Big Magnet Passes Cape

Jim Stone watches big magnet pass  by Trail of Tears 07-17-2013Jim Stone, Central High School science whiz, emailed me all excited about a big magnet that was going to be passing through Cape on the Mississippi River. He sent me a link with a near-live GPS tracking do-hickey so I’d be sure to know when it was coming.

That’s Jim on the right. He’s a Professor of Physics at Boston University and an all-around big-whoop in the world of chasing tiny particles that may or may not exist and if he finds them I don’t know if he’s going to put them in a coffee can or what.

That’s not the way he explains it, but that’s the short version. The woman in red was just a tourist who stopped by the Trail of Tears overlook. Click on any photo to make it larger.

It’s coming! It’s coming!

Big magnet passes Trail of Tears 07-17-2013The Paul Revere of the magnet world sent me a frantic text Wednesday morning: “Magnet already past Cairo. Will pass Cape in about 2 hours. I will miss it since I am just now boarding my flight. I’ll check when I land but will most likely catch it at St Louis or slightly south. It seems to be moving rather fast.

He sent the alert at 6:30; I got it at 8:30, so I figured two hours from Cairo would mean that I would miss it by the time I put my pants on. I pulled up the tracking chart and saw it was just making the curve down by New Madrid. Jim may be a great physicist, but he didn’t learn one basic rule: boats go faster downstream than they go upstream. It was going to be awhile before it got to Cape.

I had some interviews in Perry County, so I passed the ball to Fred Lynch and James Baughn at The Missourian. James managed to snag it as it was passing Cape.

A pretty day on the Mississippi

Big magnet passes Trail of Tears 07-17-2013Jim’s plane landed and he caught the magnet at Cape Rock. I wrapped up my interview and blasted off to the overlook at Trail of Tears. The route I took was hilly and curvy and one where I know (I hope) every curve, so I made good time. The brakes sure smelled hot when I pulled in, though.

Jim wasn’t there, but I heard boat radio traffic that sounded like two barges were setting up to make a pass. Sure enough, way down to the south, I could see a towboat pushing a single barge with a white thing on top of it. It might have been unique, but it wasn’t too exciting to look at.

Passing the lookout

Big magnet passes Trail of Tears 07-17-2013I called Jim to tell him it had arrived, but would probably take a good 20 minutes or more to make it out of sight. His timing was perfect: he made it when it was almost right in front of the lookout.

Wire break = kaput

Big magnet passes Trail of Tears 07-17-2013A very nice woman was intrigued by the idea of something going by that was too big and delicate to be lifted by helicopter and couldn’t be hauled by truck from Brookhaven National Laboratory at Long Island, New York, to Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in the Chicago suburbs, its new home.

Jim went into great detail about how its core was created with a single coil of wire and if that wire was broken or damaged, then the whole thing was kaput. (I’ve been photographing the last generation of German speakers in the pioneer communities of Perry county, so I’m hearing stuff like “kaput” all the time.)

He went on to explain the calibration process and how they fine-tune it by placing a piece of paper under a single strand of wire until the magnet output is exactly even. Once that’s done, they throw a pet throgmorton (or something that sounded like that) into the middle of the magnet and check for deviation.

Check break room for refrigerator magnets

Big magnet passes Trail of Tears 07-17-2013

“If they find a deviation, I assume the first thing they check would be if anybody added a refrigerator magnet in the break room,” I volunteered. Scientists take these things seriously, so I could tell he was not amused.

When he thought I wasn’t looking, though, I saw him writing “Check break room for refrigerator magnets” in a small pocket notebook.

If you really want to know what the magnet is used for, check out the Fermilab website. My explanation is easier to understand.

Had time for burgers at Mississippi Mud

Big magnet passes Tower Rock 07-17-2013As soon as the target was out of sight, we headed up to Altenburg to the Mississippi Mud Tavern in Altenburg, where I had the second-best hamburger of the whole Florida-Missouri expedition.

I calculated that it was going to take about 1-1/2 hours for it to get 15 or so miles up to Tower Rock. My guess was pretty close. We had scarcely pulled in before we could hear the throb of engines coming up the river. The Miss Kate and her precious cargo managed to make it past The Demon That Devours Travelers, so we went upriver to catch it passing under what was (and may still be) the world’s longest suspension pipeline.

Passing the pipeline

Big magnet passes suspension pipeline 07-17-2013We had a pleasant conversation with some guys enjoying the breeze and some brews. While we were standing there, Jim noticed a sign that had been used for target practice.

“What if somebody took a shot at it while it was in transit? That thing passed through Kentucky and Tennessee where somebody might have been tempted to take a potshot at something that looks like a flying saucer,” he obsessed.

 

 

 

Lake Boutin Repairs

It looks like the $250,000 project to repair Trail of Tears State Park’s Lake Boutin dam may be wrapping up. An August 27, 2012, Missourian story said the work had been delayed by the drought.

This panorama is made up of four frames joined together. Click on it to make it larger.

Waterfowl approve

These guys may like the dam, but they weren’t too happy with me. Once I got to a certain point, they would walk away from me at the same speed as my approach. When I stopped, they’d stop. When I started walking back to the car, they followed me back.

 

McLain’s Chapel

 

 

You can’t beat the Indian Creek Community for story telling: it’s a mix of Revolutionary War soldiers, Indian maidens, the Trail of Tears and a Civil War atrocity all wrapped up in about 640 acres.

It’s hard to break out McLain’s Chapel from all of the other things the McLain family touched in the Oriole / Egypt Mills / Pocahontas area. I’ll touch on McLain’s Cemetery, Apple Creek Cemetery, Indian Creek Store and School later. [Note: the sign and a stone marker in front of the Chapel spell it “McLains Chapel,” without an apostrophe. Other sources spell it McLain’s Chapel. I’m going to use that spelling.] You can click on any photo to make it larger.

McLain Brothers fought in Revolutionary War

LaFern Stiver provided this background:

This area was settled early by the McLain Clan, from the Isle of Mull in Scotland. The family came from South Carolina and established itself here before 1815, based on the earliest tax records. Alexander McLain, was one of four brothers who fought in the Revolutionary War. John, the older brother was killed; for his sacrifice, his family was given one half bushel of salt.

The father of the whole McLain Clan, Alexander McLain, settled near Indian Creek School and McClain’s Chapel Methodist Church and Cemetery. On the banks of Indian Creek is a spring that furnishes water all year, something pioneers needed for their homesteads.

David McLain given 15-year-old maiden

A letter written in 1932 from a 94-year-old lady states that David D., the youngest son of Alexander, was told by the Indians that they would allow him to have as much land as he could walk and return in two days for 8 cents an acre. For this privilege and the protection of the tribe, he was given a 15-year-old Indian maiden as his mate, with the understanding that all children remained with the tribe.

Alexander received land for service

Herbert McLain provided some information about Alexander, his third great-grandfather, in a post on flickr.

Alexander was able to acquire a 640-acre land grant that dates back to the Spanish Land Grants (date unknown) for his service to the government during the Revolutionary War, but he couldn’t claim it until after the War of 1812..

Alexander and his family lived among the Shawnee and their wigwam communities that existed for many years after they settled there. According to the Lewis and Clark documentation, there were 400 Shawnee in Apple Creek at that time.

Alexander McLain’s property backs up to the Trail of Tears State Park. Alexander, friendly with the tribe, would let Cherokees shelter there through the winter after crossing the Mississippi. When President Andrew Jackson developed his lifelong enmity for Native Americans and set a policy to relocate approximately 100,000 westward toward Oklahoma, a trail was developed by Captain John Stuart, a Scott British Army Nobleman, who had come to the colonies to serve as an Indian agent. The trail that connected Kentucky to Arkansas and Missouri stretched across Alexander’s property.

Even though Alexander was able to enjoy his land grant most of his adult life, it wasn’t until March 4, 1831, when he was 77, that he began receiving his $33.33 per year pension for his services in the Revolutionary War. He lived out his life in Missouri with his family. He gradually went blind, as his father had. He died February 8, 1847.

 Wouldn’t plow holy ground

LaFern passed on another Trail of Tears story. “I know that two braves escaped and hid on the property that was owned by descendants of Alexander.  One of them died shortly after his escape, but the other had a rough shelter built on the farm and stayed to help my grandfather.  He refused to come into their home to eat and crouched Indian fashion at the back door as he ate his food. 

“I know that when my aunt owned the farm, we did not plow over two areas in one of the fields because her father had told her that was where the two Indians were buried and we should keep the ground holy for  them. My cousin griped because he had to plow around them.”

Blood spilled in church

A March 5, 1931, Missourian story recounts a chilling story of how the Civil War touched the area. “Down the creek from Oriole is located a Methodist Church known at McLain’s Chapel…. It was in this church that a Civil War tragedy was enacted. A farmer in the neighborhood by the name of Hamilton, who was known to be a very pious man, and also known to be loyal to the federal government during the war between the states, was apprehended by a number of bushwhackers, most of them residents of Jackson.

“The marauders took Hamilton to the church, and told him to kneel and pray, which he did, and was shot down in cold blood. The spot where his blood soaked into the rough planks of the floor was visible for years.

Building in bad shape

When I shot these photos April 20, 2011, I wondered if the building would stand through summer storms and the winter. The church really IS leaning. It’s not a trick of lens distortion.

Vickie Sams Cash asked about McLain’s Chapel when I did the piece of the Trinity Lutheran Church in Egypt Mills.

Reader Dick McClard answered her, “McLain’s Chapel is now in the hands of David McLain.  He’s thinking about knocking the old church down because of its poor and unsafe condition. This may be the last year to see the building.  It’s unremarkable in its architecture and contains nothing of value.