Trip to Homestead National Monument

As I listen to what is hopefully the latter phase of neighborhood fireworks, I thought I'd share 20 pictures I took from a recent family trip to the Homestead National Monument (website here).

It's a beautiful tribute; you can tell whoever researched for the film and the displays interviewed a lot of people, so many that the 20-minute film we watched often featured faceless voices, many in succession. I was glad that the exhibit talked about the reality of new farms failing; so often pioneers seem like superhumans, and indeed one part of the exhibit mentioned that you'd have to be kind of crazy to do the amount of work that was needed. But less than 40 percent actually succeeded. And whether you failed or succeeded as a homesteader, you had to deal with mental pressures of all kinds. So much for superhuman-ness (though I still believe in it, especially for the women who won the titles to their homesteads all on their own!)

It was a good time. (Especially enjoyed the exhibit of Joel Sartore photographs in one building :))