Art Alley, Rapid City, South Dakota

As a somewhat jaded and road weary urban archaeologist with a particular interest in urban decay and guerrilla street art (although you would never know it from all of the entries until now), I thought I had seen it all until I stumbled on the most unusual thing, in the most improbable of places, Art alley, a riot of color, art, and anarchy in the center of downtown Rapid City, South Dakota, a sedate, orderly, thoroughly Presbyterian conservative small mid western city.  On one city block, behind the Alex Johnson Hotel between 6th and  7th street was a kaleidoscopic display of art, now predominantly graffiti, covering every imaginable surface and producing a mural testifying to the energy and vitality of this community no less important that the large projects commissioned by the WPA during the 1930's.  It cost nothing and required nothing more than the foresight and indulgence of the city officials who have allowed this post apocalyptic gallery/outpouring of energy to exist and evolve, while larger, supposedly "hipper" cities wage war on non-gallery approved artistic expression.

Just as you could never capture the grandeur of the Sistine Chapel in one photo, the following pictures are the best I could do to communicate the manic excitement of the alley.  It is only about 30 feet wide and the transit of the sun from one side to the other lasted only about 1 hour during which all of these pictures (and more) were taken on the Sunday morning before we were leaving town.

Hope you get the photo!!!  Given the ephemeral nature of street art and the politically driven whims of public officials, who knows if this will be there when you get there, and if it is, what it will look like.  It will certainly change and will be in need of redocumentation, so don't wait too long.  By the time you get there,  I'm sure everything here will be different.   As it should be. 

While in the alley, I was approached by a nicely dressed man a few years older than myself who was inquiring as to the camera I was using.  His name was Robert something (something Jewish) and it turned out that he was also from Long Island (what are the odds).  When I told his I was from Hewlett, he asked if I knew a certain person he served in the army with.  Of course, I said.  He lived across the street from my friend Phillip, and his mean, dreadful, sadistic, spinster aunt, was my 5th grade teacher who made my little ADHD life miserable for a year.  When I began to question him about what he was doing all the way out here in Rapid City, he became kind of vague, uncomfortable and seemed to unravel a bit, talking about some business opportunity or other, and at that point he said he had to go and get to church.  He sure didn't look like someone who would be going to church, but what do I know.

While in Rapid City I bought a pair of sneakers at the pretty great skate board shop where the kid there did not call me sir and treat me like some old guy.  In fact he seemed at least a little interested in my stories about being an east coast surfer when I was his age.  And then,  Jackie and I somehow bumbled into free movie night at the Elk theater across from the hotel and got to see the movie Lincoln Lawyer which we liked a lot.

So it was a pretty interesting and eventful 2 days in Rapid City.

                                                                     Pablo

Leaving Rushmore...

So we've left Mt. Rushmore and are ambling our way through the Black Hills of Dakota evocative both from the reference made in Rocky Raccoon and for the idea of black hills, whatever that might be.  Well, it turns out that the Black Hills are really green, evergreens mostly, and very reminiscent of the Adirondack Mountains in New York, where we come from, so if there's no pictures here, it's because I didn't take any.  Not that it wasn't ok, but it looked just like upstate New York or upstate almost anywhere, even New Mexico with it's national forests.  Its nice, but don't expect any surprises.  After this amble and some short stops in some very tacky,  not so interesting small towns that have sold  their souls to attract the Mount Rushmore tourist trade, it was getting a little late on Friday, and it became a mad dash for Rapid City, SD were we were spending a few nights.  As the old joke goes, for me anyway, the best view of the Black Mining Hills of Dakota was in the rear view mirror.

And back to the flat lands for which I seem to have developed quite an affinity.

                                                                     Pablo

North to South Dakota....The Badlands...

So, heading west out of Merriman for a short time on Route 20, we turned north on highway 73,  and soon found ourselves in South Dakota, and happy about it because we had never been in a Dakota, and we were on route to see the holy grail of all USA road trips, Mount Rushmore.   As an added bonus, we got to pass through the Bad Lands which we were looking forward to, but which did not seem all that bad viewed from an air conditioned car at 50 miles per hour, but as the movie and the printed information at the visitors center informed us, it was very, very bad, even horrible if you were making your way west in a wagon train at the rate of a mile or two a day, exposed to the heat, the cold, the bugs, the mind numbing tedium that drove many people crazy, the disease, the impassable trails, and if you lived through all that, the indians, who were not all that happy about your being there.  Having travelled extensively through some of the most inhospitable parts of the USA, it has always astounded me how these early pioneers did it.  Many, many didn't however and were buried along the way, so there must have been some sort of natural selection in which only the fittest and luckiest made it west.

Vaguely apropos to our disconnect with the landscape of the Badlands and all of the terror and misery it once held, was a vaguely poetic thought I had when I was having poetic thoughts.

Middle age, when life starts to seem
like a long series of wrong turns and
missed opportunities, New York to LA
at 65 miles per hour and coming up on the left,
the last chance to fill up for the next hundred miles.
Its now or never!#&@@!
As long as its more important to  be right than happy,
There can be no hope....

This was about as close as we got to anything remotely dangerous, and having spent a great deal of time in the barren expanses of the south west, the bad lands did not seem all that new or awe inspiring to us, but not uninteresting either for that matter.  I don't know, maybe I was expecting something badder, or maybe I should have gotten out of the car a little more at that point.  But I seemed fixated on the ghost towns of Nebraska at that point, and I had already done my southwest thing (refer to the blog entry "Seeing")  so it was hard to get enthusiastic.   But in case you were curious, here you go.

So after our visit to the badlands, we were off to Mount Rushmore, which it turned out was quite an inspiring sight.  In spite of the millions of times you've seen it in photos a, movies, and postcards, it was kind of breath taking to be there.  I was quite surprised by my reaction!!!  I guess I'm not as jaded as I thought.

In preparation for our pilgrimage to Mount Rushmore, we watched North by Northwest which was shot there in the late 50's or early 60's.  Much to our disappointment, the evocative visitors center/restaurant in the movie was gone and replaced by some oversized, overwrought, stone extravaganza with promenade, 50 state flags and an overkill that would have made the Disney people proud.  Luckily, when viewing the mount, it was to your back and easily forgotten.

But all in all, the reviews here are 4 thumbs up.  Glad we did it.  Onto Rapid City, SD to spend Saturday and Sunday morning.

                                                                    Pablo

Merriman, Nebraska

Our last stop on route 20 along the northern edge of the sand hills in Nebraska, before heading north into South Dakota, was Merriman, another town that was more or less devoid of life and activity, the first time we visited in May 2011.  With the exception of the town maintenance man, a customer at the bank, and the teller who came out to see what we were up to, and was kind of excited to hear that we came all the way from New York, those were the only people we saw.  On this visit, there was a little more activity, as noted below.

The grain elevators and railroad line that passes by seem to indicate that while there are only about  118 people listed as the present population the grain depot was and continues to of great importance to this town.  But regarding the town itself, other than the bank, a post office, and an auto mechanic's shop, there was no other active business establishment  along the main street of what appears to have once been was a busy center of commerce running perpendicular to the tracks and depot.  The grain elevators are in good condition and seem to indicate that this continues to be an active service of Merriman.

Even the bar was a little outside of town along Route 20.  Appropriately named the Sand Bar.  No beach, but lots of sand.

These are most of the buildings along the sunny side of the main street.  They provide a good sampling of what is there to see.

The old fire house that is now the the headquarters of the town maintanance department that is part of the only three contiguous buildings in this once thriving town.

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The bank, and next to the bank is a placard displaying the many cattle brands of the ranches of the sand hills.

While in town, which seemed quite busy at that time of the day, I got talking to this rancher, Robert Moreland, who has lived and worked there his whole life and told me he has written a number of books and asked me to get in touch with him when I got back, and I will.

An old storefront at the intersection of route 20.

The Merriman Dance Hall.  Close to 100 years old, it was the old theatre, meeting hall, and general center for entertainment.  The stage is still there, but little else.

I am usually obliged to take a picture of the post office, but in this case it nothing but a double wide on the shady side of the street and not much to see.

Soon after leaving Merriman, we made a right turn onto the 73 heading into South Dakota and our tourist's homage to Mount Rushmore.

                                                                           Pablo