I recently made a stronger commitment to photographing the signs of over 200 major colleges and universities.
- Identify which institutions should be included.
- Get the GPS coordinates of their signs. That was a two-fold process -- optionally contact the universities and ask
'Where on campus is your sign?' and about 2/3 replied although some were unhelpful. Regardless of a response, I would use the Google Street
View feature to actually 'see' the sign and get the specific GPS coordinates. Spreadsheet!
- Make a plan for traveling to these places in which years with the goal of completing almost all of them by summer of 2022.
- Go on the trips and take the photos
- Make a website of the results
This is a series of weekend trips to the colleges and universities in the states that fall into a 300-mile radius of Kansas City.
KANSAS: Since I have lived in the KC metro area for nearly half a century, many of the colleges in the state have made the news once in a while. I thought I should visit them all at least once.
MISSOURI: Many of the colleges in the state are within 50 miles of either side of I-70 which splits the state. One trip was to visit all of them.
Bonus was, with one place, getting another national park visited and another home/library/museum of the US Presidents.
While in St. Joseph in July 2017, I scouted some areas that I will probably use on August 21, the day of Totality. Around 1:00 pm that day, the moon will totally block the Sun for about 2-1/2 minutes. St. Joe will get one of the best views in the country (it goes from south of Portland OR to north of Charleston SC). Things to consider: I should arrive very early in the day, sunrise if 6:37 am and the eclipse goes from about 11:40 to 2:30 pm. I will be in one location for many hours and need food, shelter (it likely will be a hot day if it is clear, no need to both showing up if it is an overcast day), restrooms, food and water, and, something to do for several hours.
IOWA: Iowa has several small colleges plus the two that are in the NCAA upper division. The small college of Morningside only made the list because my grandmother attended there one year in the mid 1920's.
ILLINOIS: Illinois has their two most major colleges within a single day's trip from Kansas City. Beyond that, there are a number of well-known colleges in Chicago which is a separate trip.
NEBRASKA: There are only two major universities in the state, and they are located close to each other.
OKLAHOMA: The major two schools were visited in March. That left just Oral Roberts University in Tulsa which was visited in June.
ARKANSAS: The University of Arkansas is in the northwest corner of the state which is where four states come together: Arkansas, Oklahoma, Missouri and Kansas. The other school in the state, Arkansas State, is left for a future trip.
MISSED VISITING:
--Ulysses S. Grant National Historic Site -- I showed up expecting to take a quick tour. However, there was a loooonnng line of cars trying to get in that were barely moving. At the time, unknown reason. After a while, I gave up when I got to a point where I could turn around. Later, I found that at the site that day was the St. Louis Storytelling Festival. Oops!
OBSERVATIONS: Some observations made while traveling in this area:
- While driving I realized that by the time I complete this new venture to photograph the signs at major universities that I will pretty much have been TWICE to everywhere in the US 48 states.
- Along the highways everywhere in July 2017 were thousands and thousands of colorful wild flowers (or weeds). Purple. Yellow. White. One Nebraska farmer let one entire field be covered with the purple ones.
- Iowa and Missouri had hundreds of corn fields growing in JUly 2017. The stalks were over six feet tall and looking good for mid July.
- On both days of my July 2017 trip I noticed how the temperatures, after driving out the a larger city, really drop in the rural parts. The larger the city driving out of, the bigger the drop in temperature in its surrounding rural area.
- The east-west highways between Beatrice NE and Maryville MO are literally like a rollercoaster ride. They were constantly up and down, hill and dip. ANd, being cautious, I always lightly hit my brakes before popping over a hill since who knows what could be there, out of sight until right on it.
Iowa had construction going on in many places in the summer of 2017. In both Sioux City and Council Bluffs several entrances/exits for I-29 were blocked. Also, Iowa had about 40 miles of U.S. highway 30 down to a single lane plus a 20-mile detour to a county road to the north. That all added about half an hour to my expected drive.
Curious about Iowa highways materials. They often change colors, sometimes several times in a given mile. It might be pink for a couple hundred feet, then concrete gray then asphalt black. They kept being interspersed. Maybe there is a benefit to that. Certainly a reason why they choose to make their surfaces those colors.
In July 2017 I had planned to re-photograph the Iowa state capitol building since the photo I took several years ago has a shadow on part of the building's east face. However, when I visited this time, the building had scaffolding all around it, and that makes for an unsightly photograph. So, for now, the shadowy photo remains for Iowa. A few other capitols I want to re-photograph, especially Maryland which, both times I tried that one it was pouring rain. Vermont has a pickup truck in front of it. Idaho has construction around it.
Only July 15, 2017 Iowa State University had something (or somethings) going on. I expected the campus to be quiet and lonely on a summer Saturday. Wrong! Hundreds of people and vehicles everywhere.
Also, Lisa, a good friend of mine who now lives in Washington state, graduated from the Iowa State veterinarian school. She had asked for a copy of the photo I took of the school sign. I send her one right before I left town. About an hour or so later she replied asking if I could go by the veterinarian school and take a photo of some statue of a doctor in front of the school. Too late!
The Bests:
- Westminster College -- it had the look and feel of an Ivy League school. And such a historical place given that both Winston Churchill and Mikhail Gorbachev have spoken there.
- Fontbonne University was a bonus. I just happen to spot the sign while driving towards Washington University.
The Worsts:
- Missing seeing the Grant Historic Site. And I relearned my lesson of 'Stay Away from the Forest Park' area -- tooooo much traffic.
- Iowa highway construction. But at least drivers do get to keep moving as opposed to Idaho and Kentucky which literally make you sit and wait for an hour.
The Totals:
- Miles Driven: 9999
- Driving: 99 hours
- States: 7 -- Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Arkansas
- Major Universities: 99 --
- Pictures Taken: 999 (and deleted 99 of them)
- National Parks: 2 new ones: (1) Ulysses S. Grant National Historical Site in south St. Louis, this also counts towards visiting the homes/libraries/museums of all US Presidents, and, (2) Homestead of America in Beatrice NE.