Suburban Exploring

In recent weeks there have been a number of local stories about people getting seriously injured, or even killed, inside abandoned mills, silos, grain elevators and deserted buildings.  These places are not in the boondocks; they are within the city limits of Minneapolis.  One University of Minnesota sophomore, twenty year old Emily Roland, was killed on June 6 when she fell thirty feet inside the Bunge grain elevator, a boarded up facility which has stood abandoned near campus since 2003.  She was with two other friends late at night when tragedy struck.  That was not their first such excursion, some of which were posted on Instagram accounts.  Six days ago, the city of Minneapolis decided to demolish the Fruen Mill near Theodore Wirth Park as a safety precaution, because the uninhabited structure was attracting not just vagrants and hobos, but curiosity seekers too.

Other sites frequented by these adventurers include underground tunnels, sewer systems, culverts and industrial complexes.  The name attached to the practice of rooting around in these structures is "urban exploring."  Prior to the past twelve month period, I had never heard that term.  It seems akin to box car jumping.  There is a combination of at least two things in play here, the rush of trespassing and a sense of taking the path less traveled.  What is more exciting, being among a bunch of tourists taking an elevator to the observation deck of a downtown skyscraper, or breaking into a dark spooky warehouse in the middle of the night?  Reading these sad stories brought back some memories.

In my youth I was an urban explorer, or more accurately, a suburban explorer.  I was introduced to this craziness by a classmate of mine, Charles Poorhus.  We were both seventh graders at St. Joe's in Libertyville, a town of 6,600 thirty-five miles north of Chicago (hence, the "suburban" modifier).  I was not really a friend of Chuck, although after being under the thumb of the Sisters Of Mercy ever since first grade, I secretly admired some of the "bad boys" like him in my class.  If compliance with the good sisters' rules was too inconvenient for them, they simply blew them off with total disregard.  Somehow those guys managed to avoid expulsion and got to live mischievously for another day.  Of course, unlike me they probably did not have parents whose code of conduct for their children mirrored that of the nuns.

My family lived on Cook Avenue, four blocks west of the main drag, Milwaukee Avenue.  The Pook did her grocery shopping at Jewel, also on Cook but a block east of Milwaukee.  One day while I was assisting my mother at Jewel, I ran into Chuck.  I was surprised to see him in there.  He seemed more like a dumpster diver than a patron of a civilized supermarket.  He had that Dead End Kids aura about him. Chuck pointed across the street over to Coy Lumber and asked me if I'd ever been over there.  Up until that point, I may not have even realized there was, in fact, a lumber yard across from Jewel.  The Marquis, from whom I inherited my complete absence of handyman talent, would have had no reason ever to set foot on Coy's property, and therefore neither had I.  (My dad did, however, make a trip or two to Schanck's Hardware Store each year!)  After replying "no" to Chuck, he did an impressive sales job on me, telling me Coy's was the best kept secret in Libertyville, with mysterious treasures yet to be discovered and wondrous spectacles to behold.  Trap doors, hidden rooms, fake walls, concealed tunnels.  It sounded too good to be true, but my curiosity was piqued to the point where I needed to find out what I'd been missing.  There was also a factor of getting to behave in a manner much more daring than I would ever have been willing to try in a school or household setting.  We agreed to meet the next evening after dinner so he could show me around.

 

I must admit that, from the perspective of this twelve year old, the results came pretty close to, though short of, matching Chuck's hype.

 

I didn't dream of requesting permission from my folks to go exploring the lumber yard.  There's no question what their answer would have been.  I never even told them when I'd play flashlight tag or hide-and-go-seek at Lakeside Cemetery, a mere quarter mile from our house.  In retrospect, partaking in such frivolity on burial grounds was in poor taste on my part.  But at least the cemetery was public property, while Coy's was not.

 

The main building on the lumber yard was like something out of a Stephen King novel.  A shadowy, creeky and rickety old wooden structure, it seemed out of place in a pleasant burg like Libertyville.  The eerily quiet premises was the antithesis of bustling Milwaukee Avenue, only a block away with cars and pedestrians making their way through Libertyville's classic downtown.  Coy's was not abandoned, but apparently business was not brisk enough to run more than one shift.  By 5:00 p.m. there was nobody left on site, not even a watchman.  Other than a yellow light above the main entryway, the ominous place was dark inside and out. Gaining access through a rear garage door was a piece of cake.

 

Twilight came fast, and we had one flashlight between the two of us.  Our mission was, quite simply, to see what we could see.  I had just finished reading The Tower Treasure, the first in the famous Hardy Boys mystery series.  In contrast to those sleuths, Chuck and I had no crime to investigate -- in fact, we were the ones breaking the law by trespassing -- but my imagination got carried away thinking he and I were Frank and Joe Hardy!

 

We did not discover anything out of the ordinary.  No secret passageways, ghosts or skeletons.  There were stacks of wood everywhere, sharp dangerous tools and equipment in every corner, and piles of unswept sawdust.  We could hear invisible four legged critters scampering behind the boxes and barrels.  The place was giving me the creeps within minutes of our arrival.  When we climbed two sets of stairs to the loft I was afraid the wooden slats would give way.  Adding to my anxiety was my distrust of Chuck.  Why hadn't I thought of that earlier?  I figured if trouble arose, either by injury or upon being found out, he would bail on the theory of "every man for himself."  Thankfully my theory never got tested.

 

The lumber yard also included several out buildings which, ironically, were locked.  It struck me as weird that they would padlock sheds and yet not secure the main building.  Additionally there were a number of what I'd call three-sided huts, cheaply built relatively tall rectangular structures which, although covered by a roof, were missing a fourth exterior wall.  My guess was that the company used those huts to store large pieces which would not fit in the main building.  We checked out all of them.  Most fascinating to me was the Milwaukee Road rail spur, terminating right in the middle of the yard, on which a half dozen flat bed cars and box cars were parked.  I had always wanted to see the inside of a boxcar; this was my chance.  Most of them were empty, but it was cool nonetheless.

 

After an hour we mutually determined that the outing was a rousing success.  We had not been arrested, nor had we tripped any alarms or accidentally amputated any limbs.  We made a pact not to tell anybody about our escapade.  I kept my end of that bargain, but as I wrote above, my faith in Chuck was shaky, so I could not be sure whether he would blab.  But as I considered what we'd done, the following thought occurred to me:  What good is having a unique and exhilarating experience like that if you have to keep it to yourself?  Good thing I have this blog.  The truth now comes out after hibernating for fifty-five years.

 

A month or two after our memorable night, Chuck approached me to suggest another visit to Coy's.  He had been back there in the interim, and once again made it sound like our next visit to the forbidden sanctuary would be more fun than a day trip to Chicago's Riverview Amusement Park.  I politely turned him down.  I figured we'd gotten away with one caper but did not want to press my luck. He was left to explore Shangri La on his own.