Listing Through Life

We weren’t yet ready for lunch, but walking around was losing its appeal due to the damp, cold wind that was scouring the town. We drove around looking for interesting things.

We found this old bridge across the Fox River with its own manger scene.

This old water tower. According to the Internet, there’s a plaque somewhere around that reads, “This city’s first water tower was completed in July of 1890. The original tank burst when its iron bands gave way on July 19, 1938. The second cypress stave tank was retired from service and reinforced with concrete in July of 1981.”

And a bunch of very impressive old houses. This was the most impressive. We were somewhat amused to see two Hondas in the driveway/garage.

While in the Chamber of Commerce, I picked up a booklet on Burlington. Under “Historical Sites” it listed the Voree Strangite Mormon Settlement. We drove about a mile south of town and found two buildings along a country road. This house, with an indecipherable sign on the front …

A woman was walking in the side door, so I didn’t feel comfortable getting out of the car for a closer look.

And this small church building with a monument in the yard.

The monument was decipherable, but it has to be in contention for the prize of most poorly worded thing ever engraved in stone. See if you can make anything of either bit.

The Strangites are a denomination of Mormonism that followed James Strang instead of Brigham Young. According to Wikipedia, “At the death of Joseph Smith, Strang insisted that there still was a Mormon seer [him] who communed with God and conversed with angels. Strang’s claim was bolstered by his discovery of the Voree Plates, purporting to contain the last testament of an ancient Native American, one “Rajah Manchou of Vorito”. These plates were found in the so-calledÂHill of Promise, which would become the temple site in the new Strangite town of Voree.” The Mormons in Utah don’t consider the Strangites, all 50 or so of them that remain, legitimate Mormons.

Burlington also has a Lincoln statue, but I’m not sure why.

We had exhausted the town’s attractions, but we still weren’t ready to eat lunch. On the advice of our chocolate guide, we stopped at Gooseberries Fresh Food Market and ate samples of cheese and pizza and bought some Wisconsin food specialties, like cheese curds and kringle and Point Root Beer.

It was now around 1:40, and there was nothing left to do but eat lunch. We headed downtown to Fred’s, home of the “World’s Best Burger.” We’d been told by someone during our morning’s wanderings that this was Tony Romo’s favorite restaurant. He lived in Burlington during high school and played quarterback for the local Burlington Demons. The town booklet says, and I quote, “Romo has gone on to become one of the most famous people to have ever left Burlington through his starter position on the Dallas Cowboys football team.” Supposedly, he returns to Fred’s whenever the Cowboys play the Packers.

They had a Romo jersey and other memorabilia behind the bar.

Fred’s was a small place, with maybe 20 tables and a bar. It also had the clunkiest ordering system I’ve ever seen. Teenage waiters offhandedly pointed us to our table. We looked at the menu, then filled out cards with our orders. We then took the cards to the register by the bar where a waitress wrote down everything on our cards on a separate check. We were then given a number to place at the edge of our table. When the food was ready, a waiter brought it to our table. When we’d finished, we took the number back to the cashier who compared it to our check and told us how much we owed.

Fred’s made their own potato chips, which were kinda cool. The potato was spiral sliced and fried without being pulled apart, so when it came to the table, the chips were linked in a chain.

I ordered the Fred Burger, with ham and green onions and Swiss cheese. I think “World’s Best Burger” might be stretching it a bit.

We stopped at a nearby chocolate store and bought a few pieces, but much like the chocolate museum, the chocolate was unimpressive.

And so, having nothing left to do, we left — thereby becoming the 8,945th through 8,948th most famous people to leave Burlington.

We wandered about town, looking into windows and poking into stores. Unfortunately, it was Saturday, so we couldn’t take advantage of Waxing Wednesdays, but we did get our selves on tape.

This ballerina with a male head and a run in his/her stocking was scarier than anything we’d seen at the Sci-Fi Cafe.

We stopped in an imported toy store and had an extended conversation with the lonely owner about his political views (he thought there ought to be a third party) and running a niche business in a small town (he rents the space as an office for his card store in Lake Geneva, so he figured he might as well sell stuff too).

The Burlington Liars Club was founded in 1929 when two bored reporters fabricated a news story about a lying contest between the police and fire departments. Each year since, there’s been contest for champion liar and the winning entries are posted on plaques around town.

The Historical Society museum was closed, as was the Pioneer Cabin, the Logic Puzzle Museum, and the Spinning Top Museum. Another trip to Burlington is obviously in the works.

An antique store was open, and we wandered the aisles.

The Chamber of Commerce also houses the Chocolate City Museum. As we walked in, a young lady offered to give us a tour. She pointed out a few displays around the room, then flipped a switch and let Farfel the talking dog tell the story of Nestle chocolate, some of which is, or was, made in Burlington.

The chocolate statues are replicas of those made for the annual chocolate fest in town.

We then walked into the back room and watched a video on the history of chocolate production after which we were given a sample Nestle Crunch Bar. For a city that hosts an annual Chocolate Fest, the museum was rather … meager.

Stay tuned. There’s more Burlington excitement yet to come.

On the final Saturday of 2012, we drove to Burlington with friends. Our first stop was The Sci-Fi Cafe and Earth Mysteries Museum.

We were the only customers. Brad, who owns the place with his wife Mary, gave us our pick of the five or six tables and took our breakfast order. He made the meals himself, so we had plenty of time to look around.

It was obvious that the place caters to those who believe (or pretend to believe) in ghosts, U.F.O.s, and odd paranormal phenomena. But at the same time it was filled will all sorts of silly kitsch — inflatable aliens, Star Trek figurines, sci-fi movie posters — that made fun of the belief.

I had time to grab the chair and take a photo.

My friend ordered the green eggs and ham, which was about the closest thing to a paranormal event I’ve ever witnessed.

When we finished eating, we asked if we could see the “haunted cellar.” We were directed through a hallway, down a set of stairs into a parking lot, then down to this doorway.

The small basement was done up as a haunted house — a pathetic, dusty, uninspired haunted house.

A brick was knocked out of one wall. Through the hole, we could see a bit of an opening which may, or may not, have lead to some sort of tunnel. The explanation we were given was that it was connected to a series of tunnels under Burlington that were used as part of the Underground Railroad. I doubt southern Wisconsin saw enough escaping slaves to warrant an entire tunnel system. The tunnels are also listed, along with ancient races, multi-dimensional worlds, vortices, and the inner earth, as things the owners of the Cafe have researched. We did see this one “ghost,” but I had to do some pretty extensive post-processing on the photo to make it look even this scary.

Back upstairs, Brad made sure we took a look in the library. It was an odd mix of books, silly statues, and reproduced Indian artifacts. I’m pretty sure this is where the meet-and -greets with tarot card readers and astrologists take place.

As you can see, we took it all very seriously.

For $25, you can take a Haunted Woods Tour during which you will feed M&M’s to fairies and learn how to “become one with the trees.” While all this is going on, Brad will take double-exposure photos that are evidence, or so you will be told, that you were touched by spirits and entered doorways to parallel universes. We declined.

As we toured Burlington, we asked various local residents what we should see while we were in town. When we said we’d already been to the Sci-Fi Cafe, we were met with a standard, somewhat reserved, reaction — they knew about it but they had never been there themselves.