Newton, Kansas

 

I have completed my western swing back into Kansas and have begun heading east back to Missouri, and just in time, as a wind from the northwest has just arrived. I was lucky not to have to contend with a westerly since I returned to the state last Sunday, just a southerly.  Eight Carnegies in the southeast corner of Kansas await me and then I’ll have completed the state.  I have 250 miles of cycling left  in Kansas.  I’ll be happy to escape the state without experiencing a tornado.

The last on my westward push came in McPherson at McPherson College.  McPherson, as did Emporia, had a public library provided by Carnegie as well as a collegiate library, but tore it down, as was also the fate of twelve other of the sixty-six Carnegies in Kansas, including the main library in Kansas City.

The McPherson Carnegie is now Beeghly Hall, renamed in 1950 when the Beeghly’s gave funds to expand the library.  It was replaced as the school library in 1970. The transfer of books was performed by a long line of students passing them from one to another, almost a tradition with Carnegie libraries.  Beeghly Hall was transformed into a music hall for a spell.  It now houses alumni relations and marketing and human resources.  There were three large photos of the library in its early days and crowds of well-dressed students in coats and ties in front of it in the foyer along with a write-up of the library’s history.

The wind had picked up to twenty-seven miles per hour from the south when I reached McPherson, the strongest yet.  It had been such a struggle trying to stay on the road as I pedaled west into McPherson I couldn’t stoke my engine with nuts and dates in my handlebar bag, as I had to keep both hands on the handlebars at all times, and for the first time in these travels I felt the nagging of hunger.  There was no threat of bonking, just a sensation that I’ve successfully warded off all these miles.

Chocolate milk is one panacea and another is mini-pecan pies.  At fifty cents for 390 calories, they were perhaps Walmart’s greatest bargain.  Inflation has raised the price to seventh-four cents, still a good deal.  I try to save them until my final hour of the day for a sure-fire energy boost, but these tasty morsels are hard to resist at any time.

From McPherson I had to turn south into the ferocious wind.  It was tempting to take the rest of the day off, even though it was only noon, knowing that the next day I’d have a wind at my back.  I resisted, as I wouldn’t have to take it head on, as I’d be on a road angling southeast. I was glad that I did as I managed an additional forty-five miles.

At one of my rests at a service station convenience store two pre-teenaged boys asked me the most popular question of these travels, “Are you biking across the country?”  I affirm people’s perceptions, as even though I’m not biking coast-to-coast, at least this time, I am biking across the country, and the 1,700 miles I have already biked is the equivalent of having biked from San Francisco.  The boys then asked how many miles I bike a day.  Though the winds have been holding me to around sixty lately, I told them seventy to eighty miles.  “Wow, that’s a lot,” one said, then added, “After one mile, I’m out.”

My route happened to take me through a town with a Carnegie I had visited on a previous crossing of Kansas on one of my rides back to Chicago from Telluride.  It was in Newton, whose sterling library certainly merited a return visit, even though it was now the County Historical Museum, as it has been for years.  

The day before I had a similar experience, renewing acquaintances with a Carnegie.  It was in Peabody, home town of Laura.  The library she grew up with remains a library and has not been expanded.  It is a typical small-town Carnegie, one large room with partitions for a children’s section and computer section.  I was there in the afternoon when a couple of young boys showed up on bikes and scampered up the steps to play a game on one of the computers.  There was no sshhhing from the bearded librarian.  He just told them, “You know, the winner is going to have to play me.”  I was gone before that happened.

For the fourth time in five nights since I acquired the garden clippers along the road I put them to use clearing out a spot for my tent in a forested area.  The only night I didn’t put them to use was the night I spent in the cemetery.  The clippers have been so handy I keep them on top of my front right pannier for quick access.  I won’t want to be without them on future trips.