Badlands, SD – Cruising along the meandering scenic bypass through Badlands National Park in southwestern South Dakota it’s difficult to ignore the supernatural inklings they evoke. Teddy Roosevelt, awed by the dark beauty of this region, aptly described the Badlands as “hell without the fire.”

Indeed, this vast, jagged landscape is composed of eroded buttes and spires spread across nearly 244,000 acres that formed as a giant sea receded some 69 million years ago. Prehistoric animals likes mammoths, rhinos and saber-toothed cats once flourished here, making it one of the most fossil-rich areas in the nation, with some fossils dating back 33 million years. The erosion that formed the Badlands we see today began approximately 500,000 years ago. It’s expected to take just as many years before it’s completely eroded away.

Paleo-Indian tribes lived here prior to the arrival of the Lakota. In 1890, Chief Big Foot passed through here in the run-up to the Massacre at Wounded Knee, in which 300 Sioux Indians were felled by U.S. Army guns, Big Foot among them. During World War II, the military used a southern portion of the badlands as a practice aerial bombing range.

There are many hiking trails graded to varying degrees of difficulty, but don’t get to close to the edges. Even after millions of years the land is soft and crumbly. And beware of rattlesnakes, which tend to hide in crevices and near rocks. Because of the park’s size, help isn’t immediately available. Camping in designated areas is also permitted.

Lost Springs, WY – If you’re looking for a drive to get away from it all, I-25 north from Denver to US-HWY 20 east in Wyoming is about as remote as it gets. Two-hundred-and-fifty miles of beautiful nothing. You won’t see utility lines strung along as there are no towns along the way. It’s beautiful country, with large, rocky hills covered with prairie short grass. Wyoming is the nation’s least populous state and Lost Springs is its least populous town.

Lost Springs sits on US-HWY 20 east. It’s a town that never really was. It’s population peaked during the mining boom of the 1920s, but has been in decline since. The town has one mayor and a councilman. In 2000, census workers wrongly calculated the population at 1, to the chagrin of the other 3. Lost Springs may have only four residents, but there’s room for at least one more, as five mobile homes sit within its .1 miles. That’s right, .1 miles.

After fighting my eyes over dozens of miles en route to Denver I pulled off in Gothenburg, Nebraska, home of college football hall of famer Jay Novacek and, according to Golf Week Magazine, America’s best golf course under $50. But there’s another little gem. Tucked behind the Shell gas station just off the exit was a big red barn with a windmill and a cloth-covered pioneer wagon. It’s an ode to Nebraska’s way of life after the Indians had been driven out and the government began doling out free plots of land. Inside sat a diminutive elderly woman who, judging from how her face lit up upon seeing me, didn’t get many visitors.

“Well hello there,” she said, setting down her crochet hooks. “Welcome to the Sod House Museum. Where are you from?”

“Pennsylvania,” I lied, only because people often seem very confused when I tell them Wisconsin then later they notice my PA plates. I like to avoid explaining things over and over, which is why I could never be a tour guide.

After explaining the nuts-and-bolts of the operation, the woman made me an offer. “How about I give you a guided tour? It’s free and if at any time you get bored you can tell me to shut up. How does that sound?” she asked with a big megawatt smile.

“Sounds great,” I replied, hoping I wouldn’t have to ask her to shut up. It was a hopeless thing to hope, I feared, considering she was going to be talking about Nebraska, a place you couldn’t pay me to live. But even unappealing things sometimes have interesting back stories so I let the woman run with it.

She didn’t disappoint.

In old pictures, bird cages hang just outside the front door of many sod houses. The birds provided women with companionship while the men hunted.

The museum consists mostly of reprinted photographs taken by a man named Solomon Butcher, who produced roughly 3,000 glass-plate negatives of settlement life beginning in 1886. This came more than 25 years after President Lincoln signed the Homestead Act, which drew thousands of European immigrants to the plains with promises of free land.

“They came with big ideas,” the woman said.

Problem was, the woman explained, the soil was pretty crappy. Even worse, there were so few trees and stones on the plains that houses had to be made of sod, like those built by the natives who occupied those lands previously had built. Those who could afford it purchased enough lumber, delivered via railroad, to accommodate door and window frames.

Life was hard for these homesteaders who, under the law, had five years to improve the land and file for a deed of title. Problems with the soil were compounded by a lack of water. Few were willing to undertake the dangerous work of digging wells. Even if they were, many didn’t have the money to build the windmill needed to bring the water up in buckets. Their sod homes, built inexpensively, were prone to insect infestations and needed constant maintenance due to rain.

The woman pointed to the sod house behind the museum. “There’s a lot of damage to it from the all the rain we’ve gotten,” she said.

I looked out and could see the exterior sagging. The museum’s owner, who was on vacation, was going to be displeased with the damage, according to the woman. She says he’ll make the repairs himself. It must’ve been a constant struggle for settlers to protect their homes from the elements. A single thunderstorm could turn a sod house into a mud hut.

The woman finished her tour, leaving me to check out the damaged sod house on my own. It is a lot like you’d expect: grassy, damp and dusty. The air inside was very cool, and each step kicked up a plume of dust from the dirt floor. I couldn’t imagine a full family residing inside, enduring the brutal winters together, hemmed in by the elements with nowhere to escape. The disappointment must’ve hit hard these homesteaders, whose dreams had led them to a barren, virtually useless wilderness. More than 60 percent of the of 1.6 million who made land claims failed to meet the five-year requirements and lost the land they’d sacrificed so much for.

From what I gathered Nebraska hasn’t much improved since 1862. The Indians are still gone, as are the buffalo. So are most of the sod houses. More than 90 percent of the state’s surface area is tied to agriculture and 89 percent of its towns have fewer than 1,000 residents.

While its corporatized farms produce tons of corn, soybeans and beef we also have Nebraska to thank for Kool-Aid, CliffNotes and the second-richest guy in the world, Warren Buffett, a.k.a. The Oracle of Omaha.

Nebraska is also where the west begins. You can feel – about halfway across – the air shed its humidity to become semi-arid. It’s true. Even the sun shines differently.

And let’s not forget the Sod House Museum.

After strolling the grounds a bit, taking in the life-sized barbed-wire buffalo and Indian horse rider sculptures, I returned to the gift shop. The woman, who I learned was a retired charter pilot, asked some questions about Pennsylvania. She had never been there, a realization that seemed to surprise her. “We never had flights there, I guess.”

I decided there wasn’t anything gift shop junk I wanted to buy, but felt a little bad that I didn’t have any loose cash to plug in the donation box. The woman was a great tour guide, charismatic as hell and full of interesting deets, insofar as Nebraskan deets are interesting. I apologized for having nothing to give. She assured me it was okay and I believed her. I thought I’d stop by on my way home from Denver, as a way of demonstrating the fundamental goodness of humankind, but that didn’t happen either.

I detoured around Nebraska instead.

As much as I’ve traveled I’ve never left America. Pathetic, right? Earlier this year I was eyeing an autumn excursion to Vietnam, then became curious about South America. Now I’m a food vendor with festivals lined up pretty much into October. But my appetite for foreign soil has been anything but satiated. In fact, after coming very close to purchasing a plane ticket to Bogota, Columbia – the would be jump off point for a South American adventure – I’m a tad regretful that I opted instead to plunk my change into a mobile food vending business, an idea baked from a mix of lost nerve and financial prudence. But if for the time being I can’t write about traveling through a foreign land I can at least write about the four places I’d like to visit before I croak.

Vietnam
My desire to travel to this southeast Asian nation has its origins in the Vietnam War movies I watched as a kid. Nowadays, it’s Vietnam’s forested mountains, jungles, expansive biodiversity and geographical formations that are the main appeal, not to mention the adventure of negotiating the hustle of Ho Chi Minh City. If and when I visit I’d love more than anything to journey from Ho Chi Minh City in the south to Hanoi, settled in 3,000 B.C., in the north. Certainly an incursion into neighboring Cambodia would be in order, perhaps by boat up the Mekong River. Steeped in ancient history, the Vietnamese have fought of Chinese invaders, French colonialists and American occupiers. Its backpacker friendly and emerging economy make Vietnam an ideal spot for the budget traveler.

Mexico City
With all the grisly images of drug violence streaming out of Mexico in recent years and its capitol’s reputation as one huge lawless barrio, Mexico City might seem like an unnecessarily risky destination. But Mexico City, unlike Mexico’s borderlands, has, since 2009, become one of the safer places in Mexico to visit. Bouyed by tales from several people I’ve met over the last couple of years, the writings of various travel bloggers and Chuck Thompson’s account of his recent visit in To Hell Holes and Back, I’m confident the world’s most populous city is a safe and worthy place to visit. With more museums than any other city in the world and architecture from every epoch since the 11th Century, this sprawling metropolis undoubtedly holds many surprises. I hope its reputation continues to improve.

Rwanda
No place in Africa has captivated me like Rwanda. Like Vietnam, my fascination with this landlocked country has roots in my formative years, 1994 to be precise, after reports of genocide first appeared as side items in newspapers. Since then the country has been reborn as a stable democracy and now has the distinction of being high among the continent’s safest countries, tourism being among its fastest growing industries. Its mountains are home to gorillas and thirteen other primate species. Its savannas teem with giraffes, elephants and topis. With a friendly population welcoming of foreigners, the only thing not to like are the costs, which mirror those in the developed world. Plus, flying around the African interior seems a little dicey.

Easter Island
The world’s most remote inhabited island, located in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, was highlighted by anthropologist Jared Diamond in his seminal book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Diamond argued that Easter Island society collapsed in the 1800s due to deforestation, while others claim a combination of environmental ruin, European diseases and Peruvian slave raids decimated the island’s population. Today the island is a World Heritage Site, where more than 800 moai – those monolithic human forms with oversized heads – still stand on the island. Many that had fallen over the years were re-raised during to a massive 20-year restoration project that began in 1955.

Where would you like to visit and why?

A wax depiction of a technique developed in ancient China where rats are encouraged to eat people alive.

Wisconsin Dells, WI – Normally I’m not keen on tourist towns, with their bubble-gummy aesthetic and overpriced fare, but there are exceptions, of course. Wisconsin Dells, where I spent my Fourth of July, is one of them. And though I’ve visited dozens of times over the years, it still holds a secret or two.

Located about 50 miles north of Madison, along Highway 12, the city, along with nearby Lake Delton, attracts more than five million visitors annually. Famous for its massive water parks, themed resorts, boat tours and natural beauty (glacially-formed sandstone gorges along the Wisconsin River), the Wisconsin Dells is a remarkably laid-back spot, having lured visitors seeking an escape from city life since the mid-1800s.

We left Madison early, hopping in Purple Thunder and heading west along Highway 12, which cuts northwest across idyllic Wisconsin farmland prior to meandering through the forested hills south of Baraboo. I always encourage visitors and newbies eyeing a trip to the Dells – as its locally known – to forsake the Interstate for this route instead. Not only is Highway 12 a peaceful and scenic drive, but it also offers an array of unique sights and destinations of its own, including Devil’s Lake State Park, Ho-Chunk Casino, the Baraboo Candy Company (home of the Cowpie), and Dr. Evermor’s fantastic steampunk-esque metal sculpture garden.

On this trip, however, the only stop we made along Highway 12 was to buy discounted fireworks – firecrackers, Saturn rockets and other exploding goodies you can’t buy in Madison.

I had to school some punk-ass kids in the proper ways of putting the pedal to the metal.

We arrived shortly after noon, without any itinerary. Naturally, on such a gorgeous day, the water parks teemed with people, but we failed to bring with us any swim gear. Instead, we started things off with a visit to Big Chief Go Karts, where, for $3, we raced around a state-of-the-art go-kart track.

Despite their small engines, the go-karts really go. I had one of the faster ones, which seemed to irritate a trio of young boys to the point of compelling them to try and slow me down. Twice I cruised by a kid in a red t-shirt. On my third approach, I saw him glancing to his rear. When I attempted to pass him a third time, he began to deliberately obstruct my path. When I swerved left, he swerved left. When I swerved right, he swerved right. How was it that this pipsqueak was besting me, The Feral Scribe, a road warrior who has clocked thousands of highway miles and negotiated traffic in America’s biggest cities? I was chagrined.

This game of vehicular brinkmanship went on as we sped up a large incline, our little engines roaring, and continued as we began our descent. Bu I’d had enough. This little punk was no match for my road superiority. When he again glanced back at my position, I cut left ever so briefly. When he, too, cut left, I put the pedal to the metal and cut hard to the right. Realizing he’d been out maneuvered, the kid cut hard to the right before I could pass him fully. A collision was imminent.

A lesser driver may have fallen back, but I was determined to pass him. As he rammed me against the curb, I let off the accelerator a bit, and broadsided his back end. He sped up and as he tried to straighten out his vehicle I saw an opening. Hitting the gas full throttle, I rammed his front end with enough force to spin him so he faced oncoming traffic. With no reverse, he was out of commission until the attendant turned him around.

His buddies then came after me, each deploying similar tactics. In both instances, they failed to keep me down. But just as this rat race was becoming fun, we completed our final lap and were routed back into the pit.

Legendary Dells dive bar, Nig's Bar, a name that many find off-putting.

After road warring with children, it was off to have a swig at Nig’s, a very old bar that’s been serving drinks in downtown Wisconsin Dells since 1947. Commentators on several travel adviser sites say they find name, which may have been that of its original owner, inappropriate. “Completely inappropriate,” wrote a visitor from Ohio, “especially in a town that caters to families and children.”

The bar itself isn’t anything special, though maybe night hours are a different story. After sucking down a pair of pretty crappy strawberry margaritas, we perused the gift shops and t-shirts stores that line the strip. We stopped to watch a street magician do tricks for tips after firing off more than a hundred rounds at a paintball shooting range.

We toyed with the idea of riding roller coasters at Mount Olympus, but having just gone to Six Flags a week earlier, the admission seemed a tad high for the parks limited options. So we kept up our stroll, looking for place to grab a beer. One of the drawbacks of the Dells, is the complete lack of outdoor seating. I’m not sure if the city prohibits it, but along the strip there wasn’t any. During our search for a suitable watering hole, we turned onto a cross street and were greeted with a pleasant surprise: the Torture Museum.

What possibly could be more incongruent in a town whose economy is driven by families and fun than a museum dedicated to torture throughout the ages? But that is exactly what you’ll find if you go off the strip and onto Eddy Street. More stunning, at least for me, was that I had never heard of the five-year-old museum, which has been featured on the History Channel. With admission only $7, there was no doubt about what our next activity would be.

The first thing you see upon entering is a fake electric chair. For $1, you can electrocute yourself amid lots of loud buzzing, flashing lights and a dial that measures the rising voltage. It’s not real electricity, of course, but vibrations similar to the Magic Fingers in old motel rooms. The chair’s noise and lights scared a little boy who, upon our arrival, was being coaxed back inside by his parents. When their efforts failed, they left and we went inside.

Exhibits consisted primarily of torture devices and execution techniques pioneered by the Chinese, the Romans and others across midieval Europe, each device accompanied by a brief description of how and why it was used. The Shrew’s Fiddle, for example, was a wooden “fiddle” that was locked around the necks and wrists of German women accused of nagging or gossiping. Other items included a guillotine, an electric chair, a heretic’s fork and crucifixion spikes. One particularly gruesome device, the Iron Maiden, is described in this eye witness account from the device’s 1515 debut:

A forger of coins was placed inside and the door shut slowly so that the very sharp points penetrated his arms and legs in several places, and his belly and chest and his bladder and the roots of his member and his eyes and his shoulders and his buttocks, but not enough to kill him, and so he remained tortured, making great crys for two days, after which he died.

The self-guided tour concluded with an exhibit showcasing John Wayne Gacy, complete with an original painting by the modern torturist and serial killer who was executed in Illinois in 1994. In all, it took about 15 minutes.

It being the Dells, I should not have expected too much, but I left the museum feeling a tad disappointed. Not because it was brief or because all of the exhibits, save for the Gacy painting, were replicas, but because it dealt so flippantly with an issue we’re still debating today. No mention of waterboarding, modern execution methods or even how ideas regarding criminal punishment have evolved. It’s shock without substance. Even the Gacy exhibit, though unique, had an unsettling shrine-like quality that verged on the celebratory.

Jenny Lewis once sang, “Any asshole can open up a museum/Put all the things he loves on display.” She could have been singing about the museum’s founder.

I think the crying little boy was on to something.

Many stores in the Dells have co-opted the more stereotyped aspects of Native American culture.

We didn’t stick around too long following the Torture Museum. After stopping off for another drink, we hopped back inside Purple Thunder and headed back to Madison to wait for night to fall so we could explode our fireworks. Pop! Pop! Pop! Then they were done, too. And so was I. I drank a beer, ate some pizza, and called it a day.

Near the confluence of the Bad Axe and Mississippi Rivers, outside of Victory, WI.

Victory, WI – The nation’s highways are dotted with commemorative plaques, memorials and points-of-interest. Wisconsin alone has 520 such markers, each offering a tidbit of state-approved history. Many of these markers are tributes to obscure local figures, events or milestones, significant to few beyond the civic boosters who raised the money for their creation. Most are forgotten as quickly as they’re read. But every once in a while one will arouse the imagination and compel you to contemplate an unimaginable history.

Here, just south of Victory, Wisconsin, a tall tombstone-shaped marker with a weathered inscription summarizes two bloody days of fighting that occurred here – at the confluence of the Mississippi and Bad Axe Rivers – in early August 1832. To call it fighting is putting it mildly. Hockey players fight. This, on the other hand, was a massacre, carried out by men who would later be honored with counties, cities and parks that bear their names.

The marker itself is neutral, providing a statistical snapshot of the atrocity. “Hard fighting… 1,200 white soldiers engaged. 17 killed. 12 wounded. Of Indians. 150 shot. 150 drowned. 50 taken prisoner. 300 crossed of whom 150 were killed by Sioux instigated by Gen. Atkinson. Of the 3000 [Indians] that crossed the river from Iowa in April 1832 not more than 150 survived to tell the story of the Black Hawk War.”

No mention of the massacre or the genocidal racism that inspired it.

That story goes something like this: In April 1832, Chief Black Hawk led of a band of some 3,000 Indians – warriors, as well as women and children – across the Mississippi from Iowa into Illinois to reclaim ancestral lands his tribe had lost to dubious treaties and the discovery of minerals. (Though the plaque says 3,000 Indians crossed the river, most accounts put the number around 1,000.) More Indians allied with Black Hawk’s band as he pursued negotiations with Illinois’ territorial governor. When talks broke down, the governor dispatched a militia that eventually killed three emissaries sent by Black Hawk to broker a truce. After twelve white men were killed in the ensuing battle, rumors that “2,000 bloodthirsty warriors were sweeping all Northern Illinois with the bosom of destruction” gripped the area.

Over the next three months, Black Hawk’s band, made up primarily of Sauk and Fox Indians, was pursued through northern Illinois and southwestern Wisconsin by the United States Army and various militias eager to see the Indian rebel dead. By July 21, when Gen. Henry Dodge caught up with Black Hawk’s band at Wisconsin Heights, the warrior chief had decided to flee with his people back across the Mississippi into Iowa. Tired and without food, more were dying each day from exhaustion and starvation. Black Hawk’s band sustained heavy losses, but the warriors were able to hold the soldiers back long enough to allow women and children to cross the Wisconsin River.

The Battle of Wisconsin Heights, considered the penultimate battle in the Black Hawk War, was also the prelude to the massacre at Bad Axe. Dodge, after leading a bayonet charge against those warriors that remained, suspended fighting until the following morning, giving Black Hawk and his surviving warriors time to escape across the river. At dawn, a fellow chief named Neopope, yelled out from atop a knoll across the river to militia leaders. He spoke in the Winnebago (now Ho-Chunk) language, but the Winnebago, who allied themselves with the militias, and took some 40 scalps during the battle, were no longer present. The white men couldn’t understand what Neopope was saying, and the chase continued.

It took Black Hawk and his starving, frightened band, eight days to reach the confluence of the Bad Axe and Mississippi Rivers, near where Highway 35 now snakes along Wisconsin’s western border. Many Indians, now numbering less than 600, made haste in crossing the river, escaping to Iowa, where they believed they’d be beyond America’s reach. Time was in short supply. Army soldiers and militia men were closing in on them by following their dead. On Aug. 1, the same day the Indians reached the Mississippi, Maj. John Allen Wakefield, wrote, “We… passed a number of dead Indians who had died in consequence of the wounds they received in the battle near the Wisconsin River.”

While some of the Indians managed to reach Iowa’s shore, many were killed when the Steamboat Warrior arrived shortly after and immediately opened fire. Black Hawk later recalled that men dropped at his feet. He waved a white flag that was ignored by the ship’s captain, who pounded the shore with canister shot until the ship ran low on fuel some two hours later.

With the Warrior headed south to Prairie du Chien, Black Hawk believed the band should go north, but convinced only 40 of his dying followers to flee with him. For the several hundred who remained, only in Iowa would their survival be assured.

In the early morning hours of August 2, 1832, spies in from Gen. Henry Atkinson’s brigade heralded the discovery of the Indians’ rear guard. The Indians, Wakefield observed, fired upon the spies as they retreated toward the Mississippi, “until Gen. [Henry] Dodge, who commanded, began to kill them very fast.”

“They now found that they could not get away from us,” Wakefield continued, in his accounting of events published in 1834. “The only chance for them was to fight until they died.”

Wakefield’s assessment was correct: the Indians’ situation was hopeless. Gen. Dodge’s brigade was closing in from the east. The Steamboat Warrior, now refueled and on its way back to the mouth of the Bad Axe, prevented a southern escape. And in Iowa, where the Indians believed they’d be safe, Sioux Indians in the employ of the army awaited in the forest. Those that made the crossing a day earlier had been captured and scalped.

After discovering a trail leading to the Indians’ main camp, Gen. James Henry led the charge down the bluff and toward Indians’ warrior guard. A fierce bayonet and musket battle erupted between government forces and several hundred warriors. As fighting broke out, Wakefield recalled seeing women and children constructing bark canoes, many of whom ran into the river and drowned.

Eager to end the war, soldiers from other regiments joined Gen. Henry’s ranks. “They all joined us in the work of death – for death it was,” Wakefield wrote. “We were by this time fast getting rid of those demons in human shape.”

Orders were given to shoot anyone who fled or tried crossing the river. Indians who escaped to one of the river’s many willow islands were came under siege by the Steamboat Warrior. Of those who didn’t brave the water, some tried hiding in the tall grass and thick brush. Others buried themselves in the mud and sand, “leaving just enough of their heads out to breathe the breath of life.”

The nightmarish assault lasted eight hours. Of the 500-plus Indians at the mouth of the Bad Axe River that day, approximately 150 survived and were taken prisoner. The Sioux collected on the 68 scalps and 22 prisoners they returned to the local Indian agent.

Reflecting on that day, Wakefield is boastful.

“We killed and wounded a great many of these wretched wanderers, who have no home in the world, but are like the wild beasts more than man – wandering from forest to forest, and not making any improvement on the natural mind,” Wakefield wrote. “Putting together what were killed in the two battles, we must have destroyed upwards of four hundred of these unhappy and miserable beings.”

Once the survivors were rounded up and examined, they were asked what Neopope talked so long about atop the knoll following the battle at Wisconsin Heights. “They stated he was telling us… that they had their squaws and children with them… that they were starving and unable to fight us… that if we let them pass over the Mississippi, they would do no more mischief,” Wakefield wrote, betraying no emotion. “But here he was mistaken… There was no one among us that understood the Winnebago language.”

Many of the men who fought in the Black Hawk War went on to prosperous political careers. Henry Dodge became Wisconsin’s first territorial governor, a Congressman and had a state park and town named after him. Another Wisconsin town is named after Gen. Henry Atkinson. Maj. John Allen Wakefield served in the U.S. House of Representatives, and, in a case of moral irony, fought to keep slavery out of Illinois and Kansas.

As for Black Hawk? Well, he was paraded through the eastern cities after his surrender not long after the massacre. Within a year, his autobiography made him a bestselling author. In 1838, he died in southeastern Iowa.

And the mouth of the Bad Axe River? Almost 179 years later, it’s difficult to imagine such horrors as those that occurred here, though similar things continue to happen routinely around the world. The wilderness here looks much the same as it did then, with grand bluffs spared by the glaciers, overlooking both rivers and with the forested hills of Iowa still within reach. The Indians are long gone. The only ones you’ll find around here are those whose bones are occasionally uncovered by construction crews or gardeners. The locals are superstitious about such findings, and tend to return the remains to their graves.

It’s probably fair to say that not many know much about the massacre that occurred here, if they know about it at all. And that makes me a little sad. Such things should not be forgotten. Then again, were it not for a weathered marker and a bit of chance, I wouldn’t have known about the Massacre at Bad Axe, either.

Gettysburg, PA – Mid-afternoon on July 1, 1863, a young seamstress named Virginia Mary “Jennie” Wade, along with her mother and two younger brothers, left her home in the center of Gettysburg to be with her oldest sister, who earlier that day endured a horrific childbirth, as Confederate soldiers marched on the 2,400-resident town.

The Confederacy’s push into Union territory was the first salvo of what would later be seen as the most decisive battle of America’s Civil War. For three days Gettysburg shook as nearly 94,000 Union and 72,000 Confederate troops slaughtered each other with bayonets and close-range shooting. Led by Robert E. Lee, the Confederacy’s goal wasn’t to occupy the North permanently, but to make northerners wary of the war and allow the South to at last secede.

The Union Army had anticipated Lee’s march on the south-central Pennsylvania town, tailing his army much of the way. However, the battle began accidentally when Confederate soldiers dispatched to occupy the town were surprised to find the town already occupied by a pair of Union Calvary Brigades. Outnumbered, the Union troops were easily pushed back.

Though terrified, Gettysburg’s residents did what they could to help push back the enemy invaders.

“My native townsmen, during that terrible struggle, acted as patriotic and bravely as it was possible for citizens to act, who had suddenly thrust upon them the most gigantic battle of modern times,” a Gettysburg resident recounted years later. “They had none of the weapons or munitions of war; they were not drilled and were totally unprepared for such an unthoughtof experience. They were civilians.”

Like much of Gettysburg, the Wades’ sympathies were with the north. Jennie’s fiance, Johnston Hastings “Jack” Skelly, was a Union Corporal. For their part, Jennie and her mother baked bread and biscuits for Union troops throughout July 1 and 2. Because of the house’s proximity to Cemetery Hill, a strategic spot that played a critical role during the three days of battle, the thick brick walls were struck by more than 150 bullets and minie balls as the Wades worked tirelessly to keep the Union army nourished.

The hole made by the minie ball that killed Jennie Wade.

For three days the battle raged just 50 yards from where the Wade’s had taken refuge. On July 3, Jennie woke early to make into loaves the dough she’d let rise throughout the night. By some accounts, Confederate sharpshooters began pelting the house with bullets around 7:30 a.m. Undeterred, she went to work kneading dough. Moments later, a minie ball penetrated the north-facing door, striking Jennie in the back and passing through her heart. There was no scream, but her mother heard the body drop.

Responding to shrieks from the house, Union soldiers came to assist, temporarily burying the young woman in the backyard as her mother resumed the work of baking bread. By day’s end, the fighting had stopped. The Union Army had stopped the rebels’ northern advance. Nearly 8,000 soldiers died in the fighting and 27,000 were injured. Some 10,000 more had been captured or were missing.

Jennie Wade was the only civilian felled during the three days of fighting.

Jennie’s fiance, who had suffered an injury two weeks earlier, died on July 12, unaware of the fate that had befallen his would-be wife.

Click here for more information on the Jennie Wade House.

Eastern State Penitentiary was the world's first modern prison. Its Gothic architecture was intended to scare prisoners and the public alike.

Fairmount, Philadelphia – Eastern State Penitentiary was conceived in 1787, in the living room of Benjamin Franklin, a leading member of the Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons. The reformist group was appalled by conditions at the recently opened Walnut Street Jail, located behind Independence Hall, where guards sold liquor to inmates and often made women available. The reformers believed that a policy of strict solitary confinement would better encourage spiritual development.

In 1790, the society convinced Pennsylvania’s legislature to pass a series of prison reforms, including the construction of Eastern State Penitentiary. The prison opened in 1826. Inmates were isolated to their cells nearly 24 hours each day, eating, working and recreating alone. Visitors weren’t allowed and the only reading material provided was a Bible. But rather than induce the spiritual awakening for which the prison was designed, Eastern State Penitentiary instead became an incubator for psychosis.

The prison was America’s first major public works project and almost instantly became an attraction for tourists, like Charles Dickens and Alexis de Tocqueville. Dickens in particular was abhorred by what he saw, writing, “I am persuaded that those who designed this system… do not know what it is they are doing… I hold the slow and daily tampering with the mysteries of the brain to be immeasurably worse than any torture of the body.”

Guards meted out arbitrary punishments like taking naked inmates outside during winter and dousing them with cold water. Some had their tongues chained to their wrist in a way that struggling would cause the tongue to tear.

By the early 20th Century, the policy of extreme isolation fell out of disfavor and the prison for the first time allowed inmates to work, eat and recreate together.

But it was the prison’s architecture more than the philosophy behind it that led more than 300 prisons worldwide to be modeled after it. The revolutionary hub-and-spoke design originally featured seven single-story cell blocks radiating out from a center octagonal-shaped tower. The prison was the first public building in America to have central heating, flush toilets and shower baths. However, it was the only prison in America to follow this design.

By the mid-20th Century, the compound was in shambles and, in 1971, was shuttered. For nearly 20 years the prison was left to rot before a group in the late 1980s successfully petitioned a Philadelphia mayor to spare the site from redevelopment. It opened as a tourist attraction in 1994.

At Angelo's, we ordered "the biggest slice in town." Coming in at 18-inches, was nearly the length of my forearm.

Baltimore, MD – We rolled into Baltimore just after 6 p.m. on Friday, arriving at my friend’s home in the Hampden section on the city’s northwest side. Kendra, an old friend from Madison, moved to Baltimore 18 months ago, where she landed a nice job and has made enviable inroads into Baltimore’s comedy scene. I’ve been meaning to visit and catch a performance. She’s an insanely funny person, and when she’s on, she’s on. But as it happened, she had nothing booked, so instead we went out on the town.

After grabbing dinner, we headed to the Lithuanian Hall for a 60s dance party. All night the deejays spun old 45s of obscure 60s dance tracks. In the background, topless women from old 60s film reels danced on the flat screen. Several hours and Utenos (Lithuanian beer) later, we headed back, stopping for taquitos at 7-11, which turned out to be a terrible idea. That morning I woke with a pounding headache and, before long, I was sprinting to the bathroom to empty my stomach of its Uteno-taquito stew.

A few hours later, my sidekick and I walked up to peruse the The Avenue, a half-mile commercial strip in search of coffee and breakfast while we waited for Kendra.

Is it against code to block the entrance to a fallout shelter? Several buildings had a fallout shelter designation. Someone suggested it may be owed to the city's proximity to the Abderbeen Proving Ground, where top secret weapons are tested. Maybe its a remnant of the Cold War, when it was feared the Rooskies would nuke D.C. Perhaps it was a little bit of both.

After finishing her Cure for Diabetes walk, Kendra joined us as we chowed on gingerbread pancakes at Cafe Hon, a trendy eatery on West 36th Street, known locally as The Avenue. We talked about the food – liked it, didn’t love it – which led to her telling us about the protests that erupted outside the cafe in December. “People were really pissed,” she said. “I boycotted this place for a while.”

What sparked the revolt against Cafe Hon was that its proprietor, Denise Whiting, had trademarked ‘hon,’ a word as much a part of Baltimore’s cultural identity as its blue crabs.

But I didn’t get it at first. People really were protesting over the word ‘hon?’

As in, “Welcome to Baltimore, hon?”

“Exactly,” Kendra replied.

In Baltimore, hon is a term of endearment, but it also refers also to a type of woman, a Hon. Baltimore Hons, depending on your source, were renown for their bright print dresses, thick-rimmed, pointy glasses, beehive hairdos, strong family values and formidable Bawlmerese.

Baltimore writer William Tandy, in a piece on the ‘hontroversy’ wrote, “[For natives] the word, as much as anything, harkens back to their youth. The city of their mothers, sisters, aunts and grandmothers – strong predominantly white working-class women whose memories forever call them home to a past as resilient to the erosive ravages of time as the marble steps of an East Baltimore rowhome.”

Filmmaker John Waters popularized the Hons by exaggerating their eccentricities in movies like Pink Flamingos and Hairspray. His 1998 film Pecker was filmed in Hampden. Like Denise Whiting, Waters isn’t from the neighborhood and has his share of critics, too. He’s a semi-regular, patronizing it’s seedier bars and hideaways. Though he has similarly co-opted Hampden’s traditions and identity, earning millions in the process, Waters engenders far less hostility. Then again, he has never tried hoodwinking locals out of a piece of their history.

But residents didn’t know Whiting has trademarked the word until it was reported that the Maryland Transit Association had paid her a licensing fee to use the word on promotional materials. The outrage was immediate, and a fierce debate took hold over whether a person can own a word. There were protests and boycotts of Cafe Hon, and two other businesses Whiting owns on the block.

Whiting only made things worse, telling a Baltimore Sun reporter that people were mad simply because they hadn’t thought to trademark it first. She followed up with a threat to sue anyone who infringed her mark. Her lawyer later clarified that people could speak the word, but couldn’t use it commercially.

Following breakfast, we ventured to a local bookstore where Kendra showed me a ‘zine dedicated to the controversy. Hon: Past, Present and Future is a collection of fun and thoughtful essays about what the word means to Hampden. Here I found William Tandy’s re-cap of the the ordeal. Other essays had titles like, I Married a Hon!, This is Hampden, Not Cafe Hon Town and Dethroning a Self-Anointed Queen Bee, which begins with, “Long before Mr. and Mrs. Whiting conceived the narcissist they would name Denise…”

The anger remains palpable.

Friday night and the Diabetes walk had caught up with Kendra by early afternoon. While she napped, my sidekick and I ventured out to explore Hampden a little more. The neighborhood origins go back to the early 1800s, when housing for the area’s mill workers was in high demand. Labor unrest marred the first half of the 20th century, with several strikes broken with violence. By the late 70s, the last of the mills and factories closed their doors and Hampden succumbed to drugs, poverty and crime.

Beginning in the early 90s, a wave of artists, writers, actors and other creative-types began re-seeding the area with new energy and money. In Hampden, Whiting saw a business model and in ‘hon’ she found a brand. In 1992, she opened Cafe Hon, followed by the Hon Bar, Hon Town (a novelty shop). Eventually she launched the annual HonFest and ultimately trademarked the word.

In Hon: Past, Present and Future, writer Caryn Coyle puts it this way, “We’re all Hons here. No better no worse than the next. We do not discriminate. We are in this together, hon, trying as best we can each day.

“We persevere in spite of what piles up against us – unprecedented amounts of snow, insufferably hot summers, a shocking murder rate… The word hon is short for honey. Sweet. Thoughtful. Welcoming. The woman who has trademarked hon is none of these.”

I felt a little bit bad for eating there.

I love alleys, and Hampden has a ton of them.

I liked Hampden from the moment we pulled up. It’s a lot how I expected Philly to be, warm and inviting. As we walked along The Avenue, we saw a large unfinished painting in an alley. I took a picture, and suddenly, from nowhere, the artist appeared and invited us into his basement studio. His name was Matt Muirhead. We chatted briefly and he told us a crazy story. While living in Tokyo, he met a girl who worked for a Japanese NGO that sailed from country to country. He got to tag along and soon became the ship’s resident artist. Now he has a studio and upcoming exhibit.

He even gave me a painting.

You can learn more about him here.

Kendra texted as we exited, telling us to head back. But she was still getting ready so we stopped off at Angelo’s, a corner pizzeria that claimed to have the biggest slices in town. They weren’t lying. Wrapped in tin foil were two 18-inch slices of pepperoni, with crust so thin you had to eat it with a fork. Eating pizza with utensils is a whole different meal entirely, so it was kind of a let down.

Aside from that, it was a-ight.

Kendra and her roommate scooped us. The plan was to go clubbin’. The roommate has a really interesting government job that affects all of your lives (U.S. residents only), but I didn’t ask if I could write about it so I won’t say what it job is. She drove us through some old sections of Baltimore, en route to the Polish Home Club for live polka, Coor’s Light and beer nuts.

The club brought in a very old crowd, the last of the neighborhood’s Polish descendents. Many of the gentlemen I suspect led very interesting lives, like the ex-French Foreign Legion soldier. Many of the women, with their still formidable Bawlmerese, I could easily imagine as Hons.

Their children have moved away, and many of them have, too. Anyone who has seen The Wire has an understanding of the drugs and corruption that still rot the city. But these expats return each Saturday night to mingle and dance at the Polish Home Club, probably one of the last vestiges in an area once governed by their traditions.

When the polka ended, we headed to a college-y part of town for karaoke and sushi. I don’t sing, but I do freak to some salmon and avocado. Kendra treated the crowd to a rousing rendition of Satisfaction (I Can’t Get No), and a few other jewels from history’s pop music playlist.

The night ended normally, with sound sleep. The next morning, we dropped Kendra off at her rock opera rehearsal, then headed north back to Philly, a city with many of the same problems as Baltimore, but with half the charm.

Philadelphia schools have made dispiriting headlines lately. Last year, more than 6,000 students and 500 teachers were assaulted. This elementary school sign near my house is emblematic of the tatters the city and its schools are in.

At last, April is here, which, for me, means shoring up life’s odds and ends in preparation for another journey around America. Namely, this entails getting Purple Thunder, my trusty Ford E-150 Conversion Van, in proper working order. Those that follow this blog regularly will recall the electrical mishaps that put a wrinkly in an otherwise spectacular adventure last summer. While that issue is resolved, Purple Thunder is currently experiencing what I think is an air flow or timing problem. No biggie. I’m taking her in next week for routine maintenance and will have Ernie look into it. Not long after that I’ll be decamping Philly for good.

That’s right! After three years, I’m bidding farewell to the City of Brotherly Love.

I can’t say where exactly my travels this year will take me. I was eyeing a sojourn to Alaska in May, but that plan has been scrapped, in part because airfares are crazy high right now. Gas prices being what they are, I sometimes wish all the noise in the Middle East would’ve waited until fall. I mean, after decades, what’s a few more months of oppression?

I kid.

But on the flip side, the Saudis are now reportedly pumping more oil to offset the deficits caused by Libya’s civil war and political unrest elsewhere on the Arab street, but it’ll be several weeks before oil prices dip.

Interestingly, gas prices are nearly what they were when I moved to Philly three years ago. Likewise, I’m just as excited to leave here as I was to arrive, which makes me feel like the last three years were a really big waste of time. I know that it wasn’t. After all, had I not moved, there’d be no Feral Scribe. But in terms of advancing professionally, my time here has been a bust. It goes without saying that I’m not even a little wistful about moving on. But, during my final days here, I’m making a point to visit the places I’ve always wanted to but never have.

Last weekend, I finally checked out UPenn’s Museum of Archeology and Anthropology. Below are some snapshots of a few of the museum’s thousands of artifacts from Ancient Egypt, Rome, Greece, and other special exhibits.