Author: Edward Lawlor

Museology*

Museology*

A pervasive feature of the North American landscape – urban, suburban, rural – are museums of every size and purpose. From county historical societies or private hobby collections in small communities to major destination sites such as presidential libraries or national art museums, it is possible to organize trips almost entirely around museum hopping. Indeed, some of the common road trip planning tools like Roadtrippers can populate a whole route – town by town – with museums of every type. Museums have played a central role in our van travels, so what follows is a kind of informal museology – the formal study of museums – as seen from our van. What follows is only a subset of the extraordinary number of museums we have enjoyed.

Continue reading “Museology*”
Beeville, Texas

Beeville, Texas

A template for many on-the-road small cities and towns in Texas and Oklahoma is a courthouse and town square, a largely-vacant downtown that provides a look-back to more prosperous times, and a smattering of franchise convenience stores and fast food on its outskirts. Often, these cities and towns were settled along major rivers in the area, or later along railroad lines.

Continue reading “Beeville, Texas”
Rockorama

Rockorama

Newfoundland has been called the “Patagonia of geology.”

The geologic history is enormously complex, but to understand some of it, nothing substitutes for visually observing the rock, plant, and animal history on display in Canada’s national parks. Continue reading “Rockorama”