Prairie Museum of Art & History, Colby, Kansas

We had planned to stay in a campground on the way that sounded good in the book and was only about 150 miles away, but when we went there it was just some hook ups in a field with nothing around so we decided to drive another 80 miles and stay at a Wal-Mart. We drove to Colby, Kansas and there was a museum right across the road so naturally I wanted to go and see it. It was a warm and sunny so Ches came with me. With the time change (1 hour later) we only had 30 minutes to see the museum, but they said we could come back the next day for no charge. (there was so much to see I went back the next morning for about an hour and took lots of pictures)

Prairie Museum of Art & History
1930’s Farmstead was a typical house of this period, nicely furnished. The yard included a wooden blade windmill called “umbrella” or “morning glory,” and outhouse, small barn with animals, and herb garden.

There was a typical one room schoolhouse and small church.

Sod House

Of more interest to me was a sod home. The sod house shows the ingenuity of the homesteaders. It is made of sod blocks, 1 foot by 2 feet and 4 inches deep. This was a fancy one with wooden floors instead of dirt, and had 2 windows.

Cooper Barn
This is supposed to be the largest barn in Kansas, measuring 66 feet wide, 114 feet long and 48 feet high. It contains over 100 hundred years of agriculture history, artifacts and photos, Ches enjoyed this part.



Museum Building
The museum building contains the collection from the Kuskas family that was donated in 1975 and it took mo re than 3 moving trucks to move the 17 tons of artefacts and is valued at more than a million dollars. The collection is very ecelectic including: glassware, ornaments, jewellery, clothing, furniture, dolls, and toys. I especially enjoyed looking at the beautiful glassware.

Jessie Montes
This artist has unique artwork that is made from corrugated cardboard. He cuts the cardboard in ¼ inch strips on a right angle, a 45 degrees or parallel to the corrugations. This gives him three interesting textures with which to work as he creates each piece of art. The strips are then glued edgewise onto the surface of the base, also made of cardboard, to form the various pieces of art. A protective coating is placed over the work when it is finished.

Denver Museum of Dolls, Miniatures, Toys

It was another beautiful warm sunny day. We don’t like this RV park much, it is crowded, small spots in a not that great an area but decided to stay another day anyway because we don’t feel like moving. We drove downtown to see a museum and I enjoyed looking at the old buildings like the mint, State capital building and large historic houses. We checked out a Camping World and then relaxed in the motor home.

Denver Museum of Dolls, Miniatures, Toys

The museum is in a nice historic Dutch-Colonial home built in 1899 called Pearce McAllister Cottage. There several dollhouses, one in particular were a huge mansion with a large landscaped yard. There were lots of dolls; some were dressed as well known women in outfits that they wore for special occasions. There was a very large collection of raggedy Anne dolls. I love looking at the really tiny things, like clothes, pictures, ornaments, food, dishes. I bought a tiny cake mix master and a book for my own dollhouse. One of their prized exhibits is some Japanese friendship dolls. In 1926 a gentlemen collected over 12,000 blue, eyed dolls that said “mama” and sent them to Yokohoma in Japan for the Japanese children. In return Japan sent 48 dolls (known as friendship dolls) to the USA, one for each state. Some of the dolls are 2 feet high and came with their own furniture and tea sets and are in traditional costumes. They were put in museums then in WW II they were put away. There is a society, who is trying to locate the dolls and restore them.

Cheyenne

Oct 27 Monday Cheyenne

Another sunny day we drove (450 miles) to Cheyenne Walmart. It was a long drive: we went through canyons, up mountains, past forests, to flat country. We saw lots of antelope.

Oct 28 Tuesday Cheyenne and Denver
We are having such great weather we went sightseeing. We looked at the outside of the state capital and Governor’s mansion (which was closed) and 2 museums. Then we drove (120 miles) to near Denver.

us in carriage

Cheyenne Frontier Days Old West Museum
There were many unique carriages including, ambulance, wagon for selling popcorn, Conestoga covered wagon and hearse, etc. There was lots of rodeo memorabilia from the Cheyenne rodeo dating back to 1800’s. We watched a video of scenes from the rodeo that were excellent. There were many beautiful bronze statues and paintings. We bought a nice bronze like ornament of a cowboy scene for Ches.

Wyoming State Museum
There were lots of historical artefacts showing early settler life and Indian life. There was a collection of silver bought almost 100 hundred years ago for $7,500.00. I enjoyed the collection of dolls with period costumes. (couldn't take pictures inside)

State Capitol

Governor's Mansion

Salt Lake City

We were up and gone by the crack of dawn, I mean literally, the sun was just coming up as we left and the sky was a beautiful bright red. It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day. It was a short drive (165 miles) to Salt Lake City. We booked into a campground, Pony Express RV Resort. After we settled in we drove downtown to Temple Square. We did not go into library (it was closed) or convention center (it was huge, looked beautiful in pictures). It was very enjoyable walking around in the sunshine and looking at the nice buildings and gardens.

Temple
We took some pictures of the Temple, which is beautiful, but is not open to the public.

Tabernacle
We listened to organ music in the tabernacle the acoustics are unbelievable. The organist did a demonstration without a microphone she tore strips of paper, dropped some nails, and dropped a penny and you could hear it so clear and loud. The building is huge and the organ takes up almost whole wall and a couple stories high. It was interesting listening to the organ music but most of it was classical and not really to our taste. Would have been nice to see the choir but we were not there at the right time.



South and North Visitor’s Centers
These are two large buildings with different exhibits. They had wonderful paintings, dioramas and statues.

Beehive House
Built in 1854 it served as the official residence of Brigham Young and his family. It has been restored and there are many rooms, bedrooms, parlours, music rooms, dining rooms, kitchens, pantry, etc. The tour was interesting but interspersed with information on Mormon religion and at the end cards were handed out, but I did not fill in our name or any other personal information.