Features

The first Utopia

In the 1830s, our still-new republic was a land of religious chaos. New denominations arose and populist movements formed as some folks grew disillusioned with the status quo or frustrated by economic woes. 

It was with that as the setting that French philosopher Charles Fourier’s views on communal living began to gain popularity: that everyone should share equally in both the work and the wealth of a community. Fourier-inspired communes called phalanxes began to spring up from New York to Texas.

Classics

Stuffed animals

Bruns traces his fascination with the fantastical back to his 1970s childhood in front of the television, watching Leonard Nimoy host In Search Of..., the classic mystery documentary series that explored everything from UFOs to sea monsters. When he saw the original Star Wars — particularly the cantina scene, packed with alien faces unlike anything he’d ever seen — he was hooked.

“That ignited a fire in me,” Bruns says. “I’ve always had an interest in cryptids, UFOs, any kind of unexplained things. I guess it lends itself to this art form.”

Students enrolled in the departments of medicine at various Ohio medical schools soon discovered the answer to their quandary lay inside the gates of the local graveyards.

Heineman’s Winery

978 Catawba Ave., Put-In-Bay

Ohio State Parks earned the National Gold Medal Award for Excellence in Park and Recreation Management in 2025 — essentially the top honor a park system can earn — but Mertz knows there’s always room for improvement, and she says restroom facilities are low-hanging fruit.

“We want people to want to be in the outdoors,” Mertz says. “Fifty years ago [when many of the facilities were built], people’s expectations were different. Today, people have come to expect a higher level of accommodation.”

So — now that you’ve got the song ringing in your head — read on for the story of Dorothy Sloop.

Dorothy (known as “Dottie”) was born into a musical family in Steubenville in 1913. “Her grandfather owned a music store, and her father played the pump organ and was the theater organist for silent movies,” says her nephew, Fred Ruland of Marietta. 

Heilman manages nearly 800 hives, which he hires out to farmers. Half of his hives travel out of state, but he estimates his bees alone help Ohio growers produce
$10 million to $15 million worth of crops each year.

Oh, and by the way, those busy workers also make one of the more luscious food products on the planet. Heilman’s bees produce more than 35,000 pounds of honey annually.

ACCORDING TO A MAP from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, most of Ohio’s springs are in the southeast part of the state, with a fair number in central and southwest Ohio as well. Steven Lyon, an associate professor at the School of Environment and Natural Resources at Ohio State University, says they’re driven by the state’s geological history and the prevalence of limestone, sandstone, and shale. 

In 1774, the Ohio Country was a vast land populated by a host of Native American tribes, and the British Crown wanted to use it as feudal property — owned by the king — where occupants would pay a tribute to live there. A young Thomas Jefferson was having none of it. He penned a pamphlet denouncing the plan — he hated the thought that only aristocrats and kings and churches could own land in America. More on that in a bit.