The crowd includes an octogenarian here to support her grandson, a safety who she proudly notes has already been setting records; a single mom from Wichita whose son would go on to score the Badgers’ first touchdown of the afternoon; and two former New England Patriots.
The father’s plea could so easily have been forgotten: a handful of phrases in an unfamiliar language, lost to the rain and the rush of the wind in the pines on that spring day in 1877.
Located just off of Route 66, it attracts a mix of believers, locals, and international tourists who happen across it while driving America’s most iconic highway.
Some people have the Washington Monument or the Golden Gate Bridge or Mount Rushmore to associate with their first memories of a trip to the United States. I have Cimmy the 9-ton metal dinosaur.