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A group of people sitting in grass listening to a book reading

Hometown boy

In 1957, humorist James Thurber wrote to Columbus Dispatch writer and artist Bill Arter to discuss the future of the house where Thurber had been born.

Not a bad local legacy for a humor writer and cartoonist who frequently made his hometown and its inhabitants the butt of his jokes. In stories like “The Day the Dam Broke” and “University Days,” the good citizens of Columbus and its land grant college, Ohio State University, were often portrayed as naïve or foolish at best, bumpkins at worst. But overall, his portrayal was fond, says Leah Wharton, operations director at Thurber House. 

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A man standing with a dog in front of the Delaware County Water facility

A nose for flows

A dog’s sense of smell is thousands of times more sensitive than that of a human being. So-called cadaver dogs, for example (working dogs trained to detect human remains), can even locate a drowned victim whose body is still underwater.

“The first water-detection dog in the U.S. began working in Arkansas several years ago,” said Lohr. “That K-9 program proved so successful, and now there are a dozen or more such dogs scattered throughout the country.”  

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The original Carnegie building in Steubenville, Ohio

Landmarks, by the book

Among the many documents stored in the Archives Research Center at the Sandusky Library is a copy of a letter dated Oct. 7, 1899, and signed by Andrew Carnegie.

Carnegie, in fact, eventually became the wealthiest person in the world in his time, thanks to early successful investments in the railroad industry and building what eventually became U.S. Steel. And he followed through on his musing. Carnegie — and later his philanthropic foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York — gave away most of his fortune in his later years, spending much of it on free-to-the-people libraries.

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A group of people playing a gameshow-style game during a land cruise

Cruising for landlubbers

Vacation cruises are among Tom and Sally Davies’ favorite ways to relax. Three-day all-inclusive getaways with exceptional food, a variety of entertainment options, and lots of lounging by the pool while making friends with your fellow travelers — what’s not to love?

The land cruises “embark” about once a month, drawing landlubbers from throughout Ohio and neighboring states. Festivities commence on a Tuesday afternoon and continue through checkout the following Thursday morning.

There is no gangplank to negotiate and no required program on the proper way to use life preservers. Just belly up to the reception desk for colorful leis and the lanyards that serve as tickets for the duration.

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A painting of Constantine Rafinesque-Schmaltz

Remembering Rafinesque

Constantine Rafinesque-Schmaltz is the scientist you did not know that you knew. His walkabouts through Ohio impressed upon him a desire to discover more about plants and fishes and a prehistoric culture that predated him by millennia. 

The family moved to Italy to escape the terrors of the French Revolution. It was there that a self-educated Constantine came of age and took an ardent interest in natural history and languages, which would come to have its consequences in the names of organisms — through the eastern U.S., in Ohio, and even into the American Southwest. 

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Ohio State University's new dairy facility

On the moo-ve

Ohio State University’s herd of Jersey dairy cows will soon have a permanent new home. The cows, currently in temporary housing at OSU’s Wooster campus, should be back in Columbus in a new $6.2 million facility by the end of the year.

The dairy’s prime location just off of Lane Avenue, near the main entrance to the Columbus campus, reinforces the importance of agriculture to the university and the state, says Maurice Eastridge, senior associate chair of animal sciences and dairy extension specialist at Ohio State, and the new dairy was designed with education of students as the top priority. “Public education and research needs are its second and third missions,” Eastridge says.

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A woman using a hunting horn to call her hounds during a fox hunt.

Following the hounds

Ohio Cooperative Living outdoors editor W.H. “Chip” Gross spent a morning this past autumn observing a fox hunt with the 100-year-old Rocky Fork Headley Hunt in Gahanna, one of more than 100 such traditional foxhunting clubs throughout the U.S. and Canada.

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A mural in downtown Greenfield, Ohio

Throwbacks

“People call here thinking that we have the answer to every question,” Hunter says. “WVNU was the internet before the internet; for some around here, it still is the internet.” He reaches for a stack of papers, finds the report, and gives the caller the information.

It’s from here that WVNU, a tiny 2,300-watt radio station known as Lite 97.5, has been broadcasting adult contemporary hits from the second floor of a downtown office building for the last 30 years. 

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The unveiling of Wilson's new facility in Ada, Ohio

Super supplier

In the small Hardin County village of Ada, the play clock begins ticking about two weeks before the first snap of America’s most-watched sporting event. 

“As soon as they know who wins, they are making these balls and they are shipping them out,” says Lindsay Hollar, director of the Ada Area Chamber of Commerce. “The guys just want to get their hands on them.” Hollar doesn’t work for Wilson, but like lots of people in and around town, she speaks with a sort of proprietary pride about the local treasure that is the Wilson football. 

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