I don’t think I’m passionately religious, but I am somehow, sometimes drawn to these overt Christian demonstrations of faith. Remember the huge cross a few days ago? This morning, my waitress at the Waffle House tipped me to this particular site; it has certainly not been on my list, but I had to go see. The praying hands have been around since 1972. The sculpture weighs 100 tons and is made principally of white stucco over a steel skeleton. It is in King Jack Park, a rather remarkable municipal park in Webb City, Missouri, just north of Joplin. A stone sign at the base of the hands says simply “hands in prayer; world at peace.” King Jack Park is a huge municipal park that includes a farmers market that runs late Tuesday afternoon, early Thursday morning, and mid day on Saturday – so there’s no excuse for someone to not take advantage of the market at some point during the week. The park also includes a restored trolly from the old trolly days in Joplin that gives rides on a track around the park. There are picnic areas, ball diamonds, expansive lawns and more. This has been a recurring theme in many areas – the scope of the municipal park lands in various communities. Meanwhile, the one thing I really stopped in Joplin to see actually took me no time at all. The Joplin museum complex encompasses three museums, the smallest of which is the National Cookie Cutter Historical Museum. As you can see from the top picture, it’s really just a collection of cookie cutters on glass shelves in a very small room. There is very little signage to explain what you’re looking at – the original cookie cutters, the aluminum display of cookie cutters from the 1920s to the 1940s; there are Peanuts cookie cutters, Christmas cookie cutters, red plastic cookie cutters, etc., etc., etc.

But the museum also had a very nice World War I display, a circus miniature display, a fire engine, and more.There is also the mineral museum; again very little signage, not much to rivet me. Apparently this area is part of what they call the tri-state mineral deposit, lead, or galena being the prevalent product. Lead seems to of made quite a number of people very wealthy in this region in the 1800s. Two more things in Joplin, before hitting the road: one of them Grand Falls, or as the locals simply call it “the falls”, on Shoal Creek. The other is one of the cutest bits of advertising any company could have! What better way for the Volks Insurance Agency to advertise itself than with a Volkswagen… In this case knocking over a fire hydrant! Right in front of the agency! Water actually gushing from the broken pipe! Finally, it was off to Oklahoma City for the weekend! Television news tonight reports that parts of Tulsa got up to 7 inches of rain in a massive thunderstorm that I happened to drive through as I passed that city. Flooding on the interstate means the underside of my car is clean as a whistle! It was otherwise a good drive to Oklahoma City and I have already learned on my first evening that this is the city that supports my theory about how wonderfully Americans entertain each other and themselves. No way will I be able to do all of the things that I would like to see and do here; but I’m going to try – starting tomorrow morning!