The Spokesrider

A few articles ago (“Slept Here“) I posted a photo of Lydia Lucinda Wight’s gravestone. She is the person who recalled that Black Hawk slept in her family’s log cabin in 1830. I got a comment from somone who posted under the name “Gravestones and Monuments,” which seems to be a maker of gravestones in [...]

Ken Steinhoff’s new blog reminded me of this photo. It’s one I took on July 27, at the end of a two-day tour that took me down to the extreme northwest corner of Ohio. At the end of the ride back I stopped at the cemetery in Allen, hoping to find the gravestone of Lucinda [...]

Before Michigan became a state, a national military road was built to connect Chicago with Detroit. Territorial roads were also built. I presume they were financed by the federal government because there was no state government at the time, but I must confess that I don’t know quite how they were financed. I’ve seen old [...]

Moscow would look even more like Sleepy Hollow if the decrepit general store building down at the bottom, on the right. was still standing. It was a building that crowded the road, and somehow made the place seem like it was of a different time. But it burned down 5 years ago, and has been replaced by a little convenience store back from the road. This was the first time I had been there since the old store was gone. I missed it, but do have a photo of it somewhere.

When Black Hawk came through here in the 1820s, on his way to Fort Malden, there was no Moscow. On his last trip, in 1830, there would have been a new, log-cabin tavern. When the militias from Lenawee County and the Detroit area came through here in 1832, on their way to defend the territory [...]

Moscow is at the bottom of a valley formed by the Kalamazoo River, which is just a small stream here. I don’t think I’m the only person to have thought of the village as a Sleepy Hollow sort of place. Sundown comes early down at the bottom.

This is a scene from my last ride in Hillsdale County, almost a year ago. I’m hoping for another one tomorrow, even though there is a chance of rain in the forecast.