| I did a lot of driving on this trip, sometimes for hours just to see one thing. Lots of farmland in this part of the country. |  |
| Further proof I'm in a rural area. |  |
| Whatever you do, don't ask them about their weather in July. |  |
| I came all way up to Clarinda, Iowa to visit the Glenn Miller Birthplace Museum. |  |
| The only trouble was that the museum was temporarily closed when I got there. So I drove toward the town square to find an ATM. Here's the county courthouse. |  |
| Sometimes when things go wrong you unexpectedly get a surprise. It turns out the Clarinda High School homecoming parade was underway on the town square. |  |
| If the museum had been open (which was closed for the parade) I never would have seen this little piece of small town life. |  |
| After about an hour of waiting, the museum eventually opened back up. |  |
| Only four Glenn Miller trombones are
known to be authentic. His first trombone and another he used in
his civilian band are on exhibit at the University of Colorado.
One of his two military horns is in a U.S. Air Force museum in
Dayton, Ohio. This one was also used by Major Miller in England in
1944. You can't see it, but he had an engraved mouthpiece. That's how you know you've really made it. |
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| This is not one of Glenn's horns. But since there are so few actual things in this museum I figured I ought to take a picture. This belonged to Paul Tanner, who played in the Miller band from 1938 to 1942. One interesting fact about Mr. Tanner is that he co-created an instrument called the Electro-Theremin in the 1950's which mimics the sound of a theremin. He played the instrument on several Beach Boys songs including "Good Vibrations". How about that? |  |
| No, Glenn Miller did not play drums but his drummer Moe Purtill did. This is his original kit. |  |
| Here is one of the Glenn Miller Orchestra's band stands, as shown in the photo behind it. Starting in 1946, they continued to be used by the Tex Beneke-Glenn Miller Orchestra, with Tex eventually replacing the "GM" with "Tex B". They were donated to the Glenn Miller Birthplace Society in 1989 and are still used in their Glenn Miller Festivals, with the "GM" restored of course. |  |
| When I said there wasn't much in this museum I wasn't kidding. That was pretty much it. There are many photos along the walls as well and there was an exhibit in the middle of the room featuring things from The Glenn Miller Story movie from 1954 starring Jimmy Stewart and the awfully cute back then June Allyson. There was also an hour-long documentary that they show, but since I waited more than an hour for the place to open, I didn't want to stay that much longer. I can always watch The Glenn Miller Story again sometime or find a documentary online. |  |
| Right next door, on the corner of 16th and Clark is this house. It is the home in which little Glenn Miller was born. |  |
| This piano and the vase on the right side of it (a wedding gift) belonged to Glenn. |  |
| It is a small house as you might expect for a small Iowa town. |  |
| Almost all of the furniture is not authentic to the Millers, but appropriate for the time. This is the kitchen. |  |
| And in this room the musical great entered the world. He of course left it on December 15, 1944 somewhere over the English Channel. |  |