fbpx

Meandering Tippecanoe County

Today it’s time for a visit to Tippecanoe County, where I first touched down in Indiana. On my first visit to the state, I was so ignorant of its geography…

Today it’s time for a visit to Tippecanoe County, where I first touched down in Indiana. On my first visit to the state, I was so ignorant of its geography that I booked a flight from Los Angeles to Chicago to West Lafayette. The little plane (maybe a dozen passengers) flew so low that we navigated by following the highway from Chicago to the Purdue airport, which apparently no longer has commercial airline service.

Another puzzler for me when I first got there was the way people with expensive homes (deans and the like) were extremely proud of living on ravines. What is this thing with ravines? I wondered. Well, situated in the northern, glacier-flattened half of Indiana, Tippecanoe County does not have a lot of interesting terrain. Ravines are about it.

Tippecanoe is a word that many school children would recognize because of “Tippecanoe and Tyler too.” Few campaign slogans are remembered 170 years later, but that tribute to William Henry Harrison has a pleasing rhythm to it. Should any student wish to learn more about Harrison and the Battle of Tippecanoe, there is always the redoubtable Ginger Smith’s Fourth Grade Class website, created by the students of Battle Ground Elementary School.

Battle Ground is also the site of Historic Prophetstown in Prophetstown State Park, with its 1920s Farmstead, now offering farm produce. Located south of the town is the Tippecanoe Battlefield Museum, a site run by the Tippecanoe County Historical Association. The association also oversees the Fort Ouiatenon Blockhouse and the Feast of the Hunters’ Moon. In Lafayette, the Association runs the Moses Fowler House and the Frank Arganbright Genealogy and Research Center, 1001 South Street. Conveniently located across the street is the Art Museum of Greater Lafayette. Over the years all of these organizations have partnered with the Indiana Humanities Council on numerous projects, as have the Tippecanoe County and West Lafayette Public Libraries.

You can find a lot of information about these venues and more on the website of the Lafayette-West Lafayette Convention & Visitors Bureau, homeofpurdue.com. Purdue? Oh, yes, Purdue. That brings me back to my first experience in Indiana, which was at Purdue. There I met my husband, Joel, and, 36 years later, I’m not sure whether to praise or blame the university. But, in this season of joy, let us be charitable. Kudos to Tippecanoe County!

[Originally published in Hoosierati on Dec. 25, 2009]