You won’t find a camel stuck to a pole in the Mid-East. However, in the USA we actually put big trucks on sticks along with things like the Sky Bridge in Oklahoma City.  Dig those big highway numbers on the road. What a neat country! As we proceeded out of Oklahoma City we passed Tinker AFB.

Tinker AFB is the headquarters of the Air Force Materiel Command's Oklahoma City Air Logistics Center. This is the worldwide manager for a wide range of aircraft, engines, missiles, software and avionics and accessories components. The base, originally known as Midwest Air Depot, is named in honor of Oklahoma native Major General Clarence L. Tinker, the first Native American Major General.

Woodrow Wilson Guthrie was born in Okemah OK. We had to stop and see his old stomping grounds.

He is known as Woody Guthrie and is best known for writing the song This Land Is Your Land. Many of his songs are about his experiences in the Dust Bowl era during the Great Depression when he traveled with displaced farmers from Oklahoma to California and learned their traditional folk and blues songs, earning him the nickname the Dust Bowl Troubadour.Throughout his life Guthrie was associated with United States Communist groups, though he was seemingly not a member of any.

Okemah had a couple of interesting sites. Click on one of these photos to take a look. Jorge wonders if placing a quarter will bring the funny lady back to life and for how long?!?

The former Miss Laura’s Social Club, a house of prostitution, serves as a unique visitor center for Fort Smith. Laura Ziegler in 1898 borrowed $3,000 from a banker to buy the building. She renovated the building and opened it as a brothel in 1903. She repaid her loan in only seventeen months. Business was good!

Miss Laura’s was on what was known as The Row in Fort Smith, an infamous red-light district. It was one of the most celebrated bordellos in the Southwest, and her ladies were known as the healthiest and most sophisticated in Fort Smith.

She sold the house to Bertha Gale Dean—known as Big Bertha—in 1911 for $47,000. Little is known of Ziegler after that.

The area soon deteriorated into a slum, and the house became a haven for drunkards and drifters. The building was eventually abandoned, and in 1963, the local government announced that, unless a buyer was found, the house would be demolished. Donald Reynolds, founder of Donrey Media Group, bought the house and saved it from demolition. The building was selected in 1973 for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places, and restoration began in 1983. A year later, Miss Laura’s Social Club and Restaurant opened. Its life as a restaurant was relatively brief, and it reopened as the visitor center in the fall of 1992.

<  Click on either picture to enlarge.  >

The coin that counts for only $3.00!

Cycling Alligator Snapping Turtle of Russellville AR!