The Barn of Damnation and the Toothless Curator

 

 I traveled last week to Chillicothe, Ohio where I met up with Chad Harvey, a pastor friend of mine, to do some motorcycle riding. Part of the joy of riding is that, on trips like this one, you see so many unique people and places. On this particular trip, as I was coming around a curve on U.S. 50, I spotted a red barn with enormous letters shouting: “EXCEPT YE REPENT, YE SHALL ALL LIKEWISE PERISH.” What a strange sentiment to post on the side of a barn! Wouldn’t you be more interested in letting people know that they’re loved by the God who created them? I thought about just going on, but I couldn’t. I found a driveway a few hundred feet up, turned the bike around and parked outside the Barn of Damnation. As soon as I parked, two dogs came running up to me, barking and whooping; the hounds of hell. They turned out to be big babies with no bite at all. Maybe there’s an analogy there. At any rate, I shot an excellent photo of the barn with one of the dogs standing in front.

A few miles later, I saw it . I had just passed a blue wooden sign with aging silver letters boasting “Bainbridge, Ohio: Home of the First Dental School in the United States.” And then,to my left, a tiny white block building with a sign that read: “Dental Museum.” I am a fool for unique museums, and odd things in general. It’s part of the reason I love traveling by motorcycle. It seems you see things better and have more time to enjoy them when you’re on two wheels and in the open air. The Dental Museum moved to the top of my list of things to see on our ride.

It took some convincing to get Chad to go inside, but the experience repaid him for all the uncoolness of riding up on motorcycles and paying $2 to visit a dental museum. We were met immediately by the sweetest lady, the curator, who asked us if we were “the boys on those motorcycles.” We were, we assured her, expecting to be scolded for taking such risk. She said, ”It’s the best way to travel, isn’t it?” She talked to us for a few minutes about her brothers having ridden when she was young, about the fact that she ‘got the bug.’

But everything she said after her first few sentences were overshadowed by the thought that wouldn’t leave me: “The curator of the dental museum has no teeth!” There she was, standing in a building that housed the history of tooth repair, and she had not a tooth in her head. How did she get that job?

We ate at greasy spoons, including one roadside stand that had incredible fresh walleye sandwiches and fried green tomatoes. We saw two beautiful lakes, met some interesting people, got some great pictures, and spent time catching up around the shared interest of biking. I’m a newby, but there’s nothing like a bike.