Flat Traveler Adventures: Atchison & Leavenworth

  Daddy was gone this past week.  Usually when he has a big trip & we aren't able to come along, we plan some nice distractions for ourselves.  We decided to spend a couple of days with Ducky and Grandma & take them with us on our field trip.  We've been pretty busy with our trips this month.  We're hosting 2 flat travelers, one from England & one from Idaho.  I love doing the flats because it really makes you an ambassador for your area.  You need to get out and show what makes your area special.  The kids have been dying to do some specific things in Atchison, and since a it's the birthplace of a notable Kansas figure - Amelia Earhart, we went for it:)
  We started out our tour of Atchison at the statue of Deafy Boular.  He's a very distant cousin of ours (I wrote a blog on him here if you're interested in him further). Aside from all he overcame, he's amazing for the fact that was featured in Ripley's Believe it or Not for laying 46,000 bricks in less than 8 hours. He laid most of the brick in the streets of Atchison.

Mookie, Shorty & Deafy (and Longneck the giraffe)

 Our next stop was the historical museum where there is a display of Deafy's boots and other Atchison memorabilia. 

Bubby checking out Deafy's boots

The kids enjoyed the museum, but they LOVED the train exhibit outside even more! Especially Shorty, they're his favorite:)

You can't beat getting to climb on and explore trains.  Just the engine was open, but getting to crawl up on the stairs and peek in the windows was a thrill in itself.
  Our next stop was Doniphan Cemetery.  We were trying to track down some ancestors (no luck), and document stones for Find A Grave (huge success).  Some of us were not quite as dedicated to the cause though...

Bubby "King of the World"

That's ok, we'll just call that part of the day PE;)
  Heading back into town, we got out and stretched our legs at the riverfront park.  Its a lovely area with some interesting historical markers.

Ducky and Mookie at the Lewis & Clark display

  Our last stop was in Leavenworth where we picked up supper and headed to the riverside railroad park.  This is a favorite stop on our way to Jamesport.

Shorty loves it because the possibility of train spotting.  We almost didn't see one, then came the distant whistle of a train.  Bubby & Mookie got into a position on a ledge where they could get a good picture of their travelers when the train passed.  It was going to be great, right by the bridge with them in a perfect spot to be safely close.  The train got closer until we could see that it only had 3 cars on it - and it was really traveling!  I snapped the shot...

and the photo op turned into one that we laughed about the rest of the way home:)

Guess Who?: Atchison

My Atchison batch + some tintypes:

W. Babberger - photographer

Conklin - photographer

Hill - photographer

J. C. Hill - photographer

Possibly a Beeson or Locker. J. M. Munn - photographer

Kleckner - photographer

Kleckner - photographer

Most likely children of Philo Mauzey.  McLeod - photographer

My tintypes:

I sincerely hope that this is my
gggg-grandma Charity Beeson (b. 1803),
but I don't know

Guess Who?: St. Joe & Atchison

These are a series of other unknowns.  Some I think I have figured out, and I can narrow down the family branch on the St. Joeseph ones, but I need to know who they are! Let me know if you can help:)

no photographer's mark,
but he looks very similar to a picture
I have of the sons of
Amos and Ally Isaacs of St. Joseph, MO

Memorial photograph.
I'm thinking this is Samuel Isaacs,
 son of Amos and Ally Isaacs

Thinking this is Ally Jane (Judah) Isaacs,
the resemblance to Ally's daughter Addie is striking

J. S. Saurman, St. Joseph - photographer

Speculating that this is either Levi or Samuel Judah,
brothers of Ally Jane (Judah) Isaacs

The only one in this post from Atchison,
he has similar features, so I included him

J. W. Souder, St. Joseph, MO - photographer

W. J. Rea, St. Joseph, MO - photographer

Field Trip Friday: Atchison

  This week we received a "guest" in the mail. Flat Darcy (a flat traveller from our Homeschool Swapping Adventures group) came to stay with us for the month.  She is from the great state of Texas.  So, since the kids & I were headed up north again this week, we decided to see a piece of famous Kansan history - Amelia Earhart's birthplace.
  My mom's family is from Atchison area.  My gggg-grandpa John McNemee settled in Atchison in 1855 when there were only 10 log cabins in town.  Atchison was a primary entry point to Kansas during territorial days and has a ton of history!  Our first stop was to eat lunch down by the Missouri River.  The city has really made this area a nice place for recreation now.  Not far from where we pulled off was an interpretive area for the Lewis & Clark Trail.

Mookie & Darcy on the Missouri River near the Lewis & Clark trail

They also had a great veterans memorial & had a piece of the section of the aft deckhouse superstructure of the battleship U.S.S. Arizona.  This thrilled Bubby to no end!  It even had a place you could actually touch it.

Next up was the birthplace of Amelia Earhart.  I was wary of attempting this because Shorty DID NOT SLEEP on the way to Atchison & so we were facing the early afternoon in a small museum with a toddler in need of a nap:/  I was so glad we followed through with our plans though.  What a beautiful house!

the kids and Darcy in front of Amelia's birthplace

I told Hubby when we got home that if someone told me I had to pack up and move to that house without prior notice I would!  It sits on the bluff overlooking the river and is beautifully restored.  Amelia lived here for approx. 10 years.  It was her grandparents' house & her father traveled alot with his job.  The two oldest kids took the self guided tour paper & walked themselves through while I chased the toddler around.  He didn't really try to get into anything, he just had to keep moving.  Mookie especially loved the house. She loved all the pretty things in it:)

Mookie's favorite room (she loved the window seats!)

I think I should have ran him up and down the back porch steps a few more times!

On the way out, I asked them if they could stand the hour and a half ride home while wet.  They thought they could, so we took an unplanned trip to the free spray park we saw on the way up to the Earhart house.  This turned out to be the highlight of the trip, you can't go wrong with kids & water!

Shorty hates being sprayed with water, but he warmed up to the idea and had a blast! 
We came home totally tired and happy:)

 

It Never Hurts to Ask

Recently, while prepping for a research trip to Atchison, my mom e-mailed the Depot museum there where our distant cousin William "Deafy" Boular's special boots have been on display too see if they were still as such.  She received a reply that they were not, but if she would ask for the curator upon her arrival, they would bring the boots out for her to see.  Awesome!  This led not only to an actual viewing of the boots, but a one on one with the curator where she could ask some questions of him as well.  She found out that if he had still had his legs, he would have been over 6 foot tall.  The museum is gearing up for another exhibit on Deafy as soon as funding allows, so I'll have to revive my research on him I suppose:)

Deafy's boots