October, 2018 Day 9... A Certain Stretch of Indiana Road

Day 9, Saturday, October 20, 2018

      The Richmond Inn doesn’t do breakfast.  So, I ate my Cliff Bar while packing up the room and pondered my day.

  I had read about a music Walk of Fame and decided to start my day there.   I knew it was in the general area of the old Gennett Records studio, now an attorney's office.

      

     This block was once a piano factory until Gennett Records built a studio here in 1919.  The Walk of Fame celebrates some of the more famous people who recorded here including Gene Autry, Louis Armstrong, Lawrence Welk, Duke Ellington and Charlie Patton.   I never did find it.  

     I even stopped into Roscoe's, the neighborhood coffee shop.  The woman running the place didn't know where it was, either.  

     State Route 227 officially begins on this block of Fort Wayne Avenue and heads northward.  After following the signs through multiple detours and construction zones, I found myself right where I started, in front of the coffee shop.  

     Eventually, I did work it all out and picked up the state road a few blocks away.  Along with the high point, it’s one of the reasons I came to this part of Indiana in the first place.  For that, I blame my mother.

     A few years ago, I went in search of a few of the original Mason-Dixon markers.  Mom then sent me a book about how President Jefferson brought order to chaos when it came to measuring out the country as we expanded westward.

      Presidents Washington and Adams both knew something had to be done.  There was no real standards for surveying and it led to land claims and counter claims.  The country was expanding fast and it was getting crazy.  Considering we had just started putting the new government together, it was a little lower on their priority list.

      While President Jefferson was in negotiations with Napoleon Bonapart for what would eventually become known as the Louisiana Purchase, he knew the country couldn’t wait any longer.  This huge swath of land would be flooded with settlers.  The country was adding 828,000 square miles.  Something had to be done and done quickly. 

      There was a new, modern method of measurement recently developed in France.  Jefferson sent an inquiry and France sent a representative with a standard meter long metal rod, a standard kilogram weigh and a standard liter container.  The ship was diverted and the representative delayed.  Along the way, the rod, weight and container were lost.  So yes folks, Jefferson could have taken us metric. 

    Jared Mansfield was a mathematician and an astronomer.  He was one of the few to hold acclaim in both America and Europe.  Jefferson hired him as the country’s first Surveyor General and tasked him with finding a solution. 

     Mansfield first thought was to use latitude and longitude.  But, longitude lines become more narrow the further north you go.  That wouldn’t work.  Instead, he adopted a grid design.  Plots would be square and subdivided, the smallest being forty acres.  But, they would all be set. uniform sizes. 

     That brings the narrative back to State Route 227.  A few miles from the interstate, it straightens out.  Sure, it’s not exactly flat, but it’s very straight.  That’s by design. 

      Mansfield understood the borders in neighboring Ohio were uneven and sometimes seemed random..  Everything would change with Indiana.  He surveyed this stretch of road and declared it the First Meridian.  Using the standard lot sizes he had devised, he started measuring west in a methodical fashion.  State Route 227 was the eastern border of all those new lots.

     This is why when you fly over the central United States, suddenly all the farmland becomes neat, orderly squares. 

      Eventually the road ends and it was time to head into Ohio for the day.  I crossed the border near Greenville.  Many of the signs downtown refer to it as "Treaty City."  Two treaties were negotiated here with Native American tribes.  The first was in 1795.       The Treaty of Paris had ended the Revolutionary War.  Part of the treaty ceded this land to America, including what was owned by the local tribes.  Since they hadn't been part of the negotiations, these tribes felt no need to give up their land and fought back.  In what became known as the Battle of Fallen Timbers, the last of the resistance was defeated.
     Nineteen years later, the Blackhawk indians were protesting their forced movement west.  The end of what became known as the Blackhawk War was also negotiated in Greenville. 
     That’s where I picked up Hwy 36 and took it further northwest through the town of Fletcher.  Somehow, I expected something else when I randomly followed the sign for “covered bridge.”

       In Urbana, I picked up Hwy 68 northward.  It was one town after another and one empty farm field after another.  Eventually, I made my way to Bellefontaine, named for the french for “beautiful spring,” and references the numerous natural springs in the area.

     The big goal was just east of downtown, Campbell Hill, the highest point in Ohio.  It sits on a small peripheral campus of Logan County College.  On Saturdays the entrance gate is only open until 3P.   You can only access the high point during normal business hours.  Unless of course you want to hop the fence.  
     It's named after Charles Campbell, who owned the land from 1896 to 1937.

      With plenty of time, I did make a stop at a local Kroger for some supplies.  I only mention this because I had never seen peanut butter, banana and dark chocolate Clif Bars before.  Quite tasty actually, though I wouldn’t go out of my way for them. 

       Less than ten minutes later I was at the parking area for Campbell Hill.  Fifteen seconds later, I was standing over the marker, checking out the view.

      When I first booked this trip, I had booked a night here in town.  It was still pretty early and started thinking I should have booked a room another hour down the road. 

       I ditched the car in front of the Logan County Courthouse.  It’s getting spiffed up for the county’s bicentennial. 

   The road that borders the courthouse’s southern side is Court Street.  They’re very proud of it here.  It’s the first concrete street in America. 

      It’s also where I found Sweet Aroma Coffee.

     One thing you can almost always find in a coffee shop is good wifi.  I hoard the free nights from hotels.com for this very reason.  I knew it was too late to cancel and get my money back for the original reservation, but I burned a free night at Woodbridge Springs Suites on the south side of Columbus.  As it turned out, this was definitely the right move.  And the coffee was good, too.

     After changing the booking, I went off to find Bellefontaine’s other famous road, McKinley Street.  That’s it right there.

       It's that little stretch by the building.  They claim it’s the shortest road in the country. 

       I wasn’t thinking pizza again yet, but something made me wander into Six Hundred Downtown, right across from the courthouse.  While waiting for a table, I met two women who had driven fifteen miles just for their pizza.  That was good enough for me.   And yes, it was delicious.  

      Seen walking around downtown...

      Columbus is a straight fifty-five miles down Hwy 33 and an easy drive.  It cuts through the city and comes out the other side, just a few miles from the motel.   Or, you can take the interstate around.  I should have gone around.

       Hwy 33 is well marked.  But, I hit two construction detours and numerous road closures.  They were already setting up for the next morning’s marathon.  I found myself in the heart of downtown’s arena district.  The streets were filling up with people in hockey jerseys heading to the Blue Jackets game. 

      Full disclosure: I did finally break down and buy a GPS for this trip.  This is the first roadtrip I’ve had it and I didn’t want to use it unless I had absolutely no choice.  I still prefer to puzzle it out myself.  I broke it in getting out of downtown. As for the Woodspring Suites Motel.  They advertise the rooms as basic and they don’t lie.  The guy at the desk told me I got the last room.  It was certainly fine.   But seriously, when was the last time you saw one of these in a motel room?

      This is also the first place I stayed without free wifi.  There’s a charge per day.   But, considering I didn't have the extra drive in the morning, it was all good.   

   

Coming Up,
I tackle a trail named after a famous hiker you've probably never heard of.