Journal 3- Katie Wagoner

Part One: Reading Holding On has been surprisingly enjoyable so far. Normally reading assignments for courses are extremely boring or long to read. I typically can never finish reading the reading assignments, but Holding On has been different. Holding On has short, but enriched stories.

The strengths of Holding On is the writers ability to bring forth each person's own unique personality. Even the photos seem to capture the personality and the life of each person in one photo. As mentioned in class, the black and white photos seem to bring a sense of history and importance to the people in the photos. If there was a weakness to Holding On, I would say that some of the stories seem (how would I say it?) less impressive or empowering. However, I think it is a good thing because everyone is different and finds different thing empowering and impressive; this just reaches a broader audience.

Part Two: The profile in Holding On that I will be talking about in this post is that profile about Father Louis H. Greving and the Grotto of the Redemption. I absolutely love when people make beautiful, impressive, and historic buildings. I believe that Grotto of the Redemption was not only Paul Dobberstein's way of showing love for God, but also was a way to the history behind his belief, depicting the scenes from the life of Jesus Christ. I would love to be able to see this building. This lead me to ask the question about what the Grotto of the Redemption looks like today and if there is still work being done on it.

The Grotto of the Redemption is still around today. It is a museum where people can come and see the Grotto as well as the tools Dobberstein and Greving used to make the Grotto. Here is a link to their website: http://www.westbendgrotto.com/. I'll admit that the Grotto of Redemption looks less beautiful than I imaged, but it is definitely still impressive.

Air shot of the Grotto

I continued to read more on their website and found that Greving continued to work on the Grotto for 50 years! If I understood the text right, the Grotto was finished around 1996, and Greving died in 2002. For your reference: http://www.westbendgrotto.com/history/.

The Grotto of Redemption reminds me of a place I went to with my boyfriend this past year, its called Loveland Castle. Loveland Castle is in a castle made by Sir Harry in Ohio (yes, Ohio). If you haven't seen it you should definitely go check it out. The castle is beautiful and impressive. It was hand made stone by stone by Sir Harry. The castle has been turned into a museum showing off the hard work and dedication that Harry had to build this castle; just like the Grotto of Redemption. I believe Sir Harry and Greving and Dobberstein had the same level of dedication to build their historical monuments. For your reference: http://www.lovelandcastle.com/.

Loveland Castle