Tag Archives: History

Support Your Local Cryptid

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I can’t really claim to be a big supporter of cryptids of any sort but I can claim to support my local cryptids more than any of the others. I have taken a few pictures of Bigfoot signs and statues but I’ve never gone out of my way to do it, and I’ve never for a moment thought of going to Scotland solely to look for that critter reported to live in Loch Ness. I have, however, visited Point Pleasant, West Virginia, a couple of times primarily to admire the Mothman statue, and when I heard about the first-ever Frogman Festival, I figured attending it would just be proper. You can’t get much more local than a cryptid sighting a mile and a half from where I once lived and less than three miles from where I live now.

Some background, I suspect, might be in order. I’ll start with a definition. I now know what a cryptid is but I didn’t a few years ago and the word is not one I use daily. From Wikipedia: “Cryptids are animals that cryptozoologists believe may exist somewhere in the wild, but are not recognized by science. Cryptozoology is a pseudoscience, which primarily looks at anecdotal stories, and other claims rejected by the scientific community.” Mothman, which has been sighted about 120 miles from my home, is a cryptid and I believe the pictured inflatable is a representation. Here is a picture of a more solid, but not necessarily more accurate, rendition that’s in his hometown.

The Loveland Frog or Frogman is a cryptid that some cryptozoologists believe lives, or at least lived, in or near the Little Miami River around Loveland, Ohio. There are numerous descriptions floating around and even some reports of more recent sightings but essentially all descriptions mention sightings in 1955 and 1972. The creature is sometimes described as having webbed hands and sometimes as having human-like hands. Sometimes it’s very frog-like and sometimes it is basically a human with the face of a frog. Sometimes it’s about three feet tall but sometimes it’s closer to six feet. There are many other variations too. Legends and cryptids are often like that.

Vendors were a major part of the festival. It was announced at the start of the presentations that there were fifty-two vendors present representing twelve states. They filled the majority of the space offering clothing, books, games, a variety of craft items, and some really serious masks. Some very impressive works of art could also be found.

Here is an aspect of the festival that was a complete surprise to me. A company named MetaZoo was identified as the festival’s official sponsor. The name meant nothing to me but I soon learned that it is a gaming company and that a big tournament was part of the festival. I said that vendors had the majority of space but that’s because vendors were set up in the hallways. Space inside the main room was about evenly split between vendors and gamers. I don’t know much about the game itself but it looks like wizard hats, swimming goggles, and other paraphernalia could be important. I did learn from one of the people supervising the tournament that the play was one-on-one with winners advancing. The final rounds will be held at the tables with overhead cameras sending the action to the large screens. At the moment, all tables were being used so that random preliminary games were taking place at those tables.

I took in some but not all of the festival’s eight hours of presentations. The first picture is of one of the event’s organizers, Jeff Craig, introducing the first speaker. Dee Elliott talked about the effect of “hauntings” on three small West Virginia towns. Ashley Hilt’s presentation was entitled “Mothman” but it ended up touching on other sightings as well. I realize it looks like Mickey Mouse ears on the pair of audience members but they are actually frog eyes. Quite a few attendees were wearing frog eyes or something similar.

James Willis’ “Frogman of Loveland, Ohio” presentation was the main thing I wanted to see and I was certainly not alone. This was a standing-room-only presentation that was worth the price of addition. Willis dug into original police and newspaper reports to construct a rather thorough history of the legend. It’s the first time I’ve heard a version of this saga that makes sense.

The City of Loveland seems to have embraced its local cryptid. The picture at left was taken during the recent Hearts Afire weekend which I reported on here. That’s the city mascot greeting a young visitor on the bike trail.

I suppose it’s too early to know if this will become an annual event or was a one-time thing. It was clearly well-attended which I assume means it was a success. I had fun and learned more than I expected and will be on the lookout for a big festival or a big frog.

 

Book Review
Lost Treasures of Cincinnati
Amy E. Brownlee

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Amy E. Brownlee is a lifelong Cincinnatian. She naturally learned a lot about the city growing up here then used that knowledge and added much more during her ten years at Cincinnati Magazine. An awful lot of the treasures she writes about in Lost Treasures of Cincinnati were lost before she arrived but a rather frightening number have disappeared during her lifetime. Of course, an even larger number have disappeared during mine. Neither of us is responsible for that. I swear it’s coincidence pure and simple.

Lost Treasures of Cincinnati contains five major sections with several sub-sections in each. Most pages are split between two different lost treasures although more than a few treasures get a page all to themselves. Most descriptions are accompanied by images and these are usually of the actual treasure but there are exceptions to both. I believe that each treasure is described in a single paragraph although it is possible that an exception or two escaped me.

The book opens with “Food and Drink” in Section 1 then covers “Entertainment” and “Retail” in the next two sections. The smallest section, “Media”, is followed by the largest, “Community”. Definitions for those section titles are not particularly rigid and the size of the “Community” section probably indicates that it is the least rigid of all. It is where things like churches and breweries, of which Cincinnati had more than a few, appear.

Most, but not quite all, of the breweries mentioned in the book were gone before I got here. Likewise with restaurants and attractions which together comprise the biggest part of things that have disappeared during my lifetime. I caught one show, Hair, at the Shubert (“Entertainment”) before it was torn down. I also saw one movie at the Albee (“Entertainment”) but I don’t remember what it was. I had one meal each at The Gourmet Room and the Maisonette (“Food and Drink”) before they closed. There are quite a few places in this book where I ate one or more meals or watched one or more movies, plays, games, or concerts. Encountering each of them on these pages prompted memories that went way beyond the single paragraph of text. Reading about places that were already gone when I came to Cincinnati didn’t prompt any memories, of course, but it did make me appreciate just how many treasures have been lost.

I really enjoyed reading Lost Treasures of Cincinnati cover-to-cover front-to-back but as I did, two other ways of reading the book came to mind. With its fairly short standalone essays, it seems like a natural fit for that popular personal reading room with the porcelain furniture. Its use as a reference book also seems rather natural. I don’t mean an every-last-detail reference book to use in conducting deep-dive research but a great place to answer questions like “What was the name of that boat-shaped restaurant?” or “What happened to our NBA team?”. The full index will help the book play that role.

Lost Treasures of Cincinnati, Any E. Brownlee, Reedy Press (October 1, 2022), 6 x 9 inches, 192 pages, ISBN 978-1681063263
Available through Amazon.

Book Review
Cincinnati Curiosities
Greg Hand

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Greg Hand has been a man of letters — or at least a man of words — his entire adult life. He began as a newspaper reporter, moved up to editor, left to head up a university PR department, co-authored three books about the university while he was there, then retired. I was not even slightly aware of any of this as it was happening. I only became aware of Hand’s existence when I stumbled upon the blog he started post-retirement. His knowledge of local history and ability to dig up information to augment that knowledge was immediately apparent and I’ve been an ardent reader of that blog ever since that happy discovery. The blog’s name is Cincinnati Curiosities and it can be found here. That the blog would lead to a book by the same name seems pretty natural.

The book borrows more than its name from the blog. I recognize some of the book’s subjects from the blog and I suppose it’s possible that all have appeared there although I don’t believe that’s the case. Of course, there is a good chance that any topics appearing for the first time in the book will show up in the blog sometime in the future.

Cincinnati Curiosities (the book) begins with a definition of Cincinnati taken from Urban Dictionary. When I visited the source, I discovered that the definition was just one of more than forty that individuals have contributed. Most are simply excuses for hurling insults rife with misspellings and such but a few, including the one that Hand chose, make some attempt at being insightful. The Hand-picked quote begins, “A pleasantly bland and annoyingly conservative city…” Although there are some that disagree, I believe that’s a fair representation of the view that most non-residents (and many residents) have of Cincinnati. Hand goes so far as to state that, “We deserve this reputation.” Then, after agreeing that Cincinnati’s “bland” reputation is probably justified, he proceeds to show us that it wasn’t always so.

In fact, later in the book, Hand offers another very different capsulated view of the city. On December 12, 1890, he tells us, “The Palace Hotel had elephant steak on the menu because an elephant was executed by firing squad that morning at the Cincinnati Zoo. Hundreds of people watched. That pretty much summarizes Cincinnati in 1890.”

The book is not just some blog posts strung together. There are, in my opinion, two big differences between blog and book. One is simply the physical difference between holding a book and flipping through pages versus scrolling through items on a screen. The second is grouping. The book organizes the writings in groups so that a subject can be looked at from multiple angles or related stories can be read as a collection. The previous comment about the well-attended elephant shooting begins the chapter titled “The Sensational and the Senseless”. In addition to the tale of a pachyderm’s public demise, the chapter tells of the zoo’s annual Butcher’s Day, people leaping from bridges for profit, musclemen demonstrating feats of strength, and other assorted entertainments.

“The Sensational and the Senseless” is the fourth of ten chapters. Other chapters tell of monsters in the Ohio River (“The Old Weird Cincinnati”), Fanny Trollope’s visit during the “Porkoplis” period (“Tales From the Old City”), the possibility that striptease was invented in Cincinnati (“Freaks, Flesh, and Footlights”), and a large variety of other topics. The striptease claim is based on Millie De Leon’s orchestrated removal of several garters in 1901, and Hand cites the claim in suggesting that a Striptease Hall of Fame might be an “appropriate addition to our Over-the-Rhine neighborhood”. 

Hand’s usually light-hearted reports are often accompanied by contemporary illustrations. At left is a Pears Soap advertisement based on Lillie Langtry’s famous bath in Apollinaris water at Cincinnati’s Grand Hotel in 1883. It’s in the chapter titled “Nudity, Naughtness, and Negotiable Affection”, and if that doesn’t get you interested in the book I don’t know what will.

In addition to authoring this book and the aforementioned blog, Mr. Hand is a founder and mainstay of Stand-Up History which I reported on here. His stand-up presentations typically also fit in the Cincinnati Curiosities category. In a wonderful coincidence, the troupe is appearing at Muse Cafe on the same day that this review is being published. In a not-wonderful coincidence, I am committed to doing something else at the exact same time. Happily (for you, not me), my absence will mean more room for attendees. There is more info here.

Cincinnati Curiosities: Healing Powers of the Wamsley Madstone, Nocturnal Exploits of Old Man Dead, Mazeppa’s Naked Ride & More, Greg Hand, The History Press (November 14, 2022), 6 x 9 inches, 160 pages, ISBN 978-1467152822
Available through Amazon.

Stand Up History Live

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Historian Greg Hand and mixologist Molly Wellman dreamed up Stand-Up History a few years back but, due to a combination of ignorance and conflicts, it took me until January 2023 to actually make it to a performance. I liked the concept the instant that I heard of it, and the reality did not disappoint in the slightest. That January event was at the Muse Cafe on Harrison Avenue. The subject of this post, my second Stand-Up History experience, took place at the Mercantile Library in Cincinnati’s downtown. Not only would Molly be one of the evening’s presenters, she had made and was serving a big bowl of her Ginger Punch.

Stand-Up History is a wonderful learn-while-you-laugh program. As you no doubt guessed, the name came from “stand-up comedy”. In fact, searching for “stand-up history” will result in a bunch of links to the history of stand-up comedy pushing hits for this operation well down the list. The name isn’t all that’s borrowed, of course. A program consists of individuals standing up and talking. The subjects are all historical and the presenters are all experts but the presentations have a decidedly humorous focus and the subjects are chosen to assist in generating smiles, grins, chuckles, and guffaws. 

First up tonight was astronomer Dean Regas. Regas was also a presenter at that January show I attended. I’ve heard him on radio many times but that was my first time seeing him in person. Tonight’s topic was “How to Teach Grown-Ups About Pluto” which happens to be the name of Regas’ latest book.  It was a good use of his wonderful wit and his knowledge of both science and history.

Author and blogger Dann Woellert was up next with “Our Badass Sister of Charity and the Creation of Cincinnati Pizza Pie”. Sister Blandina Segale’s long life included serving her church in Colorado and New Mexico, dealings with a lynch mob and Billy the Kid, and establishing institutions such as Saint Rita’s School for the Deaf and San Antonio Parish in Cincinnati. One of the first places in America where pizza was served was at San Antonio festivals. It’s pretty amazing where the history of food will lead you if you let it.

As Cincinnati’s favorite mixologist, Molly Wellmann is an expert on the history of Cincinnati’s adult beverages and the places that served them. She sort of ventured out of her comfort zone tonight by telling the story of “How Hyde Park Became a Village Without Having a Tavern”. It was long ago annexed by the city of Cincinnati and now has taverns aplenty.

Greg Hand, of Cincinnati Curiosities, finished things up by poking holes in “Myths Cincinnatians Dearly Want to Believe”. There were myths about hills, chili, ketchup, and more. The final myth addressed was that Mark Twain quote about Cincinnati and the end of the world. “When the end of the world comes, I want to be in Cincinnati. It is always ten years behind the times,” has often been attributed to Twain but, as Hand pointed out, there is absolutely no evidence that he actually said it. I’ve always thought the quote presented Cincinnatians with a dilemma. On one hand, it’s kind of nice to have someone as famous as Twain notice your city but, on the other, very few people really want to live in a place that is ten (or, in some versions, twenty) years out of date. I don’t believe that Hand mentioned it but I’ve turned up a claim that the first reference to the quote in print was in 1978. A similar quote about the end of the world and Bavaria being fifty years behind appeared in print in 1886 and probably existed earlier. By 1978, Twain had been dead for 68 years and the Bavarian comment was 94 years old. That makes being one or two decades “behind the times” appear not so bad.

So here’s the whole crew including MC Mike Perrino in the middle of all the presenters. Having been founded in 1835, the Mercantile Library has lots of history. Perrino reminded us of that by noting that this was the 165th anniversary of an appearance by Herman Melville that local papers reported as “Earnest, though not sufficiently animated.” Tonight’s presenters seemed to be well aware of the importance of being animated. Some of them will be doing this somewhere on the third Thursday of every month for the foreseeable future. Next month, Molly, Greg, and Mike will be joined by Ann Senefeld at Muse Cafe. Details here.

Happy Imbolc Again

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I’ve made it known that I use canned posts when my world is “too busy or too boring for a current events piece”. Although my life was neither this week, the things that kept it from being boring were not the sort of things that make interesting reading. I was on the verge of scheduling a Trip Peek when I decided to instead reuse this article from 2016.

gknob2010Groundhog Day has long been one of my favorite holidays. In fact, attending America’s biggest Groundhog Day event in Punxsutawney, PA, was among the first things I did with the newly available time that retirement brought. The photo at right was taken at 4:58 AM, February 2, 2010. Sunrise was more than two hours away and the temperature was four degrees Fahrenheit. I had a good time and I’m glad I went but the experience did not lead to plans for an annual return. Standing outside in pre-dawn single-digit temperatures is something I prefer to discuss in past tense only.

I credited my original fondness for Groundhog Day to a belief that it had no religious connections and was basically folklore that had been adopted by some Pennsylvanians largely to promote silliness. While both of those claims are sort of true, there is more to it. I started to doubt the “no religious connections” when I discovered that America’s Groundhog Day shares its February 2 date with Christianity’s Candlemas. But sharing a date does not a connection make and there are no direct ties apparent between Groundhog Day and any of the three events (presentation of the child Jesus, Jesus’ entry into the temple, and Mary’s purification) Christians attribute to the day.

February 1 is also a day recognized by Christians. It is the day that Saint Brigid of Ireland is reported to have died and is celebrated as her feast day. Before Saint Brigid was born (in 451 they say) a Gaelic festival was celebrated about this time to honor a goddess also named, perhaps by coincidence though probably not, Brigid. I have to say “about this time” because man-made calendars had not yet taken over and feast days were not yet tied to specific numbers on pages. Brigid’s was associated with a point halfway between Winter Solstice and Vernal Equinox called Imbolc which happens near the beginning of what we call February. In 2016 it occurs at 4:30 EST February 4. (See 2023 comments at end of article.)

Without donut shops and corner diners, it isn’t clear where ancient Irish farmers gathered to talk about the weather but it’s a safe bet that they did. Around Imbolc, the coming spring would have been a big topic. Farmers without donut shops and cable television are quite observant of their environment and they no doubt noticed that bright clear days in the middle of winter were usually a little colder than cloudy ones. With Imbolc being the most “middle of winter” you can get, giving some special significance to the weather on that day was likely fairly natural. That’s about as close to science that the groundhog and shadow story gets.

I’m guessing that making a determination at sunrise was also fairly natural. Even if those early farmers were capable of determining Imbolc’s exact moment — and I’m not saying they weren’t — in those years when it did not occur during the daytime they weren’t about to get up in the middle of the night to see if the sun was shining. The crack of dawn probably seemed about right.

So there really are no direct connections between Groundhog Day and religion and there is plenty of silliness in its fairly recent (1887) use to bring fame to a small Pennsylvania town but its timing is firmly linked to the workings of the solar system and there is a tiny bit of logic in it being a day to make weather predictions. If nothing else, the days around Imbolc are most likely the coldest of the year meaning there’s a good chance that it’s all up-thermometer from here.

My 2010 Punxsutawney visit is here. I will, as usual, celebrate Groundhog Day on Tuesday by consuming pork sausage at some point. I have no plans to be awake at 4:30 Thursday to observe Imbolc.

I don’t know where I got the time and date for Imbolc 2016 but I know I did not calculate either. This year, my first searches turned up the date February 1 but no time was given. I decided to calculate it myself and came up with 11:48 GMT February 3. Of course, I initially doubted my math but quickly found reassurance at the Farmer’s Almanac that February 3 indeed is the midpoint of winter and eventually found support for that being the date of “Imbolc exact” in the Witches Astrological Calendar at Patheos. I cannot say for certain why so many sites give February 1 as the date but am guessing that some have decided that Imbolc is just another name for Saint Brigid’s Day. Regardless, I now have some confidence in my calculations being reasonably close and there is even a possibility that I’ll be awake when Imbolc 2023 rolls around (at 6:48 EST) with the previous day’s serving of pork sausage completely digested and sunrise not quite an hour away. 

Trip Peek #121
Trip #153
Kitty Hawk Holidays

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This picture is from my 2018 Kitty Hawk Holidays trip. It was a Christmas Escape Run so obviously the December 25 holiday was included but it started sufficiently early to include another holiday — the 115th anniversary of the Wright Brothers’ first flight on December 17. Stops on the way to Kitty Hawk, NC, included the National D-Day Memorial and Appomattox Court House. The anniversary was celebrated with ceremonies at Kill Devil Hill then I stuck around the area a couple more days in order to drive some of the Outer Banks Scenic Byway and check out other points of interest. Christmas was spent in Knoxville, TN, which I reached largely on US-64 and the Dixie Highway with several stops and side trips to Charlotte and Mount Airy. I reached home on December 27 following a last meal on the road at the since-closed Parkette Drive In in Louisville, KY.

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.

The House That Harry Built

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It had been several years since I last visited Chateau Laroche on the banks of the Little Miami River. I don’t know that I was ever what could be called a frequent visitor but I have been there quite a few times over the years. The first was in the mid-1970s and the last was, as I said, several years ago. Sometime last summer, when I realized just how long it had been, I decided I needed to stop by the well-known local landmark and have been waiting for an idle day with good weather. That combination finally appeared on the first Tuesday of October.

Chateau Laroche is more commonly known as the Loveland Castle. It is almost entirely the work of Harry Andrews who was born in 1890, began construction of the castle in 1929, and continued building until his death in 1981. I don’t know exactly when Harry moved into the castle but he had been living there for a long time — sleeping beneath the dome he happily reminded visitors had been declared impossible by professional architects — when I first met him.

Domed ceilings had been constructed entirely of stone hundreds of years in the past, Harry pointed out, and there was no reason they couldn’t be built today. He built this one by adding one row of stones per week. The office is where he did his writing and notarized signatures. It’s where one of my favorite Harry stories took place.

I’d used Harry to notarize a couple of car titles but this time I needed my signature notarized on an affidavit for some out-of-state legal difficulties. The castle website identifies Harry as the state’s oldest notary and claims he never charged more than a quarter. I don’t want to start an argument but I’m pretty sure he was charging fifty cents at the time of this 1978 visit. Four signatures were required and I handed Harry two dollars for his services. Having read over the affidavit and realizing that some sort of fine would be involved, Harry returned a dollar explaining that it looked like I was probably going to need some extra money.

The office and Harry’s living quarters are blocked off by gates and kept essentially as Harry left them. Much of the rest of the interior also looks pretty much the same as it did although it’s not maintained as fervidly as the personal spaces.

I was surprised to find a locked gate blocking access to the castle roof. The castle is owned and maintained by the all-volunteer Knights of the Golden Trail, an organization with origins in Sunday school classes Harry Andrews taught in the 1920s. There were about a hundred knights at Harry’s death. There are about three hundred today. Sir Fred and Sir Eric were working on the roof and explained that too many years of too many feet (“especially high-heeled shoes”) had created a crack and a leak that threatened the castle. They told me the crack was quite visible in the ceiling of the banquet hall (the room with the big table) and I checked it out when I went back down. Work is underway to seal the crack to head off further water damage but the roof will likely remain closed to the public permanently.

Protecting the structure is clearly of utmost importance but I was disappointed nonetheless. The rooftop deck was always a favorite spot of mine and was the scene of another Harry story. At the time, I lived just a few miles away and a neighbor’s truck-driving brother was visiting after dropping off a loaded trailer. For some reason, we decided to take his semi-tractor to the castle. For reference, it looked quite similar to this one that recently sold at auction. I rode in the middle of the cab and recall ducking reflexively as we approached low branches in the tall truck. We eventually ended up sitting on the castle rooftop chatting with Harry. The tractor could be seen from there and Harry asked just what that strange-looking vehicle was. “Why, that’s a White Freightliner”, its red-bearded owner proudly answered in his best West Virginia drawl.

With the castle’s tallest tower inaccessible, I grabbed a picture of the Knights of the Golden Trail logo from the balcony. Then, after exploring the garden area for a bit, I got a picture of the balcony itself.

The dungeon is actually reachable from inside the castle but the curved stairway is quite low and unwanted head-banging was all too common. Today visitors are encouraged to access the locked cell and its long-suffering occupant through an exterior door.

Steps leading from the castle to the road in front of it are currently closed so I walked up the road to take this picture. The archway marks the closed steps. The wide doorway beyond the steps is the garage. There can’t be very many castles around that were originally built with a garage. On the way back to the parking lot (nicely paved, BTW) I slipped down by the river to get the opening photo. Another memory l have is of canoeing past the castle and seeing it through the trees from a similar angle.

I was pleasantly surprised at the number of people touring the castle with me. At one point, I estimate there were as many as fifty curious folks exploring the building and grounds. Many were young homeschooled students from nearby. Apparently, even though the actual schooling takes place in small family units, much of it is somehow coordinated and medieval history is a common subject this time of year. Their parents were there, of course, and there were also several youngish couples without children including one I spoke with from Indianapolis. All seemed suitably impressed. The KOGT have done a fine job of taking care of Harry’s house and keeping it available to be appreciated by others.

Big Ol’ Ford Airliner…

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…did not carry me too far away but it did carry me nearly a century into the past.

In 1922, Henry Ford invested in the startup Stout Metal Airplane Company then purchased the entire outfit two years later. The most notable of numerous modifications made to Stout’s original design was the addition of two engines. Ford Tri-Motor production began in 1926 and ceased in 1933 which coincided almost exactly with the period when the Waco Model 10 was produced. There were several Model 10s present at the Waco Fly-In I attended a couple of weeks ago.    

Ford produced 199 Tri-Motors in a span of eight years. In one year less (1927-1933), Waco turned out 1,623 Model 10s. Both airplanes were civilian passenger planes and both were icons of the early days of human flight but similarities between the two don’t go far beyond that. The Ford was all metal while the Waco was mostly cloth-covered wood. The Waco was an open bi-wing with a compartment for two passengers positioned in front of one for the pilot. The Ford was totally enclosed with a pilot and co-pilot sitting ahead of, depending on model, up to seventeen passengers. With a stewardess often part of the crew, it is generally thought of as the first airliner. That these two aircraft were contemporaries and both highly successful is certainly food for thought.

As of Friday, I can list another difference between a Waco 10 and a Tri-Motor. I have never flown in a Waco. On Friday, I took a ride in a Ford Tri-Motor 5-AT-B at the Greene County Airport near Xenia, Ohio. As was the case with the subjects of a couple of last year’s adventures (Smooth As Glass and An Airy Plane Ride), I learned of the touring Tri-Motor through Brandi Betts’ Make the Journey Fun blog. Brandi flew in the plane during its Chillicothe stop and reported on it here.

I guess I was eager to fly like it was 1929 and arrived at the airport before the airplane was even rolled out of the hangar. While chatting with some of the event organizers, I was told it was OK to step inside the plane for some photos which is how I got these shots of the empty interior. Sharp eyes might notice that not everything is triplicated in the cockpit. Tachometers plus pressure and temperature indicators for the outboard engines are mounted on wing struts near the engines.

Before the day’s first flight, the Ford was taxied down the runway for refueling and I was able to watch the three radial engines fire up and the propellers start turning. The into-the-sun shot near the top of this post was also taken at the start of the gas run.

Shortly after the plane’s return, the first set of passengers was given a short briefing and permitted to board. Note that every seat is a window seat and every seat is an aisle seat. Six of the ten seats as well as the extra-charge co-pilot’s seat were occupied by males of a certain age. The other seats were empty.

Not only was every seat a window seat, the windows were real windows and not those too-low and too-small foggy portholes found in today’s airliners. It was even possible to look out the opposite side of the plane. Photos here are of the water-filled gravel pits northeast of the airport, OH-73 crossing Ceasars Creek Lake, and downtown Dayton from eight or ten miles away. Plus I got a pretty good look at the ground during our final bank to return to the airport,

Assuming the event is more heavily attended during the weekend, showing up on Friday morning worked out well in avoiding crowds. The downside was that I wanted to take photos of the next flight and I had to wait a while for it to fill. When it did, I again got to see those props start turning then watch the plane head into the sky.

Flights are about half an hour from engines on to engines off with fifteen to twenty minutes of that being airborne. Having waited to see the takeoff, it only made sense to wait for the landing.

The Transcontinental Ait Transport logo this plane now wears was also the one it wore first. The plane first flew on December 1, 1928, and became the property of TAT in January 1929. Its complete history is told here. The TAT story is a short but important one. Although crossing the continent was not accomplished entirely in the air, the company did put Ford Tri-Motors to work for about a year expediting travel between the coasts. Overnight trains were used to connect New York with Columbus, OH, and  Waynoka, OK, with Clovis, NM. Tri-Motors carried travelers between Columbus and Waynoka and between Clovis and Glendale, CA. The fare for a forty-eight-hour one-way trip was $352.

Rides will be available at the Greene County – Lewis A Jackson Regional Airport until 5:00 PM today (Oct 2, 2022) and at some other spots in Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky during the rest of October. Check it out here.

Three in a Row

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Life seems to always get busier as autumn approaches. That’s no doubt partly pure perception as we try to pack as much as possible into the last days of summer but it’s also partially real. Maybe event schedulers once avoided some conflicts by delaying things but there is a limit to how late in the year outdoor activities can be moved without a high risk of cold weather. This week found me participating in blog-worthy outings on three consecutive days. On Thursday, it was the Open Doors: Camp Washington- The Home of Makers walking tour. On Friday, I made it to the first day of Oktoberfest Zinzinnati and on Saturday, a friend and I attended the WACO Fly-In where the photo at right was taken.

The first stop on the Camp Washington tour was at the Crosley factory. An effort is underway to convert the place where radios and appliances were once manufactured into apartments but it has a long way to go. Camp Washington was once filled with factories, meat processing plants, and some oil storage. The 1937 flood damaged many buildings and most of those on Spring Grove Avenue were destroyed by a fire fed by oil floating on the flood waters. The middle picture is of the tallest building in the area to survive. The third picture is of the surviving office building of one of the meatpacking firms.

The only building we entered on the tour was the former hotel and bank that most recently housed US (Uncle Steve’s) Chili. It is now owned by the Cincinnati Preservation Association and slated for renovation. I’ve eaten breakfast and 4-ways here but had never been beyond the first floor. The tile (Rookwood?) fronted fireplace is on the third floor and I also got a shot of a neighbor from that floor. One of the things I remember about US Chili was a large petition calling for removal of the disrespectful (to George) mural seen in that overhead shot and from ground level here.

The tour had started at the American Sign Museum and would technically end there but it more or less disbanded at Valley Park where a farmer’s market was wrapping up for the day. I have driven by the park quite often and have noted its WW I monument but this was the first time I’d actually approached it.

Besides being the host and an interesting Camp Washington building in its own right, the American Sign Museum pulled signs from a pair of former Camp Washington businesses from the attic and offered up some musical entertainment. As marked by a reproduction sign on a parking lot wall, the museum building was once home to Fashion Frocks. I was well aware of that but had never seen any of their products. Tonight the museum had a frock and some advertisements (“Value Priced $7.98”) on display.

My guess that things might not be too crowded on Friday afternoon proved more or less correct. I grabbed a sausage sampler at Mecklenburg’s, a smoked mettwurst at Mick Knoll’s Covington Haus, and a Festbier from the “World’s Oldest Brewery”.

I caught lots of good German music but I didn’t catch any of the performers’ names.

I didn’t catch this guy’s name either but if it’s not Cincinnato Batman I’m going to be really disappointed.

 
 

My completely unqualified impression is that the WACO Fly-In had fewer total planes than usual and that a higher percentage of them were non-WACO but that a higher percentage of the WACOs were the real thing rather than modern reproductions. I also had the more reliable impression that the weather was perfect for the event.

The fly-in is a wonderful place to get up close and fairly personal — no touching — with some beautiful aircraft.

We had semi-intentionally timed our visit to include the Parade of WACOs which meant we got to see quite a few airplanes take off and land and sometimes pause for directions.

And cruise by at fairly low levels, too.
 
 
The WACO story is definitely an interesting one.  An onsite marker tells an extremely brief version with a whole lot more available at the museum website. Or you could probably learn a bunch chatting with this fellow at his color-coordinated airfield campsite. 

Sub Terrain and Marine

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This week my friend Terry and I succeeded in seeing something we’ve been talking about for quite a while. That something is in the picture at right. It’s the USS Cod moored in Cleveland, Ohio. We toured the retired WWII submarine on Tuesday after a leisurely drive to within striking distance on Monday. range the day before. That leisurely drive included a little sightseeing and something of an unplanned adventure.

We drove on “America’s Oldest Concrete Street” (1893) in Bellefontaine, then stopped at Indian Mill and crossed over the Parker Covered Bridge near Upper Sandusky.

I knew absolutely nothing about Seneca Caverns and Terry knew only that we would be passing nearby. Both of us thought it would be a nice diversion which is exactly the sort of thinking that can lead to, as it did this time, an unplanned adventure. The pictures here are of our guide Allie, a fairly rare horizontal section of the cave, and an elegant 1893 done-by-candlelight inscription.

Seneca Caverns is unique among Ohio show caves in being formed by an earthquake crack and by being maintained pretty much in its natural state which explains its nicknames of “Earth Crack” and “Caviest Cave in the USA”. These pictures show Terry and others descending one of the stairways made of natural stones, another natural stone stairway without people, and our farthest penetration (110 feet below the surface) into the cave.

After returning to the surface, we still had time to check out the cemetery for Confederate soldiers on Johnson’s Island and the nearby Marblehead Lighthouse before ending our day. Confederate prisoners, mostly officers, were kept on the island between April 1862 and September 1865. More than 200 died here and are buried in this cemetery. By the time we arrived, the lighthouse was closed for the day but we were not overly disappointed. Having just climbed up from 110 feet below the Earth’s surface, we didn’t feel a burning need to climb 50 feet above it.

Our short drive to the trip’s primary target was fairly wet but the rain was really letting up by the time we got there and we were headed inside anyway. The USS Cod was commissioned on June 21, 1943, and completed seven successful patrols before the war’s end. Following the war, she served a variety of training roles until 1971 when a group of Clevelanders campaigned to save her from being scrapped. The submarine was turned over to the civilian group in 1976.

Entry to the submarine’s interior is through a hatch in the forward torpedo room. Stepping back from the torpedo tubes shows folding bunks where crewmen sleep in the space between torpedos. The aft torpedo room is similarly equipped and there are other sleeping areas midship. Other necessities are nearby. The third picture is of the captain’s quarters showing that one’s concept of luxury clearly depends on perspective.

Red light is used to preserve sailors’ night vision and some sections of the Cod are illuminated in red to let visitors see what this was like. Submariners reportedly ate better than any other members of the military. Meals were prepared in this stainless steel galley and most were consumed here. Note the books and games stored near the tables and other entertainment was also available. Movies were sometimes shown in the dining area. One of the four 1,600 HP diesel engines is shown and there is a 500 HP auxiliary engine as well. These engines generate electricity which is stored in batteries to turn the propellers. Two stills at the front of the forward engine room provide fresh water for batteries, drinking, and other uses.

Visitors normally exit the USS Cod through a hatch in the aft torpedo room but that was closed because of the rain. We traveled back through the ship and where we had entered in the forward torpedo room. I exited first and got a picture of Terry climbing the ladder and another proving he made it out.

The fellow at the gate of the USS Cod suggested we walk over to the International Women’s Air & Space Museum which we took as permission to leave our car in the Cod’s parking lot while we did so. Amelia Earhart and Katerine Wright are among the many women honored with exhibits there.