Cheraw, Colorado - Junkrassic Park

If you make your way down a country black top road (Co Road JJ) just northeast of La Junta, Colorado you will find a place of the most bizarre wonder that is definitely worth the trouble to see.

Since 1990, retired farmer Johnnie Allen has been welding huge sculptures made from castoff farm implement metal. One day back then, his wife asked him to make her a rooster sculpture out of scrap metal like the one she saw on a trip to the Western Slope of Colorado. After he finished the rooster, he continued making all kinds of other characters out of the multitudes of scrap metal found around his farm.

His largest piece is an oil tower version of the Eiffel Tower, the 40-foot tall "Awful Tier," made from an old windmill set atop a platform. The four acre place is populated by a pun-filled gallery of rogues, including "Infidel Castro," "Jon Way-In," "John L. Weigh."

The humor and the work that went to this vast collection of sculpture art by one man is just amazing to behold... no matter how corny some of the puns are.

Sadly, Mr. Allen is getting on with age, and it is apparent that some of his sculptures are showing a bit of weathering and neglect due his lack of energy and/or interest. Now would be the time to take the drive and see it before it all rusts away. [Bob Pearce, 11/06/2009]