THE STORY OF JAMES H, BROWN OF BATTLE CREEK

 While cereal and holistic medicine brought new fame to the city of Battle Creek, the automobile brought increasing fame to the State of Michigan. Cars and Michigan combined like milk and cereal. The automobile brought great wealth and much notoriety to the likes of Henry Ford, Louis Chevrolet, and Mr. Dodge. Lesser-known personalities like James H. Brown transitioned further with the advent of cars, but never built or designed a single car.

          Brown pioneered automobile travel during the transition between the horse and buggy era and America’s love affair with the mobility of the horseless carriage. By the 1920’s, the enticement of the open road lured young and old alike. Roads were rutted, unpaved, often narrow, and sometimes steep. Maps were few and unreliable; roadside accommodations were far apart and of undependable quality.

          If that were not enough, the cars themselves often broke down. Drivers frequently found it necessary to mechanic their own cars. People changed their own flat tires along lonely roadsides, but the siren songs of the open road proved overly tempting. So, how could “wanna-be tourists” fulfill their hopes and dreams of traveling to exotic far away places? James Brown found a solution.

          Brown organized tour groups. He led his first annual tour from Battle Creek in 1916. Brown completed twelve tours by 1926, visiting such historic East Coast sites as Plymouth Rock, Washington, D. C., Mt. Vernon, Niagara Falls, and Lincoln’s birthplace. His tours furnished an interested and expanding public the convenience and essential safety they desired. Maximum safety and efficiency became his primary goals. Brown took great personal pride in leading more than 4,000 tourists more than 30,000 miles, all within the span of little more than a decade.

          J. H. Brown could boast that no one was ever injured and no car was ever bumped or decommissioned. Each tour car received a fender flag and a permanent place in the caravan. Each night the cars parked with the precision of a military operation, most always using the field of some cooperative and friendly farmer. The touring families prepared dinner right there, followed by setting up their sleeping accommodations. Each car carried its own variety of camping gear, tents and sleeping bags that they kept rolled up on their running boards.

          The common campfire became a customary feature on each tour. There, each camper gathered for an educational lecture on the history or agriculture of that area. Gradually, those touring families created more elaborate recreational vehicles, adding built-in-amenities we now consider standard equipment. Brown designed one of the more sophisticated vehicles for his own personal use, a six-person touring car. At night, he lowered two full-size sleeping hammocks in the rear compartment of his coach and mounted a sink, stove and refrigerator nearby.

          On the outside of his vehicle, he installed a ten-gallon tank that stored the water for the toilet and shower bath inside. One of his most valuable accessories was the brass map case that he also designed. Thirty feet long, Brown’s road map marked the tour route, scrolling around two rollers inside the case and viewed through an eight-inch window.

          A passionate historian as well as a pioneer in automotive travel, Brown collected a commemorative stone at each stop along various tour routes. Each stone recalled a visit to a particular place. Many of these “historic” stones returned with Brown to Battle Creek, where they later formed the Stone History Cairn that Brown constructed in his hometown.

          The old stone tower now serves as a tourist attraction in Monument Park, as well as a memorial to Brown--now located across from historic First United Methodist Church and the City Municipal Building. Travelers arriving downtown from the south see the stone cairn first, but quickly discover Sojourner Truth and C. W. Post guarding the other points of the triangular park.

          One of Brown’s most famous stones came from Plymouth Rock, one of four he picked up along the rocky coast near the site of the pilgrim landing. Owl Drug Store displayed the four stones at the downtown Bank Corner for a time. Local residents later voted on their favorite stone and officially installed it in the Stone History Tower. Brown donated his three other Plymouth Rock stones to the cities of Seattle, San Francisco, and San Diego, and the next westbound caravan delivered the three stones.

          James Brown pioneered in tourism. He did it by taking advantage of a transition time in his life and converting a very unsettled time of change into an exciting time of discovery. I cannot but wonder what others of us might learn from our changing times of transition The bible reminds us that change and transition are neither good nor bad within themselves. Rather, they are changing seasons through which we must all pass.

          After ninety-four years I am more convinced than ever that the only thing that really counts in life is what we do with our times of transition. May you be blessed in your times of transition.