I had planned to go to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame and Museum this morning, but...guess what? Today is RACE DAY! Today was the Brickyard 500...woops. Well, we'll put the museum down for another time.
I scurried out of town as soon as I found out that this was race day and headed down IN37 to Bedford, where I picked up US50 again. Lots of rolling terrain, and the further south you went, the bigger the hills got...actually pretty nice. It was about 70 miles to the Illinois line, and I stopped in Lawrenceville, IL to see the Mid-America Air Center, formerly a WWII pilot training base known as "George Field." What actually piqued my interest was this crop duster flying low overhead:
If you double-click the picture, you should see the plane pretty clearly. So, I turned off the highway and wandered through the corn fields for about 3 miles when I got to the old training base. All the original building are gone now, but there are two 5,000 ft. runways at the "Air Center" that are still in use. This was the main air terminal:
I met a couple of the local airport buffs and learned a little about the field. It was named after a General George (last name) for some reason...never did find out why. Inside there were a few interesting displays and pictures of some of the trainees. If you carefully look at this narrative, I think you can read at least part of it:
Anyway, I headed on down US50 through southern Illinois, where the land got flatter the further west I went. Man, they grow a lot of corn in this part of the world.
Most of the way along US50 I could see parts of the "old road", the original US50 that must have dated from the 1920's or so. Near Flora, IL I came upon this section of road that I thought was an interesting contrast:
You can see the "new road" on the right and the original highway, including an old iron truss bridge in the center. Looking in the other direction:
I paced it off, and the original highway was 20 feet wide with, apparently, no shoulders. Since a modern semi is 8-1/2 feet wide, that wouldnt' have left a lot of room.
Continued along US50 until it merged with I-64 and took I-64 and I-44 through St. Louis and called it a night in the little burg of St. Clair, about 40 miles west of St. Louis. Not much here except for the Super 8 and Mickey D's.
Tomorrow, it's back on US50 to Jefferson City and then US54 through the Ozarks and on toward Wichita, KS.
Miles today: 386. Total: 1,082.
