Peoria Illinoisan

I love oddball roadside attractions as much as the next guy, so using RoadsideAmerica.com as my guide, I compiled a top 10 list of attractions that I would like to visit.

[All text is reprinted from RoadsideAmerica.com]

10. Cathedral of Junk, Austin, TX.

Wrapped in years of subtropical Texas vegetation, the Cathedral is a hollow framework of improvised trusses, around and within which Vince has wired and packed all manner of mass-production cast-offs: lawnmower wheels, car bumpers, kitchen utensils, ladders, cables, bottles, circuit boards, bicycle parts, brick-a-brack, and a lot of stuff that is frankly unidentifiable.

Illuminated beer signs, clocks, and other electric do-dads still operate, powered by unseen cables and outlets hidden within the shadowy silvery-green. Walk through the Cathedral’s passages, and one is eerily reminded of scenes from the film Aliens, where half-organic walls are built of humans waiting to be sucked dry.

“Some people recognize junk that they used to have. Women, mostly,” Vince tells us. “A few people get overwhelmed and have to leave. Sometimes people get weird. Some people cry. Women again. They just get overcome or something, I dunno.”

9. Truckhenge, Topeka, KS.

“I don’t try to be nice to the county when they’re morons,” [Ron Lessman] tells us, showing us his signature creation, Truckhenge.

8. Giant Lady’s Leg Sundial, Roselawn, IN.

Dick had big ideas: he renamed the place Naked City, made it the home of the Ms. Nude Teeny Bopper Contest and the “Erin Go Bra-less” Dance on St. Patrick’s Day, and had built the giant lady’s leg sundial, 63 feet long and properly positioned to tell time — a useful feature for wristwatchless nudists.

Naked City closed in 1986 when Dick was run out of Indiana on child molestation charges, but the leg remains and so does the resort, now under new management.

7. Idaho Potato Museum, Blackfoot, ID.

At the World Potato Exposition, you can “Learn about the agricultural, historical, social, scientific, educational, artistic and economic aspects of the world-famous Idaho potato.” A giant chunk of Idaho gold — the world’s largest Styrofoam potato — lies next to the parking lot, like something that fell off a flatbed truck on a novelty postcard.

There are displays on how the industry grew in Idaho, and exhibits of farming and sorting equipment.

A tribute to Mr. Potato Head sits behind glass.

6. Museum of Bad Art, Dedham, MA.

“Talented artists can make bad art,” said Louise. “Incompetent artists can make bad art, too, but mostly what they make is just boring.”

And what about people who intentionally make bad art? Do their creations qualify for exhibit space in MOBA? Louise said no. “If you do it bad deliberately, you’ve accomplished what you set out to do. You’ve done it good. It’s not bad any more.”

5. Kansas Underground Salt Mine, Hutchinson, KS.

If ever there was a mine tour designed for Mr. and Mrs. Armchair American, this is it. The Kansas Underground Salt Museum doesn’t even have the word “mine” in its title, and that’s no accident. There are no claustrophobic squeezes here, no deadly gasses, not even any dirt. A tour here is like a drive inside a parking garage — except that it’s 67 miles long and sealed inside of a 400-foot-thick block of salt.

4. Arm of General Stonewall Jackson Grave Site, Ellwood, VA.

In the early days of the war, Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia surprised the oddsmakers by winning battle after battle. In Chancellorsville, though, Jackson was mistakenly shot by his own men. He had his left arm amputated, and died eight days later.

In 1929 it [the arm] was exhumed from a nondescript crypt and reburied in a steel box on a plantation known as Ellwood in the Wilderness Battlefield. Little has changed around the field in which it now lays. There is only one gravestone, the one belonging to Jackson’s arm.

3. Presidents Park, Lead, SD.

The 43 heads are arranged chronologically along a path winding up into a rocky knoll of tall pines. George Washington, generally accepted in history as the first President of the USA, looks over the snack bar.

The busts are16-20 feet tall, with the seven greatest Presidents’ heads rendered at about 12 times life-size. Each head is accompanied by an informational display.

2. Eastern State Penitentiary Tours, Philadelphia, PA.

Eastern State Penitentiary was the largest building in America when it opened in 1829. Its grounds still cover a dozen acres; its 30-foot-high walls extend for nearly a mile.

There’s a second floor view from Cell Block 7 (”one of the most beautiful cell blocks”), and the well-appointed cell of former star prisoner Al Capone, and Cell Block 12, “the haunted cell block” where people pay to be locked in overnight to see ghosts (It’s also the location for “Terror Behind The Walls,” one of America’s creepier Halloween attractions.)

1. Carhenge, Alliance, NE.

A family reunion in 1987 produced what has become America’s best-known quirky Stonehenge — “Carhenge,” built in a dusty field outside of Alliance, Nebraska, under the supervision of farmer Jim Reinders, who meant it as a memorial to his dad. What made Carhenge unique was that it was made of, well, cars — 38 of them, rescued from nearby farms and dumps. The Reinders family spray-painted the cars a flat gray to make the monument more accurate. Two foreign vehicles were originally part of Carhenge, but they were subsequently dragged away and buried, replaced by models from Detroit. The “heel stone” is a 1962 Caddy.

The residents of Alliance at first wanted to tear down Carhenge. The Nebraska Department of Highways wanted to label it a “junkyard” and erect a big fence around it. But the animosity has long since passed, and signs on the outskirts of town now proudly identify Alliance as the “Home of Carhenge.”

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