Author Archives: Denny

Book Review
Headley Inn and Cliff Rock House
Cyndie L. Gerken

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Cyndie Gerken’s third big helping of National Road knowledge was served up a bit more than a year ago, and I have no good excuse, or even enough bad ones, to account for waiting so long to take a look. Of course, once I did, the same accuracy and thoroughness that marked her earlier books were instantly apparent in this one. In 2015, she documented Ohio’s National Road mile markers with Marking the Miles Along the National Road Through Ohio.  In 2018, Taking the Tolls Along the National Road Through Ohio told of the toll gates that operated after the federal government rid itself of the highway by giving it to the states through which it passed. Both books took a deep and wide look at their subjects although that phrase did not occur to me until I was well into the current volume.

Those other books were geographically wide because they involved the whole state of Ohio, and they were also wide in the variety of information they included on their subjects. Depth came from the layers of time and degree of detail covered. Headley… isn’t nearly as wide geographically (The two buildings in the title are barely 300 feet apart.), but it does include the passing road and nearby towns, and the information variety is every bit as wide as in the first two offerings. The detail component of depth is at least equal to that of the earlier books and the time component is considerably greater. The period covered by all three begins at roughly the same time but the story of the two inns has yet to end.

Physically the latest book is much like the others. All are largish paperbacks printed in color. All include a brief overview of the history of the National Road that provides context for the rest of the book. Headley…‘s introduction also includes information on the surrounding area and the role of early roadside inns and taverns.

Both of the book’s subjects appeared almost immediately after the National Road passed by the land they would occupy. The first section of the Cliff Rock House was completed in 1830 and the Headley Inn’s first section in 1833. Other dates have appeared in articles and even on signs but Gerken sorts through the various claims and presents a solid case for these dates. Both structures have been enlarged and modified over the years. Despite their nearness to each other, the inns were constructed and operated independently by two separate families. That has not always been the case although it is again today.

It is generally thought that the Headley Inn initially served as a stagecoach stop while the larger Cliff Rock House catered more to drovers herding sheep and other animals to market. That sort of division was never iron clad, of course, but that kind of thinking does serve to justify the two businesses being so close.

The two periods of glory experienced by the two taverns naturally coincide with the glory days of the passing road. They prospered in the early eighteenth century doing what they were constructed for: serving travelers on the new National Road. Gerken digs deep into public records and family histories to tell the story of this period. Prosperity ended with the coming of the railroad.

Prosperity returned in the early part of the next century when traffic returned to the road out front. This time the customers were carried by automobiles. Alexander Smith, who had built the Cliff Rock House, added the Headley Inn to his holdings in 1857. In 1922, two of his granddaughters opened a restaurant and tearoom in the former stagecoach stop. The old National Road had become part of the National Old Trails Road. Its traffic, and the sisters’ culinary skills, made the tea room a nationally known success. Like they did elsewhere, the interstates of the last half of the twentieth century pulled traffic from the old road and might have ended this second round of glory if the sisters had not already ended it by retiring and closing the restaurant in 1961.

Gerken also uses public records to tell of the tearoom period but they form a much smaller part of the story. There is considerable family documentation available, including photographs, and, more significantly, she has access to quite a bit of living memory of the era. The most important source of that living memory is the son of one of those sisters, Alexander Smith Howard. He not only shared stories that appear throughout the book, he also wrote its foreword.

Living memory provides even more input to the post-tearoom era and here the living memory is sometimes Gerken’s own although it is more often her personal interviews with the short series of owners. The book is heavily illustrated with historical photos, maps, diagrams, newspaper clippings, and more. Modern photos include many taken by the author herself.

For the third time, an era of glory early in a new century is a definite possibility. Major restoration of the Headley Inn was accomplished by Stephen and Bernadine Brown during their 1989 to 2006 ownership. It continued under Alan and Patricia Chaffee until 2015. The current owners, Brian and Carrie Adams, along with their daughter Ashley, have added their own historically sensitive improvements and now operate a bed and breakfast with facilities for weddings and other gatherings. In 2018, Cliff Rock House was purchased by Otto and Sally Luburgh and restoration work is now underway there.

I know that this book’s true value lies in its collection of facts, photos, and carefully researched history. It is unequaled in that regard. Much of its readability, however, comes from the stories that fill the background and cluster around the edges. From the story of the Headly Inn’s original owner verbally abusing federal troops early in the Civil War, and tales of tearoom employees drawing straws to determine who had to brave snakes in the attic to retrieve supplies, to reports of elephants appearing — both expected and not — in front of the inn, there are plenty of human interest style anecdotes to balance the solid and valuable historical facts.

Headley Inn and Cliff Rock House: A Storied History of Two Taverns Along Ohio’s National Road, Cyndie L. Gerken, Independently published, March 20, 2019, 11 x 8.5 inches, 378 pages, ISBN 978-1790228089
Available through Amazon.

It’s Easter (Again)

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This post first appeared last year. It is being reused due in part to 2020’s reduced mobility and (apparently) creativity. Articles in USA Today and elsewhere, include Root Beer Float in a list of five new Peeps flavors but, as can be seen below and in the original post, the flavor was already around in 2019. Hot Tamales Fierce Cinnamon, on the other hand, really does appear to be making its debut this year.


Today is Easter. I know that because I looked it up on the internet. It was easy. It was easy in the early days, too. Easter was originally simply the Sunday of Passover week. Since most early Christians had once been Jews, they just naturally knew when Passover was. Even those that had converted to Christianity directly from Druidism probably had some Jewish friends they could ask. Easy, peasy. Too easy, it seems, for some.

Things changed in 325 at the First Council of Nicaea. Maybe the priests felt threatened by pretty much everybody knowing when Easter was without asking. Or maybe the astronomers, who might have been the same guys, were feeling left out. Or maybe the priests just weren’t all that happy having a Christian holiday tied so tightly to a Jewish one. So, they tied it, instead, to the moon and the sun.

Their starting point was the vernal equinox when the sun is directly above Earth’s equator and day and night are of equal length. Next was a full moon which occurs when the surface visible to Earth is completely illuminated by the sun. These two events are not synchronized. A vernal equinox happens every 365.24 days; A full moon every 29.53 days. But even the most radical of the Nicaea councilors dared not mess with the idea that Easter was a Sunday thing. That meant that a mostly arbitrary period of seven days and the completely arbitrary selection of one of the seven were overlaid on the two asynchronous sun and moon events. Henceforth, Easter would be celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox.

That probably sounds a bit involved and confusing to many people today let alone 4th-century peasants. Come spring of 326, priests were no doubt busy letting the laity know when they should hide their eggs and have relatives over for baked ham.

In the centuries since, alternate sources of the information have proliferated. Asking a priest continues to be an option, but one that has been unnecessary since sometime in the 20th century when the majority of refrigerators became covered by calendars — with Easter marked in red — from every merchant and insurance agent in the area. The time saved has been put to good use finding ways to enhance the Easter experience. A Lego bunny and never before seen colored and flavored Peeps are available for 2019. And scheduling egg hunts has become even easier. “Hey Google. When’s Easter?”

Book Review
Overground Railroad
Candacy Taylor

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“This is not a book about the history of road-tripping and black travel”, is the first sentence of the last paragraph of the introduction. That’s something I knew long before I read it. It was something Candacy Taylor said early in the presentation I attended in Indianapolis back in February. It may even have been something she said during another presentation of hers I attended back in 2016. I discovered Taylor the same way she discovered the Green Book. Well, not exactly the same way. She learned of the Green Book while doing research for a Moon Travel Guide on Route 66. I learned of Candacy Taylor as a mere attendee at a conference on the historic road. Research for the book was well underway when Taylor spoke at that conference in Los Angeles but Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America was still a concept. It was a reality when she spoke in Indianapolis, and that’s where I acquired my copy.

Another phrase that caught my ear at the Indianapolis presentation and which I subsequently read in the book is this: “I wasn’t interested in presenting the Green Book as a historic time capsule.” Maybe the reason I noticed the phrase was that, without actually being aware of it, that is exactly how I saw the Green Book. The book, published between 1936 to 1967, identified businesses where Negro travelers were welcome. A too often true assumption was that they were not welcome in any place not listed. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not make racial discrimination disappear, but it did make it illegal. By the time I became aware of the book, it had not been published for decades and I figured it had been more or less the same throughout the time it was published. In my mind, the Green Book essentially was a historic time capsule.

The book was no doubt historic, but it was not a sealed capsule. If pressed, I would have known that the book must have grown over the years and that listings and advertisers would have come and gone. Taylor meant much more than that. There were changes in the book’s overall tone that were related to changes in society and vice versa. She uses changes in the Green Book as a timeline to frame changes in the world at large. It isn’t a hard link and the two certainly don’t move in lockstep. Societal changes just aren’t that tidy. But the editions of Victor Green’s book pace the chapters in Taylor’s.

One of the bigger Green Book changes Taylor covers occurred with its return at the end of the Second World War. The guide was not published during the war, and when it returned in 1946 it was bigger and better than ever. Not only was the book enlarged, its tone was changed a bit, too. Serious articles about the situation of blacks in American society appeared along with information, such as a listing of black colleges, not exactly associated with travel. In a chapter based on the 1946 and ’47 editions, Taylor says, “This comprehensive list of colleges elevated the Green Book from a travel guide to a political weapon.”

Another big step came in 1952 when the guide’s name was changed from the Negro Motorist Green Book to the Negro Travelers Green Book. Train travel by blacks had already been included starting in 1950. Travel by airplane and other means would be covered in the future.

In a chapter linked to the 1957 and ’58 editions, Taylor addresses what is almost certainly a big reason she felt the need to stress that, “This is not a book about the history of road-tripping.” The chapter is titled “The Roots of Route 66”, and she uses Route 66 examples to explain why blacks have virtually no nostalgia for the classic American road trip, but the story is essentially the same for every other highway, too. While it’s very much an understatement, the following line does sort of sum up the chapter: “[T]he experience of driving Route 66 was not the same for everyone.”

Overground Railroad is heavily illustrated. Taylor’s research for this project included cataloging and visiting businesses listed in the Green Book, and several of her photographs of sites that remain appear throughout the book. She also includes some personal photos. Numerous historic photos along with reproductions from the Green Book accompany the text. A section in the back of the book lists surviving “Green Book sites” and includes Taylor’s photos of many. It is followed by a section with reproductions of every known Green Book cover other than the very first edition of 1936.

Victor Green hoped that “There will be a day sometime in the near future when this guide will not have to be published.” That day came, technically, when the 1964 Civil Rights Act became law. There was just one more Green Book published before it shut down permanently. But reality has never quite matched the technical equality of the Civil Rights Act. The first chapter of Taylor’s book, in which she discusses the risks and difficulties of Negroes driving during the early years of the Green Book, is titled “Driving While Black”. It’s a title that could have come from yesterday’s newspaper. Maybe it did. In her introduction, Taylor asks the standard road trip question, “Are we there yet?” then answers with a whole book that tells of progress but ends up with a solid “No.” It is not, however, a hopeless “No”. The “Author’s Note” near the book’s end talks of the challenge and is followed by a “What We Can Do” list.

Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America, Candacy Taylor, Harry N. Abrams, January 7, 2020, 9.8 x 7 inches, 360 pages, ISBN 978-1419738173
Available through Amazon.

Aging in Place

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This picture is indeed a repeat. It appeared last November in a post about my first decade of retirement. It is now being used for my birthday. I’m celebrating my seventy-third birthday today in the middle of a pandemic and a statewide stay-at-home order. That is not, however, why I’m reusing the picture. As soon as I made the image, I knew it would be perfect for my next birthday post. Sure, I took the picture with retirement in mind, but once the text was added it became a birthday image. I went ahead and used it in the retirement post because I didn’t have time to think of and produce anything else. Here is where it belongs.

The aforementioned pandemic and the changes it’s brought make me aware of other privileges I have besides growing old. In normal times, having a fixed income is often seen as a negative. Any unexpected expense can be a disaster and the slow creep of inflation can be a major problem over time. But, when restaurants and other businesses are being closed, new layoffs are announced almost daily, and most of the self-employed are left with nothing coming in at all, a fixed income doesn’t sound so bad.

I’ve been living alone for more than twenty years, and I’ve become quite used to it. Quite happy with it, too. Social distancing is easy, and I don’t have to worry about anyone but me contaminating that teetering stack of books on my table. I’m not officially responsible for anyone else. Please don’t read that as a disclaimer intended to shirk responsibility. It’s an observation that there is no one is depending on me for shelter or meals. I do keep an eye on my 94-year-old stepmother but she’s remarkably independent and well prepared with wonderful neighbors who make sure she doesn’t run out of anything. I usually see her every week or two, but when I suggested coming to visit last weekend, she talked me out of it.

Each of my three kids fits the model of what I think about when describing someone being responsible for someone else. Each has a family that they shelter and feed and — with schools closed — educate. I was never a particularly good parent but all three are self-sufficient and caring and I’m pretty happy with that.

I had planned to be in the middle of a short road trip right now, and celebrating my birthday with dinner at the historic Century Inn in Scenery Hill, Pennsylvania, but the inn is about 250 miles away and only doing carry out anyway. As that affects me personally, it seems to be among the first worldliest of first world problems. It means that the only National Road mile marker I’ll see today is the one on my mantle. I’ve not often done carry out during this quasi-quarantine, but I probably will today. Maybe something from the steakhouse across the street.

Yeah, I’m privileged. Not so much for being old as for growing old. I’ve often said, in reference to road trips, that I enjoy getting there more than being there. I guess life’s kind of like that too. I think I’ll just grow older for a while.

ADDENDUM 5-Apr-2020: In the end, I did not go to the nearby steakhouse. I decided if I was going to venture out, it would be for something special — and local. The steakhouse is a chain and Montgomery Inn, while being a long way from a mom-and-pop restaurant, is independent and locally owned. I did a drive-by for my favorite ribs & shrimp combo and even helped my dwindling beer stash with a six-pack of Ted’s Red (brewed by Mount Carmel).  

Home Learning

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Since 2009, depending on your definition of work, I have either always worked at home or never worked at home. But I’ve left home a whole bunch to eat, quite often to sleep, and a respectable number of times to learn something. Of course, I more often than not learn something every time I leave the house but right now I’m talking about those times I’ve headed out to a museum or lecture. At the moment, just like the bars and other music venues I wrote about on Wednesday, museums and lecture halls are closed.

The opening image is a screenshot of the Cincinnati Museum Center’s home page and its “Notice of Temporary Closure”. The Museum Center is a place I get to somewhat frequently for OMNIMAX® movies, the permanent exhibits, and world-class traveling exhibits. A traveling exhibit I was really looking forward to, Maya — The Exhibition, was set to open right when the COVID-19 related closures began. I’ve also attended several lectures there. In particular, I liked a series called Brown Bag Lectures. During the two-year-long renovation project, the lectures moved offsite and have yet to return although the building reopened at the end of 2018. Despite good intentions, I haven’t attended a single Brown Bag Lecture since the start of the renovations.

Sometime after the Holocaust and Humanity Center moved into the Museum Center, it began lectures of its own. The Holocaust Speakers Series only recently made it on to my radar and I had not yet attended one. I did, however, once attend a similar talk by the fellow, now deceased, that the HHC’s Coppel Speakers Bureau is named after. Like all other activities, the lectures were canceled when the building closed, but some lectures, like some musical performances, can be adapted to the internet. The HHC has done that with this series with the first “digital lecture” taking place last Wednesday. In the screenshot at left are HHC CEO Sarah Weiss and the presenter of that lecture, Ray Warren. I had expected to simply call up the website and watch a live feed but the lecture was delivered via Zoom which allows questions and other interactions. I’d not used Zoom previously and had to install the application but it was automated and quick.

Ray told the story of his parents who had survived the Holocaust separately then met and married after the war. His slide presentation was set up for use on a large screen in front of a real audience and there were a few glitches early on but problems were solved or worked around. Ray told us not only about his parents’ remarkable experiences but about his own experiences in discovering some aspects of their story. His slides included pictures of friends and family before and after the war. There was a picture of the earrings, now displayed at the HHC, that his mother managed to hide even during her time at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. They were the only connection she had with her pre-war life.

I only took one screenshot during the lecture and it was very near the end. Ray talked about how people made decisions before and during the Holocaust. He spoke not only of how but when. Don’t be late, he said. He mentioned some more recent events that deserved decisions. He mentioned the white supremacist gatherings in Charlottesville and elsewhere and he mentioned the much closer and more recent incident in the photo. Just over two weeks before the lecture and barely ten miles from my home, someone painted “The Jews killed Christ. They are the enemies of the whole human race.” Don’t be late.

My post on the opening of the Holocaust and Humanity Center is here. The one on hearing Werner Coppel is here. For the present, there will be digital lectures each Wednesday at 11:00. Register here.

Music Review
Viral Streaming
Various Artists

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This isn’t so much a review of music as a review — and preview — of a situation. For quite some time, the Internet has used the word “viral” as if it owned it. Widely and rapidly shared videos, jokes, and photos are said to have “gone viral”. Now the Internet is helping us deal with something that has gone viral the old fashioned way. The novel coronavirus that causes the disease known as COVID-19 is being widely and rapidly shared and we’re trying to make it stop.

We’re trying to make it stop by practicing social distancing. Some people at the World Health Organization want to use the more accurate “physical distancing” but “social distancing” seems to be pretty entrenched. Even before there were “stay-at-home” and “shelter-in-place” orders, bars and the dining areas of restaurants were closed and the income of people who make their living in them was suddenly interrupted. We are quasi-quarantined and semi-isolated, but thanks to the Internet, it’s a quarantine that is, in ways both good and bad, unlike any that’s come before.

One large group whose income has been interrupted is performing musicians. Major festivals and tours, including the Rolling Stones’ “No Filter Tour”, have been canceled or postponed. Some of the big-name stars have moved to fill a little of the vacuum with online concerts and performances. I understand Willie Nelson took part in an online concert last week. I learned of it too late to watch and sure am sorry. There’s an excerpt here. Neil Young has talked about a series of home shows and has one posted here. It’s unclear to me if that’s from a live stream or when there will be more. I stumbled on and surprised myself by enjoying a live feed from Brad Paisley. I’m sure there are others. I think the big-name home show I enjoyed the most is the one pictured at left. That’s Neil Diamond singing Sweet Caroline with some modified lyrics: “Hands. Washing hands. Reaching out. Don’t touch me, I won’t touch you.” 

Of course, no one is really worried about Mick and Keith missing a few paychecks, and neither of the Neils was looking for a handout. Nor was Willie. He was, however, bringing attention to others on the feed who could use some help. A few rungs down the ladder from the Stones and Willie are a whole bunch of musicians that have managed to derive a livelihood from music. With the venues closed, the income is gone. Many are trying online “concerts” in hopes of pulling in some tips. Even on paying gigs, many would typically have a tip jar out. Now, though, the tips aren’t to augment what might be rather small payments from the venues. They’re the whole shebang.

During the last week, I’ve watched online performances by some Cincinnati musicians who happen to be in my line of sight. The opening picture is of Rob McAllister (Dead Man String Band) who did a show on Saturday. So did Ricky Nye, pictured at right. I watched Ricky live then caught Rob’s archived show on Sunday morning. On Sunday night I watched the folks in the other picture on the right, Serenity Fisher and Michael Ronstadt. These are all people I know so I sort of knew what to expect but there were surprises. Rob played a new only-heard-once song and Serenity broke out the bunny ears.

I also checked out some folks I’d never heard before. Ricky, Serenity, and Michael did their own streaming through their Facebook pages. Rob kicked off a series of live streams from CincyMusic. I took advantage of the series to catch three new-to-me artists. Kyla Mainous was on Monday night. Vusive and Matt Waters were on Tuesday. All three showed a lot of talent. Kyla and Matt are singer-songwriters that I’d welcome the chance to see in person. Vusive produces electronic music which happens to not be something I’m likely to go out of my way for although I appreciate the talent and effort involved.

I really enjoyed the “concerts” and I think the performers had a lot of fun too. Although I didn’t, many took advantage of Facebook’s comment support to request songs or just say hi. It gives the shows something of an intimate and interactive feel. I know there are lots of people in Cincinnati besides musicians whose income has suddenly disappeared and I know that’s true for cities everywhere. The interactive two-way aspect of this streaming means the help can go both ways. Music can be a tremendous benefit in dealing with tough times, and right now there’s a lot of music flowing through the Internet because it’s got nowhere else to go. Some can make music, and some can’t. Some can tip a little, and some can’t. Sometimes the helping hand drops a dollar in a hat and sometimes it strums a guitar.

ADDENDUM 25-Mar-2020 13:00: Not long after this was published, CincyMusic shared news of a ten act live stream planned for tonight starting at 7:30 in addition to the already scheduled stream at 6:00. Check them out here and here.

My Wheels — Chapter 40
1997 Schwinn

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Since this vehicle is still a part of my fleet, I’m claiming that it’s OK to cover it now although it should have appeared in My Wheels Chapter 33. It arrived as a birthday gift about a year ahead of the 1998 Corvette that actually was the subject of Chapter 33. In conjunction with the Forester and Miata, it provides me a full range of passenger capacities: 4, 2, or 1. The photo at right was taken when the start of my first documented road trip, in the aforementioned Corvette, was delayed and I pedaled to the nearest watering hole to pass some time.

The bike was quite a surprise. My girlfriend and best buddy combined forces to select and purchase it. My girlfriend knew me and my buddy knew bicycles and the gift was exactly what I would have bought on my own had I been more familiar with the modern bicycle world. I had no desire to go racing or take long-distance slogs up the sides of mountains so the twenty-speed skinny-tired models I’d been seeing did not appeal to me. More importantly, the skinny seats that always seemed to sit too high above those skinny tires appealed to me even less.

The gift bike had none of that. It had fat tires and a fat seat on a frame that would have fit right in during the 1950s of my youth. Chrome fenders and white sidewall tires were perfect mates for the black and brown frame with the brown bearing a sort of faux wood grain pattern. As cool as all that sounds, there’s more. There is real magic in that bike. It’s in the rear axle. It’s a Shimano Nexus 7 Speed Hub with the workings all internal and controlled by a small handlebar-mounted shifter. The biggest magic of all, however, is the genuine pedal-backward-to-stop coaster brake. It wasn’t exactly a Pee Wee Herman bike but it was closer than most. When I rode my new bike past a nearby playground, a young boy shouted out, “Nice bike, mister.” Nothing could be finer.   

I moved into my current home when the bike was just a couple of months old. The pictured Fridays was more or less across the street and there was a Kroger grocery not far beyond. There was a Walmart at one end of the street and a convenience store and some restaurants at the other. Behind the Kroger was Kings Auto Mall which was basically a 3/4 mile loop lined with about a dozen auto dealers. In the other direction, my office was less than a mile away. I frequently used the bike to reach the restaurants and occasionally did some shopping on it with the aid of a small backpack. I rode it to work several times but not as much as I should have. Days that were warm enough to allow riding the bike were usually warm enough to work up a sweat which didn’t seem like a good way to start a day at the office. My favorite place to ride was the auto mall. Traffic was fairly light and I could easily pedal through the lots to look over cars and window stickers. Conversations with salesmen happened now and then but they were never quite sure whether or not I was actually a potential customer.

The picture at left shows the Schwinn in roughly the same spot as in the opening photo. The Fridays was demolished and replaced by a LongHorn Steakhouse. The Walmart turned into a JCPenney and the convenience store has been replaced by a fast-food restaurant. The auto mall is doing well as evidenced by a Toyota dealer having taken over the Kroger store. Actually, the whole neighborhood is basically doing well. Naturally, some businesses have closed over the years but they’ve been quickly replaced. There is overall growth in both the commercial and residential aspects of the community. And in the traffic.

I ride the Schwinn very little these days. There are many reasons but traffic is one of the biggest. The Fields Ertle exit of I-71, where I live, is often cited as one of the most congested spots in the Cincinnati area and much of that congestion has developed during my time here. On top of the gradual increase from the population and business growth, there was a major step input from a new Procter & Gamble complex about two miles north of me. Major highway improvements have helped the flow of trucks and autos but not bicycles. Even the once rather quiet auto mall loop now has significant traffic and is no longer very relaxing. Getting there isn’t relaxing at all.

So I usually pump up the tires in the spring, as I did this week, and cruise through a few parking lots before returning the bike to its spot in the garage and letting the tires again go flat. There is a bike trail not far away and it’s certainly fair to ask why I don’t use it more often. The truth is the only reason I have is laziness. It is often overcrowded on weekends but not so much during the week. I have a cheap rack that takes some effort to mount on the car and more effort to get the bike secured on it. Maybe if I had a better rack that was easier to use I’d hit the trail more often but I’m too cheap to buy one. So maybe I have two reasons for avoiding the bike trail: I’m cheap and I’m lazy. But I’m honest.

My Previous Wheels: Chapter 39 — 2018 Subaru Forester

Movie Review
King Kong
Radio Pictures

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No, I’m not really going to review an eighty-seven-year-old movie that just about everybody has seen multiple times. But I am going to review the experience of seeing it on the big screen for the first time ever. The original King Kong was released on April 7, 1933, so it’s not quite eighty-seven years old but it’s mighty close. My first glimpse — and it wasn’t a whole lot more than that — was sometime in the mid-1950s.

It was on TV, of course, on what was decidedly NOT a big screen. It was probably in 1957 when the movie made its national television debut. The timing likely wasn’t considered “late-night” then and certainly wouldn’t be now, but it was late enough that I had to beg for an exemption to my normal bedtime. Although I was successful, I did not get the exemption’s full benefit. I fell asleep before the movie started, woke up to watch a few scenes through bleary eyes, then dozed off again before the big ending. Today I can’t even remember what portions of the movie I saw. I remember that I saw all of the giant gorilla, not just his face or hand, and I remember it was dark. Seeing Kong in his entirety narrows it down some. The fact that it was dark does not. The entire film was darkened to obscure, reportedly, some of the bloodier scenes and some details of Fay Wray’s femininity. Fay Wray had lots of femininity.

Since then, there have been several viewings that I did manage to stay awake for. Although the screens were considerably larger and clearer than the one parked in our living room sixty-some years ago, all were on a TV. I think the movie became a favorite the instant I actually saw it all. The story was fairly creative but not particularly complex, and the acting was only a few steps removed from the silent film era. Neither was what attracted me to the film. I appreciated its craftsmanship and the window on history it provided. Stop-action animation and rear projection on matte paintings were not invented for King Kong but they had never been used anywhere near to this extent.

The window on history I mentioned exists largely because the movie was made as a window on, if not the future, the leading edge of the present. The film’s exciting finish features the Empire State Building which had just been completed in 1931. It was then the world’s tallest and would hold that title for almost forty years. The armed airplanes that attack the doomed giant were seen as “the most modern of weapons”. Some were models built for the film but some scenes show actual state-of-the-art military planes from a nearby U.S. Naval airfield. From two decades into the twenty-first century, those bi-planes look pretty primitive. Realizing that they represented the most advanced technology of the day definitely helps generate a real appreciation for the film’s special effects created with contemporary tools.

On Sunday, I finally got to see the big guy on the big screen. Fathom Events put together a one day showing at Regal Cinema. Something I’d recently learned was that King Kong was the first movie with a thematic score. This means it was written to coordinate with and enhance on-screen actions rather than just provide some background music. Sunday’s showing included the opening and closing overture which had naturally been cut from every time-constrained TV version I’d ever seen.

The experience was nearly everything I’d hoped it would be. The wall-filling Kong was more frightening than any smaller version I’d seen, and Wray was every bit as alluring as I remembered, and her screams, with an assist from the theater’s sound system, were even louder. That thematic score, which I paid a little more attention to than usual, benefited from the sound system, too. If I ignored the fact that I was sitting in a wide well-padded recliner with NBA sized legroom, I could almost imagine I was watching like it was 1933.

The experience was only “nearly everything I’d hoped” for one reason. In the lead up to Sunday, I’d read a review of the movie which was really a preview of a 2011 screening. It’s here. My anticipation grew when it talked of “seeing it in a packed theater on a big screen with an audience”. I got the big screen but I did not get the packed theater. There were less than twenty people at the 1:00 show. I know that old B&W movies just generally do not draw big crowds but there was more going on here. COVID19, the disease caused by a Coronavirus, was growing. Large gatherings had been banned and the NBA, NCAA, MLB, and other groups had canceled events. In Ohio, schools had already been closed by the governor and within a couple of hours of me leaving the theater, he would close all bars and restaurants. Many museums and other institutions have closed on their own.

That’s why Sunday’s experience was about as far from a packed theater as is possible. Yesterday (Tuesday) the theater itself was closed and so was the Empire State Building observation deck. I’ve only been to the top of the Empire State Building once. It was in the early ’70s when King Kong was no more than forty years old. In a narrow space on an inside wall. there was a heart with the words “King Kong loves Fay Wray”. I’d like to think it’s still there but probably not. 

Trip Peek #92
Trip #144
SCA Conference 2017

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This picture is from my 2017 “trip” to the SCA Conference. I put trip in quotation marks since the conference was in Cincinnati and I spent every night at home in my own bed. The retired Holiday Inn sign is in front of the American Sign Museum where we had dinner after the first full day of the conference. That day was spent on a bus tour around the Cincinnati area, the next was filled with presentations, and the third with a bus tour north along the Dixie Highway.

Trip Peeks are short articles published when my world is too busy or too boring for a current events piece to be completed in time for the Sunday posting. In addition to a photo thumbnail from a completed road trip, each Peek includes a brief description of that photo plus links to the full-sized photo and the associated trip journal.

Burr on Tap

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For 2020, the Cincinnati Museum Center is holding a series of after-hour events under the heading Museum on Tap. The first, “Space Gallery Pub Crawl”, was in January and associated with the Apollo 11 exhibit then in place. The second, “Aaron Burr: American Bastard”, happened on Thursday, and I was there.

The “on tap” in the series’ name comes from the fact that adult beverages are available. While there are no actual taps dispensing draft beer, there is beer in cans and bottles along with wine and spirits. These beverages were offered at four different locations including two in the Public Landing area. One reason the cobblestone street was fairly empty when I arrived was that many attendees were standing in lines at the other two service locations I’d passed on the way. Event literature admits that the Public Landing of the 1850s is somewhat more modern than the Cincinnati Mr. Burr would have seen but it’s a better fit than, say, the Hall of Dinosaurs.

The museum’s gathering was set in 1807 and, while Burr was not present himself, several of his friends, acquaintances, and accomplices were. Pictured, from left to right, are boat builder Leonard Armstrong, Senator John Smith, Charlotte Chambers Ludlow (widow of Cincinnati founder Israel Ludlow), and Mayor James Findlay. Smith aided Burr in his schemes, Findlay hindered him, and Armstrong and Ludlow were attentive observers.

This being my first Museum on Tap experience, I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect. I thought there might be some sort of presentation but that wasn’t the case this time. I can’t say whether or not that’s true of other events in the series. A handout supplied some background on Burr’s trial for treason and his relation with Cincinnatian John Smith. This was augmented by several posters that might have appeared on the streets of Cincinnati. Chatting with the folks in period dress added details. In conversation, Senator Smith put a modern twist on things by referring to reports of his wrongdoing as “fake news”. When I asked for a solo photo, there was no question of where he wanted to pose. He smugly stepped over to the poster with his name and the words “NOT GUILTY” while ignoring the question mark and the smaller print as only a practiced politician can.

I also spoke with Mayor Findlay, who was among those calling for Senator Smith to resign, and Mrs. Ludlow, who had met Burr only once and was clearly not impressed. Onboard the Queen of the West, Leonard Armstrong happily shared his knowledge of the flatboats he built for businessmen like Smith. From the forward deck, I could see the street becoming more crowded.

One thing happening on the street was artists from Music Resource Center performing original material. I briefly mentally questioned the presence of hip hop music in 1807 but quickly realized that the hip hop musical Hamilton is responsible for much of the current awareness of Alexander Hamilton and the man who shot him, Aaron Burr. In fact, singing karaoke versions of Hamilton tunes was one of the activities supported by the Music Resource Center but the signup sheet was still empty when I left. An area a little bit away from the landing was designated as dueling grounds and Nerf pistols were provided for anyone wanting to recreate the Hamilton-Burr encounter. Apparently, some did, as I found the pistols in various locations when I peeked in but I never caught an actual duel in progress.

Attendees could also increase their knowledge with trivia flip cards or a scavenger hunt-style bingo game and I saw quite a few people doing both. Questions on the flip cards were not Burr-specific but were generally focused on the early 1800s. Bingo game questions referred to various displays throughout the public landing area. I flipped a few cards but left the bingo competition to others. That’s why I still don’t know how much Hattie Calhoun paid to update her dress.