Elmer is not Elmer, and Lyle has a bathroom brick

July 17, 2023

I rolled around town today checking out the sites. The local museum was still not open so I just cruised the neighborhoods. I must say for a small town the vast majority of properties are well cared for and attractive. Most small towns I have been through are in dire straights. The poverty in this, the wealthiest nation on earth, is sometimes striking. I know, even our poor are wealthy compared to those in most other countries. But for our nation to decline as it has over the past 30-40 years is heartbreaking.

Two years ago I rode from home to Minnesota to meet the guys for RAGBRAI. I used the Great American Rail Trail for most of that trip and this takes you through the rust belt up around Pittsburgh. The conditions there were worse than anything I have seen in the Midwest or West with the exception of some Mexican communities in Washington State. The steel industry is dead and even small factories which were at one time the main employers in many small towns are gone. The only folks making money are the bars. I don’t have the answer but it doesn’t look like anyone in our government gives a hoot.

But Creighton seems to be doing well. There is a cattle auction here and that is big business, and a small hospital. I am not sure how others are making a living but most seem to be doing well.

While cruising around I met a 90 year old gentleman,Lyle, enjoying the cool breeze beneath his shade tree. He seems to have had several entrepreneurial adventures in life including owning a storage building, a waste management business, and a landfill. He was drafted into the army where he said he served as a grunt for three years in Okinawa. He is buddies with a number of local Amish and allows them to secretly store their power tools in his shed so their lives as carpenters is a bit easier. And he acts as a go between for the Amish when local folks need help with home repairs, taking phone calls and relaying them to the Amish.

He told me the Ash Fall Fossil Bed (https://ashfall.unl.edu/) west of town is something I should go see while here and I may do that tomorrow. It’s a 38 mile round trip. The Nebraska University is apparently in charge of excavation there. I passed it coming this way a couple days but there was only a simple hand painted sign pointing the direction down a dirt road. It didn’t explain what it was or how far down that dirt road it may be, or I would have checked it out. Lyle told me when they built the visitor center there he was asked, as a local business man, to contribute by buying a brick. He said after it was complete he went to see his brick and to his amazement the lady there knew exactly where his brick lay. She took him to the men’s room where it serves as the tee off point for one of the urinals!!! I may have to ride out there just to get a picture of that!!!!

Lyle also corrected me on the name of the 92 year old gentleman with the burned out headlight I met at the park while camping. I thought his name was Elmer and told Lyle he reminded me of Elmer Fudd. Lyle thought that was pretty funny. But Elmer is really Leroy. Lyle also said that headlight has been out for years!!! Too funny to make up. When Leroy pulled into the park where I was camped he spent 10 minutes fiddling with that light and said some lady had just told him it was out. That conformed my suspicion that he was just there to see what this disheveled stinky guy on the bike was up to.

I also sampled a Berry Pepper. This is s local treat that I don’t believe exists any place else. They sell them for a buck up at the pool. It is a mix of cherry soda (pop out here), Dr. Pepper syrup, and water that is poured into a plastic cup and frozen. It is eaten like a snow ball (snow cone for you non-Baltimoreans). Oddly, it tastes like chocolate!!!! I’ll have to try it at home though I’m not sure where to get cherry pop or DP syrup.

Tomorrow…….off to see the fossils and the urinal brick.

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