Daniel Boone Home and Boonesfield Village

The same day as Weldon Spring Site, Keith and I headed over to Defiance to see Daniel Boone's Missouri Home. Actually, I think we were in search of his grave, but that's in Marthasville and we came upon the house first. I'm always game for a historic house tour, but I was surprised to find there is actually an entire living history village down the hill from the house!



They call it Boonesfield Village and it is open year round. I know it's short notice, but if you go tomorrow (RIGHT NOW if you are reading this on Saturday,) they are having a "Ghosts From the Past" day. If I didn't already have haunted activities planned for tomorrow I would make another trip out there.



The village recreates a town in the Louisiana Territory/1840s period, with everything from general store to school house to stables to gristmill. We learned about summer kitchens (fancier than my own kitchen,) firearms, apothecary supplies, and beaver hats.





I just learned from the Boonesfield website that the chapel has a reconstructed 28 stop Wicks Organ! I should have gone inside. Oh well, just another reason to go back. In the meantime maybe Brent can tell us something about it!


This picture needs Slash playing guitar.

The churchyard even has a tiny cemetery. If I remember right, there are only two graves here. I'd love to find out more information about this lady and why she was interred at Peace Chapel. I wonder if she was involved with this project?



There were also a few artisans here and there. I understand as the village expands there will be more of this kind of thing.



The Daniel Boone Home and the village of Boonesfield are actually owned by Lindenwood University. I'm not sure what programs Lindenwood offers in history, but we saw quite a few young people dressed in period clothing, taking notes on the living history speakers in each building. I would love to see a syllabus for that class.



The Daniel Boone Missouri Home actually belonged to Daniel's son Nathan. Daniel Boone lived there from 1800 until his death in 1820 at age 86. Lindenwood does not allow pictures of the inside of the house for copyright reasons, but you can see pictures here. Note the gun ports between the windows!



Rear of the house. The tour includes the basement, first, and second floors. The fourth floor has a ballroom but is not on the tour.



The tree above has an interesting story. This was Daniel Boone's "Judgment Tree," where he held court to settle disputes between the white men and Native Americans in the area. Sadly, the tree was infected with Dutch Elm disease some years ago. In an effort to preserve it, it was filled with concrete, but eventually it fell over.


Anachronism! There are also Pepsi machines near where I took this picture.



The Daniel Boone Home is off Highway 94 on Highway F, roughly 15 miles from the Weldon Spring Site, if I remember correctly, and 45 miles from the City of St Louis. Admission for both the house tour and Boonesfield Village is $12. If you're not into historic house tours (I know, a lot of people say, "old furniture. snooze.") skip the house tour and just visit the village for $7. This would be a great day trip if you have kids and live in the St Louis area!

Nuclear Waste Adventure Trail

There is no excuse for my extended absence but this one: the Nuclear Waste Adventure Trail is almost too weird for words. Since I've been struggling with how to describe it, I'm just going to give you a brief history of the site and some pictures. You really have to see it for yourself.



The proper name for this place is the Weldon Spring Site Remedial Action Project (WSSRAP). In the 40s, the site was used to manufacture explosives. In the 50s, it was used to process uranium ore ("yellow cake") and a nearby quarry was used to dispose of radioactive waste. In the 60s, the Army used the site to manufacture Agent Orange. In the 70s the army used the site for military training. In the 80s the Department of Energy took over and started the cleanup process, and cleanup continued through the 90s. By 2001, the toxic stew was piled up and buried under what I like to call a Post-Apocalyptic Cahokia Mound and then a museum was built to tell us all about radiation and 21st century mound building.



I think my museum friends would agree that this museum is very well done. It's professional and informative and has lots of interesting artifacts. Unfortunately I was so weirded out at being in a nuclear waste museum that while I took pictures, I didn't absorb a whole lot of information.



Think about it: this site was used to make dynamite, uranium, and Agent Orange, three things I think most people have been conditioned to think of as Very Bad. And now it is a Museum and Adventure Trail. WEIRD.



You probably can't read the sign in the picture, so in response to the question, "How much radiation am I receiving at the WSSRAP?" the answer is, "Not much." Less than your average day-to-day activities, presumably because they did such a good job of mound building. Now that we're confident on that point, let's check out the mound.





Now, you might think this is just a mound, that you can maybe walk around it at the bottom and that's it. But just like the Big Mound at Cahokia, there are stairs up to a viewing platform. From this point, I'll let the pictures talk because I just can't describe it.



















We walked around the mound after we went to the top, and based on the time it took us we guess it is a little over a mile around.







This is one particular adventure I would recommend to sci fi fans. There's a movie idea here, I'm sure of it.

The directions I got were crap (it took 2 hours for us to find the place) so I will tell you the easiest way to get there from the St Louis area: Highway 40 to State Highway 94 and TURN LEFT. I just Google mapped it again, thinking I must have done something wrong the first time, and the address on the government's website sends you to somewhere halfway between 40 and 70 on 94 and THIS IS WRONG. Trust me. It's south of 40 between the Busch Wildlife Area and the Weldon Spring Wildlife Area. For cyclists, the WSSRAP is on the Hamburg Trail, which intersects the Katy Trail at mile 56.7 just west of the Weldon Spring Trailhead. The Interpretive Center is about 4 miles from the Katy Trail on the Hamburg Trail.