Historical and Educational Benefits

Dr. Helen Steussy
Chair, Healthy Communities of Henry County
Feb 2004

Have you ever read Raintree County, the dramatic best seller from the 1940s set here in Henry County USA? This is the place... "which had no boundaries in time and space, where lurked musical and strange names and mythical and lost peoples, and which was itself only a name musical and strange."

Have you noticed the clock face on the FUN playground and wondered why? "For Raintree County is not the country of perishable fact. It is the country of enduring fiction. The clock in the Court House Tower on page five of the Raintree County Atlas is always fixed at nine o'clock, and it is summer and the days are long."

Or maybe you've read A Girl Named Zippy - a true story about growing up in Mooreland, Indiana. Ask Donnie Hamilton about Catherine Winters or the tales of the haunted bridges and byways of Henry County. Henry County has a richness of place that many of us overlook in our day-to-day lives. And it's this authenticity that draws people to a location. The chain stores and food places are the same here as anywhere else. We need to realize what it is that makes our place unique and worth cherishing more than anywhere else.

Our history goes back to the mound-building Indians from long ago. Does anyone think about why it's called the South Mound Cemetery? We have an Indian Mound between the New Castle High School and Baker Park. And even the triangle of land north of the high school where I played my neighborhood baseball games is an old Indian mound.

Henry County history includes the route the Conner family used between their settlement at Connersville and the now famous Conner Prairie. And how can you mention history in Henry County and not mention our most famous son, Wilbur Wright? The man who brought flight to the world started his youth as a bicycle repairman. How appropriate now to link our community to others with a bike path near his very birthplace. Our more recent history includes the heritage of manufacturing — from pianos to iron bridges to cars. Healthy Communities hopes to tie the east and the west sides of our county together with a bridge over 3 that was built in New Castle in the early 1900s. We have an old time picture of this bridge with a young boy fishing off it just like Mayberry RFD. The Raintree Trails will do more than provide a path for walking and biking. These trails will provide a journey through the history and the legends of Henry County. People who visit our trails will learn, through signs and vistas, what makes Henry County the unique and authentic place it is today. And when they realize what a special place we have, the visitors will want to return and our families will have a place they want to stay.