Back Where It All Began

After a good night's rest, we packed up and decided to have breakfast at the nearby Cracker Barrel.  

We left Missouri and cut across the southwest corner of Iowa.

Finally, we made it to Nebraska and took Highway 75 north to Bellevue and Offutt AFB.

Below is Erling Berquest Military Hospital, Offutt AFB, Nebraska, where John Andrew was born.  

Below is the main gate into Offutt AFB, Nebraska.  When mom and I drove from Salem to the base, this is where we waited for Carol to sign us in.
 

When Carol was stationed here, SAC Headquarters was  located in a building where this new building is now.  I worked in that building.  In 1982 SAC was decommissioned and renamed Strategic Command.  This new building replaced that old SAC Headquarters building.  At the time I worked here it was a three-story building with an additional three-stories underground.  I don't know if the new building has the underground stories.

This vacant lot is located just outside the Bellevue Gate to Offutt.  In 1966 when we got married, the vacant lot was a trailer park and we lived in a 30-foot trailer...our first home!  The small building in the top corner of the picture was there at that time.

This is the second place we lived in Bellevue, Apartment #3, Lindyview Apartments.

This is the third and last place we lived.  At that time, the basement was an apartment.  We lived here when John was born.  

This is the church in which we were married on Sunday, September 4, 1966.  The sign wasn't there but 

otherwise it looks the same.  The Friday before that Sunday, Carol and I had visited the pastor to see if he would marry us on Sunday afternoon.  He didn't know us from Adam, and we weren't members of the church; but he was a kind man and agreed to perform the wedding.  

  

This is Bellevue Florist and in 1966, I brought my wedding bouquet at this shop.  It is amazing that it is still in business and my memory tells me it looks the same.

When we lived in Bellevue, this was the Southroads Shopping Mall.  For Carol and I in 1966, a shopping mall was something new.  The  little town of Salem sure didn't have one.  Nearly every weekend, we would visit the mall; usually, we didn't buy anything but a record album and ice cream cones.   We did enjoy going to the mall.  Now, this shopping mall has gone by the way of a lot of malls today.  It's no longer is a place to shop but has been repurposed.  Thanks to those shopping trips, we do have great collection of vinyl record albums from 1966-1969.  Vinyl is coming back!!

After driving around Bellevue and the base, we drove into Omaha on some of the streets we had driven when we lived here.  The western edge of the city used to end around 80th street but now it stretches out to 150th street and beyond.  Boys Town was outside of town and now it is a part of Omaha.  There are new streets and highways everywhere.  We ate a late lunch at Red Lobster before driving back to Bellevue to stay at the Comfort Inn there. It has been a good day filled with old, sweet memories.  Tomorrow we head home.