A Beautiful City
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We post a lot of pictures here of the Allen County Courthouse.  With that confession out of the way, here is another one.  This was what the east side if the rotunda looked like on Monday, during that oh-so-brief blast of blue sky that we enjoyed.

Along with this, I offer the last pictures I plan to post of the ice storm.  Unless, of course, it all happens again tonight…

UPDATE: There’s good news about the Glenbrook Dodge flag in The Journal Gazette this morning (Tuesday, Dec. 23).  According to the newspaper, Glenbrook Dodge reports that they have three of the super flags and that Old Glory will be flying above the dealership again as early as Friday.

Thanks to a loyal reader (you know who you are) for passing along the good news.

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With so many people in the dark or seeking shelter with friends, family and elsewhere, this isn’t exactly an important point.  But it was hard not to notice that many of Fort Wayne’s great flag displays were destroyed or heavily damanged by Friday’s ice storm.

The enormous flag that has flown for the past several years high above Glenbrook Dodge was completely destroyed by the storm.  All that’s left of it is a ribbon.  The large flag that flies over Georgetown Square was heavily damanged and the flag that flies over the Lincoln Tower is a shredded tangle of fabric.

The photo above is one we took of the Glenbrook Dodge flag on a windy night earlier this year.

Not exactly important right now, but it is a shame nonetheless to lose such great patriotic displays.

Just before Noon on Friday, about the time I thought I’d gotten luck and avoided the power outages, my lights went out.  So my wife and daughter and I embarked on a weekend as drifters, moving between a hotel room with a water leak, the mall and my parents’ house.

The lights came back on Sunday night, but I had enough time on my hands over the weekend to get some more interesting pictures of Fort Wayne under ice. 

‘Twas the week before Christmas and all through the town, transformers exploded like pretty green bombs.

Every creature was stirring as they slid from the house.  Tree limbs were hung from the power lines with care, in hopes that the power company soon would be there. 

The children were nestled all snug in their beds, because school had been cancelled until early next year.   

Had enough?  I’ll get to the point…

If you live in Fort Wayne, or any place else in northern Indiana, you woke up this morning to a spectacular sight.  Yep, that half-inch glaze of ice is a nuisance and potentially dangerous, but it is fascinating to look at.  Here are a few pictures I managed to grab before the slush swamped my shoes.

From my newly discovered stash of negatives (see previous post), I bring you another glimpse back at history…

On August 30, 1997, a fire that many people had been fearing for a long time finally happened.  An abandoned tire warehouse behind Fort Wayne Police headquarters at Creighton and Bowser avenues burst into flames.  The fire, the work of an arsonist, burned for nearly two days before firefighters had it firmly under control.

At the time, I was a reporter for The Fort wayne News-Sentinel.  I was at home that weekend (the Labor Day weekend) and saw the smoke on the horizon while mowing my grass.  Having covered the police beat for several years, I knew exactly what was burning, grabbed my camera and ran out the door.

Traffic gridlocked near the scene of the fire, so I ditched my car and gladly accepted a ride for the last mile or so down bumpy sidewalks and lawns on the back of some kid’s moped.

I took these photographs during the early stages of the fire and kept snapping until a better photographer arrived.  Some of them are a little over-exposed (probably because I was running at the time), but they’re still fun to look at.

If you weren’t around then, this fire shot smoke and soot hundreds of feet into the air.  Chunks of burned rubber landed miles downwind.

While digging through my attic for Christmas decorations this weekend, I stumbled onto a treasure trove of old negatives which, mysteriously, had not melted despite three years of being in the attic.

I started scanning a few and discovered some treasures like these.

A few days after the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded (on January 28, 1986) Fort Wayne held a memorial service for the lost astronauts in Freimann Square.  In spite of miserable weather that cancelled a flyover by the Indiana Air National Guard, hundreds of people - if not more- turned out.

I was there with my first high-end camera, a Canon AE-1, to record the event.  Dignataries including then Mayor (now state representative) Win Moses and Bishop John D’Arcy, spoke.  I believe this event took place on Monday, February 3, 1986.

Every year Santa Claus cruises through our neighborhood delivering goodies to little girls and boys.  But instead of arriving on the seat of a wooden sleigh pulled by eight magical reindeer, Santa is escorted by the St. Joseph Township Fire Department on a bright red fire engine.

Tomorrow morning the sounds of the engine’s siren, which normally indicate some form of trouble, will instead alert children that Santa is near!

This holiday activity has quickly become a tradition for our family.  We would like to extend our gratitude to the St. Joseph Township Fire Department not only for the continuous emergency services that they provide, but for also helping create this truly memorable experience.

The single most frustrating thing I’ve ever tried to photograph is the Santa Claus display that adorns the side of the National City Bank building in downtown Fort Wayne.

The pictures are too dark.  They’re washed-out.  They seem oddly out of focus.  The ability of this exhibit to put off photo-resistant vibes makes me believe that Santa may be for real.

Here is my latest - and so far best - effort to photograph The Claus.  This is a two image composite taken with a 28-135mm lens on a Canon 40D.

Everyone is familiar with the historic Wolf & Dessauer Santa Claus display that has illuminated downtown during the holidays for the past 29 years.

But by far the largest display of holiday lights in downtown Fort Wayne is also the city’s newest display, adorning the south face of Perfection Bakery on Pearl Street.  The display is on throughout the evening hours and is well worth a visit.  It is a scrolling display of lights that runs from right to left (shown here in a one-second time exposure).

The Perfection Bakery display kicked off last week and continues through the holidays.

Over the past couple of years Fort Wayne has seen the arrival of a few new “fast casual” eateries of the Mexican variety including Moe’s and Chipotle. Last Monday Fort Wayne’s first Qdoba Mexican Grill opened for business at 4716 Illinois Rd.

Qdoba has several locations in the Indianapolis area and in recent years has expanded to other parts of Indiana including West Lafayette, Bloomington, Kokomo, and Muncie.

According to Wikipedia “Qdoba” was formerly known as Z-TECA Mexican Grill. The first restaurant opened in 1995 in Denver and there are now over 450 locations throughout the United States.

Fort Wayne saw its first serious snow of the season on Sunday.  For a few hours, before it warmed up and most of the snow melted away, it was pretty darned gorgeous outside!

This is a picture I’ve been trying to get for a while, the Courthouse, bathed in snow during daylight hours.

Wednesday night brought the annual lighting of the Wolf & Dessauer Santa Clas display in downtown Fort Wayne.  Several thousand people filled the intersection of Main and Calhoun Streets to count down and cheer as the Fort Wayne tradition lit up the National City Bank Building.

This is the 29th consecutive year that the rescued display will light up downtown Fort Wayne.  The crowd followed along as dignataries including Mayor Tom Henry lit up the Wells Fargo Bank Building Christmas tree and the giant wreath that adorns One Summit Square.

Here are a few highlights from the evening…

I had the chance twice this year to take pictures from the roof of One Summit Square, the tallest point in Fort Wayne.  It goes without saying that a lot changes between August and November, but these two pictures from the same vantage point reall demonstrate it.

Today’s beautiful weather provided a great opportunity to see the continuing progress on the Harrison Square complex.  The stadium continues to grow with the recent addition of the field’s turf and the stadium lighting.  The suites, offices and other spaces are now largely enclosed so that progress can continue over the winter months, with opening day scheduled for April 16, 2009.

Since the last time we showed you an overview of the site, the parking garage has reached its near completion and site work is underway for the hotel and condominiums.  Also, an attractive brick gateway into the complex has been installed on West Jefferson Boulevard.

…Is that a spaceship I see tonight?

It won’t be a bright as it is in the picture above, but the Space Shuttle Endeavour and the International Space Station will be easy to spot when they sail together across the Fort Wayne sky this week.

The best viewing will be on Friday when the docked spacecraft appear in the southwest sky just before 6:40 p.m.  The shuttle/station complex will appear in the southwest sky around 6:37 p.m. and ascend to a point 85 degrees above the horizon (nearly straight overhead) at 6:40 p.m.  The combined vehicles will disappear into shadow in the northweast sky at 6:41 p.m

On Sunday, Endeavor and the space station will appear again just before 6 p.m.  Look for the spacecraft to appear in the west/southwest at 5:54 p.m., rising to a point 75 degrees above the horizon in the northwest sky by 5:57 p.m.

In both cases, the shuttle and station will appear as a single bright dot, moving slowly and steadily.  Since the sun will have set shortly before the flyovers, the docked spacecraft will be among the brightest lights in the sky, and definitely the brightest thing moving.

Endeavour lifted off on Friday and docked with the space station on Sunday afternoon.