VANDALIA - Beyond this point, there be dragons.

Well, a dragon. And we can be much more geographically precise than that, as this dragon has a street address: the front yard of the True Value hardware store, 2024 Progress West Drive, near Old U.S. 40 in Vandalia.

People coast to coast already know where the 4-ton, 30-foot-tall and 40-foot-long monster hangs out, however. He's been standing guard out here for eight years and is the fire-breathing star of countless vacation snapshots by amazed passers-by, at least those with the intrepidity to pull off the soulless interstate for a moment and be all gone to look for Americana.

"We had a couple of ladies from New York City stop by, and they had a traveling gnome with them," says Lois McCart, who owns the nearby LoMac Liquor store. "I told them we had the old Vandalia historic Statehouse uptown, but they weren't interested in that; they were just interested in the dragon. We have people stopping by every day to have their pictures taken with it."

This area of Vandalia, in the land of the dragon, is booming these days. New businesses are springing up everywhere, such as the liquor store, which only arrived in September. To get noticed, McCart's already incorporated the dragon's image into her ads which proclaim: "Coldest Beer in Town - Just Ask the Dragon."

The splendidly named Walt Barenfanger (it apparently means bear-catcher in German) is the owner of the True Value and had installed the dragon as a nice eye-catcher for his business. The idea's really taken off: "People say 'Where are you?' and I start to tell them and then they say 'Is that near the dragon?' " he says. "I just say 'That's it, turn at the dragon.' "

Barenfanger owns the ESC construction company, too, and that turned out to be the genesis for the all-steel beast. Ten years, ago there was a lull in the workload and one of his talented former welders, Paul Schaub, suggested they make a dragon. Just like that.

"There wasn't much forethought, there wasn't much afterthought, there wasn't much thought at all," says Barenfanger, 54. "He just started welding and out it came."

But there's a lot more built into this heavy metal monster than meets the eye. A hydraulic system inside can lower his head dramatically to clear power lines, and loaded on a wagon, the magic dragon has frolicked in the autumn mist as a star attraction in the town's Halloween parade.

Even better, his red eyes light up and he actually breathes fire, thanks to a fancy propane tank arrangement in the belly of the beast armed with an electronic igniter. At night, the light show is quite spectacular.

But these days, the dragon spends his time chained in place outside the store and so doesn't get around much, which may be just as well. Barenfanger recalls one parade they had to abort rather suddenly when the dragon's breath ignited some old bird's nests that were hidden inside his neck near his eyeballs. The flames burned themselves out harmlessly but, for a moment, there were fears they would reach the propane tank and then the dragon, which has stubby metallic wings, might have gotten a chance to fly.

"And that," says Barenfanger, "would not have been a good thing."

Tony Reid can be reached at treid@herald-review.com or 421-7977.