Oklahoma - Great Salt Plains and Sod House Museum

This morning, October 23^rd, saw us on the road to see the Great Salt Plains.

  Unfortunately because of the migration of cranes and other birds the salt plains are not accessible to drive on or to perchance dig for Selenite crystals.  These crystals are a variety of gypsum occurring in transparent crystals.  The crystals can only be found in the Great Salt Plains National Wildlife Refuge. 

Clark was fortunate to talk to our next door camper and received some crystals from him.  It pays to be neighborly!

We continued on to see the Sod House Museum near Aline, OK. The present museum is built around the ‘soddy’, built in 1894.  It took about ½ acre of sod to complete the 12 x 24 two room house.  The most interesting part of seeing this sod house was the lady who gave us a narrated tour.  She related stories that have been compiled from family members who lived in the house.

The inside of the house was originally covered with two layers of newspapers.  Later the walls were plastered with local alkali clay and a wood floor put in.  The blue color of the walls came from adding bluing to the clay.  These improvements helped to keep out critters and insects.

The sheeting that hung over the bed came in handy when it rained as it kept the mud from falling on the bed.  The sheeting also could house a bull snake who would keep the rodent population at bay. 

On the outside of the house are mud dauber nests that house a type of wasp that ate spiders and other bugs.  So both snakes and mud daubers were tolerated because of their benefit to the homeowner.