Vacation - Day 2

We woke up in Waco this morning and went to see the town, with native Jerome Scott as tour guide. We started at the Baylor University campus, where we toured the Armstrong-Browning library, a shrine to Elizabeth and Robert Barrett Browning.

The Armstrong-Browning museum is a tribute to the love between a man and a woman, a tribute to the poetic genius of Robert Browning, and a teaching library for the fine arts.


Above, a picture of Pawpaw and Milady under the How do I love thee? poem
After that dose of literary introspection, we ventured forth to the Texas Ranger Museum, wherein the history of that great law-enforcement organization is catalogued.



We were looking at a display of historic Winchester rifles, when Milady pointed at an 1873 Winchester and said, ""That looks just like my Daddy's rifle. And in .38-40, too. 'cept Daddy's rifle is in better shape than that one." I was stunned. It turns out Brother Harold has that rifle. I'm going to have to do some talking to Harold. Milady has a good appreciation now of Barbeque Guns. It seems every Ranger who ever retired has loaned a barbeque gun to the museum. 1911's were the far-away favorite, followed by SW 19's, 27's and 28's. Milady was looking at one case in which a wonderfully engraved SW 27 languished, when she noticed that the base pistol is the same as the one she keeps in the closet. Milady agrees that engraved pistols are attractive and wonders about the cost of a tastefully engraved Smith.

We finished up at the Dr. Pepper museum, where we learned all about bottling soft-drinks. Pawpaw worked for the Alexandria Dr. Pepper bottling company during his younger years, and was pleased that they had a copy of his old route truck. For some reason, Blogger won't let me upload an image of that truck, so I'll try to post it later.

Tonite, a steakhouse that the locals frequent. Tomorrow, we head toward San Antonio.