The church of my childhood, and some of my adulthood, is closing it's doors this year. The scheduled date of the last service was set for April 26th, but that was before the Corona Virus made itself known. Now the last service will be sometime in the future, but no one knows when.
The other thing delayed is the sale of the buildings to another congregation - one that is very excited to take the keys. As our moderator of this church has noted, the sale will be delayed for a while until everyone concerned is able to discover their financial status - temporary lack of individual income being a primary concern for many.
So, for many months now, I have been hauling home, sorting through, and discarding or scanning documents in a preservation project about the history of the church.
I have over 8000 scans as of today and most of them are posted online. There are several hundred photographs yet to be scanned, and the same number of newsletters, next to the desk, awaiting their turn in the scanner. And there are stacks and stacks of other papers which may or may not be scanned. You can take a look here, if you are in the least bit interested: mbcc
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While we are all homebound - pretty much anyway - I have realized an awful truth. The libraries are closed; the bookstores are closed; the thrift store book shelves are closed. No New Reading Material! I generally read a few books a week and sometimes more. That means I have scoured my own shelves to see what I haven't read in a while. There are books I save for winter reading, or for summer reading, or for tired-of-doing-chores reading. I guess I will go through them one at a time.
First up is my collection of books by Alan Bradley, the Flavia de Luce stories.
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While we cannot go many places these next few weeks, we can get out for drives in the country. And we have. On a recent sunny Sunday - April 5th - Mom and I took a tour of eastern Oklahoma County. Two hours out of town on country roads.
We travelled east on 10th Street, intending then to go north on Luther Road, since the town of Luther would be our first sightseeing stop. Turns out you can't go that far because of the construction of the new highway out that direction. So we jogged north on Triple X Road to 23rd Street, then east again to Luther Road. We turned back north, and drove - and drove - for miles. No wonder I hadn't been to Luther before. It was a long drive there - at least long for an afternoon jaunt.
Here are some of the things we saw:
A coach car off on a siding. It has been there many years. Railroad tracks run through many - make that most - Oklahoma towns and one runs through Luther, but I was really surprised to see this car. Did passenger trains run through such a small town once upon a time? Or did someone fancy having a car like this and brought it to Luther just because?
Sundays are often quiet in small towns; virus restrictions make them even more quiet. This is the main street, I guess. There seem to be two such streets, and I couldn't figure out which was the mainest.
Farmstead Cafe / 116 South Main
Farm to Table / Live. Real. Simple / Market / Bakery/ Cafe
Luther is an old town by Oklahoma standards. Here's a brief history: Luther
Old sandstone walls, modern venting.
An empty church on a Sunday.
Having seen most of what was interesting in Luther, we headed back south on Hogback Road. Aptly named, it twists and turns it's way to Jones, Oklahoma.
I know you're not supposed to copy, whole-hog, an article from the Internet, but if I give it credit where due, maybe I can get away with it. Here's the story of Hogback Road from the other direction:
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A Ride On
Hogback Road by Ellie Posey, published January 27, 1983, Daily Oklahoman
Question: What's straight
in the middle and curvy on both ends?
Answer: Hogback Road.
The Hogback Road section
of old County Highway No. 1 is only eight miles long and for most of its
length, runs along the top of a ridge.
It's the shortcut between
Jones and Luther and a natural extension of the Spencer-Jones Road.
To find Hogback Road from
downtown Oklahoma City, travel east of I-35 on NE 23 for five miles to Spencer
Road. Turn north and follow the road through Spencer. On the north side of
town, Spencer Road changes its name to Spencer-Jones Road. On the east side of
Jones, it becomes Hogback Road.
Steve Richardson,
Oklahoma County District 1 Road Supervisor, said he has been told the road was
called Hogback because the farmers in that area used the road on top of the
ridge to take their hogs to market.
"There is a real
good view of Oklahoma City on Hogback Road from just outside Jones,"
Richardson said. "On a clear day there is a good view."
Most city folks don't
know Hogback Road exists. Residents, lawmen and outlaws in eastern Oklahoma
County have known about it for years.
Some say it's used by
those who hope to evade the long arm of the law. Hogback Road crosses over
Turner Turnpike and getting from one to the other is relatively easy for the
less than lawful. In a few places, only a hogwire fence limits access to the
four-lane toll road.
Farther along, where
Luther becomes the northern terminus of Hogback Road, U.S. 66 opens several
avenues of escape.
But a drive along the
road is, in itself, an escape. Hogback Road is a time capsule with echoes of
the days of cheap gasoline and Sunday afternoon outings in the family sedan.
There are things to see: a
small dairy farm, a combination grocery store-gas station, a bait shop and the
red rock walls which once formed a house. There is a small, white church. A
naked bulb hangs above a sign over the door. Its black stenciled letters
announce "Welcome."
The date on the
cornerstone reveals the First Baptist Church of Douglas was built in 1949. It
seems deserted except for a choir of dried seed pods on the trees in front of
the church. They rustle and sing in the wind.
A row of seven mailboxes
stands on the berm of the road. They seem alike at first glance. Closer
inspection reveals six plain boxes and a decorator model.
Still another is a large
economy size for holding packages as well as letters and magazines. A third has
an ornate name plate bracket.
Four are mounted on
bark-covered posts and one, belonging to "Zuck," stands secure on two
braced post-legs.
As Luther's new white
water tower comes into view, the journey on Hogback Road ends. It's a pleasant
drive and for those with time to stop along the way and admire the view, there
are some surprises.
A bright spot of red in a
tree looked to be a Christmas bauble. Then, the bauble spread
its wings and turned into a cardinal. Archive
ID: 105816
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Redbuds in full bloom on Hogback Road
Jones, Oklahoma, was our next town for sightseeing.
It appears a bit more prosperous than Luther. They have a lovely park alongside the road. A fisherman was on the far side of the pond-lake (bigger than one, smaller than the other) and walkers on the trail around the far side. I wish we had brought a lunch, or had thought to stop and have something from our snack bag. Next time.
This curiosity was along Hogback Road, between Jones and Spencer. The abandoned and run-down building nearby was either a garage at one time, or a car lot. Hard to tell which.
As we neared Spencer, we had a "Cemetery Alert!". That's what I used to call out when my husband and I were driving the backroads. He would usually stop and we would explore. Since Mom can't easily walk that far on uneven ground, I did the exploring on my own.
Oaklawn Memorial Gardens, Spencer, Oklahoma
The grounds are nicely kept.
When I got home, I looked it up on Find a Grave. FaG says there are over 900 burials there (I wouldn't have known it from the markers I could see) but that only 42 percent of them are photographed. I wonder why? Are there too many markers that have sunken and are no longer able to be found? Are there many burials with no markers at all? Is there just not anyone interested in photographing the markers?
Find a Grave provided an automated list of those burials that don't have a grave photo. I made a copy. One of these days I might just walk around there and see if I can find an answer to the puzzle. In the meantime I photographed these three, which someone has already posted on Find a Grave.
Back on the trail south, we came to the Llama farm in Spencer. These critters were close at hand for a portrait.
And so, back home again - full of sights of all kinds.
