Tag Archives: Cincinnati Ohio

Book Review
Christmas in Cincinnati
Wendy Hart Beckman

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This History Press publication, as is their standard formula, is built around lots of photos both old and new. In this case, a few of those photos are mine. I won’t pretend that isn’t what made me aware of the book and triggered this review but will point out that the book does fit handily into the local-author-local-subject category that I’m fond of talking about. The local author, Wendy Hart Beckman, isn’t a native Cincinnatian but has spent much of her adult life here. I’m thinking that her New England background might actually help in recognizing what is unique or even just a little different about Christmas in Cincinnati.

As befits a book from The History Press, the first section of this book following the introduction is named “History” and notes that the very first celebration of the holiday in what would become Cincinnati occurred way back in 1788. Christmas is technically a Christian holiday, of course, and this chapter includes the history of the early days of the churches and the religion itself in the city. With Christmas being the only federal holiday with religious connections, I’ve often wondered why and when that happened but never got around to digging up the answer. Beckman answers the “when” question by writing that President Grant made it an official federal holiday in 1870. Ohio had made it official in 1857. Guess I’ll have to learn why on my own.

What follows is five chapters devoted to our five basic senses. There is a considerable amount of history presented in each of those too. But you knew that without me saying it. The reason you knew that, is because, like me, you instinctively knew that this book was about Christmas traditions and traditions are just an ongoing form of history. So, as Beckman informs us of “Things to Do”, “…Hear”, “…See”, “…Smell”, and “…Taste”, she presents the history of those things along with some guidance on how to experience them ourselves.

“Things to Do” in Cincinnati around Christmas time include skiing, sledding, and ice skating on Fountain Square. Shopping and visiting Santa in the numerous downtown stores was once a major draw in the days leading up to the holiday but the stores and the shoppers slipped away to the suburbs some time back. In 2020, COVID-19 nearly put a stop to in-person shopping anywhere and only time will tell if it ever fully returns. The same is true of sitting on jolly men’s laps. Beckman includes “Donating” among things to do and writes about several Cincinnati signature campaigns like the Ruth Lyons Children’s Fund and Neediest Kids of All.

Starting with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, there is no shortage of “Things to Hear” in Cincinnati. Beckman identifies many musical organizations, both professional and amateur, that offer Christmas-themed performances around the holidays. In addition to the many local groups, she mentions the Trans-Siberian Orchestra whose Decemberish visit has become something of a tradition over the last twenty years.

There are indeed plenty of things to do and hear in Cincinnati but there are even more “Things to See”. Beckman lists many Nativity scenes and light displays including some at private residences that have become must-sees over the years. The Cincinnati Zoo’s “Festival of Lights” and the tree on Fountain Square are in that must-see category. What might be considered the big three of Cincinnati Christmas events are on Beckman’s “Things to See” list. The oldest is Boar’s Head and Yuletide Festival which has been celebrated in Cincinnati since 1939. That’s clearly long enough ago to qualify as a true tradition but the festival’s history goes back another 600 years in England. Number two is The Nutcracker which the Cincinnati Ballet Company has been doing since 1974. The newest of the three is Playhouse in the Park’s production of A Christmas Carol which dates to 1991.

Only two categories of “Things to Smell” are identified by Beckman but each has quite a few entries. The “Freshly Cut Trees” category includes wreaths and garlands but if you want a serious grade A freshly cut aroma you need to do the cutting yourself and more than a dozen places offering that experience are listed. The second category is “Family Dinners” and only scents, not locations, are listed.

Good flavor is often advertised by a good aroma so it isn’t surprising that the word “family” reappears in “Things to Taste”. “Family Affairs” talks about some of the feasts of Christmases past. Some restaurants are also mentioned in the “…Taste” chapter but it was photos and descriptions of Cincinnati’s bakeries, candy shops, and ice cream parlors that got my taste buds’ attention. If you want to talk about tradition, how about a company (Doscher’s) that has been making candy canes since 1871?

For the history buff, Christmas in Cincinnati provides a good look at how Cincinnatians celebrated Christmas in the past. Perhaps more importantly, though, it identifies pieces of those celebrations that have become Queen City traditions and offers some guidance in how to participate in those traditions in the future.

Christmas in Cincinnati, Wendy Hart Beckman, The History Press (October 18, 2021), 6 x 9 inches, 160 pages, ISBN 978-1467148313
Available through Amazon.

Musical Review
Need Your Love

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Back in 2015, I attended a reading of KJ Sanchez’s Cincinnati King in Washington Park and wrote about it here. Three years later, I saw it performed at Playhouse in the Park and wrote about that here. At the time, I really expected that I would next encounter the name KJ Sanchez when Cincinnati King opened in another theater in another city. That hasn’t happened yet — although I very much believe it should — so my next Sanchez encounter was back at Playhouse in the Park where her second play with King Records connections is now playing.

Cincinnati King is the story of King Records told through three main characters. There are other cast members but company founder Syd Nathan, long-time session drummer Philip Paul, and star recording artist Little Willie John are all that Sanchez needed to paint her King Records picture. Her latest play is about just one member of that trio and she is every bit as efficient this time out as last. If three characters can tell the story of a large record company, how many are required for a single artist?.

For KJ Sanchez, the answer is one. I first realized that Need Your Love is essentially a one-man play while reading the program in the playhouse lobby before the show. I say “essentially” only because the four-piece band is an integral part of the performance, is always on stage, and occasionally interacts with the only cast member. But that cast member, Antonio Michael Woodard, speaks every line, sings every song, and dances every step. OK, technically — and only technically — that “speaks every line” claim isn’t entirely true but it is impossible to watch Woodard’s performance and not be impressed with the collection of talents he brings to the production.

The band’s performance was also impressive. Half of the quartet, drummer Richard Huntley and bassist Terrell Montgomery, were also part of the Cincinnati King combo. Pianist Ian Axness and guitarist Joel Greenburg may have missed Cincinnati King but they are hardly rookies. The group convincingly delivered a variety of styles. Naturally, “Fever”, John’s biggest hit, is included in the show’s thirteen songs as is his first King release, “All Around the World”. They supply a glimpse of Jack White’s somewhat edgy cover of “I’m Shakin'” then follow it with the original Little Willie John R & B version. The title inspiring “Need Your Love So Bad” is there too, of course. 

The technicality that results in Woodard not quite speaking every line is one of the production’s coolest features. Syd Nathan, who died in 1968, recorded some instructions about how King Records should operate. At several points in the performance, excerpts from those recordings and possibly others are played from off stage. Sometimes the on-stage Willie John sort of has a conversation with the disembodied voice. This isn’t an attempt to pretend that a living Syd and Willie are chatting in the 1960s. The play’s setting is the empty King Records building in Cincinnati. The time is now. It opens with a group of musicians entering the building for a not exactly kosher jam session. Something about the old building transforms the group into Little Willie John and friends and the music begins to flow. It is, I suppose, the spirits of Little Willie John and Syd Nathan having those conversations.

It was an all-around great performance and it was KJ Sanchez’s script that enabled it. Regrettably, I cannot praise the script quite as freely as the performance. Little Willie John’s life certainly had its ups and downs and its ending was truly tragic. There is little doubt that racial prejudice affected his treatment in prison and probably in the courts. It is entirely possible that John was quite innocent of the crime for which he was enprisoned. There is, however, room in the real world for doubt but little such room to be found in Need Your Love. Some of those rough spots in John’s life were his own doing. He had some problems with alcohol and drugs and even his temper. Sanchez did not omit these from Cincinnati King and I don’t believe they made me any less angry about the injustice John encountered. For some reason, though, those things seem to be missing from Need Your Love.

Sanchez made contact with Willie John’s sister Mable during the writing of Need Your Love. Mable had her own musical career both as a solo artist and as a Ray Charles Raelette. Now 91, she recorded some remembrances of her brother that are played near the end of the show to further dilute that “speaks every line” claim. It was a real surprise and a nice touch. It even occurred to me that Sanchez may have left out alcohol and drug references to keep Willie’s image a little cleaner for sister Mable. If so, I guess I can live with that.

Need Your Love wraps up its run at Playhouse in the Park on December 12.

A Hanukkah Drive-Thru

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I’m not really sure what to think about Rockwern Academy’s drive-through Hanukkah display. On one hand, this new addition to Cincinnati’s holiday attractions is clearly making a lot of people happy. On the other, it is a little sad to see what seems to be one religion feeling compelled to compete with another. Of course, it could just be an example of a religion making a small concession to the modern world. Let’s go with that. It’s way too easy to overthink the whole thing. 

As I pulled into the display on Monday, a greeter offered some guidance and tips such as turning off headlights. She also held up a big QR code to help connect a smartphone to the school’s website and a soundtrack. The connection can also be made by manually entering the site’s address. The soundtrack is a brief introduction followed by recordings of students singing a number of Hanukkah songs. I scanned the QR code, connected my phone to the car’s sound system, and entered the display surrounded by happy young (the school is K-6) voices. I’m sure the owners of some of those voices appear in the slideshow of school scenes projected on a large screen near the beginning of the display.

The display is believed to be a first for Cincinnati. There is online evidence that something similar existed in nearby Dayton, Ohio, last year but that seems to have been a one-time pandemic-inspired thing. The folks at Rockwern say theirs will be back bigger and better next year.

I’ve never been Jewish although I once claimed to be 1/8 Jewish because my wife was 1/4 Jewish. I really don’t know much about Jewish traditions. I did know that Hanukkah celebrates a lamp’s one-day supply of oil lasting for eight days back in 3622 (139 B.C.E.). And I did know that the celebration lasts for eight days with a candle being lighted on each of those days. I even knew that those candles were held by something called a menorah but I did not know that menorahs come in two configurations. A Hanukkah menorah holds nine candles. The center candle is used to light the others, which represent the eight days of miraculous lamplight.

As I poked around the internet while writing this, I was seriously confused by the seven candle menorahs I saw. I’ve certainly seen plenty of them in the past but they just hadn’t registered. The seven candle menorah predates the miracle of the oil. If there was ever a single universally accepted explanation for its seven branches, it seems to have been lost to history. I’ve found references to the seven days of creation, the seven days of mourning associated with a death, and (from pre-telescope days) the five planets plus the earth and moon.

I also noticed what I thought was a significant number of bears in Hanukkah-related images. Almost all are the cuddly Teddy Bear type like in the opening photo. The internet was of no help in explaining then so I asked a Jewish friend. She knew of no official connection and theorized that their popularity might be due to being able to dress them like humans in displays such as this. It’s possible, we decided, that the whole thing just might be a Build-A-Bear scheme to increase the holiday market for their product.

Even though today, December 5, is the final day of Hanukkah 2021, the last chance to experience the display was last night. The first was last Sunday meaning that not one of this blog’s regular Sunday morning posts occurred during the event. If you missed it because you’re depending on me for Jewish holiday alerts, you are clearly meshuggah.

Santa Claus Is Climbing to Town

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The title of this post is based on accepting that people climb down as well as up and that rappelling is a member of the climbing family. That’s because rappelling from the top of a twenty-three-story building is how the man in red entered Cincinnati last night. And that’s how he intends to enter the city every Saturday night from now until his other job has him busy all night long on the 25th. The daring drop is part of an event called Downtown Dazzle.

I reached Fountain Square with enough time before Santa’s arrival to walk a half-block one direction for dinner and a half-block in the other direction for a beer. Between the two, I snapped a picture of the city’s 56 foot Christmas tree which was officially lighted in a ceremony just yesterday.

There was a time when the Christmas tree really dominated Fountain Square during the holiday season. It still dominates the view from outside the square but it’s the skating rink that dominates the square itself. There has been a rink on the square since 2006 but it grew in size a few years ago. Last year, bumper cars were added and they’re back again this year. I was hoping to get my first look at the cars but, although they had operated earlier in the day, they were parked for Downtown Dazzle and 100% of the rink was available to skaters.

At a few minutes past 7:00, we were alerted to some “breaking” (but not very shocking) news. Reporters appeared on the square’s giant TV describing a UFO of some sort circling around downtown Cincinnati. When it was thought to have landed, searchlights played over several nearby buildings trying to locate the craft or its occupants. Three figures were soon spotted on top of the Huntington Center, and we all got to watch one reindeer, one Santa, and one elf descend to a much lower rooftop.

The instant that the trio reached the target roof and disappeared from sight, the first volley of fireworks exploded. For roughly twelve minutes, the Genius of Water and the Carew Tower were illuminated by the rockets’ red (and other colors) glare. Pretty cool! Be there at 7:00 PM on each of the next three Saturdays for more breaking news.

Although I had photos in hand, I did not identify my dinner spot when I mentioned it above. That was partly because it did not fit with describing the Dazzle and partly (maybe mostly) because I wanted to finish the post and go to bed. Now that deadlines are past and I’m no longer dozing off, I’m tacking it on.  Hathaway’s Diner has been operating in Cincinnati since 1956 but it wasn’t here. It was semi-deep inside the Carew Tower with no windows. The current owner has described it as a cave and I can’t disagree. It nearly closed in 2019 but a renegotiated lease kept it going. Then, just last month, they moved into a spot vacated by Frisch’s. It’s still in the Carew Tower but it now has windows and an entrance right on the street. There is also an entrance from inside the tower and that’s how I arrived. I exited directly to the street where, despite the chilly temperature, the diner was going hatless. I’d only eaten breakfast at the former location but went for a very good patty melt on my first time at the new, more visible and convenient, spot. I’ll be back. Probably for breakfast.

Heritage Village Cincinnati

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Friday felt a little odd. It had absolutely nothing scheduled but it was surrounded by days that did. Noting strenuous or even particularly time-consuming, but there were meetings and appointments with specific times that had to be attended to. It would seem logical, I think, to want to just sit around the shanty on that uncommitted day, and that’s probably what I would have done if the day hadn’t promised sunshine and 80 degrees. I know it was my awareness that there would soon be a huge gap between 80 degree days that made me want to avoid wasting this one. I went out to breakfast at a place a little farther away than normal and which I hadn’t been to in a long time. Over a goetta and cheese omelet, I pondered ways to put the day to use. Museums weren’t high on my list because I did not want to spend a lot of time indoors, but I eventually used “museum” as an internet search term and got a near-perfect hit. Heritage Village Museum & Education Center is definitely a museum. It says it right there in the name. But it also says it’s a village which means there is some open space. It really did seem to be exactly what I was looking for.

It wasn’t far from the restaurant where I was eating, so I simply headed directly there when I was done. As I approached the building where admission fees are collected, I passed a sign stating that guided tours were scheduled for 10:00, 12:45, and 3:00. It was about 10:30. Inside the building, I joked that I’d timed my arrival quite badly for a guided tour. The attendant agreed and added something about the last one being yesterday. I eventually figured out that guided tours are given May through September, and that she meant the last one for the year. It was October 1. I somehow felt less foolish missing a tour by a day than by half an hour. I paid my admission. received a self-guided tour brochure, and set off to guide myself.

The first building encountered was also the first building moved into the village. Elk Lick House was from a spot in Clermont County that is now covered by East Fork Lake. The Chester Park Train Station and Crossing Tender’s Booth came from Winton Place across Spring Grove Avenue from Chester Park racetrack and amusement park. The McAlpin’s clock is one of the few things in the village I remember in its original location. It stood in front of the store on Fourth Street from 1992 to 1999. It was actually the fifth clock to stand there with the first four falling to “the elements and traffic mishaps”.

The Fetter Store came from what is now known as Owensville in Clermont County. It was built around 1866. Dr. Langdon’s Office was moved here in 1973 from the Linwood section of Cincinnati. Preparations for Halloween and trick-or-treating were in evidence behind the doctor’s office as well as in that tender’s booth back at the train station.

Myers Schoolhouse is the newest addition to the village and is actually still in the process of being restored. It was moved here in 2008. Its official name was Delhi Township District School #3. It was in use as a school from 1891 until 1926 when Delhi Township consolidated all of its schools.

After reaching the schoolhouse and turning around, the first building encountered is the Somerset Church. The Presbyterian church was built around 1829 and, until it was moved to the village in 1991, stood near Fields Ertel and Montgomery roads less than a mile from where I currently live. Next to the church is the Kemper Log House and a reproduction of its stone kitchen. The house that Rev. James Kemper built in 1804 is the oldest structure in the village. It originally stood near where Cincinnati’s Eden Park is today.

The Hayner House is both the beginning and end of the tour. It was built near South Lebanon in the 1850s. In the village, it faces Sharon Creek as it once faced the little Miami River. The entrance to the museum and gift shop, where tour tickets are purchased, is on the other side of the house. A glance down while walking between the creek and the house can provide a reminder as to just which state you are in.

Music Hall Inside and Out

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I recall that at some point during the COVID-19 “shutdown”, outside tours of Cincinnati’s Music Hall became available and I had every intention of joining one. I do not recall why I didn’t. I finally made it on Saturday but by then, inside tours were also available so I did one of those on Friday. I’m no stranger to the 144-year-old building and even posted some 100% layman-type commentary on the place before and after its recent renovation: A Pre-Refurb Peek at Music Hall and A Post-Refurb Peek at Music Hall. But what little I did know about the building came purely from attending events there so I learned plenty from both tours.

Much of Friday’s tour was through public spaces I was fairly familiar with but which I’d never seen without a crowd of concertgoers. The statue of Reuben R. Springer is in the main lobby. Springer donated the majority of the money to construct the Samuel Hannaford designed building that replaced a tin-roofed wooden structure on the site. During the 2016-17 renovation, the solid wood doors across the front of the building were replaced by glass doors that really brightened up the lobby. Two of the original doors now stand behind each of the two bars in the corners of the lobby.

The main performance space is named Springer Auditorium and I’ve been inside it quite a few times. That includes once since the big renovation so I was aware of improvements like the wider seats and overhead acoustic panels. I was not, as a certain cinematic scientist might say, shivering with anticipation when we entered but maybe I should have been. I knew that the 1,500-pound Czechoslovakian chandelier was lowered and cleaned on a regular basis and was even vaguely aware that it happened every two years but I had no idea that one of those cleanings was currently in progress. Seeing all that crystal at eye level with the ceiling images unblocked was probably the day’s personal highlight for me.

We did get into some non-public spaces I’d never seen before. One of these was the huge backstage area with a glimpse of the main stage through a narrow opening. Another was the north hall which was originally built for industrial exhibitions but which became an athletic venue at some point. It was here that Ezzard Charles won many of his fights on the way to becoming World Heavyweight Champion and where the Cincinnati Bearcats played basketball in the 1940s. Cincinnati Gardens effectively took over the job of hosting Cincinnati’s athletic events when it opened in 1949. This is where I took the picture of the handpainted Music Hall that opens this article.

Friday’s last stop was the upper floor of the south hall. The south hall had been built as a place for agricultural exhibits. With its glass roof, it functioned as the city’s horticultural showplace until Krohn  Conservatory opened in 1933. Since then, it has served as a nightclub and dance hall in various forms and today is often rented out for private functions. I have been here a few times but only when it was jam-packed with people.

There were, of course, no non-public spaces on Saturday’s outside tour and I don’t believe I actually saw anything that I had not seen before. I did, however, learn quite a bit and now see some things differently. I know I’ve heard the architectural style described and may have even heard some form of the name our guide used; High Victorian Gothic Revival. But I don’t recall ever hearing the idiom he shared: “stripes and spikes”. He attributed this to an architecture critic of the day and it certainly seems to fit.

The south hall is marked with leaves and flowers to match its agricultural purpose while the north hall’s industrial connection is indicated by gears and mallets. Musical lyres adorn the central building.

The main building displays its year of completion if you can sort the digits into the right sequence. The two side buildings were completed during the following year. The fronts of all three were constructed with glazed bricks brought from Philadelphia and Zanesville. Some of these were then black coated on site. The rear portion of the buildings used less expensive local bricks and some additional money may have been saved by not paying someone to shuffle the build date.

Music Hall is close to downtown Cincinnati and I used the tours as an excuse to eat at a couple of favorites I don’t get to all that often. Friday’s tour was in the afternoon and I stopped by Camp Washington Chili on the way home but took no pictures. Saturday’s tour was in the morning and I headed to the Anchor Grill for breakfast. I did not intend to take pictures there either, but a banner in the parking lot changed my mind. Anchor Grill survived the worst of the pandemic on carryout so I checked before I went, and was happy to see they were now allowing dining-in. Apparently, they’ve been doing it since May, and that’s when the actual 75th anniversary was, too. I really should have been paying attention.

In my experience, the Band Box isn’t played much but almost as soon as I got my order in today, the curtain opened and the music began. It was still going when I left with the animated dance orchestra performing a non-stop medley of brokenhearted country love songs. I thought that was really special. And eating in restaurants older than me two days in a row is pretty special too.

The Berlin Masterpieces in Cincinnati

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This post’s title is a take-off of the title of an exhibit at the Cincinnati Art Museum the full and accurate title of which is Paintings, Politics and the Monuments Men: The Berlin Masterpieces in America. At the heart of the exhibit is the story of a wildly popular, though somewhat controversial,1948 tour of paintings with its own title: Masterpieces from the Berlin Museums. The tour did not reach Cincinnati although two of the fourteen cities it did reach, Cleveland and Toledo, were in Ohio and there is a major Cincinnati connection.

The picture of General Eisenhour looking over some of the paintings that the Nazis had hidden away is at the entrance to the exhibit. On the other side of the wall it is mounted on, there is a timeline of the Nazis’ rise and fall that ends with the Masterpieces from the Berlin Museums tour. Two items from late 1943 are “Allies invade Italy”, in September, and “Monuments, Fine Art, and Archives section (Monuments Men) of the U.S. Army is established”, in December. The Monuments Men (the subject and title of a 2014 movie) set out to locate and protect artworks at risk of being destroyed by the Nazis.

Thousands of items were located, some in a large salt mine, and brought together at Wiesbaden, Germany. This is where the Cincinnati connection comes in. The director of the Wiesbaden Central Collecting Point was Cincinnatian Walter I. Farmer. By itself, his work in documenting pieces of art and preparing them for return to their owners would have been noteworthy but there was something more.

When he became aware of plans to ship a large number of paintings to the U.S. for safekeeping, Farmer organized thirty-two Monuments Men to produce the Wiesbaden Manifesto which protested what Farmer feared was “spoils of war” type treatment of the European treasures. Smithsonian Magazine calls this “the only act of protest by Army officers against their orders during the entirety of the Second World War”. Although it was eventually published, the manifesto was initially suppressed by Farmer’s superiors. The paintings were shipped to the National Gallery in Washington, DC, and placed in storage. As plans formed to return the paintings to Germany, it was decided to put them on display before their departure. An exhibit at the National Gallery was so popular that the U.S. Congress took notice and actually legislated the tour of thirteen additional museums. All 202 paintings were returned to Germany at the conclusion of the tour. 

Photos of “The Berlin 202” are displayed on a wall near the center of the exhibition. Four of the actual paintings, on loan from the State Museums of Berlin, are on display. The exhibit is fleshed out with other paintings in CAM’s possession by some of the artists contained in the 202. Paintings, Politics and the Monuments Men: The Berlin Masterpieces in America runs through October 3, 2021.

Cincy Burger1/2Week

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The first day of this year’s Cincinnati Burger Week was basically over before I got back into town and I spent the second day otherwise engaged. It was Wednesday before I made my first CBW 2021 stop but I still managed to equal last year’s number of new-to-me ‘burger joints (3) along with one repeat. 2020 saw my first visit to the lone repeat so it was an almost-new-to-me burger joint. The 2021 Cincinnati event is about a month earlier than the 2020 event and I found no mention of the statewide involvement that was touted a year ago. I have no idea what that means. It’s just something I noticed.

That first stop was at Blondie’s Sports Bar & Grill where I washed down their offering with a Fat Tire. That offering was a “Burger served in a toasted pretzel bun, bacon, sautéed onions, and beer cheese.” Good eating.

Stop number two was at a new-to-everybody place. Miamiville Trailyard has been open only a couple of months. The ‘burger is “a custom blend of fresh Chuck, Brisket, and Short Rib. Served on a toasted brioche bun with provolone, onion straws and a delicious bourbon Sriracha sauce.” I had mine with a Garage Beer from Braxton Brewing. The Trailyard is right next to the Little Miami Scenic Bike Trail and has a really big yard that I think I’d like to sip some more beer in before the summer is over.

On Friday, I joined friends Rick and Mary at Frenchie Fresh where ‘burgers and birthdays (Mary’s) collide. This was my repeat from last year. Even though the location was a repeat, the ‘burger was not. That’s a Triangle Bacon Black and Blue Burger (blackened with Triangle bacon, barbecue sauce and blue cheese) which was accompanied by a Guinness. Frenchie Fresh offered three choices this year and by pure coincidence, we tried them all. It was the TBBBB for me, Le Pig City for Rick, and Le Gene Kelly for Mary. Strange but true.

I had my final ‘burger of the week at that southeast outlier on the map. It’s the Ugly Goat Social Club which puts it near the edge of the alphabet as well as the edge of the map. They describe their hamburger as an “Unusual Spice Combo In Ground Beef & Pork, Topped With Cheese.” Quite good and I’m thinking that if all the patties I tried were served naked, this one would likely win the flavor contest. I chased this one with an event sponsor’s beer.

Cincinnati Burger week really is a week long, Monday through Sunday, which means it will still be going on when this blog entry is published. And that means you can read this and still down a few of these gems before closing time. ¡Arriba, arriba! ¡Ándale, ándale!

Live Music From Dead Man String Band

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I have experienced very little live music during the last fifteen months, and I miss it. I was looking forward to attending a Dead Man String Band performance on Fountain Square last month but it fell victim to some serious wind and rain. It was rescheduled for June 4 and this time the weather cooperated in wondrous fashion. It was not, however, the same show I would have seen on May 7 if the weather had not misbehaved so badly back then. The “band” underwent a major transformation that included a tripling in size. You’ll see.

A difference I don’t think had anything to do with the transformation of the headliner, was a change in openers and an increase from one to two. I apologize to Loop Man Dan for catching just a smidgen of his set as I walked through the square on the way to dinner. I returned in time to hear about half of Nick Baker’s performance. Both were new to me and everything I heard sounded good.

Wikipedia says that a string band is “an old-time music or jazz ensemble made up mainly or solely of string instruments”. The original Dead Man String Band was an ensemble of one. Rob McAllister played some pretty fancy bass and lead parts on an electric guitar while wearing a mask and playing bass and snare drums with his feet.

Rob is still at the heart of the band but, with the addition of John Castetter on bass and Eric Osborne on fiddle, it more closely fits the standard definition of a string band.

Rob calls this the acoustic version of the band and has written a ton of new music for it. That even includes some banjo tunes so that the instrumentation matches that of a traditional string band a little closer. Tonight there was no snare or hi-hat; just a tambourine for that left foot. His face is still partially hidden but now it’s by a beard instead of a mask.

As I circled the crowd on the way out, two different groups spotted my camera and volunteered as subjects. One was seated at a table at the back of the widely spaced crowd and the other was listening from the side of the stage. That’s something that has not happened in a long time and it felt pretty good. Actually, the whole evening felt good — and a little strange. The pandemic isn’t over and COVID has not been conquered but there are promising signs. A little string band music is one for sure.

 

Butterflies of Bali

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Like pretty much everything else, the annual butterfly show at Cincinnati’s Krohn Conservatory took a break in 2020. The show started in 1996, and for the first couple of years was called simply The Butterfly Show. Recent shows have featured butterflies from a specific country or region. The 2019 show, with a blog entry here, featured Butterflies of Ecuador. Nothing was featured in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The show has returned in 2021 with the Butterflies of Bali.

The pandemic is not, by any means, over. Vaccines have greatly reduced the rate of new cases in the United States and led to events like the butterfly show being allowed but things are hardly back to normal. Attendance is through time-stamped tickets which are limited to forty per hour. The Butterfly Showroom is completely cleared between groups. I happened to be the first of my group which gave me a chance to capture an essentially empty show area.

The showroom was decorated with items that I assume were Bali-inspired including a pair of rather trim-looking Buddhas. In verifying that these slender fellows were indeed Buddhas, I discovered that Bali is more than 85% Hindu and less than 1% Buddhist. I guess there were no Vishnu statues in the prop room.

The brochure I was given at the show contains names and photos of the various species in the exhibit but I did not try to identify them when I took these photos and my willful ignorance continues with this posting.

My ignorance extends to all of the flora pictured with the fauna and I don’t even have a brochure to aid in guessing. 

To support all of the flitting they do, the butterflies are provided with a number of free nectar buffets placed throughout the showroom.

Despite every timeslot being sold out, there were never anywhere near forty people in the showroom while I was there. Thirty to forty-five minutes seemed to be the typical amount of time spent in the showroom, and attendees somehow staggered their arrival and departure so that no more than twenty to twenty-five people were present at one time. 

I headed out after about forty-five minutes. The exit path passes right by the Butterfly Nursery. Butterflies come from neither eggs nor storks but from cocoons spun by caterpillars that are sometimes as colorful as the butterflies they become and sometimes not attractive in the least. The show runs through September 6 so there is plenty of times for these little guys to shed their cocoons and become part of the big show.