King of the Road, John Robinson

Bounding Around The Burgs

Posted at May 27, 2008 15:45

By John Robinson

Like a Silent Conductor, the big, green highway sign along
interstate 70 announced we were approaching aullville. “no services,” the
same sign warned. that message spurred my recollection of a comment
years ago from an aullville resident, who was upset because the sign discouraged
traffic to his town. i asked him if greater aullville offered any services
for interstate travelers.

“Well, not at the exit,” he said.
aullville itself sits two miles off the interstate. assuming the collective
temperament of interstate traffic trends toward immediate fulfillment, if
not gratification, it’s hard to argue that the “no services” sign is misleading.
With no such warning, impatient drivers would reach the top of the exit
ramp and face an uncertain choice between aull or nothing.

My car wasn’t due to lash up to a parking meter in Warrensburg for two
hours, so we coasted up the aullville exit ramp. at the top, i surveyed land
around the interchange that wasn’t so desolate as it was pastoral—rather
refreshing, this panoramic view
from the crown of a hill along
this crowded highway. We turned
north on route T and drove a couple
miles. Just short of the banks of
Devil’s creek, a tributary of the Black
river, we rolled through aullville.
indeed, if tiny aullville, population
seventy-two, doesn’t provide
for most of the basic needs of an
agrarian community and its visitors,
neighboring Higginsville can.

We motored four miles farther
away from the interstate, north
to Higginsville. along the way,
we passed the republican cemetery—no sign of a Democrat cemetery …
yet. We passed a flagpole flying a more historically correct version of the
Missouri confederate battle flag—not the ubiquitous southern cross. the
flag reminded me that Higginsville is home to the confederate Memorial
state Historic site.

Minutes later, i was strolling through the old cemetery on this historic
site, the grounds of the old confederate soldiers Home of Missouri (civil War
series, February 2007). the home provided refuge to more than sixteen hundred
veterans and their families, beginning in 1891, for nearly sixty years.
the home is gone, but several structures remain, including a chapel.

Walking down the rows of tombstones, i spied the marker. His name
startled me at first, though i knew his remains are interred on these grounds.
Well, at least part of William clarke Quantrill is buried here: five bones and a hank of hair. Other parts of him lie in a Dover, Ohio, cemetery, near his
boyhood home. Author Edward E. Leslie recounts the journeys of Quantrill’s
skull and bones and separates fact from fiction in the 1998 biography The
Devil Knows How to Ride, an exhaustive examination of this infamous character.
Despite Quantrill’s mother’s wish to bring his body back to Dover, only
part of his corpse made that journey. Grisly capitalists intervened to pilfer
body parts from Quantrill’s remains, and the skull and several bones ended
up in Lawrence, Kansas, in the possession of the University of Kansas. They
stayed there, in and out of museum displays, until Jefferson Citian Robert
Hawkins, a member of the Sons of the Confederacy, negotiated to have him
interred in Dover (skull) and Higginsville (bones).

I’m not the first person to retreat from Quantrill, but my reason was
trivial. Hunger held my attention. Angling east to Route 23, I dropped into
Concordia, where a burnt-ends sandwich at Biffle’s Smoke House Barbeque
thoroughly satisfied me. Please understand that while discussions about religion
and politics can become heated, arguments about barbeque often result
in chokeholds. So I will reserve my comments about Biffles’s world ranking
for my book on Missouri’s best barbeque, to be released after my death and
the safe relocation of my relatives.

Leaving Biffle’s Smoke House and traveling south on Route 23, my car
made no complaint as it absorbed the faint wood-smoke smell from my
clothing. We crossed Highway 50, eschewing the most direct route west
to Warrensburg, and continued south past Whiteman Air Force Base,
where glider pilots practiced during World War II. We turned west on
Route DD, which dissects Knob Noster State Park. Knob Noster, the town,
became a familiar name to faithful listeners to St. Louis’s KMOX radio in
the 1970s. Announcers loved reading weather reports from Knob Noster,
just to say the name. Well, Knob
Noster may never eclipse St. Louis
in size, but it helps play an equal
role, arguably, with St. Louis in our
national defense.

When viewed in the air, the B-2
Bomber resembles an attempt to
wrap a flight of geese in black plastic.
The first time I saw this flying
wedge—I didn’t hear it until
it passed—we were biking the
Katy Trail east of Clinton. The jet
appeared from nowhere and flew
directly over us. It made several
wide circles over the next hour,
each time flying precisely over our
heads. Since then, I’ve often wondered
if the bombardier was lining
us up in the cross hairs, just to
practice. If so, I guess I played a
small role in national security. But
I’ll never know.

Even without a bombardier’s
view, I knew Montserrat Vineyards and Bristle Ridge Winery were nearby,
and I vowed to return when time would allow. But the clock required that I
lock my sights on the ’Burg, as college students began calling Warrensburg
at some point after a blacksmith named Warren settled in the area back in
1833. Students may not know, or care, that the town has many textures.

The ’Burg claims at least two world-famous former residents, forever captured
in song, verse, and bronze. In fact, their statues have become my favorites
in the world, one because of its style, both because of their significance.

The first statue is a favorite of Baskin and Queenie, my Yorkshire Terriers.
Together they weigh only a fraction of the statue’s subject, but they share
that canine trait the statue celebrates. They’re convinced that every time
I walk out our front door, I’m headed to sniff out Old Drum, the central
character in the story about man’s best friend.

Old Drum unwittingly strayed into controversy, which evolved into a court case, Burden v. Hornsby. It wasn’t poetry. Hornsby shot the beast of
Burden, aka Old Drum, for trespassing. When Burden and his attorney
entered the courtroom to sue Hornsby for the loss of his dog, most everybody
thought the shooter should pay. They didn’t realize they were about to
witness history. The lawsuit, which wound through the courts and ended up
before the Missouri Supreme Court, asked fifty dollars in damages. Burden
received an award ten times that amount.

More lasting is the attorney’s speech, or at least part of it, which produced
the most famous line in the history of inter-species friendship. Nobody kept
records of the first half of George Graham Vest’s argument, but the second
half contains this phrase: “The one absolutely unselfish friend that a man
can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him and the one
that never proves ungrateful or treacherous, is his dog.”

Since 1958, the statue honoring man’s best friend has stood guard on
the grounds of the Johnson County Courthouse, on the Warrensburg town
square. Nice dog. Handsome courthouse grounds. Nice town square, too—
well-preserved, a menagerie of shops, restaurants, and saloons.

From the courthouse, I walked downhill toward the
Amtrak station, to view my other favorite statue.

I was mortified to discover the statue missing.
For years it stood in plain view of passengers aboard
Amtrak as the train idled at the Warrensburg depot. It’s
a likeness of Willie, who sits on a bench at a piano on
a downtown sidewalk. Well, he doesn’t quite sit. From
this most animated statue, Willie’s arms are not merely
extended, they’re launched forward, fingers splayed like
ten cobras striking in precision. He’s leaning back, to
offer a better glimpse from the train when it stops. Or
at least, he was.

Even before Warrensburg became a college town,
young John William “Blind” Boone was sharpening the genius that would
jump from his fingertips, transforming a piano into a worldwide messenger
of inspiration. Concerned about the fate of this most animated of all statues,
I inquired at the nearby Tee Haus, on the town square.

“Not to worry,” Tee Haus proprietor Sandy Irle says. The statue was hit by
a car. After repairs, it went to a new spot, in the park that bears Blind Boone’s
name. She sent me west down Pine Street to see the park. Overgrown and
overlooked for years, the park shows new life.

And across the street, the old Howard School—one of the first segregated
schools in Missouri—stands defiant against time, even though its classrooms
have been dormant for many years. After decades of neglect, loving hands
are preparing the school to tell its story of educating thousands of young
African-American children.

These icons—the school, Blind Boone, Old Drum—form a metaphor.
This territory can tell about a turbulent past. Bushwhackers. Dog slayers.
Segregation. Through it all, those venerable ideals of opportunity, perseverance,
and loyalty—nurtured here in Warrensburg—have survived. Blind
Boone would be proud. Students are enlightened. Dog lovers are inspired.

Someday, I’ll tell Baskin and Queenie that Warrensburg has a pair of petfriendly
motels. Oh, and there’s one in Knob Noster, too. Hear that, KMOX?

December 2007

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