Bear wants to see
the Buddy Holly Center. Bloodroot wants to see the Wind Power Museum. Of course
we can tour both of these places in an hour. Right? Duh, Jody, make a decision.
I decide on the Wind Power Museum as I fear the dreaded ear worms, songs I
can’t get out of my head, emanating from Buddy Holly. I can’t bring any Buddy
Holly songs to mind but I’m certain that once I heard any Buddy Holly song, it
would spin in my head forever. Keith drops us off at the Wind Power Museum and
disappears, driving over to the Buddy Holly Center.
At
the Wind Power Museum, Bloodroot and I have our own personal guide. We learn
that wind brings power—power we don’t think of back East and that windmills
have been fundamental to Texans since the first settlements. We find a
surprisingly environmental attitude at the heart of this museum in rural Texas,
as our guide hugely supports the necessity of wind power in Texan history. “The
industrial revolution,” he intones, “has its origins in the mill races used in
Europe to grind corn (grain). Grain came first but remember that all ideas and
inventions build upon the previous ideas and inventions.”
To wit—in 1606,
the Governor of Virginia built the first US windmill, again to grind grain. It
resembled a Dutch mill, but while Dutch mills remained stationary this one
rotated on a post, spinning about to catch the wind.
Innovation in wind
power moved west with the nation. With our near constant wind, windmills could
be used to pump water, but never in a steady stream. The water spurts out as
the gears spin around, reminding me of a hit-and-miss engine.
Windmills in Texas
evolved with tails, looking rather like weathervanes, which would push the
whole contraption into the wind. Later tails could fold up or fan out depending
on the wind pressure. To catch the wind, a windmill’s blades would rotate a bit
on their axes, presenting a larger surface for times of little wind. When the
wind became too fierce, these same tails would flatten out the blades entirely,
letting the wind pass through. A windmill without the ability to open and close
would have blown itself to pieces in the force of the plains’ winds.
We also learned a
bit about the first chain of restaurants that sprang up alongside the first
trains. Railroad steam engines could travel forty miles before needing more
water, leading the railroads built windmill powered pumping stations for water
every forty miles. Towns began to grow up around the windmills where the trains
would stop. Sensing economic potential, a man named Fred Harvey cut a deal with
the railroads and began selling food in chain restaurants at the train stops.
He hired women—the young, chaperoned, now famous “Harvey Girls.” Perhaps for the
first time, women safely reveled in the freedom born of escaping the
restrictions of the East, earning decent money and traveling somewhere distant
on their own.
As Western
settlement progressed, windmills dotted the landscape. So, we learn, the
country grew up with the power provided for free by the wind. We had only to
harness it.
I remember dad’s
family stories of Williston, North Dakota and his disgust that, “we didn’t even
have electric.” But they had two windmills. One windmill pumped water while
another on the roof produced electricity on demand for my grandfather’s radio.
Family lore avers that when grandfather Andrew switched on the electric
windmill atop the shanty, the roof sounded as though it would fly off any
second.
FDR brought
electricity to the masses via the REA (Rural Electrification Authority). Local
co-ops sprang up across the country. Everyone now had electricity and the
windmills faded into western dreams. When I picture old farms, I always see a
windmill pumping water in the background. Think Dorothy Gale!
Now, of course, we
have huge new windmills dotting the land, spinning when demand rises,
explaining the silence of so many windmills. The mills start up as needed.
 |
| Per Bloodroot "My parents before they were eaten by windmills." |
We take some
photos of ourselves by the numerous windmills as Bear returns from the Buddy
Holly Center, a museum he thoroughly enjoyed. The Center has huge Buddy Holly
glasses out front. Many country musicians hail from this area. The museum
celebrates the music of Lubbock and west Texas including Waylon Jennings, Roy Orbison,
Bobby Keyes, Tanya Tucker, Joe Ely, Butch Hancock, the Gatlin brothers, Jimmy
Dale Gilmore, and Delbert McClinton. Is there a desperation in the soil that
drives so many to the uncertain career of flickering fame? Are there no other
jobs? No other way out?
The town
constructed the museum in the old train station—in Bear’s opinion, the best
repurposing of an old train station ever. I vehemently disagree. “What about
the Orsay?” I counter. (The Musee d’Orsay, an amazing impressionism museum, is
housed in the old Art Nouveau Orleans train station in Paris.) “Okay, okay,”
says Bear, accepting defeat, “the best repurposing in the United States.”
We pile into the
car and head north to Amarillo. We stop at the Palo Duro Canyon, our original
plan for today. Amidst the endless North Texas cotton fields, a vast Canyon
opens. Pearl takes a road that goes down, down, down. “Am I driving to Hades?”
the classically trained van asks.
We arrive at the
Canyon around 2 PM. At the visitor center, we learn that Palo Duro was the site
of the Comanches’ and Quanah Parker’s last stand in 1874. We’ve obsessed on
Quanah Parker since reading Empire of the
Summer Moon, a most excellent book all about the Comanches. In our travels,
we have often sought Quanah, but have come up empty-handed. Here we finally
strike gold and read all about his final military defeat, another point in the
closing of the western frontier.
Next, the exhibits
cover the geography of the Canyon featuring the various rock layers. I’m
ashamed to say that I don’t remember a thing.
The CCC (Civilian
Conservation Corps) built the road down to the canyon floor—two companies of
blacks and two of whites. The CCC, a famous New Deal program started during the
Depression, originally planned to hire 18 to 25 year-old men. Soon the program
expanded to include World War I veterans. The men lived in military barracks,
obeyed military rules, worked forty hours a week, and attended mandatory education
classes.
The Corps built
the visitor center into the cliff using carefully matched rock. Today people
drive by it unwittingly because it blends so well with the natural surroundings.
Loading ourselves
back into Pearl, we leave the visitor center and head for the bottom of the
canyon. We cook a picnic lunch. Keith and Bloodroot leave at 4 PM for a 6-mile
hike out on Lighthouse Trail.
I read. I watch
the sun illuminate different stripes of rock layers, wishing I had retained
some knowledge from the visitor center. The multihued canyon changes color suddenly
and repeatedly as the afternoon wanes. I wonder if the boys will have enough
sense to turn around before night falls. As the evening approaches, the light
accentuates the different rock formations.
The boys wisely return
around six. They speak of encountering the biggest mass of bluebirds they’d
ever seen. They also met a couple lugging plein air supplies to paint out in
the canyon, creating beautiful paintings in which they justifiably took great
pride. The artists argue between themselves as to whether they found hauling
all the supplies worthwhile.
Reunited, we pack
up and direct Pearl to our last hotel, this one a mere thirty minutes distant in
South Canyon, Texas. Tomorrow, our final feat, we face a seven-hour journey
home.
