Craig Springer

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.

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.

It read, in part, “As the Love of Liberty, and Attachment to the real Interests and just Rights of America outweigh every other Consideration, we resolve that we will exert every Power within us for the Defence of American Liberty, and for the Support of her just Rights and Privileges; not in any precipitate, riotous, or tumultous Manner, but when regularly called forth by the unanimous Voice of our Countrymen.”

In today’s parlance, it might be described as a challenge to “fool around and find out.”

The colorful northern cardinal lives over the entirety of Ohio, and that alone is reason enough for the state legislative assembly to name it the official state bird.  There are other meritorious reasons that call forth warm approval and high regard. 

If you need a reminder that the world is held together by stone, then consider Ohio’s basement. You cannot see it except in the long strands of bored-out cores that have been extracted from hundreds of feet below the earth’s surface. The basement is composed of sedimentary rock, settled and compressed at the bottom of what was once a deep ocean. That bedrock dates to about 570 million years ago, geologists say. It’s called Cambrian period stone, named after Cambria (which is now called Wales), where the stone type was first described and given a name around 1835.

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. 

Like the Christmas celebration itself, hanging mistletoe in your house is rooted in ancient tradition. But before we get to that, it’s worth noting that mistletoe has no real roots — it’s a parasite, making its way in life by living off of rooted trees. “Mistletoe makes its own sugar, but poaches water from trees,” says Savannah Ballweg, who manages the Miami University botanical conservatory in Oxford.

According to Ballweg, Ohio is home to one species of mistletoe: American mistletoe, also known as oak mistletoe, found mostly in the southern part of the state.

You might have seen a service flag: a blue star (or stars) on a field of white, surrounded by a red border — hanging in the picture window of a seemingly random home in the neighborhood or in a shop window of a downtown building. But many folks might be unaware, or at least unsure, of its significance.

That’s why they are also known as harvestmen — for their gregarious nature at harvest time. They live throughout Ohio, on the farm, in the forest, in the suburbs, in your gardens, and in every corner of every city. And they are good to have around.

More than 2,400 species of fireflies exist around the globe, including about two dozen that make a home in Ohio. Fireflies, or lightning bugs as some people call them, are not flies at all, but beetles characterized by heavily armored shells over wings. 

When they take to the wing, they move about as though they carry a heavy load; speed through the air is not a defense mechanism. Heck, they advertise their whereabouts, from just above the grass to chest-high to weaving through the treetops, for any would-be predator to swoop in and make them a snack.