In the middle of nowhere, in western Nebraska is Carhenge, which is like Stonehenge, but made out of cars. It sounds like a funny idea, and it is. However, when you walk in, you realize it's not a place for joviality. It is very quiet, with people talking in whispers, like a graveyard. The loudest sounds are the winds moaning in the distance, and the crisp crunching of crushed stone underfoot. The solemn tone is set by the automobiles themselves, all painted gray like ghosts, or perhaps tombstones.
When we arrived there, it was near sunset, and I imagined that it was a monument to late twentieth century setting on Western civilization. Stonehenge was built 3,000 years ago. I wondered, in three thousand years, if future archeologists would find remnants of American culture. What would they be? The dried, shriveled bones of the highways that snaked across the land? Canisters of gasoline buried, scattered about the land, still leaching their poisons into the soil and ground water...
And those archeologists will wonder, why did they build such monuments to celebrate the automobile? Why did they choke their air and scar the landscape, not knowing the destruction they brought upon themselves. In those days they wondered why there were so many terrible floods, not making the connection that they had paved so much of the land that the rain had no place to go.
Three thousand years have past and no one knows, no one remembers who built Stonehenge (it wasn't the Druids). Three thousand years from now, will anyone know why we broke the back of Western civilization in celebration of the automobile?
CARHENGE
Visited July, 1996. No fee.
Built in 1987 by engineering consultant James Reinders during a family reunion.
Accessible and visible from U.S. 385, two miles north of Alliance, Nebraska. A few hours straight south of Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse Monument, Jewel Cave and Wind Cave in South Dakota.
From Ditty Hagardorn 1/28/01
Hi Frank
I think Carhenge beats Cadillac Ranch by a mile. Great pages, and wonderful art. Speaking of art, we have a couple of sites that specialize in all things artsy:
The Museum of Depressionist Art
http://www.dearauntnettie.com/museum-of-depressionist-art.htm
The Gallery of the Unidentifiable http://www.dearauntnettie.com/gallery-of-the-unidentifiable.htm
Both of these are sprouts from the fertile mind of Aunt Nettie:
Dear Aunt Nettie http://www.dearauntnettie.com
I would love to exchange links with you. I'll resize your link button to fit the links page, if that's ok with you.
Regards,
dancinfool
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