Abilene, Kansas
Spent the weekend in Wichita, made a quick get away under the threat of severe storms, golf ball sized hail and possible tornados to make it to our next stop, Manhattan Kansas before all hell broke loose. While I was up for some action, weather wise, I was equally glad to see the clouds break and the sun shine through as we entered Abilene Kansas, on the way to Manhattan, home of Dwight David Eisenhower the reluctant but perfect president to preside over the middle years of the American Century. Didn't expect to find ourselves there, but Jackie and I agreed that it would be a mistake to just drive by and not pay our respects. Abilene is a small Kansas town like so many others, kind of desolate, irrelevant, and in a moderate degree of deterioration, in spite of the prominence of a presence in their midst like the Eisenhower Library nearby, but apart from the town. There is a disconnect between the town and the Eisenhower complex, which appears to mirror the disconnect between the political insanity we are experiencing in 2016 and the simple needs of a suffering America, although in reverse. Just so I don't let myself forget how good we had it in the Eisenhower era and how bad things seem to be getting, I bought myself an "I Like Ike" button.
In fact, the only acknowledgement of or homage to Ike in the whole town, was this portrait behind trucks. Overall there doesn't seem to be much effort to capitalize on their native son, which seems strange. In Red Cloud, there is full court press to tie the town's identity to Willa Cather, which has been increasingly successful, although there are still many empty storefronts and a few crumbling building on their main street as well. There's only so much to be done.
There's the down town and a bunch of churches, none of whom seem to affiliate themselves with Ike, so I chose to display the best looking one..
They could learn a thing or two from those Cather ladies in Abilene...
More to come,
Pablo
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