It had been a little over three months since my last trip, which was a two-day adventure to Rutherford B. Hayes’ Spiegel Grove in Fremont, Ohio with my photographer, his wife Vicki, and Tom’s two granddaughters Reese and Brooke Fiscelli. Although that trip was a lot of fun to share with the two girls, I knew in my resin heart it would pale in comparison to the three-week adventure Tom had planned for most of July. I was excited – after all, I was about to tour four states I had never visited before. And better yet, there was a great chance I’d cross paths with at least one Sasquatch, UFO, shapeshifter, skin-walker, extraterrestrial, mysterious orb, or ghost. The states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Utah, and Nevada are known to be treasure troves of weird stuff and I couldn’t wait to experience some of it. Then again, I should be cautious of what I wish for.
Our Jeep Grand Cherokee L was packed and my photographer, his wife, and I left the house on July 5, 2025 at precisely 8:48am. I was stunned by our later-than-usual start, but it turned out my two companions had a nine o’clock bank appointment to keep before we left town. Once their banking had concluded, the three of us rolled out of St. Clair at 9:35am and we were headed West – and into the teeth of a potential thunderstorm Tom figured we’d see halfway through Illinois.
On the West side of our state, Tom decided he and his wife needed to make a stop at the Great Lakes Antique Mall, which was located in Coloma and was roughly 45 miles from the Indiana State Line. I had been there twice on previous trips, and each time, my two travel mates have left empty handed. But this time was different. During the 45-minute visit, Tom found an official American League baseball signed by some members of the 1966 Boston Red Sox team. But what had made this ball so special, at least in the eyes of my camera guy, was it had been signed by his friend and former Marine City Maroons teammate Jim Gosger, who lives in Port Huron and was a member of the BoSox in ’66. When Tom carried me out of the store, along with the autographed ball, I heard him tell Vicki he planned on giving the souvenir to his grandson Bo so he could add it to his collection of signed baseballs.
After gaining an hour at the Indiana border when we traversed into the Central Time Zone, we hit the area my photographer has dubbed the “Traffic Twilight Zone”, which is the section of I-80 between Gary, Indiana and Joliet, Illinois. That area seems to be always under road construction and filled with thousands of inconsiderate semi-truck drivers and other motorists. Thankfully for us, we hit the ‘Zone’ at two o’clock in the afternoon and the traffic moved fairly smoothly, even through some ongoing road construction.
With Vicki still behind the wheel of our Jeep, I was safely nestled in my camera case on the folded-down backseat while Tom navigated from the passenger seat. At one point, as we sliced through the heart of Illinois, I heard my photographer tell his wife the thunderstorm he forecasted must have dissipated because all we saw over the Land of Lincoln was the blue sky sporadically blotched by white, puffy clouds. But that all changed when we drove over the Mississippi River and into Le Claire, Iowa at 4:45pm.
Tom doesn’t usually veer too far away from his well-scripted agenda, but on that Saturday afternoon, that’s exactly what he did. Instead of going directly to West Branch where he planned for the three of us to spend the night, my photographer called an audible and guided his wife into downtown Le Claire.
“We’ve never been to the birthplace site of Buffalo Bill before, and that’s located only a few miles northwest of downtown Le Claire.” Then my trusty camera guy added, “But first, let’s make a stop at the American Pickers store and see if Mike Wolfe or Danielle Colby are in town.”
Once Vicki had our vehicle parked along Davenport Street, the three of us made our way on foot towards the famous store known as Antique Archaeology – the original home of the American Pickers show since it premiered on the History Channel on January 18, 2010. But moments after Tom placed me on the dilapidated 1951 Nash Statesman, which has sat in front of the store since Day One, the sky grew darker, and it began to sprinkle. It was time to take cover.
My photographer carried me inside the original building where I posed for several photos. When we had finished, he brought me next door to the newer of the two buildings where I posed alongside Rick Nielsen’s guitar and a jacket from his earlier Cheap Trick days. I was stunned to see the guitar in Le Claire as I had posed next to Rick’s black and white checkered axe in 2016 at Wolfe’s Nashville store. It turned out Mike had closed the Nashville store three months earlier and moved his remaining antiques to Iowa.
Although my companions have never bought any antiques from Antique Archaeology, the iconic store has always been a symbolic way to begin a trip out West. In the early televised episodes of ‘American Pickers’, Wolfe and Fritz end their opening narrative by saying, “We make a living telling the history of America… one piece at a time.” For Tom and me, we’ve been travelling together since 2013 telling the history of America… one site at a time. And the first historic site of this trip was only three miles away.
Thankfully it had stopped raining during the twenty minutes we spent inside Wolfe’s store. But as Vicki drove the Jeep North out of downtown Le Claire, it appeared we were headed into the teeth of a huge storm. Ominous clouds engulfed the area, the wind had picked up, and the only thing my photographer and I could do was hope we’d capture our images before the sky opened up.
After what seemed to be an endless drive to nowhere, my photographer’s wife stopped our vehicle near the intersection of Territorial Road and 270th Avenue after Tom said, “There it is – the birthplace of Buffalo Bill.” When my cameraman carried me to the site, however, all I saw was a wooden sign and a plaque affixed to a large rock. There was no farm; no house; not even a lonely buffalo named Bill.
The wind made it difficult for me to stand upright near the boulder while Tom hustled to capture the images. With dust blowing into my painted resin eyes during the photoshoot, I noticed the bronze plaque stated the actual birthplace log cabin was originally located 1,650 feet down the road. That meant one thing – we needed to find the “real” site.
As the impending storm grew closer and the smell of rain filled the air, Tom and I were back in the Jeep as Vicki navigated Northward along 270th Avenue, which had turned into a tightly packed gravel road. Using his phone’s GPS system, which pinpointed the birth site location as being just north of McCarty Creek, my photographer axed his wife to stop our vehicle just North of the small bridge which spanned the narrow creek.
We had made it – we were close to the site where William Frederick Cody came into the world on February 26, 1846. Although the log cabin was no longer standing, and the Cody’s left Iowa when young William was only eight months old, it was still an awesome experience to visit the site where one of America’s greatest showmen, and one of our most beloved famous Western heroes, was born. Not only was Buffalo Bill a good friend of Theodore Roosevelt, but every President from Ulysses S. Grant to Woodrow Wilson consulted him on matters affecting the American West.
While I basked in that momentous occasion, the storm arrived with all of its predicted fury. Rain and wind-blown gravel pelted my resin body as Tom carried me to the Jeep where I saw Vicki laughing at us. Then, as our smiling chauffer zig-zagged her way along the back roads of Eastern Iowa, my photographer had his eyes peeled for possible cloud rotation – which was something he was overly anxious to see. Time and time again during our past trips I’ve overheard Tom say out loud how experiencing a tornado in person was high on his bucket list. But on that hot and humid day in early July, impersonating Dorothy Gale would have to wait.
Our final destination of the trip’s first day was located roughly 50 miles West of Le Claire, and not surprisingly, it was a Presidential site. That’s right, for the fourth time in my illustrious 13-year career, I was headed back to Hooverville – also known as West Branch, Iowa, the birthplace of Herbert Hoover.
We rolled into town at 6:30pm, which was just in time for my companions to grab some Coney dogs at their favorite eatery in West Branch called Main Street Sweets. With food in hand, Tom and Vic headed for the Days Inn, which was situated on the South side of I-80. After they registered and unpacked the Jeep for the night, my travel mates ate their fine cuisine in the room.
Both Tom and his wife were exhausted following dinner and were fast asleep by eight o’clock. But just 90 minutes later, my photographer awakened, grabbed me and his camera, and the two of us were headed for President Hoover’s birthplace cottage. Tom wanted to see the historic cottage at night.
The humidity was thick enough to slice with a cheese grater, and the threat of rain was prominent in the windless, black sky. But after a one-mile drive into town, I soon found myself standing in front of the small, two-room cottage where President Herbert Hoover was born on August 10, 1874.
For over ten minutes, I posed in several locations near the historic home, which was illuminated by bright floodlights. It seemed a bit eerie to be there alone at night, and I kept my eyes peeled for anything out of the ordinary. My imagination was running wild. Even though President Hoover didn’t pass away in that house, he and his wife Lou Henry were buried about a quarter mile behind the birthplace. Throughout the entire ordeal, I had a sensation that someone, or something, was watching me.
Although I was grateful for the opportunity to visit Hoover’s birthplace at night, I was also relieved when my photographer placed me back into the camera case for our ride back to the hotel. Vicki was asleep when we returned, and Tom quietly placed me alongside the television set for the night. But as my chunky friend sat on his bed and reviewed the images on his camera he had just taken, I heard him suddenly say out loud, “Are you kidding me right now.”
Of course, Tom’s outburst woke his wife, who sat up in bed to see what was wrong.
“I have a picture of an orb in front of Hoover’s birthplace,” Tom said in a serious tone. “I didn’t see it when we were there, but it looks like the small ball of light flew from the front of the building and around to the side. It may have flown back to the gravesite.”
Vicki, who has always been a skeptic and a nonbeliever of the weird entities her husband holds dear to his heart, scoffed when Tom showed her the image. “Oh, come on, that’s just a lightning bug flying in front of the house. Trust me, it’s not an orb. Now let me get back to sleep.”
Tom shot back with his own logic as he tried to convince his hard-headed wife of what he believed was photographed. “What are the odds a firefly’s butt would light up at the precise moment I pushed the camera’s shutter? And not just once, but twice. I took those images in a burst of three consecutive frames and that object travelled a long way in a matter of just one second.”
I laughed to myself because my photographer’s words had fallen on deaf ears as his wife was once again fast asleep. In my mind, an orb could’ve flown out of her butt and she’d say there was a logical explanation – like gas from a Coney dog.
When Tom extinguished the room’s lights at a few minutes past ten o’clock, I stood alone in the darkness and thought about the mysterious orb that flew around Hoover’s birthplace. Was it a lightning bug, as Vicki suggested? Or was it just the first of many potential entities that I hoped to experience over the next three weeks? What a way to start a trip!
Here are the three images and I’ll let you decide. Please leave a comment and let us know what you think the ball of light was.
Looks like a firefly to me.