Showing Tag: "history" (Show all posts)

A National Parks Pass Review

Posted by Jason Hussong on Tuesday, July 27, 2010,

A year ago I purchased an annual pass for the U.S. National Park Service, (left) and made it a

point to hit as many places as I could during the life of the pass. I wanted to get out and experience more of the natural world around me, as well as learn about the history of important events and places that I maybe didn't know about before I purchased my pass. Some of the places I had visited before, like Rocky Mountain National Park (above)here in Colorado, but overall I'd give it the big ol...

A Return to the American Museum of Natural History

Posted by Jason Hussong on Monday, July 12, 2010,

I was insistent that I would delve into the American Museum of Natural History on my return visit to New York City since, on my previous trip, I only ran by the highlights since I arrived so late. I really wanted to get there early, spend hours in the halls,

and maybe see a show or two that was playing. After all, the museum is one of the highest rated stops in the city, and one of the best in the whole country.

Well, that was the plan until jetlag reared it's ugly head over a two hour t...

The Oregon Trail and Fort Laramie

Posted by Jason Hussong on Monday, October 5, 2009,

I drove north on Interestate 25 through Wyoming easily recalling everything I hate about freeways in the United States. I wanted to get off on a highway and enjoy a bit of the area; after

all, I was on vacation and not exactly in a hurry to get anywhere. Fortunately I saw one of those lovely brown signs that points to areas of interest. This particular one lead to the Oregon Trail wheel ruts and Fort Laramie National Historic Site.

I headed east on Highway 26 in search of my first stop. ...

Mt. Rushmore at Night

Posted by Jason Hussong on Tuesday, September 29, 2009,

The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the republican model of government are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American People.

~ George Washington, first inaugural address, April 30, 1789

I bought my annual National Park pass this year because I knew I'd be hitting a lot of the great places across the United States. It would've been nice had someone told me though that Mt. Rushmore wasn't ...

The Minuteman Missile National Historic Site

Posted by Jason Hussong on Friday, September 11, 2009,

"A nuclear-missile silo is one of the quintessential Great Plains objects: to the eye, it is almost nothing, just one or two acres of ground with a concrete slab in the middle and some posts and poles sticking up behind an eight-foot-high Cyclone fence; but to the imagination, it is the end of the world." ~ Ian Frazier, Great Plains, 1989

I studied a lot of Cold War history, particularly from the Soviet side, in high school and college. Looking back on those days, I think they helped ma...

Scott Lake State Park

Posted by Jason Hussong on Tuesday, August 18, 2009,

Just a short drive north of Garden City and the Arkansas River, the border with Mexico in the early 1800s, sits Scott Lake State Park in Kansas, which is a great spot for fishing, camping, hiking and the like.

Driving through the vast plains and farm fields of

western Kansas it's difficult to believe such a place exists. It seems totally and completely and in every other way inconceivable that a 100 acre lake, created from a dam in the 1930s, could sit here amongst the wooded bluffs. It...