Story, Indiana: Where they elect the town idiot
When Mark Carmichael sawed through a live electrical wire while standing on the tin roof of the Story Inn, he
took an important step toward fulfilling the prophecy of President Millard Fillmore back in 1851 when the President issued a land grant to Dr. George
Story. Recognizing that the Story grant lay right on the Ten O’ Clock Treaty line in south central Indiana (see note below), Fillmore muttered something like “only an
idiot would live out there.”
The Story InnUnless you knew about it, you probably wouldn’t turn off the highway (SR 135) to enter Story. From the road, in spite of an attractive grassy, wooded setting, the Inn looks like an 1850's General Store, with a pair of Standard Oil gas pumps out front.If it’s a hot day, you may be attracted to the beer garden where, on weekends, you’ll hear local Bluegrass or Gospel or Country bands serenading horse riders and bikers munching on burgers or barbeque either unaware of or feeling not dressy enough for the turn-of-the-last century dining room inside.
Once a month you may happen on a “Wine Dinner,” dedicated to the food and wine of a specific place, say Burgundy or Alsace or northern Italy. And before or after dinner you can stroll next door to the Story Artists’ Gallery to look at or buy paintings or jewelry created by some of the finest artists in Indiana. Stay overnight, and you may get the Blue Lady Room, named for the mysterious ghost still hanging around these many years. And if it happens to be the last weekend in April, you’ll see every Indiana wine producer on the grounds, pouring and selling their wines to 5,000 visitors at the annual Indiana Wine Fair. Yes, the Story Inn is off the beaten track, but it pays to beat a track to it.
If You Go
Allen Dale Olson is a freelance writer, and host for the Bloomington (Indiana) Herald-Times wine
website -- www.hoosierwinecellar.com. A wine consultant, Olson is known as the Pontiff of
Palate at the Story Inn (Brown County, Indiana).
© 2008 |
Inside -- that’s where you get the aged beef rib steaks, the bison roasts, the pork
tenderloins, all procured from nearby farms. It’s where your salad is plucked
from the herb garden just minutes after you order it. It’s where you choose a
wine from France or Spain or California and where you listen to chamber music
by musicians from all over the world but who teach or work on graduate degrees
in the nearby Indiana University School of Music.
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