The Gateway to the West doesn’t have stockyards like its western sisters Saint Joseph and Sedalia and Kansas City. Still, one prime Saint Louis cattle drive steers my tastebuds to Lindbergh Boulevard. Kreis’ Restaurant has been kicking steak house butt … Read More
Pegleg Shannon’s County
Shannon County is a synonym for wilderness, with a few small settlements scattered across the deep woods. It’s a great place to hide, or get lost. From border to border, as the Jacks Fork River slices across its face, Shannon … Read More
‘Til We Meet Again
“I met an old buddy of yours,” I told my uncle Dan. He received the news as I expected he would, since he lies six feet beneath the granite marker that bears the name Daniel W. Drake. There was a … Read More
Cut your cookie
Of all the Joplin icons—Langston Hughes, Bonnie and Clyde, Route 66—I never put mining on the list. But that’s how Joplin got its start back in 1873. I sought to uncover the boomtown you won’t see from the interstate, the … Read More
Carny Road
Two icons along Route 66 point to a third. Sticking up like a wart on the flat windy Texas Panhandle, where dust is a commodity spread liberally along the armpit of Oklahoma, a leaning tower teeters, posing for shutterbugs intent … Read More
He was older than me
Morning rush hour murders your nerves. Worse for turtles. I saw one the other day, stranded on the center line of a busy expressway. He was upside down, legs fully extended, grasping at the sky. His chances for survival were … Read More
19 minutes at Burger King changed my life
I was running behind. Miles of untraveled road awaited to unfold north of Springfield, and it was already nearing lunch time. I wanted to stop at the legendary Anton’s Coffee Shop, looming ahead in my windshield. The experience at … Read More
The Sad, Strange Case of the Missouri Waltz
You’ve heard it a thousand times. At Mizzou games. On TV. Radio. Most recently at Mizzou’s Cotton Bowl victory over Ohio State. The Mizzou band begins the familiar strains of the Missouri Waltz. Then the song morphs into a march … Read More