I was fascinated by a sign on the mountain over the rail bridge (left of the tunnel) in the previous/below picture, but it was impossible to read. We later saw a T-shirt featuring the sign in the NPS bookstore with the words “Mennen’s Borated Talcum Toilet Powder.” Apparently, from the establishment of Harpers Ferry in the 1700s through today, the landscape has been exploited for business. The National Park Service website relates the story of how a woman in labor in 1906 watched the creation of this sign from a milk and whitewash mixture. Attempts were made to eradicate it in 1963, but it subsequently became visible again and has been left as is until the present day.

Best to view in "Original" because other versions resized by Pbase are decidedly unsharp.

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We took an hour-and-a-half drive the other day to historic Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. Due to its strategic location at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers, it hosted the first ferry and then first railroad bridge across the Potomac and served as the only rail link between the Northern and Southern states during the Civil War. It was also the site of the famous raid by abolitionist John Brown on the town’s arsenal in 1859 in the hope of starting a slave revolt across the South, which was put down by then-Lt. Col. Robert E. Lee. Brown was subsequently tried and hanged for treason.

Bridges across the Potomac River, posted earlier: