Falcon Rest, Rock Island & Twin Falls State Parks

We started the day by driving across about 70 miles of back roads through central Tennessee from Crossville to McMinnville. Our goal was to find and tour the Falcon Rest Mansion located just north of McMinnville, we arrived there just as a tour was getting ready to start so we joined them and brought the total number up to four.

The tour starts on the front veranda with a history of the house and families that have lived in it. Clay Faulkner promised his wife that he would build her the grandest mansion in all of Tennessee and build he did, a 10,000 sq foot brick mansion right near his textile mill, complete with all the modern conveniences he could muster. Electric lights, indoor plumbing, central steam heat and even a primitive form of ice conditioning, he had cold spring water pumped through a series of pipes in the floor to help cool it in the summer. The mansion was converted into a hospital in the 40's by Dr Dietrich and continued as such with additions being added until he closed it in 1968, from what we picked up it was because of a disagreement with Medicare about payments. He wanted to tear it down but because it was built so solidly it was cost prohibitive so it sat abandoned and empty for 15 years.



Then along came the current owners George & Charlien McGlothin, be sure to ask her about the story of how George bought the house in 1989 at auction. Over the next four years they started their restoration of the house, working seven days a week and doing a majority of the work themselves. No photography is allowed inside the house but every room is filled with some fascinating antiques and artifacts.






Did I mention that the mansion is haunted, each tour guide has there own story of their experience with the friendly ghost. I looked in every corner and behind every door but was unable to make contact with him.


For more info on the mansion and ghost click here for their


Before leaving we spent some time walking around the grounds taking pictures and made a stop at the Tea Room located next to the gift shop for lunch, we both had the chicken salad on a croissant which came with a super fruit salad, sweet potato fries, a really super swirly type brownie and our drink of choice. Everything was delicious.


Now normally this would have been enough for the day but like they say on TV. “But wait there's MORE”

We took US70 north to Rock Island State Park, the Falls City Cotton Mill is located in the park on a bluff above the Great Falls, this was a mill that was built by Faulkner owner of Falcon Rest. The park has a dam operated by the TVA, Great Falls which is a series of cascading waterfalls during low water levels, during high water the gorge fills and submerges the falls. There is a trail from the parking lot to the base of the gorge. From the overlook we were able to see another waterfall down at the bend of the river but not really sure on how to get there, we took off trying to find the right road, as usual we made a few wrong turns but eventually we found what we were looking for, Twin Falls Overlook.

Twin Falls is very unique, there was no Twin Falls until the Great Falls Dam was built, the dam caused the Caney river to rise, the water seeped into some underground caverns in the gorge it is then carried down stream and exits the gorge wall at the falls. We hiked down the gorge a little and took some pictures of the falls, it's strange seeing the water just coming out of the wall of the gorge.



Click to enlarge and notice how the water is coming right out of the side of the gorge.


All in all it was a pretty good day.

Quad City

Finally back on the road
The weather around here has pretty much been cold and wet so it's time for us to hit the road for the winter. We left south central Michigan and drove down around Lake Michigan and Chicago, when we tried this last year everything including the interstates were flooded and we had to take a two hour detour around it. A quick overnight in Utica Illinois and then it was up early to get hooked up before the rain came, only a 75 miles drive today to Rock Island where we will spend a week checking out the area. We arrived at camp just as the clouds opened up and I was drenched by the time we got settled in. Of course 30 minutes later the rain slowed up but it never stopped, according to the weather we may be getting soaked until Monday which will put a damper on a lot of our plans.

Four Days Later

The rains finally stopped and the sun has come out a little bit so we decided to try a little road trip to Tempico , Illinois, population 800 and famous for being the birthplace of President Ronald Reagan. It's a pretty neat little museum, located in a store front right on Main Street. After the guide tells you the history of the Reagan family, they take you on a tour of the old bank building next door which is below the apartment that Reagan was born in, the bank has been restored to what it was like in 1918 when it opened ( when Reagan was born there was a bakery in the building). Then we get to go up stairs to the apartment, when you're going up the narrow staircase you're thinking that it's going to be very small, but it turns to be very big three bedroom with a large living room, dining room, kitchen and large enclosed back porch. Here's a few pictures of the apartment.

If it wasn't for this sign you would probably drive right on by.







Their apartment is right above the National Bank Sign, the museum is in the building to the right of the car.









This is the bedroom that Reagan was born in.







Another building was built on the side of this one and they never bricked up the windows, so when Reagan's mother needed a babysitter she would pass him through the window and the neighbor would take care of him. Years later after he was president he returned to visit and crawled through the window one last time.








On that same visit some women in town had made this little rug which Reagan had his picture taken standing on, of course I had to step on it myself.







Another nice day so we're off to the Black Hawk State Historical Site where we plan to go through the Indian museum and the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) museum, as I said that was our plan, when we got there we spotted the sign that said CLOSED MONDAY & TUESDAYS, you think they would mention that on their web site. It turned out pretty good for us, we were in by the museum reading a few historic markers when we heard some really weird bird, when we looked around to see what it was we spotted a Bald Eagle sitting in a tree about 100 feet from us, we watched it for a few minutes before it took off for the Mississippi River. I managed to get a picture of it but the weather was so cloudy and dark that it wasn't a very good one.



OK so now we're all dressed up with no place to go, guess will just drive over to the Rock Island Arsenal (RIA), sounds simply right, NOT, this is the Quad City area which means four different cities, two different states and three different rivers to figure out. We never did, so after driving around for 45 minutes we decided the hell with it we'll just head back to camp and wait for the Baseball game to start. So of course the first turn we take we see the sign for the RIA, This is an active military base so you'll need picture ID to get through the gate, first stop was the visitors center which is located at the Corp of Engineers at Mississippi Lock number 15, here we got a map telling us where we could go and couldn't go on base. We spent about hour and half in the museum, which has one of the largest gun collection on display you'll ever see, it cover ever inch of a wall that is about 12 feet high and about 70 to 80 feet long. Each gun is tagged with a number and there are seven three ring binders on a table that you can look the number up in and read about that gun. Incidentally this is the oldest US Military museum next to West Pointe.











On the way off the island we stopped at the Confederate Cemetery, Rock Island was one of the 21 Union prison camps and operated from December 1863 to July 1865, over 12,000 Confederate Soldiers were held here and 1,960 of them died while being held here, many
Southerners referred to Rock Island as the Andersonville of the North although the death toll doesn't come any where close to Andersonville's. Each stone is identified and marked and maintained by the National Cemetery Administration, which is convenient since the Rock Island National Cemetery is right down the road from here. A quick stop there to add it to our list of National Cemetery's visited and then it was home to watch our beloved Tigers lose in the bottom of the 12th inning.




A nation wide project is under way to restore all the National Cemetery's, notice how perfectly straight the stones are.





This is just an old lift bridge that is on the Hennipen Canal that we happen to come across, part of a 72 mile bike/hike path.