Had an awesome meeting with Alex Umlauf for our Sep 27, 2020 17th National Mayors’ Ride reception on the bridge that replaced the original Gateway to the West, an honor that St Louis somehow assumed for themselves. I mean there was not even a bridge over the Mississippi that Easterners could use to reach the West Coast for gold or for settlement by working their way up to the Mormon or Oregon Trails until the game was well underway. But in 1834, there was the National Road covered bridge that crossed the 700 foot wide White River, the first obstacle to westward expansion.

As for Alex, we’re talking the former second in command at the mammoth 250-acre White River State Park as it was formalizing a lot of its systems. In fact the 11 page form that Laura Chernin Dowling has me filling out to rent the bridge was created by Alex!! He and I discussed among many things, the form, the general layout of our event, the critical path of what has to happen when and the task forces that we will have to start recruiting for.

Next week, we’ll meet to put a timeline in place and dial in what volunteer tasks need to be attended to. Alex has tons of experience with producing events. He sees this, in soon enough time, being replicated in all our NBG Anchor cities.

Since Alex does so much work in the community, our event will now really celebrate Indianapolis as we will also be taking what we will have learned to showcase the bicycle fire in all 19 of our other NBG Anchor Cities. This on the way to their getting Indianapolis Cultural Trail: A Legacy of Gene & Marilyn Glicks of their own!