A bridge no more

I am glad I decided to ride through Weston Cemetery this morning because I discovered a work crew demolishing the bridge that spanned the creek. A pneumatic hammer was loosening the concrete around the iron railing, and a backhoe was lifting the freed pieces into a truck.

 The last of the south pieces is lifted away.

 Returning an hour or two later, I found that the bridge itself was under attack. One of the reasons for replacing it is that it was a choke point. It had a 3 ton weight limit, though I bet it would easily have held a lot more.

 I snapped this picture a second or two before the span collapsed.

 And this picture as taken about five seconds later.

The people who enjoy walking through Weston Cemetery will have to change their routes for a while. There will be a new bridge put in. I am not sure I will like it as much as the old bridge, which with its arch and iron railing had some charm to it.

Sunflowers

A few years ago I planted some seeds I had harvested from along the roadsides and now have some perennial sunflowers that are easily ten feet tall. After much effort, I think I have finally identified the species. My best guess is that they are Sawtooth Sunflowers (Helianthus grosseserratus). Unlike the cultivated sunflower, which is an annual, they come back every year and spread pretty aggressively.

 They have much smaller flowers and seeds. The insects like them, and after the flowers die, little birds come and eat the seeds.

 You cannot distinguish sunflowers by their flowers--they look too much alike. Instead the leaves and the stems are the key to identification. These have alternate leaves near the top and very smooth stems. The leaves are not highly serrated, but the Illinois wild flower page linked above says that they often are not.

 There are a lot of flowers that look like yellow daisies. The flower on the left is from the plants shown above. The one on the right has very different leaves.

 And if you turn them over, they look completely different.

I think I have finally identified the flower on the left. It is a False Sunflower (Heliopsis helianthoides). It is not even the same genus as sunflowers.

If you drive along the interstate, you can see lots of yellow flowers like these--they are late summer bloomers. There are also a lot of goldenrod plants in bloom. I have not attempted to identify goldenrod plants--there are way too many different kinds. Summer is drawing to a close, but there are still a few flowers that have not yet bloomed--my New England asters are not yet blooming.

Maps at the Historical Society

The Jasper County Historical Society Museum has an exhibit of maps that will run to the end of the month. For this exhibit the museum is open every Saturday from 10:00 until 1:00. If you cannot make that, you might try their monthly meeting tomorrow (Tuesday) at 6:30 pm.

Part of the exhibit is from the Indiana Historical Society and titled, "Indiana through the Mapmaker's Eye."

I found the local maps from the museum's collection more interesting. Here is an old map in which Jasper County is the biggest county in the state. Newton county as we know it today came into existence in 1859.

Below is a map of airline routes from 1953. The LCA routes in Indiana were those of Lake Central Airlines.

The museum had a guessing contest on one map. When was it published? Below is a section of the map that gives some clues to narrow the date range.

The map had ads on the sides. Where was West Side Grocery located? Rick's Pizza occupies what was once a gas station on SR 114. Was there another to the west?

I remember Arihood's Tire Market and know where the Rensselaer Locker plant used to be--the building still exists. The Planing Mill was where the laundry next to the Iroquois River is now located.

I suspect that Karch's General Store was the only store in Gifford. Kanne's is now the City Office and Pub.

The museum has a collection of old clothing and usually has some on display. These dresses were owned by Tillie Malchow who was born in 1884.

The outside window along the highway has some handcrafted farm models made by Jerry Knip, who was the owner of Jerry's Welding Service in Virgie.

Some Saturday fun

Today (Saturday) was full of fun events. The high school and middle school hosted the annual cross country invitational. Here is what the start of one of the races looked like.

While at the meet, I noticed that one of the high school gym doors was open so I peeked inside. Most of the floor seems to have been installed, except for the bit along the north wall. Although it was Saturday, men were working on the installation.

 You can see that the subfloor rests on studs. The top layer needs to be finished in some way yet. There was much less to do on the south wall.

 Saint Joe's had a home football game that it lost in the final moments. I wanted to see the band's halftime show, but it did not perform one.

Saturday evening St. Augustine School had its second annual Fall Frolic. They were blessed with ideal weather. One of the attractions for kids was a pony ride.

There was bingo for adults and the people playing looked like they were serious players, able to handle multiple cards with ease.

Back in town

I have been busy the past two weeks with family affairs, most of which took me away from Rensselaer. Driving on I-65 (Did you know that I-65 is closed in downtown Indianapolis? The closure snarls traffic on I-465.) I noticed a lot of corn is turning brown and many of the soybean fields are turning yellow. South of Rensselaer there are a couple of corn fields that have already been harvested.

Getting back to Rensselaer Friday morning, I noticed a CSX crew working on the abandoned sidings just west of the McKinley Street crossing.

You can see the new office building for the scales of the elevator in the background. I do not think it is in use yet--the door in the front open to a eight or ten foot drop.

I am not sure what the work crew did, but I was hoping that just maybe it was preparation for improving the crossing. The highway now crosses fours sets of tracks though only two are in use. Getting rid of the two sets that are no longer used would make the crossing much better.

 I stopped in the This and That Store (formerly the Store with No Name) to find out why it is closing. The owner said that the business was taking too much of his time. He will be open for a few more weeks, but there is no firm last day of business so it may make its first anniversary. The store is only open on Thursday, Friday, and Saturdays. There was still quite a bit of merchandise in the store.

 Already closed is a small store further down the sidewalk, the Mexican clothing store, Novedades Maru. It opened less than a year ago.