Mark Twain once said that “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness.” As a seasoned carnie, traveling around the world has also taught me that tour guides are full of crap.
Case in point: Not long ago, my crew and I had the opportunity to disappear in London for a few weeks. It was an awesome trip, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to explore the place at our leisure, and we made the most of it, wandering around the city which once called itself the capital of the world. We absolutely loved stumbling across all the historic sites… at least until the last few days, when we made the mistake of buying tickets for one of those Hop On / Hop Off tour buses.
These buses can be found in pretty much every major tourist destination, and in theory, at least, they’re a great idea. If you’re short on time, or if you don’t want to bother figuring out the local transit system, you can just shuttle back and forth between the big-name attractions with very little hassle. Or if you’ve got a longer itinerary and you’re getting a little sore from urban trekking, a day on the bus can make for a relaxing scenic tour. No, my issue isn’t with the London tour buses themselves— it’s with the pre-recorded audio guides. Specifically, with the garbage this one guide started spouting as we rolled through Trafalgar Square.
There, dwarfed by Lord Nelson’s column and drowning in a sea of tourists outside the National Gallery, stood a lonely stone column capped with a lantern, a landmark which our uninformed guide introduced as the world’s smallest police station. Barely large enough to hold one or two drunk prisoners, this “station” was actually little more than a place for a Bobbie to seek cover from the rain. It was the type of hidden-in-plain-sight attraction which might elicit an impressed “ooh” of wonder from the uninformed masses, maybe even a snapshot or two if the tour bus was stuck at the light, but it definitely wasn’t worth a stop. As the traffic light changed, our bus chugged away into the afternoon, and it seemed as if I was the only one aboard who caught the lie we’d just been fed.
Flashback to 2011, when I had the privilege of spending a few years living in the modern-day capital of the world: Florida. The traveling circus was in full swing that summer, with regular engagements booked across the Sunshine State. We’d just pulled up the stakes after a successful show in Tallahassee, and on a whim, I’d decided to get off the highway and chart a scenic route west to Panama City Beach. Highway 98, running long and slow along the Gulf Coast, didn’t disappoint a bit. Even though I never learned how to pronounce “Appalachicola”, I’ll never forget those epic, white sand beaches… and of course, my quick stop in Carabelle to visit the real World’s Smallest Police Station.
There on the side of the road, with no fanfare whatsoever, stood this tiny gem of local color. Back in the 1960s, before police cars were equipped with two-way radios, officers used dedicated call boxes to communicate with their headquarters. When the telephone company installed a new public phone booth in 1963, the city of Carabelle took the opportunity to install a police call box inside of it. This public-private partnership allowed deputies to get out of the rain while answering calls, and also kept tourists from abusing the emergency line by making free long-distance calls back home. Even better, the citizens of Carabelle always knew where they could go to speak with a deputy in person.
Of course by the time of my visit, those days of black-and-white policing had given way to nationwide 911 service and consolidated dispatch stations. Even pay phones were a dying breed, so it wasn’t surprising to find the World’s Smallest Police Station standing bare and empty. Like any beat cop, the landmark’s been through its share of hard times. It’s stood through hurricanes, been struck by vehicles, been targeted by vandals, and even shot up once or twice. The station’s officially retired now, so these days, if you find yourself passing through this side of Old Florida, you’ll have to stop into the city’s modern municipal center if you want to see this piece of law enforcement history. Feel free to take measurements if you need to, but anyone can see that this station is much smaller than that British impostor.
Yes, Carabelle might be a little far off the beaten path, but trust me, the detour is worth it. After all, millions upon millions of people visit London every year… but how many Europeans can say that they’ve been to the Florida panhandle?