445. Shawnee, Pottawatamie County (OK39)

Another handsome courthouse. I very much approve. Unfortunately, the building got short shrift from me this day because I had other things on my mind.

I’ve actually seen a number of Carnegie Libraries as I’ve been going around, but I haven’t been photographing or even considering them. I give credit where credit is due: Andrew Carnegie must have been a hard man because nobody amasses that much wealth without being such a person, but even as a young man he had an eye on philanthropy, hoping to use a small amount for his person and family and “spend the surplus each year for benevolent purposes.” Of course that small amount in and of itself would be the modern day equivalent of a million dollars a year, but still. He would amass a great fortune, and put his money where his mouth was, funding libraries, a university of some repute, and the Tuskegee Institute. He built thousands of church organs, owned Carnegie Hall, funded the Hooker Telescope, and founded a generous pension plan for his university employees. And standing before one of his 1600+ libraries, I though t about the irony that this former library has been turned into a District Attorney’s Office. Insert something here about education being crippled to the needs of “public safety,” be it the so called War on Drugs, the security theater we see from Homeland Security, or any other societal safety measures which seem less than effective.

May I also say that the Veterans’ Memorial is a little off the proverbial chain. A weapon of war from every service? OK, technically a Huey is a transport, not a weapon, but I think you get the idea. But I had something else to attend to before I got my official cache. You see, right around the corner from the Courthouse is Shawnee City Hall, home of Oklahoma’s one and only Webcam! I was to add a third to my credit! Except I couldn’t! The camera was down! Crap! You’re killing me, Smalls! Killing me!

At least I can say I was there, but that doesn’t help me. I’ll pass through the area again and it’s not that far from Oklahoma City so I’ll get another shot at it, but I was so looking forward to it. That said, there have been a number of logs that have claimed it and just taken a photo of themselves there. While I get what they’re doing, I myself don’t agree that’s legit. To each their own, though. I do not judge too harshly because I, too, have committed what some might call (for lack of a better term) “geocrimes.” He who is without something or other should cast the first thing-a-ma-bobber.

For my official cache, I first went to get a park and grab a few blocks from the courthouse, but I had to wait forever for a muggle who parked near it to take her stuff out and move away from it. Once she moved, someone across the street decided to hang out in their doorway smoking in freezing temperatures, staring my way, looking toward the cache. After enough time, I decided to proceed to Plan B.

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Wait… What? At some point, I had to grab an official cache and here it was. They demolished a building, but they left the safe behind, no doubt because it just wasn’t worth it to move. I was reminded of the safe of the Teikoku Bank. It survived Hiroshima though the building didn’t. They even rebuilt the bank around the safe. But not here they didn’t. No, here there was a magnetic plate waiting to be plucked, covering a log waiting to be signed. It was. Signed, I mean. Signed and returned. With my duty done, the road beckoned again. I mounted up and headed north, preparing for my arrival in…