BATTER UP!

Friday, September 23 – We visited another great museum today....The Louisville Slugger Factory & Museum. What an interesting tour. Unfortunately, no pictures are allowed on the tour but they were permitted in the museum.

Check out the "Big Bat" leaning against the building. The total weight of the bat is approximately 68,000 pounds, height 120 ft. and diameter 9 ft. The bat is constructed of ASTM A36 carbon steel. The "Bud Hillerich" signature is a tribute to John A. "Bud" Hillerich, who turned the company's first bat in 1884. Called the world's largest bat and I believe it!

 

We started out holding bats actually used by the greats. Paul held Mickey Mantle's Model B220 used sometime between 1961 ns 1964. It measures 35" and weighs 32 ounces.

Marsha chose Johnny Bench's Model B278 bat that he used between 1980-1983. It is northern white ash 35" and weighs 32 ounces.

The factory tour takes you step by step through the production of a Louisville Slugger baseball bat. Our guide was very knowledgeable and informative. We did find one window that we could take a picture through.

Each year 40,000 northern white ash and maple trees supply the logs for Louisville Slugger bats. Ideal trees for bats are at least 80 years old.

You can see bats used by almost every famous professional baseball player like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Derek Jeter, and Barry Bonds. We saw bats in production for the likes of Jim Tome and Grady Sizemore of the Cleveland Indians. Marsha went crazy!

Each year a professional player goes through approximately 100 bats at a cost between $60-$80/bat. Approximately one million bat are made per year.  During peak production times about 1500 bats are made per day at the factory in Louisville.

Babe Ruth carved a notch in this bat for every home run he hit with it in 1927. During that historic season, Ruth smashed a record 60 home runs in 154 games.

During WW II, Louisville Slugger reduced bat production and began manufacturing wooden gunstocks and tank pins for the war effort.

We stood behind a glass enclosure and watched a 90 mph ball come towards us. We actually were able to capture the ball before it reached the catcher. That thing flies in!!!

The was an awesome tour and museum. There is tons of memorabilia for those dedicated baseball fans. When you are in this area, don't miss it! We will leave you with a few fun"extremes" used by players… 

Edd Roush of the Cincinnati Reds used the heaviest bat, a 48 ounce piece of timber.

Billy Goodman, who won the batting championship in 1950 while with the Boston Red Sox, used the lightest bat.  He used a 30 ounce bat to win the batting crown.

Joe Morgan, former Most Valuable Player of Cincinnati Reds, also used a 30 ounce bat.

The longest bat in our history was used by Al Simmons, a 38” bat.  Simmons played with Philadelphia and Boston in the American League during the 1940’s.

The shortest bat ever ordered for regular play was a 30 ½” ordered by Willie Keeler who played with the Yankees.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see ya'll back real soon. Have a great day!

 

LOOAVUL, LOUEVILLE OR LOUISVILLE, KY?

Thursday, September 22 – We arrived at Grandma's RV Campground in Shepherdsville, Kentucky – that's just South of Louisville, KY. We spent last night at the FMCA headquarters in Cincinnati, OH, where camping is free for FMCA members. We only had a couple hours drive today, but we started out in some pretty heavy fog around the Ohio River Valley. Once we climbed into Kentucky is was pretty clear sailing.

Grandma's RV Campground is a great location for visiting this part of Kentucky. It has paved roads and level gravel sites. There's a pretty good crowd here, but there are a few empty sites. It's easy access to I-65 being just a quarter mile off the exit ramp.

We are in Site 37.

The sites are a bit close, but plenty of room for our short one-week visit.

Down the road.


We drove down to the Louisville Visitors Center to pick up some brochures to check the sights to see. We asked the gal, "What is the correct pronunciation of Louisville. Is it Looavul, Luhvul, Loueville, Looaville or Looeyville?  She said, "You can pronounce any way you want EXCEPT Lou-is-ville. We also met up with the "Fried Chicken King" himself at the Visitors Center.

Unfortunately, Marsha spotted some “painted horses” scattered around town, so it looks like we'll be taking pictures of horses for the blog. (Notice the one in the header.)

We'll be here for a week checking out this area so stop back and see what great things we write about.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see ya'll back real soon. Have a great day!

GATEWAY TO AMISH COUNTRY…NAPPANEE

Saturday, September 17 – We went over to Nappanee today for the Apple Festival.

Our first hint that we were going to have an enjoyable day was the four WWII fighter planes buzzing over head in formation. We first saw them when we were about half way to town and enjoyed their antics for the remainder of our drive.

We arrived in town to take in much of the parade. An official “Small Town USA” parade. There were fire trucks, tractors, bands, politicians, queens, and tons of candy being thrown to the kids. We even enjoyed a few Tootsie Rolls tossed our way.

They even had a float honoring the Elk.

We couldn't attend an Apple Festival without sampling some Apple Fritters, Apple Turnovers, and of course an Apple Pie to take home.

There were numerous food venders selling everything from fries, hotdogs, sausage sandwiches, elephant ears, and just about any festival/carnival food you could imagine.

This place was PACKED!

This was a very interesting sign…Music and Fencing?

Of course there were tents full of crafters selling adorable things for the ladies to purchase. Marsha loves strolling through these areas searching for unique gifts. Dare I say she found a few things for the upcoming holidays.

She wanted to share how cute these candle tops are. This gal had 100s of them.

How's this for small town honesty? The “self-serve” apple vender. Take your pick and leave a quarter!

It was fun to see the Amish/Mennonite families enjoying the parade, candy, junk food, and the rides. A pretty festive occasion for these conservative families.

This is one ride Paul said he would NEVER go on!

We had a wonderful time. If your in the area around this time next year, don't miss this festival. You'll have a great time!

Driving home we saw this sign…

We looked at each other and had to turn around and go back for a picture. We had no idea what this meant so we consulted our trusty friend Google. Here is what we found…The Eastern Continental Divide runs along the high ridges and peaks of the Appalachian Mountains, and it separates land draining east to the Atlantic Ocean from that draining west and southwest to the Mississippi River, and the Gulf of Mexico.

It begins in Key West FL, goes up through the center of FL into GA through Atlanta, on up into NC and into VA creating much of the border of VA and WV, through western MD, into western PA, into western NY, then looping west close to Lake Erie, through Portage County OH and Akron OH in "Summit" county, into Indiana and on into Chicago [less than a mile form Lake Michigan], on up into Wisconsin, and into Minnesota where it eventually becomes the Northern Continental Divide.

Now you know the rest of the story!

With sadden hearts we must change our plans again. We are leaving on Sunday and heading back to Canton. On Thursday, a cousin and aunt of Marsha's passed away. Jim, 74, had a stoke and her Aunt Johanne, 72, passed from kidney failure. We will arrive in Canton early to attend calling hours on Sunday, a funeral on Monday and calling hours and a funeral on Tuesday. We are so happy that we are only five hours down the road. We hope to fit a quick visit in with our daughter, Kelly. Please keep our families in your prayers.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see ya'll back real soon. Have a great day!