Summer of '06

The St Louis Post had a good article about the river and the tourist business in Lesterville. My only concern right now has nothing to do with theTaum Sauk event, but the weather. It was 99 degrees this afternoon at the pottery and we have not had a good rain in almost three weeks. Maybe everyone coming from St. Louis should bring a five gallon bucket of water for the rivr.

Smithsonian

Tomorrow is a big day in my art career, probably the biggest. A work that I created along with Doug Hendrickson in 1975 is going on display at the Smithsonian. The old Patent Office Building has been remodeled over the last six years ($283 million) into the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the National Portrait Gallery. One wing of the American Art Museum is known at the Luce Foundation Center for American Art and that is where our work will displayed. The work, titled "Bronze Vessel", has been owned by the Smithsonian since it was purchased from a Bicentennial exibition in 1976, but it has always been in storage. So this is a big day for Doug and me.

Your Government at Work

The following is a quote from a letter FERC sent to Ameren yesterday.

Since the reservoir is no longer retaining water you may temporarily suspend
submitting the leakage report.

4th Plans

I've had a couple of requests for our 4th plans. This weekend will be the normal pottey schedule, open on Saturday (9-4) and closed on Sunday and Monday. We will be open Tuesday the 4th and the rest of the week.

This says it all!

Here is a recent comment that says it all about the summer. Yesterday was the busiest day so far at the pottery. Those of you that have been to a Tuesday morning feeding frenzy will know what I'm talking about. What we need now is some rain, it is very dry.

Just returned from my week at Black River Lodge, great as usual. The beach is back and the river was wonderful. Plenty of shallows for the kids to play in. Deeper spot across the river for the rope swing. I sat in my favororite spot in the rapids. Not to fond of the rock I hit while tubing, but the Black River on a bad day is 100 times better than anywhere else. Visited the Pottery Store and loved all the new colors and designs.

The Good Old Days?

Anybody remember ever seeing anything like this? Only in Mayberry!

Bad Info

The St Louis Post-Dispatch ran an article on June 3 about floating Ozark streams. It had the following quote that I noted on this blog at the time.

The upper Meramec, Courtois and Huzzah are fine float streams. The Black River at Lesterville, Mo., also will fall back into this category once the AmerenUE mess is washed away. A breached reservoir at the hydroelectric power plant sent a flood of mud into the river. High water in recent weeks has helped.

The Wichita, Kansas newspaper just decided to run that story. Not only did I disagree with the Post statement almost a month ago, but its really not a fair statement now. If anything, the big problem now is a typical summer lack of rain. Our grass is dying, there is no water in Peola Creek, but it is 53 degrees this morning. Boy do I love cold summer mornings.

Memphis Fountain

Doug and Bonnie have returned from Memphis. Delays in construction and lack of parts for the water pump system resulted in the fountain not being installed. Once it is completed I will post photos.

Shut-Ins in the News

Here is the first article about the Shut-Ins since it opened one month ago.

Six Months

On Christmas Eve my son pointed out that the posts that I was making on my pottery site were like a blog, and that the Taum Sauk event would probably last for some time so I should just start a blog. On Christmas morning I was the first one up so I got on the computer and opened a blogger account and transfered the few posts that I had from the previous 10 day to the new site.

Here we are six months later, I've made 275 posts and you have made over 7000 visits to see what I had uncovered. Here is where I think we are with the story. Ameren is continuing with design and engineering for a possible rebuild of the upper reservoir. DNR is working on plans for a new park design and will start shortly to rechannel the East Fork above the shut-ins. Life in Lesterville seems like any other summer season, but we will wait for a final report in September. Ameren has not received permission to lower the level of the Lower Reservoir and start removing all the clay from the event that is deposited in that lake. When that starts we will see a lot of big machinery activity and a lot of local howling. And through it all we will have the political and legal mess.

Life goes on and the hummingbirds a sucking down five quarts of juice a day.

Upper Reservoir

Here is part of a letter from FERC to Ameren.

We have received your request to advance three borings near the upper reservoir at Taum Sauk....Upon completion of the work, please provide us with copies of all boring logs and results of any field and/or laboratory testing conducted as part of this work.

A firm that is mentioned in this letter is the Rimkus Consulting Group. This is a quote from the Rimkus web site.

Rimkus’ engineers, environmental scientists, and business analysts use proven forensic techniques to probe and analyze construction accidents and disputes, residential and commercial problems, product failures, motor vehicle and marine accidents, and industrial fires and explosions of all kinds. Our job is to find out what happened and why, from the cause and origin through the extent of loss. In many cases, we can point the way toward a speedy disposition of the claim.

So work continues on a possible rebuild.

Shut-Ins and Taum Sauk

I finally got this site to load, problem was my slow dial-up connection. Anyway many people that have visited the pottery have said that when they were at the Shut-Ins they thought they would be able to see the upper reservoir and many were confused about where all the water came from.
So go to this site and there is the best photo I have seen to explain the relationship of the reservoir to the state park. There is a four page article starting on page 10.

Clean River II

In response to my earlier post about river clean-ups I received this note from Glee at Bearcats.

Just wanted to let you know that there IS a Black River Stream Team that was organized last year. Most of the members are young folks from STL. They were down in Mid May for the first clean-up float of the year. They come to float at least 3 times during and after the season. Anyone who wishes to participate is always invited and is welcome. Just give us a call at Bearcat and we'll hook everyone up with Dave Baker who heads up the effort.

Glee
Bearcat : ) 573-637-2264

Old Bridge

Two years ago today the Old Bridge was knocked down after spanning the river since 1917. At about 10pm they dropped a 3000 pound wrecking ball on the NE corner of the main span. The second hit the entire bridge fell into the river. By 9am the following day they had all the metal out of the river and canoes were going by. If you wanted to come to Black River Lodge, Riversedge, Wilderness, Camp Taum Sauk, or the Peola Valley Pottery this was the way. Here is a great web site about the old bridge and every other bridge in Missouri.

For those of us on Peola Road the loss of the Old Bridge was a bigger event that the Taum Sauk breach.

Dr. Iron and Missouri News

First, if you read this anywhere near Memphis, Doug and Bonnie left yesterday for Memphis. They will spend the week overseeing the construction and installation of a fountain at the National Metals Museum. So if it is convienent you might stop by later in the week to see how things are going. I will post photos once they return to Lesterville.

Second, you would have to live in some place like Lesterville not to know about all the legal/political fighting going on over Ameren and DNR. The News-Leader in Springfield stated that Nixon was off the case and the Post-Dispatch in St. Louis ran a story that Nixon says he is still on the case. Here is Reynolds County we only get a local paper once a week (Thursday) and I'll bet it take at least another week for a small article, but we'll know right away who the new third grade teacher is in Lesterville.

Except for those people that want to see Ameren brought to their knees, I don't think most local folks care about all this. We would like to see the state park back to normal and the mess at Taum Sauk cleaned up. I think most local folks are even infavor of rebuilding the upper reservoir and getting the plant back in operation. What we would like most is for life in paradise to get back to normal.

Someone is Happy

This is a comment I received today.

OK. I was in Lesterville all weekend. We came down on Friday and after putting up our tents headed to the beach at Twin Rivers Landing. I was very nervous as to what we would find. What we found was about 50 people at the beach having a wonderful time. You were able to see the bottom of the river with no problem at all. On Saturday we canoed 9 miles. I thought the river was absolutely wonderful and I cannot wait to come back. The water was clean and clear. There were only a few places you could not see the bottom but those were in the deep areas which has always been true. Someone needs to get the word out. The river is BEAUTIFUL still.

Summer to Remember

We left Springfield at 10:30am today and arrived in Lesterville a little after 2:30pm. By 4:30pm we had sold $300 of pottery and tiles. Not bad for a day we are closed, a day we woke up in Springfield, and a day during a summer that no one was supposed to come to Lesterville because of a cloudy river. I bring this up not to brag about one days success as a country potter, but to show the nay sayers out there that as far as I have experienced this is going to be a summer to remember.

Father's Day

My son and daughter-in-law could not make it to Lesterville because of work schedules, so Pam and I are in Springfield. Its a beautiful day and we have some great steaks ready to put on the grill, so hope all you fathers out there are have a good day.

What's the Real Story?

I'm sure that many of you that read this blog don't check out the comments. Here is a recent one.

I guess I'm confused. I called a lady who runs canoes and cabins near Lesterville last night. She says the river is murky green and the rocks are all slimey. She told me it would probably be years before the river recovered. What's the real story?

If any of you have already been to Lesterville and would like to leave a personal comment about how you found the water and your experience while here I think it would help. I haven't heard a single complaint about the river from my customers, but I don't see everyone. My feeling is that whoever this person called, they are still waiting for a check from Ameren or priming the pump for a law suit.

Someone today told me that most local businesses are not mad at Ameren, they are upset with the media coverage. I do think it interesting that there has not been any follow-up stories on life in Lesterville after Memorial Day. And I wish the media would work a little harder to find other business owners to interview. If all you do is interview people within 500 feet of the East Fork bridge you are going to get a similar story, and the East Fork still looks bad, but no one floats the East Fork. Just come one mile down Peola Road and look at all the activity below the new bridge.

Where is the Press?

After months of stories about a dirty river, damaged state park, and unhappy businesses here is a story that I have not seen any newspaper or TV station cover. They have started tearing down the Upper Reservior. A track hoe started working at the old observation platform and is knocking down the concrete walls at the top of the reservoir. As they work they are also flatting the top of the rock fill to make a safe work area. A new access road will have to be built to get large dump trucks inside the reservoir to remove all the concrete panels that are being pushed down the interior walls. If you click on the photo it will bring up a larger image. I was a long way from the reservoir with a telephoto to get this shot.

Clean River

I saw an article in the Springfield newspaper this morning about a group that helps clean up the Missouri River. I bring this up because of all the talk about the Black River since December. Twenty years ago, Wilderness and Riversedge would head up a group of local businesses and have a river clean up day. They would provide free canoes and the county road department would provide dump trucks at key spots to take the trash. At the end of the day there was a Bar-B-Q at Riversedge with free food and drinks for all that helped clean the river. This type of activity has not happened on the Black in a number of years. I see people from BRL and Wilderness out for their after meal walk on Peola Road with trash that they pick up, and I hope that those of you that tube from BRL to Wilderness grab the occasional trash that you find in the river. Maybe those businesses that howled the loudest about the Taum Sauk breach should work to start a river clean day again. Just an idea.

One Half Year

Sat down to pay some bills and realized that it has been exactly six months since the Taum Sauk Reservoir breach. In fact it was on a Wednesday. While much remains to be done, finish rebuilding the state park, remove the old reservoir, clean the lower reservoir, and decide whether to rebuild the upper reservoir, I think life in Lesterville and on the Black River is 95% back to normal.

What Breach?

This is the first week of the summer that BRL is on a regular schedule. Yesterday was a typical Tuesday, lots of people in to get their pottery fix and lots of youngsters asking, "is the pottery guy going to be making anything." We even had a good size group in after lunch. If it hadn't been for one person thanking me for keeping her informed by this blog I would not have known that the day was any different from any other summer. So if you are one of the people that decided not to come to Lesterville because of the Taum Sauk event I think everyone else thinks this is just another summer on the Black.

Weather

It was 55 degrees this morning at Peola Valley. I can remember 30+ years ago when you needed a long sleeve shirt every morning until about 9am because of the cool nights. Now we seldom see temperatures in the low 50s. We did not get any of the rain that central Missouri had over the weekend, so we are back to the hot, dry, and dusty days of summer. I spend about a half hour each morning watering the flower gardens by the pottery just to try and keep things alive. May was so nice in terms of rain and temperature, the gardens really looked great. Even though I live in paradise it seems that we can never have it all.

BRL on the Web

In the first seven days that Black River Lodge had a page on the web 359 people have visited the site. What is encouraging to me is that people are getting to the site from both lestervillemissouri.com and experienceblackriver.com as well as the two Peola Valley sites. I hope to see Kevin Perry of experienceblackriver later this week and will be interested to see how many visitors he has had and what they are looking at while on his site.

New Photos

The Ameren recovery site has posted a new page of photos from the Shut-Ins. They also have a video posted. Some of the people that I talked to this weekend that had been to the Shut-Ins are still confused about what they are seeing. One of the problems is you cannot see the Upper Reservoir from the Shut-Ins and it is hard for some folks to put the whole story together.

Views from KC

I know that most of my readers are not from Kansas City so I'll post this editorial that I found interesting.

CTS

Camp Taum Sauk is one of those Lesterville places that many know about but few have visited. It's tucked away below Wilderness Lodge and over the hill from Peola Valley Pottery. Today is the day that the first group of campers arrive and for the next eight weeks there will be all sorts of activity - swimming, floating, horseback riding, high ropes, crafts, nature study, and cave exploring and their own radio station (KCTS). The camp also has the best web site of any business in the area. So check it out.

Finally

The Johnson's Shut-Ins web site is finally updated with information about this summers activities and new photos. Thanks to whoever got this done.

Another River Story

A couple that have been loyal customers stopped by the pottery today. They normally come down in mid-July, but wanted to see what the river looked like. They thought the river at the lodge looked fine and could not understand how it could look so bad on TV and look OK in person. The reason is all the stations would set up their cameras on the road that leads to Twin Rivers because it is easy to get to from the highway. The East Fork is right there in the background. Of course the East Fork is also still cloudy with clay from the breach. So if you come down and stay at BRL, Riversedge, or Wilderness you will find the river just fine.

Are You Up for an Adventure?

The Bell Mountain Wilderness Area is only about 30 minutes drive from Lesterville. This would probably be best in April or October.

Story Poorly Told

We had a family in the pottery today and I asked if they had visited the Shut-Ins. They said they had and they were disappointed that the story of the event and the recovery was so poorly told. They felt that there should have been photos and signs with more information about what happened. They recommended that a video of the recovery should be playing in the park store. I know that many in the park service felt that even making the May 27 open date was a big event, but when people travel to see the park and leave feeling that there should be more information something is wrong. I for one will still encourage all those that visit the pottery to try and make it out to see the park, because this is something that they will not see next summer.

$$$

Here are two links to the continuing controversy between Nixon and DNR.

Columbia Daily Tribune

Kansas City Star

One thing to remember, Nixon was appointed by a local Reynolds County judge to represent the people (State or Reynolds County I'm not sure) when the Reynolds County Prosecuting Attorney stepped aside because his salary was dependent on Ameren property tax funds.

Free Camping

Want to come to Lesterville this weekend and camp for free? The Mark Twain National Forest is offering free camping at ten of its camping areas this weekend and one of them is Sutton's Bluff. If you have never visited Sutton's Bluff I would encourage the trip. Located between Lesterville and Centerville it has a spectacular bluff over the East Fork of the Black River.

River and Politics

If you are keeping up with this blog from outside the state of Missouri you might not see this article. As I stated in January, politics will muddy this event worse than clay in the river. As far as I know, and I'm frequently misinformed, Mr. Blunt has only been to Reynolds County once and that was December 14, 2005. He came by National Guard helicopter because there is no airport near Reynolds County where a corporate airplane can land. Mr. Nixon came to Lesterville at least twice during the 90's for a vacation with his family. They stayed at Wilderness Lodge and shopped at the pottery on each visit. Mr. Nixon was also very involved in the earlier clean up of the river, namely, getting the 4 wheel drive vehiciles and ATV's out of the river.

I don't have enough information to form an opinion on what is the right course in this situation. I have no complaint with the effort that Ameren has put out to correct and heal the aftermath of the event. I'm certainly happy that this event was not caused by the Doe Run Company, our other big corporate neighbor. I'll have to trust that Mr. Nixon has a lot more experience in public service than Mr. Blunt and that somehow the right balance will prevail by the time we have this in our past.

Black River Lodge

Black River Lodge is on the web. Here is a link to their new site.

Bad Information

I continue to be frustrated by the lack of current information from the State Parks department. The Shut-Ins have been open for 10 days now and there still are no photographs or stories about what one can see and do during a visit to the park. But even more disturbing are web pages like this one that have not been updated. Looks like the Department of Tourism has finally gotten all its listings updated, as has Conservation. Now if we can just get DNR to realize how important the web is for people planning a vacation.

If you click on the link above it has been updated. Funny how a little publicity will get things done.
Lee Ferber 10pm Tuesday

Great Job

I bought my first piece of property near Lesterville in 1970 and spent about five weeks a year here for the next 13 years. Then I moved to Lesterville in 1983. I bring this up because over the last 36 years I have not visited half the places that Kevin Perry has in the last few months. Kevin is the editor/webguy for ExperienceBlackRiver.com. He has poked into every business and tourist attraction in the area. He has a great job and is doing a great job. So if you are not on his email update list here is a link to todays stories.

Congratulations

Forgive me for family pride, but I wanted to congratulate our son and daughter-in-law for winning three awards from the Missouri Broadcaster Association this past weekend at Tan-Tar-A. Our son, Jason, produced and edited a one hour documentary about the Original Springfield Cardinals for Ozarks Public Television and received recognition for his work. Addie received recognition for her work at KY-3, the NBC station in Springfield.

Tile Show

Pam and I just received word that one of our tile pieces has been accepted for exhibition in Minneapolis as part of a national tile conference. Our work titled "Five Greys for Louise" will be on display from July 15 to October 31.

75

This is a 1931 postcard taken on the Black. Question for all you old timers, do you think it was shot above the rocks or below the old bridge?

The St. Louis Post had an article on floating today. This was the only mention of the Black.

"The upper Meramec, Courtois and Huzzah are fine float streams within an hour or so of the city. The Black River at Lesterville, Mo., also will fall back into this category once the AmerenUE mess is washed away. High water in recent weeks has helped."

I still have not heard any pottery customer complain about the river or beach. Had one customer yesterday that just drove down from the city to see the Shut-Ins and drop by the pottery before heading back home.

River and Rain

Went to town after lunch and the river looked good. We had a half inch of rain last night, not enough to matter to the river, but the flowers sure loved it. For those of you that came to Lesterville last June, we were in the midst of a drought. This year we have had a very wet spring and everything is growing like kudzu. If any of you are weather nuts like me you might be interested in this new weather web site. I think I will join and contribute.

Rainwater / Ameren Settlement?

The St Louis Post-Dispatch has an interesting interview with Ameren CEO Gary Rainwater. And there are a number of stories about a possible financial settlement between the State of Missouri and Ameren. Here is the article that appeared in the Houston newspaper.

Another Oldie

This is a photo post card from the late 40s or early 50s, before the Shut-Ins was a state park. I hope to someday be able to see if I can figure out where the photographer stood for this photo and see what has changed in over 50 years.