Journey Along the Bible Road

Categories: Travel , Nonfiction

If you’ve driven north of Cincinnati on I-75 all the way up to Monroe, you may have noticed a grain silo topped by a little red horse on the side of the highway.  Written very plainly on the side of this silo is the Bible reference, “John 3:3.”  A photograph of this simple expression of faith is one of many beautiful and thought-provoking photographs in the new book, Bible Road: Signs of Faith in the American Landscape.

Photographer Sam Fentress has been taking pictures of religious signs across the country for the past twenty-five years.  My personal favorite is the commercial sign on page forty for the East End Body Shop in Huntington, West Virginia.  Next to the name of the company, is a little drawing of a man who has crashed his car into a tree.  The man is smiling and saying, “Praise the Lord anyway!”   

Fentress points out that the signs in his photos are not only from south of the Mason-Dixon Line, as might be expected. They are from all over the U.S.  A bright neon sign from San Francisco states, “Jesus is the Light of the World” and a small line of graffiti from Harlem reads, “Obey God or burn.” 

It was the great variety of religious expression—the simple Bible verses, the prayers, the exhortations—from around the country that kept me turning page after page of Bible Road.  You’ll enjoy the journey, too!