October 22, 2014:
Normally, when one thinks about the oil patch, a Spark is something to avoid. Twice now, however, I have started out to do just that ...... make Sparks in the oilfield! Sparks, Oklahoma, that is. The first time, we just didn't know the roads well enough and turned around to discover some new roads elsewhere, the second time, we covered some of the same roads, but continued on until we reached our destination. Sparks is a tiny community north of me in Lincoln County. Originally started as a tribal town on the Sac and Fox reservation, there was a lot of oil drilling going on around in that area, and the Eastern Oklahoma Railroad decided to make a line through the town. But ..... WW1 happened, then the depression, and the Eastern Oklahoma Railroad was no more, the Santa Fe had no desire to build tracks there as most of the oil was by that time transported by pipeline to Cushing, and the town started dying. At one time, the town boasted 50 businesses, a couple of banks two schools and was a thriving community of about 500 people. Today, however it is a different story. At the last census, there were still 137 people living there, the majority of them over 65. The schools have closed, we saw no businesses open, and the only thing that was still operating was the U.S. Post Office, which the government is trying to close down. Ah, me ..... times do change.
Even though the town is now more or less a ghost town, it was a fitting destination for an October bike ride. Since the acquisition of my gravel bike, I look for opportunities to use it, and this seemed like a good destination. Riding gravel brings back memories of my rural South Dakota youth and gravel was the only surface I had to ride on. The area we passed through is a gravel paradise ..... Lincoln County has some wonderful gravel roads, many more miles of gravel than pavement. The roads and infrastructure are old, but maintained and have lasted a long time. Starting out, we just got on the first gravel road by my house and rode north, and the further north we went, the prettier it got.
The original reason for this trip was to look for old bridges, and there were several on this route. This one has been redone with concrete roadbed, but still has the original riveted iron sides.
The next was only a couple hundred yards up the road but was much older and much more original.
Still sporting the wooden planking on the roadbed, it was old and weathered and looked almost original. The old sides were not the more modern malleable iron but old wrought iron, dating the bridge back even older, probably around the very early 1900's.
The road between the two bridges looked like this .....
Such an idyllic setting to ride bikes. We might have regressed 100 years into the past, and we had it all to ourselves.
Another wooden bridge. This one was completely wood, and if you can make out the beams under it, you will see that they are also wood. Most of these have been replaced with steel beams sometime during the life of the bridge, but this one was still all wood.
One of our first signs of Sparks. I have no idea what this was, but obviously an old business of some kind.
The busiest place in town. If you hang around here fifteen minutes, you will soon know everyone in town ...... and they will know all about you! It was here that we learned that if we call the number on the sign by the senior center that someone will come down and fix us lunch...
Inside.... you will find no big city lines and take a number machines. Just walk up to the window and get your mail.
We also learned here that directly behind the post office was the town jail. Obviously a deterrent to crime. It certainly would have deterred me from wanting to ever spend any time in there.
A view of the jail from the other side.
One of the town's banks, this one says it was built in 1905.
This old building had an interesting past. Built originally in 1926 as a Masonic Lodge, it had also been used as a mechanic garage according to an old resident we met outside the post office. He didn't remember it ever being anything other than a garage. In the cutaway portion in the front was the piping and wiring for a gas pump, so it might have also been a service station too.
Inside, taken through a very dirty window, the place didn't look nearly as good as the outside.
Loved this old house with the morning glory climbing up the porch post. Abandoned and neglected for years, it still maintained a bit of dignity. One could only look and imagine it with kids running in and out, wash hanging from the lines and happy noises from the inside. Today, however, all was quiet.
The old high school. Now it is the City Building and senior center.
An old abandoned church where family get-together's once brought good times and happy laughter.
Back on the road again leaving town, the old hickory reminds us that Fall is almost upon us.
This was the lightest weight rated bridge we found. Scary, a pickup truck would almost be too much. We crossed it one at a time.
A pastoral scene as we moved along various county roads.
The roads and the scenery went on forever! It was a beautiful Fall day, the blue, blue sky filled with big fluffy white clouds and the endless road makes me glad to be a part of it all. This section of the road was all very new and loose gravel for about three miles, there were very steep and long hills and it proved to be very tiring. I had a bit of excitement just past here on the next downhill when the gravel suddenly became quite loose again and almost caused me to lose control. I had turned it loose coming off the top (foolishly), and was up to about a bit over 20mph when I hit the loose stuff, and wondering where the steering went. I managed to keep it upright, but not without some white knuckles for a bit. Ah, gravel, always a surprise.
And yet another wooden bridge, this one fairly long and no side rails. Parke County Indiana may boast many old covered bridges, but Lincoln County Oklahoma has a good share of wooden bridges to find.
At one time, this old building was a sawmill, the ready to cut logs still stacked beneath the lean-to. When I first saw this, I thought of the Walton's sawmill, as it looked almost like the one in the T.V. series.
From here, it was only about four more miles to Jacktown, and a lunch I had been thinking about for at least the last ten miles. I was hungry enough to eat a .......
But, I'll settle for a hamburger at Jacktown. They are huge! We finished our lunch and headed on back toward home, finding yet another wooden bridge over a very unusual intersection in that the creek split the intersection at a forty five degree angle and the intersection and bridge was built around the creek. If you look over the bridge, you can see the road coming down from the opposite direction that would have intersected right at the bridge. As it was, they angled the roads at the last few feet to be able to accommodate only one bridge. This one had steel supports only directly under the traffic area, the other supports were still wooden beams.
And so, the last twelve miles back were uneventful, and soon, I found myself on very familiar roads, heading for the house once again. What a trip! We covered 53 miles from my home (my riding partner even more), almost all on gravel roads in isolated areas of the State, and just had a ball. This trip was not a race, but a ride of discovery, a historical adventure, and as such, not something to be hurried, but rather something to be cherished and remembered as much as a trip through history. Although I felt as tired as if I had travelled back 100 years, and back again.
