Change is Constant

Old Man Jones surveys a miners cabin in the San Juan Mtn Range

Call it divine will, the winds of change, the ebb and flow, simple wanderlust, but one proven constant at each revelation of the fossil record is; Mankind is a migratory mammal, though we will establish roots when the location proves fertile we'll just as quickly move on when the resources are depleted, or as the progeny develop an awareness of the road onward and drift away.

Another constant are the signs left behind once mankind vacates an area. Though the Native Americans were fastidiously tidy they left tell-tale signs of their habits and habitats behind them, the Americans who followed behind have taken the task to build monuments to mankind across the landscape and create ephemera in abundance.

Navigating a tight spot of Poughkeepsie Gulch

Populated centers continue to shift, hip is relative, secluded is often overrated and always difficult to sustain, prosperous fluctuates with the market. I learned most of this from my dad, trailing him through woods and streams, over stumps and mountains, mounted in off-road vehicles, or on foot, as necessary to the destinations time had forgotten. Dad had a respect for the workmanship and a passion for the history, for the left behind remnants of societies and how they came to be as such that he passed onto me.

Of course, getting there is never easy, and I harbor a need to feel the adrenaline rushing through my body as a part of the experience. Whether a breath-taking view from the top of a Rocky Mountain, or that tingling feeling in the buttocks that senses your angle of ascent is near to invert to a reciprocal descent as my old jeep climbs dry-rock riverbeds and ancient railroad beds, within lands long abandoned or entrusted to the USA and it's manifest destiny. As much as the sensations dancing through my spine following well-travelled dirt paths into the bowels of "abandoned" buildings. These first artifacts in towns struggling to sustain themselves, whole, against the elements and the ever-changing, always-fickle whims of man and his commerce.

Ghost buildings, hidden behind over-growth and sequestered from public view, like that uncle that doesn't come for Thanksgiving anymore. My running headlong into Jezebel Marie proved fortuitous, her ability to capture beauty in the most decaying of places spoke to me. Delving into the unknown, graffiti-covered and litter-strewn "ghost-buildings" scattered within sight, if not within the limits of, major cities.

Large swaths of man's finest accomplishments discarded and forgotten as pursuits turned to the next, higher goal to achieve. The larger metropolis' such as Detroit and Gary are notorious for their perilous slides toward political oblivion.

A little research shows the population shifts over the last two centuries moved life from the inner water-ways of the collar counties to the lake shore in Cook County, IL. Thanks to Joliet, the Frog, and his open-minded approach to Native American relations, the Chicago short-cut opened up the west, and firmed up the lake frontage of Cook County, IL, and the budding city of Chicago as the most-western, most-sustainable seaport accessible to the European Markets.

While the early french continued westward seeking to find the fabled Northwest Passage, Chicago proved to be the first of two significant continental divides between the Pacific and Atlantic the French would find contraindicative to their theory of a shortcut to China.

The similarities in our hobbies was instantly obvious. 

So we found the popular activity for the kids is coined urban exploring, but since we've visited some of the more publicized haunts around the Chicagoland area, we've come to realize we're not UrbExers, we're simply tourists.

History buffs, architecture admirers, a writer and a photographer who stumble around in grey areas of land rights, snapping photos of the forgotten bits that highlight a sliver of history from the area that is endangered. These photos and many, many bags of litter are all we carry from these experiences.

Well, you carry away something intangible, having stood where the others stood, predecessors who thought they were a part of an enterprise so much larger than themselves it was destined to last forever. Others who carried that pride of man. Others who would be shocked to see the populace shifted away from the center of what was once their world.

 From this spark the project was born, we've scheduled trips to see some of the more famous landmarks that have been cast aside, as well as revisited photos taken along the way for some interesting scenes of the ADD in modern society, the decaying and discarded "real property" once so prized for the very fruit it produced.

Now brushed off like a rape victim in the overgrown shrubs, often filled with or leeching carcinogens or other poisons into the immediate vicinity. Many property of the federal government, or in progress of being shouldered off onto the state of possession such as the emerging state prairie at the former Joliet Army Ammunition Plant, just outside the town bearing the cunning explorer's name.

 Traveling the back-roads is in my blood, and finding the unexpected beauty in decay is a trait she has in spades. Wandering two-lane highways on any given Saturday is certain to turn itno a project; this place alongside another county road in northern Wisconsin, for instance.

Not everything old has been detoured by civilization, the Big Foot Cemetery proved well groomed for hallowed ground, hardly showing a century-and-a-half of use.

Others were lost to time, this cemetery didn't meet the IL bureaucratic definition of cemetery in some manner and was purposefully omitted from a tract of land granted to the county for preservation. While it's origins pre-date the Big Foot Cemetery by only a few years, its fate has been left for decay of the elements and desecration by vandals, claimed and denounced photography of ghostly apparitions make this a notable destination for all things ghoulish and macabre, but the settlement that hoped to be a township one day and failed surrounds the area.

Traces of mankind can be found throughout the surrounding woods and adjoining forest preserves, the technicality allowing for the omission of this cemetery has wrought disastrous consequences as the shifted populace remains within walking distance for the time being.  Miles of wooded and overgrown clearings surround the area where life once thrived.

Other places I've travelled proved harder to access, and the historical significance identified earlier by today's "locals" who pulled up their boot straps and focused on preservation of the history contained within, such as this ghost town in the Rocky Mountains.



But we continue to put miles on the old jeep, and search out the boom areas where populations of a bygone era have declined until official history ends, and the next chapter awaits.

Following the paths of those who came before us;

Wherever they might lead;

While teaching my own progeny to appreciate the historical and archeological value represented by these sites, to tread lightly and respect the souls who lived and labored for the common good toward the American Dream from these places.

The individuals who contributed the legacy of American to us deserve more respect than the spray-painted cock/balls/tits that seem to be tagger move 101.

Be Safe Out There!