WTIU members.

Thank you!

>> ASHLEY: Coming up... >> BRANDON: Discover an Indiana music legacy.

>> ASHLEY: Visit the home of one of America's first aviators.

>> BRANDON: And find some peace in an unexpected place.

>> ASHLEY: That's all on this episode of... >> TOGETHER: "Journey Indiana"!

♪ >> BRANDON: Welcome to "Journey Indiana."

I'm Brandon Wentz.

>> ASHLEY: And I'm Ashley Chilla.

And today, we're coming to you from the Wabash & Erie Canal Park in Carroll County.

The Wabash & Erie Canal was once part of a 19th century engineering marvel, making it possible to transport people and goods from one end of Indiana to the other.

Today, visitors to this park can explore what remains of this canal on foot or by boat.

You can also visit the pioneer village which models life during the canal's heyday.

>> BRANDON: And we'll learn all about this historic place in just a bit, but first, producer Todd Gould takes us to Monroe County to celebrate the legacy of cellist and Indiana University professor, Janos Starker, who would have been 100 years old this year.

♪ >> In 1999, dozens of the world's top cellists gathered on one stage to perform at the Musical Arts Center at Indiana University in Bloomington.

They were there to celebrate the 75th birthday of the man who taught them all, Hungarian born, cello master and IU faculty member, Janos Starker.

>> The most perfect, technical, incredible magician on the cello I could have ever thought of.

This ability to be able to do anything on command.

♪ >> Janos Starker was a child prodigy who grew up near Budapest and picked up his first cello by the age of 6.

Within two years, remarkably, he was teaching his own students while attending Europe's famous Franz Liszt Academy.

♪ >> His big break occurred in 1939, at age 15, when he first performed the Zoltan Kodaly Sonate for solo cello, a piece known for being so difficult, it was deemed to be virtually unplayable.

>> The piece encompasses every major component of difficulty of how to play the instrument.

It required so many advanced techniques, that at the time nobody could play it.

[ Gunfire ] >> When World War II swept across Europe, concert performances gave way to notions of mere survival.

The Jewish-born Starker lost his two brothers to Nazi forced labor camps, and he himself was interned for a time in a Nazi war camp.

♪ After the war, Starker resumed performing in several European countries and won a bronze medal at the Geneva Cello Competition.

This helped him earn his first recording opportunity in France in 1948.

>> This early success helped Starker gain the attention of those in the US, including IU President Herman B.

Wells and Wilfred Bain, the Dean of the School of Music.

♪ >> Bain and Wells helped Starker immigrate to America.

He first performed with various orchestras in Dallas, the Metropolitan Opera and Chicago.

Eventually, he settled in Bloomington to teach generations of talented young cellists at IU.

>> One of the most important things in musical activities and in musical life and a musician's life is teaching.

From the musician's point of view, when you teach, the effect of your teaching may go through generations if you happen to believe that what you are doing is right.

♪ >> But it's too much tension.

>> Starker shared with students what he called his organized method of string playing.

What he always envisioned was the ability of the individual to be able to produce on command 99% of the time what you want to achieve, and for that, you need to understand exactly how every part of your body works in order to be able to control what happens with the mechanics, so that then the message you are trying to convey from here unto an audience is not hindered by physical traits that you are not aware what's happening with them.

♪ >> For more than half a century, Janos Starker taught hundreds of the world's most talented musicians.

Many of them, like Emilio Colón, are not only performing, but like Starker himself, they are also teaching new generations in ways that represent the man who once mused that music is the highest form of expression.

>> If anyone gets into music without having this absolutely essential aspect of it, that music means just as much as eating and drinking or living, then that person should not be in music.

♪ >> The way he played the cello will be one of his grand, lasting legacies, but I think that his greatest legacy was the fact that he considered himself a teacher, artist, and as a teacher, if you look around the world, you will see that he has left one of the grandest legacies with performers and teachers all over the world.

♪ [ Applause ] >> ASHLEY: You know, I think I have mentioned before that I moonlight -- my other job, when I'm not on camera, you know, I work in admissions at the Jacobs School of Music.

And Professor Starker is such -- you know, he's held in such high regard there.

I was so excited to see that we were going to be focusing on him today.

>> BRANDON: Want to learn more?

Head to the address on your screen.

>> ASHLEY: Earlier, we spoke with the folks here at the Wabash & Erie Canal Park to learn all about this unique place.

♪ >> It may be hard to believe, with our modern transportation system, but for decades in Indiana, canals were a major mode of travel.

And there's one canal in particular that stood out.

>> The Wabash & Erie Canal was Indiana's first superhighway.

It connected Lake Erie at Toledo, Ohio, all the way down to Evansville, Indiana.

They started construction in 1832, and it was finished in 1853.

>> At the Wabash & Erie Canal Park in Delphi, visitors can see the last remaining navigable portions of this once great waterway.

They can also learn more about the canal's history.

And they can even go for a ride on an authentic canal era packet boat.

>> Our goal here at Wabash & Erie Canal Park in Delphi is to preserve the story of Indiana's canals, specifically the Wabash & Erie Canal because we believe that it holds a lot of valuable lessons for what infrastructure is, what it should be, pitfalls to avoid, but also some of the amazing true stories of how Hoosiers made a life for themselves at a time when Indiana was a very young state, when life here was a lot different than we experience it today.

>> The full length of the canal was dug by hand, often by Irish immigrants under grueling conditions.

Its completion was nothing short of an engineering miracle.

>> 1832 is when canal construction started in Fort Wayne.

Fort Wayne is the summit city, it's at the highest point of elevation on the canal's route.

So they started in Fort Wayne and went both directions northeast and southwest.

When you think of Indiana, most people don't think canals.

But when New York finished the Erie Canal in 1825, all the other neighboring states wanted a piece of the action.

The Erie Canal was profitable right off the bat.

It was shipping tons of goods, and all the interior states like Ohio and Indiana thought a canal would be their ticket to the future.

So Ohio invested a lot in canals, Pennsylvania did as well, and Indiana -- we're actually the furthest west state to really go all-in on canals.

The White Water Canal, which goes through Metamora; the Central Canal, which runs through Indianapolis and Broad Ripple; and then the Wabash & Erie, those three canals were all going to be part of the same connected network.

The Wabash and Erie began operat in 1843 but the others were neve >> As difficult as it was to build the canal, its day-to-day use was rather simple.

>> Transportation along the Wabash & Erie Canal consisted of really anything you could move by boat.

We're talking a lot of agricultural goods, meats, building materials, things that would make life better for your fellow Hoosiers.

Passenger boats would go up to about 5 miles an hour, and they were towed by mules.

They would literally just pull the boat as they walked, and that was it.

>> However, a new mode of locomotion would spell the end of the canal era.

>> The end of the canal came mostly because of competition from railroads.

Railroads ended up being faster.

They could operate year round; whereas, canals had to close in the winter because the water froze, as you may imagine.

The other thing that really spelled the canal's doom was the upkeep.

The maintenance on the canal was really through the roof.

For a long time its operation, the income didn't necessarily even pay for the upkeep and the maintenance of the structures.

>> And while it may lack the speed of modern highways or the romance of the railroad era, Indiana's canal era still holds valuable lessons for today.

>> We believe that the canal era of Indiana's history is really worth preserving, because it tells stories about who we are as Hoosiers.

It's a really incredible story and gives us a vision for even moving forward.

>> ASHLEY: This is such a beautiful space.

I mean, as we were getting on this boat, a gigantic crane was, like, flying over us.

>> BRANDON: Yeah.

>> ASHLEY: Again, these experiences that you wouldn't necessarily place in Indiana, yet here we are.

Want to learn more?

Head to wabashanderiecanal.org.

>> BRANDON: Up next, producer Saddam Abbas takes us to Henry County, to soar to new heights at the Wilbur Wright Birthplace Museum.

♪ >> The aviation started when he was young.

His dad brought home a -- a little device that when you spun it, it would fly.

And from that point, that sparked those boys into wanting to fly.

♪ >> He was born in 1867, and he was born here in Millville, Indiana.

♪ Wilbur Wright was half of the Wright Brothers who had actually pioneered flight in the United States.

They were the first ones that proved themselves to be the first flyers.

He was kind of mischievous, I guess, when he was little.

Him and Orville would sneak out to the barn lot and take some of the equipment apart, just to see how it worked.

And then Ms. Susan Wright, the mom, would actually have to take 'em back to the farmhouse the next day and make them put the stuff back together, and she wouldn't help them.

They'd have to do it themselves.

So they were -- they were just kids, you know.

Ornery, but kids.

Orville started a newspaper business, and he was the editor and Wilbur went along with him.

And so they had a newspaper for a few years.

Then they went into the bicycle business.

It was repairing them at first, then they built their own bicycles.

And all along, they were kind of getting things ready to go to Kitty Hawk and start flying or start trying to fly.

I really can't imagine what people were saying about these two crazy dudes down on Kitty Hawk, bowler hats on, ties, trying to fly.

People can't fly!

If God wanted people to fly, he'd put wings on them, you know?

And they would go down there just to watch them wreck, you know, tear up the plane.

They would go back, fix it, and do it again.

And when you look at it now, they were heroes and they were just smart, smart people.

But back then, they were thought of as kind of kooky, like a lot of the other really intelligent people, you know, in life.

They were the biggest influence in flight.

The main thing is that they were the first in controlled flight.

They were the first to take off, turn, and come back.

That's why we think of them as the fathers of aviation.

His father actually was real adamant about clean water.

And he was always worried about making the water clean so they wouldn't get whatever the disease was.

And Wilbur -- I think maybe he was in France, and ate some shellfish, and that gave him the disease and he died of it.

That's what he died of, 1912.

Milton Wright, his father wrote later about his son Wilbur in his diary, "A short life full of consequences, an unfailing intellect, mild temper, great self-reliance, and has great modesty.

Seeing the right clearly, pursuing it steadfastly, he lived and died."

>> Welcome to the birthplace of Wilbur Wright.

Milton Wright, Wilbur's father, purchased this house and acreage for $700 in 1865.

>> The house here, where Wilbur was born, was run by the state for years, and now it's a private organization, the Wilbur Wright Foundation.

And it actually burnt twice and was rebuilt this last time as an exact replica of the original house.

And there's a lot of the wood and stuff that's in it was in the original house.

And the replica, we have the -- here at the museum is probably the most accurate.

And the reason I'm saying that is, we actually have the chain from the Diamond Chain Company in Indianapolis, Indiana, and that's the same thing that the Wright Brothers had on theirs.

We have the only plane that has that.

So ours is the most exact replica.

It took the guy about 10 to 12 years to actually build the plane, and it did fly.

It got up about 18 inches off the ground, and he put it back down.

He was afraid he would tear it up.

It took him so long to build it.

Now, he had a 13-year-old daughter that actually sewed all the Dacron.

This is not a cotton top on ours.

It's Dacron, and that was one of the things different from the original.

Measurements, like 60 feet wide.

It's 600 pounds.

It has a 12-horsepower, 4-cylinder motor that was actually designed by the Wright Brothers' mechanic for the original plane.

We have a lot of flight history.

We've got a place called Main Street back here.

It looked like Main Street in Dayton.

It shows their first business was a printing press.

And then we've got a bicycle in there, kind of a replica of the bicycles.

It's really a great place to read.

We have so much reading material here.

It's really a gem in the country.

>> BRANDON: So, you know, they talk about the idea of the fevered dreams of a madman creating genius.

Do you feel like you are there yet with your fevered dreams creating genius?

>> ASHLEY: Not quite.

I don't know if I'm quite ready to say that I'm gonna invent something as wonderful as an airplane, but maybe one day.

>> BRANDON: Yeah.

Want to learn more?

Head to wwbirthplace.com.

>> ASHLEY: Up next, producer Todd Gould takes us to Marion County to inspect Indianapolis' inspiring idiosyncratic Idle Park.

>> The white noise of the traffic is kind of like the ocean.

So it's kind of like you are sitting at the beach and a big storm is rolling in, and it just -- there's something calming about it.

♪ >> It's hard to imagine anything calming about this scene, traffic ripping along at more than 60 miles per hour, along the intersection of two major US interstates and merging into the heart of one of the Midwest's largest cities.

And yet for Indianapolis resident, Tom Battista, there seems to be no better spot for one of the city's newest green spaces and city parks, an area Tom dubbed "The Idle, a Point of View."

>> Because we're going to sit idly by, and the traffic is all going to be racing by at 60 or 70 miles an hour.

The idea of two things, a point of view.

So it can be we can go out and sit and watch the view, or we can sit here and talk and have a point of view.

Talk about the neighborhoods.

Talk about the latest things that are going on in our lives.

>> It seems unimaginable, but it's true, The Idle, which opened in the fall of 2018 sits right smack dab in the middle of the intersection of Interstate 65 and Interstate 70 in the heart of downtown Indianapolis.

The park is perched a mere 25 feet above the roaring traffic below, and at the same time, according to Tom, it stands as an oasis of calm above the roaring speed of life that endlessly rumbles along the paved streets below it.

♪ >> So in the late '60s, early '70s, the interstate came through, and I found out that they dislocated 17,000 people.

They went through the south side and just ripped these neighborhoods apart.

So there were five neighborhoods that were totally divided when they came through.

♪ >> Tom Battista has always been a guy who thinks outside the box.

For nearly five decades, he served as a concert tour manager for some of the biggest names in Rock 'N' Roll, including Jimmy Buffett, Davy Bowie, Styx, Kiss, and many others.

So one day, when he was running an errand near his business in the Fountain Square District of Indianapolis, he crossed over a bridge near the intersection of the two major highways, saw a patch of undisturbed, overgrown thickets, and had an epiphany.

>> And I got to the middle where this forest was, and I climbed over the guardrail and walked out, and there was a brow of a hill.

And so it just seemed like it was a great place to sit and view the traffic.

So it just seemed like, God, we could put some chairs out here and be able to just sit here safely and watch all these crazy people in a hurry to go somewhere.

>> Tom's vision to reunite the neighborhoods of Fountain Square, Fletcher Place, Holy Rosary and Bates Hendrick seemed a noble pursuit when he began his quest to build The Idle back in 2011.

And his connections with powerful names like Jimmy Buffett got him meetings with many of the movers and shakers in the state to talk about his vision for a new city green space.

But ultimately, he ran into six years of long meetings and miles of red tape as folks from Federal Highway Administration, the State Department of Transportation, and the city government all feuded over this tiny strip of land between the two interstates.

>> Being in the entertainment business for 50 years now has allowed me to be able to work with all kinds of different people and be able to make a show happen.

And no matter what happens, be able to put it together and make it happen, and that's kind of what happened here.

>> Tom pulled together several civil engineers, city contractors, and landscape architects, most of whom donated their services to help present a concept that was attractive to each government entity.

After seven years of hard work, Tom and a team of neighborhood activists finally raised the money needed to turn The Idle into a reality.

>> There's a cut in the -- in the guardrail.

Off the trail, you go down this little path that's hidden between trees, and you walk this -- this snake path.

And the brow of the hill, then there's three rows of chairs from our old ballpark.

And so you can actually sit and watch the traffic merge.

It's really kind of a fun thing to watch.

>> The Idle features many native plants from the region, as well as handcrafted benches and sidewalks that highlight everything from a Jesuit motto to paintings of local birds, to thoughts from a neighborhood poet about the importance of building community.

And, yep, there's even some commentary from a music legend or two, which reflects Tom's Rock 'N' Roll roots.

>> Here we are, a green space in the city.

We're a mile from downtown.

There was an acre of ground that could be used by the people instead of fenced off.

It just -- it was the right thing to do.

♪ >> BRANDON: You know, this is one of my favorite places to go because the idea of someplace that's quiet and calm in the midst of all of this chaos, like, it's such a great thing inside of the city.

>> ASHLEY: Want to learn more?

Head to idleindy.com.

>> BRANDON: And as always, we'd like to encourage you to stay connected with us.

>> ASHLEY: Just head over to JourneyIndiana.org.

There you can see full episodes, connect with us on Facebook, YouTube and Instagram and suggest stories from your neck of the woods.

>> BRANDON: We also have a map feature that allows you to see where we've been and to plan your own Indiana adventures.

>> ASHLEY: You know, Brandon, we have done a lot of things on this show, but we have never driven a boat!

>> BRANDON: That's true.

>> ASHLEY: Do you think they'll let us drive this one?

>> BRANDON: You know, I had the tank.

I think you get the boat.

>> ASHLEY: I'll take it.

We'll see you next time on... >> TOGETHER: "Journey Indiana."

♪ >> Production support for "Journey Indiana" is provided by WTIU members.

Thank you!