THREE SUMMITS: #3, BLACK MESA IN OKLAHOMA, CAPULIN VOLCANO, AND SUGARITE CANYON

 October 18, 2020

We had one more highpoint to summit on this trip: Black Mesa, the highest point in Oklahoma. One of the interesting thing about this highpoint is that Black Mesa actually extends into Colorado and New Mexico, and the highpoint in both of those other states is higher than the highpoint in Oklahoma (but is not the highpoint in those states).

We left our hotel at about 7:00 AM and drove an hour to the trailhead. When we began our hike just after 8:00, it was only 36° F.  I wrote in my notes that I was wearing 2 pairs of pants, a long-sleeved shirt, a Columbia zip jacket, a down jacket, and Bob's gloves. (Thanks, dear.)

The round trip hike was 8.4 miles, and when we got back to the car at 11:30, it was 39°.  It was cold, but we kept up a quick pace and it wasn't too bad--until we got to the mesa itself.

Just before the gate is this granite bench honoring Jean Trousdale, "Highpointers Foundation Director, Founder of the Club Mercantile, Clinical Psychologist, Mother, Grandmother, Friend." The photo of her with her dog is captioned, "Enjoy the view and have a good hike!"  She looks like someone I would have liked to know.

NORMAN, OKLAHOMA: UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA

About half an hour south of Oklahoma City is the booming metropolis of Norman (pop. 110,000). I had never heard of Norman, but my husband was set on a visit because one of his travel checklists is Great Universities of the World, and the University of Oklahoma is in Norman.

The University of Oklahoma hadn't made my list of Great Universities, but I can't recite football statistics like my husband can. OU (not U of O) is a football and basketball powerhouse.


But before I get to that, I have to talk about my pre-conceptions once again being shattered. The campus is absolutely gorgeous, more like Oxford or Yale than I thought could be possible for anything in Oklahoma.

Donald W. Reynolds Performing Arts Center, built in 1918. William Jennings Bryan, Louis Armstrong,
Martha Graham, William Butler Yeats, and Aaron Copland, among others, have graced the stage here.

The Bizzell Library

George Lynn Cross, President of OU from 1943-1968.

OKLAHOMA CITY, OKLAHOMA: STATE CAPITOL BUILDING, Part 2 (Inside)

We entered the Oklahoma State Capitol building not through the grand doors at the front, but through a little side door in the basement. Not so glamorous, but we did feel welcomed, both by the friendly security staff who checked my purse and by the signage:

Nothing says "welcome" like a land grab:

. . . or a spouting oil well:

Our first stop was a small art museum featuring Oklahoma artists. What a great idea!

OKLAHOMA CITY, OKLAHOMA: STATE CAPITOL BUILDING, Part 1 (Outside)

Our first impression of the Oklahoma State Capitol Building was that its Greco-Roman architecture made it look a lot like many other capitol buildings, including the United States Capitol Building (Ignore the winter vs. summer differences):

Oklahoma

Washington, D.C.

Originally, however, the Oklahoma building did not have a dome. That was added in 2001-2002. At that time the statue was also added on top (see left photo below). Standing 17 1/2 feet and entitled The Guardian, it is a Native American holding a spear. Oklahoma is the first state to so honor the Native American population. The U.S. Capitol also has a figure atop its dome. It stands 19 1/2 feet tall and is a classical female bronze statue entitled Freedom.

In spite of the fact that Oklahoma's statue is two feet shorter than the U.S. Capitol's statue, Oklahoma's building is five feet taller than the U.S. Capitol, which I'm sure the architects took into consideration when they drew up the plans for the dome addition.

OKLAHOMA CITY MUSEUM OF ART

Oklahoma City has a B-grade art museum anchored by an A+ Dale Chihuly collection. I don't know what it is about this area of the country and Chihuly (who hails from Washington State), but on this week-long trip we saw Chihuly's work in each of the three states we visited: The Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock, Arkansas; the Oklahoma City Museum of Art in Oklahoma; and the Dallas Museum of Art in Texas.

The Oklahoma City Museum of Art (OKCMOA for short) has the most stunning Chihuly piece I have seen to date: the 55-foot-tall Eleanor Blake Kirkpatrick Memorial Tower, a tribute to one of the founders of the museum.   It is impossible to get the whole thing in a single photo, so I did my best to put two pictures together here to give an idea of its grandiosity:

OKLAHOMA CITY: THE MURRAH FEDERAL BUILDING BOMBING MEMORIAL

At 9:02 a.m. on Wednesday, April 19, 1995, a huge explosion ripped into the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City. It was one of those days when most Americans were glued to their TVs, much like the day in 1986 when the Challenger exploded or the day in 2001 when terrorists flew two planes into the Twin Towers in New York City. The bomb, originating in a vehicle parked on the street, hit at a time of maximum damage, a time when everyone was likely at work and the daycare center in the building was full. Not only did the blast rip away a full third of the Murrah Building, but it also damaged another 324 buildings in a 16-block radius. In all, 168 people were killed and more than 680 others were injured.

We parked our car across the street from the memorial near this incredibly moving display erected by St. Joseph's Catholic Church. Christ stands with his back to the scene of the devastation, facing a wall with 168 niches representing the voids left by the victims.

Directly behind Him is the entry into the bombing memorial site.

To His left is part of the chain link fence that has become a wall of remembrance, little scraps of paper, toys, knick knacks, and photos tucked into the spaces--an American Wailing Wall.

OHHHHHK-LAHOMA: ST. PAUL'S EPISCOPAL CATHEDRAL IN OKLAHOMA CITY

It took a while for Bob to convince me that we should take a trip between my last day of school and Christmas so that he could check another state off his States List, and even after I agreed, I ribbed him a lot for making me spend my holiday season in--of all places--Oklahoma (with a little Arkansas and Texas thrown in for good measure).

However, I have to confess that I loved our trip. Every time we add another state to our list, we realize that those who think they have to travel thousands of miles to find something worth their time are missing out on the richness of domestic travel.

English writer and theologian G. K. Chesterton noted that "The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one's own country as a foreign land." I'm pretty sure he was talking about our trip to Oklahoma, which to me was definitely a foreign land.

Each time we crossed a state border on this trip, I had the appropriate song ready and waiting on my Spotify app. For Oklahoma, it just had to be this one (Fast forward to about 50 seconds):

Oklahoma also helped me to discover the truth of another great theologian's words: "All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware"  (Martin Buber, Austrian-Israeli Jewish philosopher).

Like every state we've ever visited, Oklahoma was full of surprises, "secret destinations" just waiting for us to discover them. Our very first stop in Oklahoma City was one of those: St. Paul's Episcopal Cathedral.

If ever there were a brave church, this is it.

St. Paul's, built in a Norman Gothic architectural style, held its first service in 1904. On April 19, 1995, the huge explosion that blew apart the Murrah Federal Building just two blocks away caused extensive damage to the church, including breaking many of its stained glass windows, destroying its organ, fracturing the Celtic cross on top of the building, lifting the roof partly off its moorings, and splaying the walls.

Nevertheless, immediately after the bombing, the church became a triage site, provided food for rescue workers and then clean-up crews, and served as a much-needed spiritual touchstone for downtown Oklahoma City.