much interesting stuff happened in Fulton County, Ohio?

There are a couple of possible approaches to viewing the museum. You can read absolutely everything, which was what I chose to do. Alternatively, you can accept their invitation to see how history repeats itself and focus on periods that are in some way similar to the one in which you were born or in which you currently live. I thought this approach was immensely clever, but I didn’t want to miss anything.

The museum starts in the area’s pre-history and moves up through the centuries. One way they handle the abundance of artifacts is, under a primary display, there are drawers and drawers of additional items labeled by time period.

Signs are abundant, making it possible to really fit together the pieces of Fulton County’s history–which includes a remarkable range of events and people who operated at the national level, from the show promoter who helped Buffalo Bill to race-car driver Barney Oldfield, plus of course involvement in such key elements of U.S. history as the Civil War and industrial progress.

The museum only took us about 2 hours to view–so this isn’t a place you’d likely plan an entire vacation around. However, if you happen to find yourself on the Ohio Turnpike near Hwy 108, you might consider stopping.

Of course, the other lesson is, when you see a sign telling you there is something of interest a mile ahead, you might want to check it out.

Dakota Discovery Museum—Part 2

The second floor of the museum is an art gallery. A large section is dedicated to Oscar Howe, the Sioux artist I posted about previously. The museum displays bronzes by Remington and Russell, plaster casts of Gutzon Borglum’s miniatures of the faces destined for Mt. Rushmore, work by Western painter Harvey Dunn, and the model created by sculptor James Earle Fraser of his most widely circulated work—the buffalo that graced the buffalo nickel (though the statue End of the Trail is better known, and Washington, D.C. would not look the same if he had not decorated so much of it). For Charles Hargens, there is a display of his art studio, as well as a gallery of original paintings and illustrations. Hargens was best known for recreating the West for such magazines as the Saturday Evening Post, Colliers, McCall’s, Boys’ Life, and more (and whose prints and posters you can still buy online).

Through the splendid bookstore, and then outside, where Rod Brown led me and a handful of other visitors through the four historic buildings that have been moved onto the museum’s property. We toured the 125-year-old Methodist Church (still used for special events and weddings), a prairie schoolhouse (the one-room variety), a train depot (Milwaukee Line came through here), and ended up at Beckwith House. This handsome, Victorian confection was built for Louis Beckwith, the enthusiastic booster who got Mitchell to build the original Corn Palace in 1892. Wagons, a tractor, and other memorabilia are scattered around the site, to add to the sense of history. Great fun.

The Old Schoolhouse

Beckwith House

Buckboard Wagon

If you do find yourself in Mitchell, this is another worthwhile stop.
http://visitmitchell.com/attractions-posts/dakota-discovery-museum/

Welcome to the Village

Outside the indoor museum, one enters the “village” itself—twelve historic buildings around a broad, tree-shaded lawn. Ranged around the “town” are other relics from the past, including some early forms of now-important farm equipment.

Each building—barns, houses, church, stores, schoolhouse, Pony Express station, print shop, doctor’s office—is home to its own collection. The toy store is filled with antique toys. The barns are crammed with tools and inventions no longer at home on farms. The shelves and counters of the general store are crowded with the goods from bygone eras. The schoolhouse has all its original furnishings. The collections are fascinating, but the buildings themselves are wonderful, as well. They are all original buildings that have been rescued, moved here, and restored.

A Remarkable Museum

Before moving out into the “village,” we spent a fair amount of time wandering amid the wonders of the sprawling, indoor museum. One can watch the progression of technology over more than 100 years, in fields as disparate as art, transportation, farming, and food preparation. It’s truly a remarkable collection. There are wagons and coaches, more than 350 antique cars, more than a dozen airplanes, and 100 antique tractors, plus toys, sculpture, and machines for every possible task. Fabulous.

One fact I found fascinating was the extent of operations for moving freight. Before Henry and Clem Studebaker made cars, they made huge Freight Wagons, and these wagons moved a tremendous amount of goods (from trade goods to simply people moving households) along the Oregon Trail. The operation of one freight company alone — Bussell, Major, and Waddell — required 6,000 wagons and 75,000 oxen to move freight over the trail. Remarkable. And not the sort of thing one ever sees in schoolbooks.

There was a sign that explained that the buckboard wagon paralleled today’s station wagon or mini van. It could accommodate a family, but the seats could be removed to make room for grain bags or other supplies.

Having already done enough research on popcorn to know that C.C. Cretors would be a major part of my chapter on popcorn, I was delighted to see one of the early Cretors popcorn machines/wagons, with the little Tosty Rosty Man looking a bit the worse for wear, but still at his station, ready to turn the crank if the steam got turned on again.

Early Cretors Popcorn wagon