For one thing, it cost me six bucks just to go in and take a picture. For another, it wasn't nearly as magnificent as Mt. Rushmore. But I was curious, and satisfied that curiosity before I left Atlanta that morning. End of that story.
I headed around Atlanta and south to Warm Springs, Georgia, the site of my third and last Long Trip encounter with Franklin Delano Roosevelt, at his little White House:
Warm Springs is the site of a then rundown little health resort where FDR went to bathe in the mineral springs in hopes that it would help the paralysis left from his bout of polio. There's a wonderful HBO movie about FDR and his polio, partially filmed on this site, starring my favorite actor Kenneth Branagh, who did a terrific job despite the fact that he looks nothing like FDR through the face. The movie is called Warm Springs, oddly enough.
Warm Springs itself was a fascinating place. I spent several hours there, going through the little White House, and through the museum, where I saw, among many other things, FDR's hand-controlled car:
And strolled down a walkway lined with stones, one from each state in the Union, that led to a rather lovely fountain:
After I left Warm Springs, I drove down through Columbus, Georgia, where I stopped to run a couple of errands, and then down into Alabama, to the town of Enterprise, where I spent the night.
Enterprise has since, unfortunately, had its fifteen minutes of fame in the form of a tornado that struck and completely destroyed its high school in 2007, killing nine people, injuring many others.
Somehow I managed to miss the Boll Weevil Monument, though. And I drove on both the Lewis Grizzard Highway (Grizzard was a very funny newspaper columnist), and the Billy Watson Highway. I never did figure out who Billy Watson was at the time [googles]. Nope. Still nothing. Anyone know? I'd be grateful...
Did you go to the top of Stone Mountain? The view is impressive. The carillon is also cool. There's lots to do there, but we mostly don't because the parking fees are indeed bogus. The view is just as impressive from surrounding "mountain" parks: Panola & a couple of others I haven't been to yet.
ReplyDeleteI didn't. I went in the park, took a couple of pictures, and left [wry g]. I didn't even know you *could* go to the top.
ReplyDeleteI did hear the carillon, though, and it was nice but unexceptional (UT Tyler has one on their campus, so carillons are something I hear almost every time I go visit my mother).