October 27, 2003 - Front Royal, VA - 3
Bill and Carol left today, heading south. We'll stay here until Saturday the 1st, and then head east to Chesapeake Bay, VA. During the week we'll visit with Marilyn & Wayne, my niece and her husband, get caught up a little around here, and maybe if the weather holds we'll scoot down to see the Natural Bridge, one of the seven natural wonders of the world. With any luck the rain will quit by Thursday and I'll be able to go chase some fish with Wayne in a state park near here. The update on Bill's heart condition is that his insurance wouldn't pay for the procedure. They belong to an HMO, and those folks wanted him to fly back to WA to have the procedure done. Of course, since that artery has been blocked to that degree since 1998 or so and they didn't want to do anything about it back then or since, Bill and Carol don't have a good feeling about letting them fool around with it now. The chest pains quit, and the lungs are clearing nicely, so they just went on about life as normal as they can. Nice to know there's a Dr. someplace that is willing to do the procedure with the little burr grinder, and next time Bill has chest pains, they'll at least have that option. They'll take a hard look at whether to stay with the HMO or not. The health care system in this country is broken in more than one way, that's for sure. The recent publicity about getting drugs from Canada cheaper than we can here at home is just the tip of the iceberg. It seems it's difficult for our system of government to leave things in the hands of the people. Private enterprise can almost always do things less expensively and more quickly than government can, it seems to me. But off the soap box and on with getting caught up here.
The TTN park in Lebanon (or Annville, depending on location verses mailing addresses) near Hershey, PA, is a nice one and we enjoyed being there. It's obviously fall. One of the things we did there while there, was drive over to Newfield, New Jersey, to meet the fellow who is responsible for you being able to get this page on the internet. Newfield Nethosting (as in net host) is the business name Tom Dye uses. Not only did we want to meet him and his wife Ruth for personal reasons, I had some questions about some difficulties I'm having with Microsoft FrontPage, the software I use to write this with. Turned out to be a very special day. Originally I thought we'd spend about 3 or maybe 4 hours there getting acquainted and getting the problems solved. The problems turned out to be a bit more complex, and we ended up staying long enough to enjoy a wonderful dinner with them and their three "boys." They are caregivers for these three special needs kids. The three boys go to special schools during the day, but live with Tom and Ruth. While their challenges are significant, the joy and peace felt in the home was great. Ruth is a recently retired school teacher, and Tom's background is varied. He spent quite a bit of time as a truck driver, and has great stories to tell. The bottom line with the problems with the software is that I need to upgrade my laptop to a machine that will run Windows XP so I can upgrade to FrontPage 2003. Ah, the joys of this little hobby. After we pay our taxes for the year we'll see if we have any money left over to indulge in the luxury of a new computer.
Our neighbor across the street was ready for the season. Little electric fans and lights in those inflatable decorations. And then a couple of pictures of the supplemental braking system in the Jeep. The cable is activated by the brakes in the motorhome, and pulls the pedal of the Jeep just as hard and as quick as the brakes in the motorhome. And there's nothing to do to the Jeep when we're hooking up or unhooking it. The cable is inactive when the Jeep isn't hooked up, so driving it around is the same as always.
That's the solenoid that pulls the cable, and it lives under the back seat, out of sight and out of the way. The cable runs under the floor mats until it comes out by the brake pedal. Then I wandered around the park taking pictures of some of the colors. I couldn't tell if this little evergreen was jealous of the other trees changing colors, or if maybe it's like the Larch trees we're familiar with in WA, and shedding it's needles for the winter. At any rate, it's in on the color-changing act of the season.
We've been told that this is the latest the colors have been showing in a long time. Milton S. Hershey was a great man. He was persistent. He failed in the candy making business three times before finally getting it right. And his candy making business wasn't chocolate, it was caramels. He sold the caramel business, moved back to his home town, and got to fooling around with mixing milk with chocolate, and aren't we glad he didn't give up! We're in the "Founders Hall" of the Milton S. Hershey school.
The guide for the bus tour that we tagged along with is an alumni of the school (1960) and very proud of it. On the floor are tiles depicting the different phases of Hershey's life, and this one is showing him as an apprentice candy maker.
The cocoa beans, the homes, the factory, the cows, and of course, the street names in Hershey, PA, are all a part of the story.
Founders Hall is gorgeous. Those dancing lights behind Barb are reflections off the pools which are also behind her. They're not just shining from her halo! The floor in the auditorium caught our eye, as it's all brick with tile between the seats.
The entire interior was made of this brick, and what a challenge for the sound man! There was evidence along the back wall of sound-proofing work. One part of the lobby is devoted to us visitors, and inside the alcove was 3 TV monitors where we could watch a 20-minute video tape of how the school came to be. On either side of the alcove are paintings of Mr. Hershey and his wife.
If the paintings are accurate, don't they look like people you'd like to know better? So often the paintings of this era make the subject seem stern and unapproachable, but not these. At least not to us. He was 42 and she was 26 when they married. She died of MS when she was 43; they were married for just 17 years, and he never married again.
The dome is the second largest in the world, second only to St. Peter's basilica in Rome. Someone had donated a piano, and whenever we see a beautiful piano, we think of granddaughter Robin, and wonder how it would sound with her playing some Mozart or Chopin piece on it.
The ornate carving on the piano was noteworthy we thought, and also the rather clever wall papering around the light switches. See them? They're in the middle of the picture.
There they are! And the detailed careful workmanship like that was evident throughout the building.
The school has 10,000 acres, and some of it is open area like this. And on the way down to take a better look of the grounds, Barb came across another "Sedro." Must be a tough winter coming up. They're all really fuzzy.
Looking up at Founders Hall, and then down to the little ponds, fountains, and bridge in the simple garden.
I went to pretty good schools when I was growing up, but none of them had grounds like this. Did yours? Across the street is one of the farms that the boys learned trades on in the early days. Before the child labor laws eliminated the opportunity for kids to get any real good training in how to live useful lives.
The students are housed in homes like this. The divisions are junior, intermediate, and senior. Don't know exactly which this one is. The students are separated by gender, but efforts are made to keep siblings within walking distance of one another if possible. Even the flagpole mount reflects the heritage of the place, with its little "Kisses" around the top.
Kisses were the theme for the street lights in downtown Hershey. The little "Hershey" tag would swing around in the wind.
Hershey is in the middle between Lebanon and Harrisburg, as plainly shown. And then the most famous lamppost around here.