Co-op People

When asked if he couldn’t just drop it off at a local garage and have them repair it, the veteran racer laughs. 

“No, this is the fun part,” he says. “At least most of the time, so long as you get to run them every now and then. I just enjoy building this stuff.”

Pence’s Concessions originated in 1902, when Michael’s grandfather, Clarence Pence, started selling popcorn and peanuts from a pushcart at state fairs. Michael’s father, Don Pence, continued the business in home-built trailers that he towed to fairs and festivals. “My dad didn’t get a manufactured trailer until 1957,” recalls Michael. “I still have that trailer, but it doesn’t travel anymore because we use it for making candy.” In the 1980s, Michael decided to make the company’s concession trailers pink and green.

Some miniaturists buy completely finished items when they want to furnish a dollhouse or display. Other collectors buy furniture and other items from kits so that they have the fun of doing the craft and painting it however they wish. 

The dollhouses that miniaturists enjoy furnishing are very different from dollhouses made for children. They are smaller and constructed to exact scale, and the furniture and other decorative items placed inside are too small and too expensive for children to play with. 

Multigenerational

Rick Moore is the seventh generation in his family to raise sheep at Cottage Hill Farm near Cadiz in Harrison County. The farm began as a land grant signed by James Madison in 1816. 

Moore’s son Steven and his father, Stanley — still active at 88 — farm with him. The foundation of Moore’s flock is 250 purebred Merino ewes. In alternating years, some are bred to purebred Merino rams and continue the line of high-quality wool production, while others are crossed with other breeds to produce lambs for meat.

The Batdorfs started Red Barn Catering in 1998, working from the back of a pickup truck stacked with coolers, grills, and cooking utensils. One of their early engagements had them preparing 77 customer appreciation lunches for Ebberts Field Seeds, down the road from their Miami County farm. They still work that lunch, but today, the number of lunches they produce for the annual event has grown to about 630.

“We definitely needed something more than a pickup truck bed,” Tawni Batdorf says with a chuckle. “We needed a place out of the rain and the sun and a place to wash dishes.”

It was the pandemic that moved him to action. “I was just sitting around, getting outside, kind of bored,” he says. “We have a lot of space out here, and I started thinking I ought to put in a memorial for my buddies who didn’t make it back.”

And so, he did. With the help of landscapers, stonemasons, contractors, and monument-makers, Snyder funded and built an impressive military memorial right in his backyard. 

A cria is a baby alpaca, and the farm’s name was inspired by the couple’s years of alpaca industry experience. They acquired their first alpacas in 2006 and soon began breeding and showing the animals at fairs with help from their son, Jessie, who is now 20 and an aviation technology student at Sinclair Community College. Alpacas don’t shed, so Robbie and Carrie became adept at shearing. 

Bihn, a former high school teacher and a member of St. Marys-based Midwest Electric, heads a family business known as Our Fathers Food, which uses a patented technique for preparing organic grain and seed for human consumption that yields unlimited shelf life without chemicals, preservatives, enrichments, or nutrient loss.

Situated along a rural road about 30 miles north of Columbus, Groovy Plants Ranch is a 5-acre complex where Jared and his wife, Liz, grow and sell plants that they ship to customers around the world. It opened in 2016, but Jared began cultivating the business in his late teens while studying landscape design at Columbus State Community College and working at a Delaware County greenhouse. “I started growing succulents in my room because they’re easy to care for and propagate,” Jared says. “It was a side hustle to earn extra Smoney.”

ASD is a lifelong condition that affects one in 54 people. Symptoms vary but can include trouble communicating, repeated rocking, and strong reactions to sounds, scents, or tastes. It’s common for an autism diagnosis to include other disorders, such as epilepsy, obsessive-compulsive disorder, ADHD, and bipolar disorder. Depending on the severity of someone’s symptoms, it can be difficult to hold a conversation, maintain a friendship, or keep a job.