Have you ever wondered where the materials for Bon Ami cleansers came from. Frankly, neither did I. But I did find out sorta by accident. I'm enamoured with weird places. Take me to some bizarre attraction in the middle of nowhere and I'm a happy man. So when I heard of this place in Grafton, NH called Ruggle's Mine, I had to check it out. And I dragged my poor family with me ala Clark Griswald, sans the family truckster. Come to find out, Bon Ami owned the mine a hundred+ years ago, converting the minerals to an abrasive powder our grandmothers probably used on their cast iron pots and pans. OK... so now it's just a giant hole in the ground, but how was I to know until I got there and paid my $26?
However, the drive to this mountaintop crater was as quirky as they come. At one point, we drove through the town of Danbury. My wife pointed out the window to a sign reading, "The Village Whittler" in front of a ramshackle hut. Yup... the town has a village whittler. How can you not stop at a place like this? My wife, determined to buy some of whatever the Village Whittler was selling, made me run through the pouring rain to see if anyone was in. There I found a small photograph of James Walter Whitford, The Village Whittler of Danbury, NH. Underneath, a sign reading, "December 3rd, 1926- July 27th, 2008"... apparently, we just missed him.
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