Driving back from the Lake of the Ozarks with my daughter I noticed the signs pointing off to the West off of HWY 54 to Bagnell Dam. Could that be the same place I remembered? We decided to investigate. It was, and it was not, the same place.
When I was a kid going to the Lake of the Ozarks was going to
Bagnell Dam. That included of course "the strip" which was a carnival like tourist trap with gift shops, boat rides on the lake, and the gaudy and tawdry atmosphere one expects of such a place. It was wonderful! Promising everything but giving nothing. I remember getting my hands on an "Indian Spear" complete with a chicken feather died red and rubber arrow head attached that I terrorized my siblings with for weeks. The dam itself was almost anticlimactic after all that but you could cross it and visit
Max Allen's Reptile Garden (now defunct) one of the old style private zoos. I had not been there on the strip in many years.
Now the attraction at the Lake of the Ozarks is the outlet mall and the highway bypasses Bagnell Dam so that you drive by it. There is a sign but it is one more obscure sign, pointing to obscure places, among many. Most younger people do not even know the dam exists and have gone to the lake for years without ever driving over it.
Intellectually I know that when a major road, or historically a rail line, bypasses a town that it can mean the demise of a community. The community may not disappear altogether, but it can certainly be diminished. A little bit of creativity in how HWY 54 was routed would have saved the dam as a major attraction. Now, it is secluded back from the highway and literally millions of people go by it each year and never know it is there. It did not use to be that way.
The end of the strip, next to the dam where the mighty Tom Sawyer cruise boat is still available.
Once every inch of the strip was used for some enterprise or other. Now, some are for sale or sit empty. There is a fairly vigorous group of businesses which still seem active, unfortunately I did not take a picture of those details, but it is not the once crowded hustle and bustle it once was.
First of all I remembered the place through the eyes of the child. The other thing was that we had always approached the dam from the West heading East but that is reversed now so revisiting this childhood icon was from a reverse perspective. Disconcerting. Took me awhile to figure that out.
To my adult eyes the huge dam now was small and seemed ancient and crumbly. The strip? That once huge center of tourist trap enterprise was so changed I barely recognized it. Then, slowly, I began to intuit a familiarity there hidden among the closed and shabby buildings. I confirmed it with one more drive up and down the strip and then we parked at the dam to take some pictures.
An old turbine component memorialized.
When we crossed back over it I noticed that there was a park of sorts with a scenic viewing area. So, we decided to visit that as well.
Another of those turbines. This one apparently painted - at first I thought it was aluminum.
This was the most poignant journey back to childhood I have had in my life so far. Everything stays the same, and everything changes. Our reality is contextual.
Lee Mace's Ozark Opry
Oh,... I cannot end without mentioning
Lee Mace's Ozark Opry. Located a few miles from Bagnell Dam on HWY 54 was the "Opry." The building is still there but the show closed about three years ago. As a matter of fact this is an edit, and I actually had to call down and ask the good folks at the Tom Sawyer paddle boat to find out the status of the show. I was not able to find out that the show had closed anywhere on the internet. I am saddened to hear the show closed. Again, why didn't I take a picture of the theater that is still standing but empty?!
Lee Mace was serving up hillbilly music way before
Branson and was a pioneer in that genre. He was even on television. I remember at least one visit to the "opry" and painful television trials at home when Lee Mace and the gang would be performing. All in black and white on
KRCG . I was not a country music fan and have only now developed a limited taste for it in my dotage. But, my appetite for nostalgia, especially when it relates directly to me, has become sizable. I wonder if any of those shows have survived?
Oddly though, the Opry does not have a web presence of it's own and the
only wikipedia reference I could find was in German! You cannot make this stuff up.
Come Ride the
Tom Sawyer Paddle Boat!
So, this week I am going to drive back down with my family for the ninety minute dinner cruise on the Tom Sawyer paddle boat. I will take some more pictures, and of course indulge in a paddle boat ride. If everything works out we will take my parents. They will love it. Reservations are required and we shove off at 6:30 p.m.
Bagnell Dam is a little under ninety miles south west of Columbia with good roads all the way.
