We left Texas behind and made it almost all the way across Oklahoma today. In the car, the entertainment was a Hank the Cowdog audiobook read by author John R Erickson, some of the greatest family entertainment of Texas.
Today’s license plates were Arizona, Arkansas, Alabama, California, Colorado, South Dakota, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, and Wisconsin. The first thing after checking in and getting settled into the hotel Akalena finds every one of the states we saw plates from on the map. By summer’s end, she should be able to quickly point to every state. We also saw three from the Sac and Fox nation, two from the Muskogee nation, and one from Ontario.
As we passed through Oklahoma City we stopped at The American Pigeon Museum where we learned that the turtle doves that perch on wires around the neighborhood are only one of hundreds of varieties in the world. We saw a stuffed extinct passenger pigeon, some varieties whose heads almost completely disappeared into their neck feathers, a collection of live pigeons and learned the history of homing pigeons from Gengis Khan to World War II.
The Rothchild family, in the early years of their banking business, used pigeons to communicate more quickly than any messenger or courier could travel, and by getting news earlier than the other bankers, and sometimes even the rulers of the various countries in which they operated. Conspiracy theorists existed even in the eighteenth century, and theories about the Rothchilds abounded. This could be attributed to antisemitism, but could also be related to their uncanny ability to know things before anyone else.
Tonight we are hiding out from the 101-degree heat advisory in the Embassy Suites in Tulsa, enjoying their glass elevators, swimming pool, and complimentary wine.