Tower remains, but can't be scaled

Another one of my childhood icons is endangered.
So many are gone:
•The Hines Theatre.
•The Sky-Vue Drive-In.
•Northport.
•Root beer stands.
•Amusement parks like the one at Indian Lake.
And now word comes that the fire tower at Ouabache State Park has been closed.
It’s going to take something like $75,000 to repair the thing and make it kid-safe again, and that’s not likely to come rolling in tomorrow.
It’s not the first time the fire tower has been closed, of course. During my childhood it seemed to be closed intermittently and may even have been condemned at some point.
The idea of the fire tower was, in and of itself, a little silly.
When you think of fire towers, you think of mountainous terrain and vantage points that can look over thousands of acres of woodland, keeping watch for the tell-tale sign of smoke where there should be no smoke.
You don’t think of Wells County, Indiana.
In some ways, the state park itself is an odd duck.
It began its life, as I understand it, as a Civilian Conservation Corps project during the Depression. The CCC was one of those Depression-era make-work projects that are often dismissed by politicians today. But the fact is, the CCC did some great work around the country.
In Indiana, that’s particularly true in our state parks, where shelter houses, walkways, stairways and lodges still are enjoyed well over a half a century later.
Jay County’s CCC camp was located not far from Jay County Fairgrounds and was remarkable because it was all African American. In the segregated U.S. of the 1930s, the military was not yet integrated, nor was the CCC.
I’ve never been clear on what work the CCC did locally, but the veterans of that endeavor used to gather at the fairgrounds for a reunion picnic in the 1950s. The last reunion I recall hearing about was 20 years ago and was held at Clifty Falls State Park, where the same CCC contingent did some work after moving on from Jay County.
The Wells County park started as a nature preserve, and it was that way throughout my childhood. It didn’t quite measure up to state park status. The landscape is pretty much typical eastern Indiana and not particularly pretty. While there’s some second-growth forest, much of the wooded area came about through plantings by the CCC.
Just the same, it was almost a state park. And when you’re a Cub Scout or on a biology field trip, it qualified as something special.
Generations of Jay County kids made the trek over to the Bluffton neighborhood to walk the trails, wander around the lake that’s not much bigger than a pond and stare at the handful of wild animals in cages. It didn’t qualify as a real zoo, and today’s animal rights activists would have shut it down in a heartbeat.
But there was always the fire tower, and it represented a challenge to every Cub Scout: Would you climb all the way to the top?
Back in the era of the double-dare, this was one of the big tests. And any kid knew he had passed a milestone when the climb was made.
Still, there was a significant moment of relief when — upon arriving at the park — a kid learned that the fire tower was closed. The big test could be deferred until another visit.
So, maybe, this is a good thing.
The tower can still stand as an icon, but kids skittish about the climb can breathe easier.