"Land of the cross-tipped churches"

Sunday
More cloud cover today, but still a lovely day. We drove down to the nearby town of New Bremen, which as I mentioned yesterday was the site of locks on the former Miami-Erie Canal. The lock has been restored, as has the lock-keeper's house adjacent, and a section of the canal. We discovered it was the weekend for their Bremenfest, with various activities taking place. We walked for a couple of miles along the towpath trail, then back to town to get a bite to eat and watch some of the parade. Then we went on to the town of Minster. We had seen the towers of this large church as we were driving through yesterday, and I wanted to see it up close. Despite the presence of a Dannon Yogurt factory (claimed to be the largest in the world!), Minster is basically a relatively small town in the middle of farming country, and the church seems somewhat out of place. This Gothic Revival-style building was built in 1848. The twin Gothic spires were added later, in 1874, designed by Anton Goehr.The area is known as "Land of the cross-tipped churches", due to the dense concentration of large Catholic churches that dominate the area's architecture. These and other buildings were constructed by the Society of the Most Precious Blood under the oversight of the missionary priest Francis de Sales Brunner. Under his leadership, the Society founded many churches and schools in the region, as well as several seminaries. On July 26, 1979, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places as part of the "Cross-Tipped Churches of Ohio" multiple property submission. Both New Bremen and Minster were very attractive towns, with both the downtown areas and the residential areas clearly very well cared for and attractively maintained. Before returning to the campground to pack up the camper, we went to have a look at nearby Lake Loramie State Park. Lake Loramie was one of the original canal-feeder lakes. We arrived back home about 6.30, to find Laura had already returned from her weekend away visiting friends in Columbus and Cleveland. After unpacking the car the three of us went out to our local Mexican restaurant and exchanged news about our respective weekends.