Serpent a good trip

If you enjoy a little history, you'll like the serpent. If you don't like history, well, you'll just see an indention in the grass.

But I like history. I found the story is interesting -- the shadow of a serpent eating an egg, art developed by Native Americans several centaries ago.

There probably other intaglios once, before farming and other practices covered them up.

While some see a serpent, I actually think, from Stan Herd's painting, that it looks more like a spirit rising.

Snake in the grass

Earth depression a remnant of American-Indian civilization

Amy Bickel
The Hutchinson News
abickel@hutchnews.com

LYONS - On a hill amid the pasture, something mysterious emerges from the mixed-grass prairie. Just off U.S. 56 near the Rice County seat of Lyons is a flowing earth depression that's 160 feet long.

It's smaller than one would think, but delicate. It stands out distinctly - tightly bunched buffalo grass in the middle of knee-high prairie. Moreover, it curves in a way that at first makes one think it's just a wallow.

No, this isn't a crop circle. Aliens didn't form it.

This manmade curiosity represents an enormous serpent in the act of swallowing an egg. It is one of the best-preserved Indian carvings still around.

In Kansas, there are only two, said Janel Cook, the director of Lyons' Coronado Quivira Museum.
They call it Serpent Intaglio.

Rice County has long been known for its American-Indian artifacts. A trip to the museum shows countless arrowheads, pottery and tools from centuries ago. Several archaeological digs have occurred over the years, uncovering many of the objects.

However, the serpentine marvel might be one of the oddest finds.

Go back to a warm October day in 1917, when Miss Faye McGuire, a teacher at a one-room Rice County school, led her young students on a field trip. A boy had earlier reported finding a strange concentration of buffalo grass amid the pasture on his walk to school.

They concluded it was an upland creek. However, what they found was the remnants of another society's beliefs.

Then the indention was forgotten.

It would be 20 years later, when Robert Higgins, a Rice County farm boy, would notice the depression while working cattle. He was convinced it wasn't natural.

He pressed for answers.

Clark Mallam, a college professor, researched it in 1982 and 1983. He died of a brain tumor a few years later, Cook said.

That's just one more quirk some folks attribute to the serpent, Cook said.

What is generally accepted fact is that Wichita Indians dug the serpent around the year 1200,
Cook said. They removed the topsoil, which is why buffalo grass grows prolifically instead of the mixed grasses of the county.

She said there were probably some religious ceremonies associated with the earthwork. Three sites of villages lie northward, and oddly enough, line up with the serpent's outline.

The serpent image had some significance to the people, maybe representing the renewal of life, she said. The serpent could be a calendar, as well as an instrument for determining seasonal cycles.

Cook makes the trip to the site several times a year with visitors. The tour includes nearby Indian petroglyphs, then the Serpent Intaglio.

The scene from the top of the hill is beautiful, Cook notes.

The mystery might never be fully known.

There is one thing Cook does know.

"It's survived centuries," she said. Copyright (c) 2008, The Hutchinson Publishing Co.

If you haven’t been to Beal Orchard in Harper County, you should go.

If only for nostalgia purposes.

The trip was great. The peaches were wonderful. There is even a little place in Harper where they serve the best shakes.

Called the Country Creamery, owner Jim said a couple families have come by on a cross country journey in search for the best shake.

He said a few months later, he received a letter, saying after the vote, Country Creamery was the winner.

I had a shake here, and I’ll admit it was great. Thick and creamy!

Going to the country, going to eat a lot of peaches

HARPER - A cardboard box in hand and sweat beading from her brow on this 100-degree day, Lesley Wedman plucked crisp peaches from the rows of trees drooping from the weight of the succulent fruit. Sure, a trip to the grocery store would have been quicker and cooler, she said.

However, Wedman wants an experience.

"You don't get the full experience at the grocery store," she said as she stood in flip-flops and a tank top amid a grove of the Crest Haven variety. "You earn your peach out here. It makes you appreciate it."

Wedman is part of a burgeoning trend among Kansans wanting to see firsthand where their food is grown and meet the people who grow it.

So, for about two months every year, hundreds of people from as far away as Wichita and Hutchinson walk through the Beal Orchard in Harper County searching for the plumpest, best-tasting peaches they can find. They bring their kids. They bring their wallets. They roam amid 25 acres of fruit trees in the middle of nowhere.

The closest town is Harper, Kan., population 1,400 - a town with a big red fish atop its water tower; a town that has declined by more than 100 people in the past six years.
Steve Beal knows this fact all too well. It's part of his goal - to revitalize the place he calls home.

"We are all awfully aware of the decline of these rural areas," he said as he drove a golf cart through a grove of nectarine trees. "We want to get people out here."

This is part of the reason his little business has magnified from 250 trees 10 years ago to nearly 3,000 these days. There are 35 varieties of peaches and three varieties of nectarines.

"It's kind of like a 4-H project that got out of control," Beal said with a laugh.
Beal, a wheat and cattle farmer by trade, retired, selling the machinery a decade ago and planting peach trees.

"Now I'm busier than I was when I was farming," he said.
Beal, however, doesn't mind the few thousand people who swarm into his farm each year. He doesn't mind the fact that he spends countless days mowing, pruning and picking fruit.

"We like to eat peaches," his granddaughter Hannah Moss said, noting that the best part is driving the cart.

Beal loves the people.

They want a peek into the past - young and old, rural and urban, Beal said.

"The only thing that has changed is we are using golf carts instead of tractors and wagons to haul people around," he said, then smiled.

"It's peaceful, you know."

He also knows he is helping the little town of Harper.

After a few hours of picking, Beal tells his customers to go to town to The Country Creamery for home-cooked food and ice cream and a little nostalgia - the restaurant is in an old gas station.

"It's amazing how many people come to Harper because of the peaches," said owner Jim Konkel.

Some come with their children or grandchildren. Some are from out of state, some from urban areas like Wichita. Others are locals.

And they keep coming - despite the temperatures soaring on a sticky August day, or the drive.

"It's family time," Darla Schreck, of Wichita, said as she gripped the hand of 16-month-old Noah.

Her two older children, Elliott, 7, and Drew, 4, had run ahead with their father and their grandparents. "It's a fun thing for the whole family to do."

Plus, there are plenty of things one can make out of peaches.

"I might make a six-peach tart when I get home," she said.

If you go
What: Beal Orchard
Where: About a mile north of Harper on Road 100.
Miles from Hutchinson: 65
Miles from Dodge City: 140
What it includes: A fruit stand of apples and peaches, pick-your-own peaches. There are 35 peach varieties, including standards like Red Havens, Little Havens and Crest Havens; heirlooms like Lorings and Red Skins, and new varieties such as Saturns.
Hours: 7:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. seven days a week until mid-September.
Other activities around Harper County: At Harper, see the red fish on top of the 1886 stand-pipe water tower. For food or treats, stop at The Country Creamery.
At Anthony, visit Irwin-Potter Drug for a soda at its 1950s fountain, or eat at Ken's Diner, a 10-stool Valentine diner.
At Attica, one tombstone in the cemetery states a Republican message against the Democratic Party. Copyright (c) 2008, The Hutchinson Publishing Co.

Eisenhower still making town proud

Amy Bickel
The Hutchinson News
abickel@hutchnews.com

ABILENE - At age 8, Nick Brummer was in awe as he stared down at the marble slab marking the remains of a former president.

"Is this really where he's buried?" the Rossville boy asked his grandmother, Laura Lohmeyer, who nodded quietly.

Although the generation that knew Dwight D. Eisenhower as a victorious general and likable president is aging, the place that bears his name is seeing a revival of interest.

One of the greatest sources of pride for Abilene - which also enjoys a place in history as a cattle-trail town of the Old West and the first stop for Wild Bill Hickok as a lawman - is that Eisenhower never forgot his hometown, and that he chose it for the site of the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum.

It's here, amid 22 acres on the southern edge of Abilene, that a collection of buildings surround his boyhood white-frame home.

This includes the library, which houses the presidential papers and other research resources, a museum, a visitors' center and the meditation chapel where the former president and his wife, Mamie, and their 3-year-old son, Doud, are buried.

Today, the Old West town in central Kansas with a population of 6,543 serves as a commercial and agricultural trade center where visitors can taste chocolate at a Russell Stover's factory or see the birthplace of Duckwall-ALCO retail stores. It's like any small Kansas community, where freshly cut wheat fields surround the outskirts, and grain elevators are the tallest buildings.

Abilene might seem like the most unlikely place for a presidential library, but still no one can forget Ike.

"This presidential library is located in Ike's hometown, and to me that is so important because when you come here to the museum or you come here to do research, you also need to take into account this is Abilene, Kan.," said Karl Weissenbach, the center's director. "No one else can claim a five-star general who led a national force in a world war, was a world hero by 1945 - a man with worldwide name recognition who became a two-term president."

Like every presidential library, Eisenhower's depicts pictures of a great man. Here he is as a boy, playing baseball for Abilene High School. Another is of a kid in overalls, posing with his elementary school class. Years later, he waves to a crowd of Abilene residents in the wee hours of the morning of June 24, 1945, not long after the war ended.

The museum is a time capsule. A few of the items include:

* A high-security letter written by Eisenhower marking the end of World War II.

* Notes from his diary in which he wrote on Jan. 4, 1942, "Tempers are short. There are lots of amateur strategists on the job and prima donnas everywhere. I'd give anything to be back in the field."

* The Plaza Theater marquee, where Eisenhower announced in 1952 that he would run for president, as well as a 1950s living room, campaign signs and a video of Eisenhower in action.

* The suit he wore when he took his oath of office, as well as Mamie's second inaugural gown.

* His golf clubs and a scorecard showing Eisenhower shooting an 84.

Those are just a few of the thousands of relics. Even Mamie's wedding dress from their 1916 wedding is on display, as well as a piece of the couple's wedding cake.

Besides the museum, there is the library and a statute of Ike in his military uniform standing in front of five pillars depicting his five-star ranking.

Abilene is Eisenhower, and Eisenhower is Abilene, Weissenbach said.

"His legacy here continues," he said. "Not just here at the library, but throughout the community of Abilene."

After all, Abilene couldn't be prouder of its native son, Weissenbach said.

More than 20,000 people turned out to welcome Ike home June 24, 1945. There was a parade through town and a rally at the city park, now named Eisenhower Park.
Ike told his townsfolk, "The proudest thing I can claim is that I am from Abilene."

Fast facts

Eisenhower graduated from Abilene High School in 1909.
In 1955, Eisenhower signed the presidential library act that established the current Presidential Library System.
The Eisenhower Presidential Library contains 26 million manuscripts, most of which reflect his life and presidency.
It is the only presidential library with five buildings. Most have just one or two.
The Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum is one of the "8 Wonders of Kansas."
Displays at the museum
Through Thursday: "School House to the White House: The Education of the Presidents." The display shows the original grade cards, pictures and other school memorabilia of Presidents Hoover through Clinton.
Through Oct. 15: "Ike and Baseball" includes the original correspondence between Eisenhower and famous major league players, photographs and recently released Secret Service reports.
7:30 p.m. Sept 9: A lecture by Marlin Fitzwater titled "Growing Up in Abilene and White House Stories I Tell my Friends."
Sept. 16: Jay Hakes, director of the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum, delivering a lecture for his new book, "A Declaration of Energy Independence: How Freedom from Foreign Oil Can Improve National Security, Our Economy and the Environment."

If you go

What: The Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum
Where: Abilene
Miles from Hutchinson: 91
Cost: Adults 16 to 61, $8; Adults 62 and older, $6; children 8 to 15 years, $1; children 7 and under, free.
Eisenhower sites: Mr. K's Farmhouse, formally known as Lena's the hilltop restaurant hosted President Eisenhower; Eisenhower's parents, David and Ida, are buried in Abilene Cemetery; a statue of "little Ike" accents the corner of Northwest Third and Spruce in downtown Abilene; Union Pacific Station, where visitors can sample sugar cookies made form Mamie Eisenhower's recipe.
Other sites in Abilene: Old Abilene town, Russell Stover; Seelye Mansion, Lebold Mansion, Greyhound Hall of Fame, Brookville Hotel.

Go Ike!

I'd like to think I'm six degrees removed from a president.

My grandpa had an old truck with an "I like Ike sticker on it."

My grandmother graduated from Abilene High School about 20 years after the famed president.

So, the one-tank trip to Eisenhower's native Abilene was a great experience. I had no idea how much this little Dickinson County town has to offer.

There's a library and a great museum. There's the home he grew up in and a chapel where he is buried.

The museum tells of his life, from birth to death. Even his golf clubs are on display.

I figure it could take at least a half day to get through the museum and everything. But there's more to see in Abilene than Eisenhower's Presidential Library.


Go to the Kirby House for a nice meal. Stop by downtown Abilene for some shopping. There's old Abilene town, gunfighting and all. A train will take you on a trip to Enterprise and back.

This town has a chocolate factory, is home to Duckwall-Alco, has a big Pizza Hut.

Oh, and there are a couple of mansions, which gets me back to the six-degrees of separation.

My grandfather ran a store in Kipp, Kan. He said Seeyle, the former owner of the Seeyle Mansion, would sell him medicine. He even had some of the old bottles. I bet Seeyle knew Eisenhower or someone in the Eisenhower line.

Or my grandmother might have known someone who knew someone.

Should you go? Yes.

I grew up in Gypsum, population around 400 people. The tiny Saline County town doesn't have much -- a hardware, a gun store and a part-time gas station.

We do have a red sign on the edge of town proclaiming our only claim to fame: Steve Fritz.

I don't personally know Steve. I know his dad, Pee Wee, who runs the part-time gas station and who fixed my green Ford pickup numerous times. Faded, on the side of the old Phillip's 66 station, is a tribute to his son and the town's people who supported him in the 1996 Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta.

Steve competed in the Dan O'Brien era -- you know, the guy in the Dave and Dan commercials. He narrowly missed an Olympic bronze, instead finishing fourth.

No medal, but still, how cool is that.

So earlier this week, when I took a one-tank trip to the Kansas Sports Hall of Fame, I wasn't surprised to see Steve's Olympic warm up, or pictures of him on display. He's just one of Kansas' athletic greats -- along with Barry Sanders, Lynette Woodard, Wes Santee and Thane Baker.

On a side note, I was so excited to get to interview two Olympic greats, Thane and Wes were overly nice. And to reiterate what they told me, they recommend a trip to the hall of fame.

So do I.