Continuing west on US-56, we drove through Scranton (population: 724). Not much was going on…

One building of note: a former Methodist church converted to a garage (you can just make out the big roll-gates on the right):

Across the street was this abandoned gas station, and I was really intrigued by the sign on the left: ENTER IF YOU DARE. I was all set to tempt fate when I noticed the Halloween decorations on the right, and realized it all must have been left over from last year’s haunted house:

Equally deserted but far more charming was the frozen-in-time main street of Osage City. Once an important stop on the Santa Fe trail, Osage City’s Santa Fe Avenue was built large enough for a team of oxen to make a full u-turn:

A row of stores:

Despite all three stores being closed, the buildings are all in really excellent shape:

I believe a lawyer actually works in the storefront on the far corner…

And yes, he has this simple wooden sign hanging just above the door:

The old garage – again, out of business, but you’d never know it from the outside:

We stopped in the Crossroads Canteen for lunch (located in a former bank building), and found we had finally escaped the stranglehold of Boar’s Head meat products. Hooray! Our sandwiches were great, and I recommend stopping in if you ever pass through.

An ancient wall ad for 5-cent cigars:

This very odd tree stump was planted just in front:

Our appetites sated, we hit the road again…

When we weren’t seeing this out the window…

We were seeing this:

Every other farm seemed to have these silhouette figures set up on their hilltops.

Next up was Council Grove, a bustling little town compared to pretty much every one we’d been through since leaving Kansas City. One of the last stops on the Santa Fe trail heading south-west, Council Grove has a number of roadside history stops, like this reconstructed cowboy jail:

My favorite bit from the below jail history sign: “Jack the Peeper was shot while trying to escape after terrifying the town for months.”

So many questions arise from this odd fact: Who was Jack the Peeper? Why was his peeping so terrifying? Can you really peep for two months straight without getting caught? And as bad as peeping is, did he really deserve to be shot? The heavy gate that once held Jack the Peeper and others:

The last known privately-owned rail station in the US:

Council Grove has two very famous tree stumps, which has to be a record of some sort. The first is Council Oak, an oddly-designed monument (the stump of a tree and a hanging cross-section covered in a 1970’s-orange metal tent):

In 1825, when Council Oak was a towering tree, an important treaty was signed with the local Osage tribe beneath it allowing passage through their land, thereby establishing the Santa Fe trail.

A little ways down the road, we found the Post Office Oak, which has to be the first tree I’ve ever seen with its own umbrella. According to legend, Santa Fe Trail travelers heading west would leave letters in a hole on the oak, to be carried to the nearest post office by travelers heading east.

US-56 then brought us through downtown Council Grove. Though it has its share of tourist shops, Council Grove appears to have a relatively thriving life of its own, which was nice to see.

We got a great milkshake from The Apothecary (blue)…

…which still has a little soda fountain counter…

…as well as its old apothecary shelves and drawers:

Across the street, Hays House claims to be the oldest continuously operating restaurant west of the Mississippi:

A beautiful corner bank building:

The Cottage House – a cute little hotel just off Main Street (though, er, read the reviews before staying here):

Council Grove also has a branch of the awesomely-named Duckwall’s, a chain of discount stores operating in Midwestern areas lacking a Walmart:

Council Grove is home to another great (sadly, out of business) Midwestern movie theater: The Stella. Opened in 1918, it hosted live musicals and theater productions, as well as silent films. Its last film was shown in 1999. A man purchased the property in 2003, saying he would give it away for FREE (!) to anyone willing to spend the $400,000 in repairs needed to save it. Any takers?

Back on the road, the sky suddenly turned ominous, and within minutes, we were in the middle of a deluge:

Luckily, the storm passed within about twenty minutes, a common occurrence, we would learn, for storms in the midwest. This is the first time I’ve ever looked out and seen an isolated rainstorm (raining on the right, clear on the left):

Finally, the skies cleared and it was sunny again! All that remained from the storm was this one grumpy-looking cloud hanging significantly lower than the ones above:

We then pulled into Kinsley, Kansas, notable for one important fact: we were exactly halfway between New York and San Francisco! We rejoined with US-50, and gunned toward Dodge City, where we were planning to spend the night.

Finally, as we were leaving Kinsley, we passed by an enormous field of wind turbines. Noticing a friendly information plaque in a parking lot adjacent to the field, we pulled over and got out to have a look…

Suddenly, swarms of quarter-sized mosquitoes rose up out of the field and began attacking us! We ran back to the car and rolled up the windows, then spent a good ten minutes killing the ones that had managed to get in the car. I didn’t get a chance to take a picture of the friendly wind turbine information booth, but to whoever put it there…

…thanks.

-SCOUT

I’ll come clean: I’m really embarrassed to admit that, prior to arriving this morning, I thought Kansas City was in Kansas, when in fact it’s in Missouri. Hence, my celebrations at finally reaching Kansas turned out to be a bit premature (thanks to commenters below, I’ve now learned that Kansas City actually exists in both Missouri and Kansas, with the river as the dividing line; I don’t remember any of this mentioned in my 3rd grade US geography class!).

We didn’t have much time to spend in KC, so we drove around the downtown, passing by what appeared to be a great old theater (the first of many we were to encounter as we headed west):

An old warehouse – not especially notable…

…except for this great, very simple sign:

Old Westport seemed to be the destination in town that draws tourists, so we headed that way – passing this really interesting building at the corner of Westport and Main:

Awesome clocktower:

Across from it was an office building…

…covered in very whimsical, ornate patterns. I especially love how rays of light from the lamps are integrated into the design:

Another theater that is no more – the Warwick, which opened in 1912 and could seat 1,022 customers on two floors. It closed in 1953 and now appears to be vacant:

After taking a few wrong turns, we finally found it: Historic Old Westport! Westport was originally settled in 1831 and incorporated in 1857, and thrived as a supply center for migrants taking the Oregon, California, Santa Fe, and Lewis & Clark trails.

Westport was eventually annexed by Kansas City in 1897. Below, the oldest building in Kansas City is the Albert Boone store, once an outfitter for wagon trains during the 1800’s. Today, it’s a bar:

However, as interesting as all this might be, I will forever remember Old Westport for one thing: the home of the one and only Burger Mobile:

Though I’ve never seen another Burger Mobile to compare it to, I really can’t imagine a more perfect rendering:

The Burger Mobile was clearly superior to our Hyundai Accent, and we were shamed to park behind it.

A dusty marker identifying the Santa Fe trail outside the Westport Flea Market bar:

I really hate malls, and the idea of making a detour to visit a mall on a roadtrip is akin to blasphemy…But we had to make an exception to see Country Club Plaza, the very first mall in the world. When we turned the corner and found ourselves on the streets of Seville, Spain, I have to admit that it was not what I was expecting.

To be specific, Country Club Plaza is the very first shopping center in the world designed for customers arriving by car. When developer J. C. Nichols began buying land in a remote area for the purpose, he was ridiculed, and the project was referred to as Nichols’ Folly. Today, it covers 55 acres and is home to a number of upscale stores and restaurants.

Best of all is the architecture, which could be described as Seville by way of Epcot. A Barnes and Noble:

Below is Giralda tower, the tallest building in the shopping complex…

…half the size of its original in Seville:

(photo by Flickr user Rob Shenk)

Country Club Plaza features over 30 murals, tile mosaics, and fountains. Rather than rely on the typical sprawling mall parking lot, parking garages are hidden behind shops, or on top of roofs.

Detail above a door – if only this style of mall had caught on:

Another tower – note the weathervane, as well as tilework on the clock face:

Moorish arches on a Sears:

Tiles outside Starbucks:

This was outside Starbucks as well. At first, I thought the boy was peeing on a frog. Then I realized the frog is spitting on the boy. I’m not sure which is weirder:

One of many tile mosaics on the sides of shops:

That was all the time we had for Kansas City, and we headed west to rejoin our route. Because US-50 mirrors Interstate-35, we decided to follow our guide’s advice and take US-56, ultimately rejoining with 50 in Kinsley, Kansas.

We came to Baldwin City, home to Baker University (notable alumni: the founders of Panda Express). We detoured to drive through their small but charming main drag…

This City Hall building is as classic as they come. I half-expected Jimmy Olson to run out with his latest scoop from the mayor’s office.

Parmenter Hall – the first building built on Baker University’s campus, constructed of native sandstone.

In between towns, we again found ourselves traveling past endless farmland. One in particular…

A closer look:

Looks like we’re finally in Kansas!

-SCOUT

We cruised into St. Louis in the late morning. At this point, US-50 has merged with the Interstate.

We only had a few hours to spend, so of course, the first matter of business was to see the Arch. We were about to Google Map it on my iPhone when we realized it actually wasn’t going to be that hard to find…

We parked the car in a nearby lot and walked to the base. And hey – it’s an arch!

The Gateway Arch (a symbolic gateway to the west) was built between 1963 and 1965, and opened to the public in 1967. At 630 feet, it’s the tallest monument in the United States. Its exterior is covered in a stainless steel skin, and a pod-shaped tram brings visitors to an observation deck at its peak.

Unfortunately, the line for the elevator was ridiculously long, so we had to be content admiring it from the ground. Also, we were excited to note that we had finally arrived at the Mississippi River! Unfortunately, it had apparently flooded, and fences prevented us from getting close to it to do the out-of-towner hand-in-the-new-body-of-water ritual.

Riding along the riverfront, we stumbled on the Union Electric Light & Power Company building, which is one of the most beautiful industrial buildings I’ve ever seen.

It seemed deserted when we were there, but at least one website claims parts of it are still functional. Sort of reminds me of the Joker’s lair in the first Tim Burton Batman film.

I love the writing under the roof peaks:

The second:

From downtown, we then made our way to the Benton Park neighborhood, home to a number of now abandoned breweries/factory buildings and the grand residences of their former owners. Walking down a typical street, it’s not unusual to see a factory smokestack in the distance…

…then turn a corner and stumble on a beautiful house like the Chantillon De-Menil Mansion.

One in particular we were interested in visiting was the Lemp Mansion, now operating as a restaurant and occasional hotel:

The Lemp family, owners of a now vacant brewery just down the street (below picture), had a strange number of suicides in their history, one of which occurred in the mansion. It’s now said to be one of the most haunted sites in America, and large numbers of tourists flock to it to eat full fried chicken dinners and perhaps see a ghost.

I’d love to show you pictures of the interior and recommend it for future trips to St. Louis, but unfortunately, we never had the chance to go inside. We were sitting in our car eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in the parking lot when an employee came out and told us the manager had wanted us to leave. So we did.

Next, we headed north-west and saw one of my favorite stops on the trip thus far: this enormous pile of rocks in the back of a parking lot.

This isn’t just any ordinary 3-story pile of rocks, however; buried beneath it are untold amounts of nuclear waste.

Formerly on this site was the US Atomic Energy Commission Uranium Feed Materials Plant, which processed uranium and thorium ore from 1955 – 1966. Of course, there was a lot of waste, which I gather was essentially thrown out the window. Decontamination efforts began in the mid-80’s (a drinking water reservoir servicing 70,000 residents is located very close by), culminating in the “disposal cell” pictured below:

The entire cell is covered by this mountain of rocks, which is apparently safe to walk on. At least, I hope it is…

As we approached, I noticed a number of what I imagine are testing devices scattered throughout the foliage:

An enormous staircase takes you up to the top…

Along the way, we noticed a TON of these spiders crawling all over the place. Radioactive spiders? Could my dreams of becoming Spider-man be so easily realized?? Alas, I decided not let it bite me.

The stairs don’t bring you to the top, however – you still have to walk an additional 100 feet or so on this path:

You only fully comprehend how large the mound is at the top, when you realize you’re at the highest points in sight:

Four plaques describing the history of the site are at the top, along with two park benches for anyone who cares to relax on top of a pile of hot radioactive waste.

I want to believe the EPA when they claim the whole thing is safe and radiation-free…But it really started to creep me out when I noticed that my hair was mysterious standing on end (seriously – there was no wind the day we went up):

We left the toxic waste dump site (what a vacation!) and continued on the road to rejoin US-50. An abandoned building of some sort we passed:

Curious if it was a former garage:

We drove through more small towns…

One of my favorite abandoned properties we’ve seen on the trip is this shack, completely overtaken by foliage:

I especially like the front porch, the roof of which is held up by a carved post and a tree trunk:

Passing by a somewhat impoverished looking farm, we noticed their one horse had a really severe dip in its back. Does anyone know if this is common for riding horses, or a sign of ill treatment?

Though the landscape was still mostly farms…

…we were beginning to see some changes as we made our way toward Kansas.

We finally rejoined US-50, which runs alongside a railroad track. There’s something magical about racing a train on a two-lane highway:

We stopped for dinner in Sedalia, Missouri, known in the 1800’s as the “Sodom and Gomorrah of the West” for its gambling and prostitution. Today, it’s a crossroads for US-50 and US-65, and has the usual array of gas stations and fast food joints. One interesting service station:

We ate at a fantastic BBQ place called Kehde’s:

The main restaurant is attached to a dining car, which our waitress told me was featured in the Matthew Broderick movie Biloxi Blues, of all things.

Inside the dining car:

Unfortunately, the train car was closed for the night, so we ate in the main building. The few customers appeared to be locals (they knew the waitresses by name) – always a good sign for roadtrip eating.

Our waitress was charming, down-homey, and warm, chatting with us at length about our trip, Sedalia, and the menu – and my New York City paranoia immediately kicked into full gear. Was this all an act she put on for out-of-towners? What was her motivation? Was she guilting us into leaving a bigger tip? Was she trying to sucker us into buying more food? Why was a waitress in a town we’d never been to talking to us like we were old friends?!?!

But no – as far as I can tell, it was absolutely genuine. When my girlfriend asked about what pies they had, for example, she actually whispered to us not to bother, as all they had left were store-bought and not as good as the ones they make themselves.

The ribs I had were really good, dripping in homemade BBQ sauce and falling off the bone – and does it get any better than foamy root beer served in freezer-chilled glasses?

I’m exhausted here after a full day of driving (and possible radiation poisoning), but places like Kehde’s really make the trip worth it.

Kansas up next!

-SCOUT