The Indiana chapter of the Lincoln Highway Association is holding its spring events in Warsaw and Winona Lake Saturday, April 17, 2010.

10:00 am
Warsaw: Lincoln Highway Kiosk Dedication
The public is invited!
W Old Road 30 at 350 W

Join the Indiana Lincoln Highway Association and the Kosciusko County Historical Society at the Chinworth Bridge Trailhead for a dedication program and celebration of Warsaw’s Lincoln Highway heritage!

12:30 pm
Winona Lake: Lunch at the Boat House Restaurant and Geocaching
Reservations required

Enjoy this lovely location along the shore of Winona Lake and get geocache locations at closing of this event. The annual gathering of the Indiana Lincoln Highway Association will feature a kick-off of a high-tech Geocaching Adventure along the Indiana Lincoln Highway, updates on the Scenic Byway Application with the State of Indiana, and an annual auction-fundraiser. Enjoy Lunch on the shores of Winona Lake!

12:30 p.m. Browse displays and auction items
1:00 p.m. Lunch with guest speaker

Phil Worrall, Executive Director, Indiana Geographic Information Council, will kick off the INLHA Geocaching Project and entertain us with this new high tech adventure for Indiana’s Lincoln Highway! This project is funded through the Indiana Humanities Council and Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana. Attendees will be given locations of caches at the end of this event – be the first to find a cache!

Updates on Indiana LH Byway application, special projects, and a live auction fundraiser!

Cost: $22.00 (includes entrée ordered from group lunch menu, beverage, tax, gratuity, and registration fee)

For reservations, contact Joyce Chambers at (574) 272-5374 by April 10.

The ninth annual Calumet Heritage Conference, “Calumet Crossroads: Changes and Challenges in Regional Transportation,” offered lectures, exhibits and networking opportunities at Indiana University Northwest in Gary…. Conference participants took a bus tour along Lincoln Highway on both sides of the Indiana-Illinois state line. Author and historian Cynthia Ogorek accompanied them as she narrated excepts from her book, “The Historic Lincoln Highway Around Chicago.”

• Focus on transportation: Calumet Heritage Conference deals with getting around region, The Post-Tribune (Merrillville, IN), October 26, 2008

Antique car owners and car clubs are invited to join the celebration of the original route of the Lincoln Highway through New Carlisle on Saturday, Oct. 11.

• Lincoln Highway celebration Saturday, The News-Dispatch (Michigan City, IN), October 9, 2008

The Goshen Theater attracted major vaudeville acts on their way from New York to Chicago along the Lincoln Highway.

• Downtown Goshen, Inc. to present Oct. 14 Afternoon Sabbatical about changes to the city, Goshen College, October 7, 2008

Historic New Carlisle is teaming up with the Indiana Lincoln Highway Association to celebrate the original route of the Lincoln Highway through New Carlisle on Saturday, Oct. 11.

• Lincoln Highway to be celebrated in New Carlisle, The News-Dispatch (Michigan City, IN), September 25, 2008

The annual Lincoln Highway garage sales took place on August 9 in downtown Warsaw, Indiana.

• Lincoln Highway Celebration Set Saturday, Times-Union (Warsaw, IN), August 8, 2008

A 161-year old log cabin in Schererville, Indiana moves to its new home in Scherwood Park, crossing the Lincoln Highway along the way.

• Historic log cabin becomes modern-day ‘mobile home’, The Post-Tribune (Merrillville, IN), August 2, 2008

Ninety-five years after an association was formed to support construction of a transcontinental, paved highway, and 85 years after that highway’s "Ideal Section" was built in Northwest Indiana, Old Lincoln Highway still attracts the curiosity of history-minded residents along its route.

Art Schweitzer, a local historian from Schererville, has led research into the local stretch of the highway.

• NWI [Northwest Indiana]: Land of Lincoln Highway, The Post-Tribune (Merrillville, Ind.), July 20, 2008

A Goshen replica diner was featured on the Food Channel’s popular TV show – Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives. I’m not sure of the source of the following article about this:

The “South Side Soda Shop” has had the same owners for 21 years. July 3, 2007. Reporter: Ryan Famuliner

A Goshen restaurant is about to make it’s debut on one of the food network’s most popular shows. It’s called “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives.”

The South Side Soda Shop has been a fixture in Goshen for decades. Now, the owners are bracing themselves for changes that might come after their hometown, family diner hits the national airwaves. It’s that family feel that’s kept the south side soda shop running all these years — both financially...

“People would know you by name, and also know what you were gonna order,” said Todd Davis, a long-time customer at the soda shop. …And literally. Nick Boyd and his wife Charity own and run the soda shop – and both of their daughters work there too. “Growing up here, they know the customers, the products. If for some reason my wife or I couldn’t be here, it’d be in good hands,” said owner Nick Boyd.

But come next week, there might be something that threatens that family feel — flocks of food network viewers. “Mom called one of the other restaurants and they said their business increased 200%,” said Nicole Boyd, Nick’s daughter who also works at the diner. For the soda shop’s regular customers, that could mean an imposition on their usual hang-out.

“Customers are funny, they may even want to sit at their regular tables. And they may come in and they have to sit somewhere else or they have to wait for a table,” Nick Boyd said. But, that doesn’t mean the regulars are upset. “I mean, they’re happy for us. You know, the customers are like our family also. All this publicity is great, but they’re the ones that have kept us in business for 21 years,” Nick Boyd said.

And the family is ready to adapt to whatever comes their way. “As a family we’ve talked about what we’re going to need to do, and how we’re going to all really have to come together and be willing to stay until, you know, midnight if necessary to be able to make the food. So I mean, I think we’re excited, and there’s so many possibilities that could come out of this,” Nicole Boyd said.

There are a few last-minute jitters before the episode airs. “It’s kind of scary for me, that like a million people are going to be seeing my family on TV. But it’s also exciting at the same time because more people will come to, like, experience the wonderful food and atmosphere here,” said Hannah Boyd, Nick’s other daughter who works at the diner.

The owners say their staples are a family spaghetti recipe, their chili and their homemade Swedish limpa bread. They’re open Tuesday through Saturday for lunch and dinner.

The episode of “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives” featuring the south side soda shop is set to air Monday, July 9th, at 10:00 pm. The show was originally set to air last night, but it got pushed back to next week because of the 4th of July.

Next week’s episode is called “retro,” and the soda shop will be featured alongside a California burger joint, and a homestyle Oregon cafe. The owners say the producers of the show called them about the show, and at first they thought it was a practical joke. After a series of interviews, the soda shop was chosen to be on the show.

South Side Soda Shop
1122 S Main St
Goshen, IN 46526
Tel: (574) 534-3790
Website: http://southsidesodashopdiner.com/

Valparaiso, Indiana’s 49′er Drive-In Theatre is located south of the city on SR 49. Check out their website at:
http://www.49erdrivein.com/

From April’s Chicago Tribune comes an extensive article about writer Pamela Selbert‘s recent road trip on the Lincoln Highway in Indiana:
http://xrl.us/2tav

A very interesting article about 73rd Ave. in Merrillville, IN – the Sauk Trail, and later the Lincoln Highway, from post-trib.com, 73rd Avenue was ‘human epic in continental settlement’:
http://www.post-trib.com/news/burns/392306,nostalgia.article

Here’s the website for the South Side Soda Shop and Diner in Goshen, IN:
http://southsidesodashopdiner.com/