The Ohio Turnpike, aka I-80/90 northwestern Ohio, sometime in the mid 90's. With Toledo behind us, we were headed west in the red van on a perfectly beautiful day, not a cloud, when other travelers began passing us with their windshield wipers on. I thought nothing of it, because after all, this was America before windshield wiper regulation by the government, so I figured if someone wants to use his windshield wipers under clear skies that is his business. And then it happened again. And again. Then, oddly, it seemed that everyone passing us was cleaning the windshield and the only thing they seemed to have in common was they were all passing us. Right after the guy came by cursing and shaking his fist at us, the engine light popped on and one of the boys said, "Hey Dad, there is some kind of fog following us."Our luck held long enough for us to exit and head south to old US 20A. The engine doctors at Wood Trucking opened her wide, said um-hmm, diagnosed a transmission aneurysm that had burst and pronounced it fixable with surgery, but it would take about 24 hours. They loaned us a 1960 something truck and turned us loose in NW Ohio.
"Where to stay?" we asked. "Only one place," they said, "the Chief Wauseon Motel. Not fancy but clean." And so it was. We ate tacos, drove out to Sauder Village, toured town and cooled our heels generally, all with faith that our patient would soon be healed. The next day she was.
Since that day we considered the Chief Wauseon a marker of sorts, an indicator of economic change in that part of the country. It was one place we rode by consistently, just to refresh a memory. "Why this drug store," you ask? That is where the Chief Wauseon stood.
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