John Snyder and his two daughters Tracy and Nikki were fellow guests at the Prairie Garden. They are in the middle of a little bike ride from Boston, Massachusetts to Palo Alto, California. They resumed their journey this morning.
A couple of blocks from the Prairie Garden is Sterling Lake. In 1955 the movie "Picnic" was filmed here. It starred William Holden and Kim Novak. Very pretty lake with a nice swimming pool next to it.
This guy lives on the Lake. A lady comes and feeds him everyday. The Lake is deep. It used to be a gravel pit. There are two RR box cars in it. They were accidentally dumped there. They say that they are catfish hotels.
This is down town Sterling. The corner of Broadway and Main. You just can not get more downtown than Broadway and Main.
This is my favorite restaurant in Sterling. It might be the only restaurant in Sterling.
Sterling College is a Presbyterian College founded in 1879. It has a lovely campus. The newspaper mentioned that two new English teachers were recently hired at the Sterling High School. They were both graduates of Sterling College.
I drove out to Alden. Alden is much smaller than Sterling and is about 15 miles away, This whole area is wonderful looking farmland sprinkled with oil wells.
My Mother's family and my Father's family had farms in this area. Dad and Mom met, got married, and moved to California in 1905. This is the area were they were raised. I am descended from Kansas farmers. Kansas is a lovely place. It was hot. My car thermometer said 108. I longed for cool Louisiana at only 99!
I visited the Alden Cemetery.
My Fathers parents are buried here and also a brother of my Mother. (Knowlton).
The Knowltons moved here from Michigan and the Monsons from Kentucky. I believe they were homesteaders.
Daddy, because of something I'm reading as well as our trip I have been thinking of continuity in a big picture sort of way. As in me within a family context...what came before and what is yet to come. Seeing your pictures of the grave stones, I was reminded to tell you how glad I am that I was with you in Rattlesden. I stood in the very room where Thomas Monson was baptized so long ago and which must have been the center of his family's social life. And even at that point so much had already come before and we (my family of origin and the one that I have made) are part of what were to come from that place. Thank you for making us more aware of our own heritage.
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