Glen Helen, Yellow Springs, Ohio
The pictures on this page were taken in December, 2019.
Yellow Springs (the town) takes its name from this "yellow" spring, located in the adjacent nature preserve.
Following a footpath (up the stone steps, below) leads upstream to a bridge above a waterfall in Glen Helen Nature Preserve.
While I was a child in the 1950s, the tall tree-stump behind the boulder (below) was a magnificent oak with broadly-spreading branches. The plaque on the boulder commemorates Helen Birch Bartlett, namesake for Glen Helen.
"The earth smells old and warm and mellow,
And all things lie at peace.
I too serenely lie here, under the white-oak tree,
And know the splendid flight of hours
All blue and gay, sun-drenched and still."
This inscription evokes lazy summer days in my childhood long ago. When my grown-up days are colder and not quite so gay, I am reminded more of Pippin's song in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring:
"Ho! Ho! Ho! to the bottle I go
To heal my heart and drown my woe.
Rain may fall and wind may blow,
And many miles be still to go,
But under a tall tree I will lie,
And let the clouds go sailing by."J.R.R. Tolkien
Comments and questions: dgking@siu.edu
SIUC / Zoology / David King
https://dgkinglab.siu.edu/GlenHelen.htm
Last updated: 7 February 2024 / dgk
