We thought Buscovoice.com readers would enjoy this overseas blog that mentions Busco!
From http://english.ohmynews.com/:
… CONTINUING ON TOWARDS FORT WAYNE, by chance we found a Lincoln Highway marker in Churubusco. I say by chance because it couldn’t be seen when traveling east but only when traveling west. I’d stopped to take a picture of the larger-than-life green cement turtle with a green ribbon around its neck sitting on an island in the road with a green ribbon around its neck at an intersection just east of the marker when I saw the marker.
We walked through the town looking for another marker but didn’t find one. Churubusco is quite small — our Rand McNally Road Atlas says less than 2,000. There were the usual collection of fast-food shops, an eclectic group of small stores, a church, and a funeral home which had been in existence since 1872. Just on the edge of town we found a large factory and some kind of showroom on the main street saying something about C&A Tool.
On the other side of the street from the marker we found a green turtle in the window of the Churubusco News. We went in, and talked with David Crabill. First of all he said the town had only recently learned that it was on the Lincoln Highway and thus there was only the one marker.
Second, he said that in 1847 “Churubusco” was as well known in the United States as were Iwo Jima and Okinawa during World War II as there was a famous battle in a Mexican town of that name that brought about a quick end to the war.
As for the turtle, he said that was Oscar, the “Beast of Busco.” The story is long and complicate but here’s the a shortened version: Back in 1948 two men were fishing when a huge turtle surfaced next to their boat. It was seen again in 1949 and the hunt was on. Numerous attempts by various people yielded nothing. But the semi-real, semi-fictional turtle earned the name “Oscar” and the town earned the name “Turtle Town.”
The main economic driver for the town was the C&A Tool Engineering, started more than 40 years ago and still owned by Dick Conrow. They had just installed a new six-axis mill, a multi-million dollar machine of which there are only four others in the United States. The company employs 550 people and thus “Dick Conrow is the economic driver.”
When we asked David about how our travel guide said the Lincoln Highway went through Amish farmland around Goshen, Ligonier on the way to Fort Wayne, yet we hadn’t seen anything that looked Amish, he said the people were in small towns further to the northeast, places like Topeka, Emma, and especially Shipshewanna.
It sounded interesting and wasn’t so far back but where would we camp as there probably weren’t any Wal-Marts in those small towns. “No problem,” David said, and drew a map showing how we could return to the area via Indiana?9 which went past Chain O’Lakes State Park with its many campsites.
SO BACK WE WENT, CAMPING AT CHAIN O’LAKES AND CONTINUING ON THE NEXT DAY.
On the way east, we’d gone through Ligonier and seen an interesting house but the light was bad so we continued on. We went through Ligonier again earlier in the day and the light was beautiful so we stopped so I could take a picture …
Editor’s note: We were pointed to this overseas blog by Craig Alan Myers. See his note below. Thanks Craig!
Viv,
Thank you! I just happened to come across it — I don’t remember how, now. But since it is apparently a site from some people from overseas, I thought it interesting how they described our town.
Craig Myers
