(Editor's Note:  Friday we concluded a series of stories from southern Ohio that were done as the result of a visit with my lady Sue Brooks' sister Patsy over the 4th of July weekend.  Patsy lives on the family homestead in Perry County.

Tuesday, we will launch another series of stories from that same general area; this series from a square dancing weekend in Jackson, OH we enjoyed over the weekend of July 15th..

Meanwhile, we continued our roaming around the state on Thursday, July 21st with a visit to the nautical museum in Vermilion and the Edison birthplace in Milan. 

Today's blog features that latest adventure.  Tuesday's blog will launch from Chillicothe and conclude in mid-August--with a little silliness.  We hope you enjoy staying tuned.)




Sue Brooks and grand daughter Mackenna Curtis-Collins enjoy the wheelhouse of the Great Lakes freighter CANOPUS which was built in 1905.  After the freighter's retirement the bow of the ship was added to the structure of Vermilion's Inland Seas Maritime Museum in 1968 and remains a favorite of visitors.  From the pilothouse, visitors enjoy a view like that of a freighter leaving port and heading north into Lake Erie.

SHIPWRECKS and INVENTIONS--

The museum of the Great Lakes Historical Society has been located in a donated home (later purchased) at the North end of Vermilion's Main St., since 1953.

That will be ending when the museum moves to Toledo in 2012.

It's new location will be along the Maumee River in what was formerly known as Portside; a much heralded cluster of trendy retail shops that opened there in 1984...and closed in 1990.

The Vermilion facility already is showing signs of departure as some displays are being readied for the move.

I was particularly disappointed on this Vermilion visit when a life ring was the only artifact I could find concerning the sinking of the 639 foot ore boat Carl D. Bradley in November 1958 in northern Lake Michigan--shortly after my assignment to the Charlevoix, MI coast guard station where search and rescue coordination was centered.

The Bradley lost 33 of its 35 man crew.  I hope it finds more prominent mention in the museum's new location. 

We then stopped by the birthplace of Thomas A. Edison in Milan, OH.  While Sue and Mackenna toured that facility, I was pleasantly surprised to discover the nearby Milan Historical Museum, a six-building, mostly reconstructed campus between the town square and Edison's birthplace.

These buildings contain a general store, a blacksmith shop with carriage shed, a memorial building with artifacts from a prominent Milan family, the 1846 home of the doctor who attended Edison's birth, a doll and toy house and The Sayles House--a delightfully refurnished home from 1843.

A thorough visit to these two facilities can occupy half a day and is very much worth the cost of their individual admissions.



The Newton Arts Building, attached to the campus, was built in 1971 and houses the exquisite artifacts of Bert P. Newton of Milan who made his fortune in petroleum sales and traveled the world extensively in that role.  The building is dedicated to his wife Edna Roe Newton.

Vermilion Nautical Museum
Edison's Birthplace
Milan Historical Museum

LITTLE CITIES OF
"BLACK DIAMONDS"--

Shawnee, Ohio is one of those "cities" but today most people do not know that.

The town is located deep in the hills of southeast Ohio's Appalachian area, in the Wayne National Forest of southern Perry Co., and its remains look like prosperity has been long gone.

Like its neighbors it bustled with significant and sudden population growth during the period between 1870 and 1920 when the railroad came to the area and brought thousands of people in a rush to extract coal, oil, clay and iron ore.  But, as coal production and consumption declined so did the town--and most of the neighboring towns for miles around.

The phrase "Black Diamonds" refers to the riches coal mining once represented.

Today, the village's downtown appears like the dusty remains of an old movie set. 

There is a trendy gift shop open in the downtown (above) and a furniture store which spans several of the old buildings but I never did find its entrance. 

We met a craftsman who was finishing some drywall in a storefront that appeared almost ready for new occupants.  But, he hadn't heard of anyone that was interested.

He described the renovation costs of this building as exceeding the value of the entire downtown--in his opinion.

We met the fellow from New Jersey whose ancestors were noteworthy denizens of the town's history and he was about to embark on a building renovation project of his own.  But, he hadn't started on his second floor apartment just yet in the property he had inherited. 

He was wandering the downtown area promoting a festival being planned for later in the summer.  We were his only apparent customers until another car pulled into the curb from the wrong direction and joined our conversation.

That car's disregard of customary traffic law wasn't of any consequence.  There wasn't any traffic...

...except as shown in the bottom photo.  We joked about the small tractor being the county's towing service.

We also joked about the building in the background and speculated about its ability to remain upright much longer.

Our mirthful demeanor was not at the expense of the local folks.  They joked with us.  And they dreamed.

They looked at the nearby Hocking Hills and its deserved reputation as a tourist mecca.  They look at their town's buildings and see opportunity.

There is even going to be a coal miner statue erected in a little park between two vacant downtown buildings in the coming festival.

Perhaps one of the two vacant downtown theaters will come alive once more.

I hope to go back one day and see their dreams coming true.

BIRTHPLACE OF

THE UNITED MINE WORKERS--

As I stood in New Straitsville that day and pondered its history, Tennessee Ernie's song lyrics from Sixteen Tons, "...I owe my soul to the company store," ricocheted through my memory.

The town was founded in the early 1870s by the local coal mining company as a place for its employees and families to live while grandfathers, fathers and often sons worked the mines.

Houses were plopped everywhere on the steep hillsides. They were nothing more than shanties and mine wages were low. Workers had little choice but to buy their food and supplies from the overpriced company stores.

Constant poverty kept the miners at their trade. They had little opportunity for education higher than grade school.

The Hocking Valley Railroad came along about two years later and the town grew rapidly over the following ten years to a population of some 4,000 residents.

But, there is a breaking point for everyone and labor organizing meetings were held early in the town's history. Those meetings needed a place to secretly accommodate a large number of men close to town.

The perfect place was Robinson's Cave and meetings were held there for years until 1884 when miners, fed up with working conditions and a cut in wages, went on strike, filled coal cars with wood, soaked them with kerosene, set them afire and pushed them into the mines.

The fire caught deep in the mine and is said to be still burning.  It is believed it has burned nearly two hundred square miles in the mine's coal seams.

That ended coal mining activity around the town.

But, this growing labor dispute led to the Ohio Miners Amalgamated Association which by 1890 joined the newly established United Mine Workers of America; thus giving New Straitsville legitimate claim to being a source of national mine labor organization.

Lady friend Sue Brooks and sister Patsy Love (left in the top photo) study some history boards of Robinson's Cave shown behind them in a natural amphitheater on the south edge of New Straitsville. The bronze lettering is from a historical marker at the site.

The sisters, both born in a nearby town, are shown in the smaller photo, descending from the cave's amphitheater, a view miners would have had as they worked on the earliest history of organized labor in the mining industry (without the concrete steps, of course).

Today's Standard of Excellence is
MEDIOCRITY--

Friday I received a "Thank You" sized envelope in the mail from MedCentral Hospice.

The envelope was empty.

The check I wrote to them nearly a month ago still is outstanding.

I called their number at the hospital to check on my check.

The operator transferred my call to "...someone who could help me."

I got a recording.

BIG MUSKIE--

Big Muskie was once the world's largest earth moving machine, roaming the hills of southeastern Ohio and munching strip mine overburden at the rate of 39 million pounds per hour.

The only part that remains of this behemoth is its 220 cubic yard bucket now resting in a memorial park in Morgan County.  That's lady friend Sue Brooks (above) dwarfed by the bucket which was once swung by a boom with a length of 310 feet.

It could take a bite of the Earth the equivalent of 12 automobile garages in cubic size.

During its working life from 1969 to 1991 it moved over 483 million tons of rock and soil on 60,000 acres of what is now known as American Electrical Power ReCreation Land.

It was the world's biggest excavating machine, a Bucyrus-Erie dragline, and the only one ever built.  It cost 45 million dollars.

It weighed 27 million pounds and was staffed by a seven member crew.  It was one and a half times longer than a football field and as wide as an eight-lane highway.

It's boom could lift a load the equivalent of 33 stories.

It ultimately was sidlined by more efficient mining methods and ever-tightening environmental regulations.  It was dismantled in 1999 and all components but the bucket were scrapped.


The bucket resides at Miner's Memorial Park on SR 78, eleven miles northeast of McConnelsville,. OH where Sue Brooks and sister Patsy Love are enjoying the park's scenic overlook in the Appalachian foothills of Morgan County,

SUE BROOKS and sister PATSY LOVE (left) are pondering the visitor's center at American Electric Power's Miners' Memorial Park in Morgan County, OH.    The main attraction at this roadside park is the bucket from Big Muskie the world's largest drag line that operated nearby until 1991.  The machine was electric powered and used enough voltage to power 27,500 homes.  Stop by Saturday and Fogeyisms will tell you more.

BOOK REPORTS--

Next by Michael Crichton

Have you ever seen a half dozen mice scurrying through a complex maze at the same time.  That's how I viewed the portrayal of characters in this Crichton, five year old novel.  It's a science-fictionesq peek at folks fiddling with genetics in the never ending chase for big bucks.  It features a nearly human orangutan who turns out to be a very clever and helpful critter in the story line along with an extremely articulate parrot.  In the end Crichton treats readers with an informed group of Author's Notes which will leave you nodding your silent agreement.  It also includes a comprehensive bibliography for scholarly inclined readers.

The late doctor Crichton received his MD from Harvard Medical School.  He taught courses in anthropology at Cambridge, England and as a visiting writer at MIT.  13 of his books have been made into films; the most popular of which is likely Jurassic Park.  He died in 2008.


I Am Hutterite by Mary-Ann Kirkby

This is Mary-Ann's story of her family leaving the Hutterite religious community and having to adapt to "modern" ways of the time.  She had never then heard of rock-and-roll or Walt Disney or ridden a bike or tasted macaroni and cheese.  She tells of her struggles of fitting-in with her new classmates with humor and raw honesty.  Her colony of Hutterites were in southern Manitoba Canada.  The sect is Brethren-like in origin and trace their history, like Mennonites and Amish, to the Anabaptist movement during the Reformation.


Mysterious Island by Jules Verne

Outstanding read, of course.  Five fellows escape Civil War-ravaged Richmond, VA in a stolen hot-air balloon and ride hurricane-like conditions to a crash landing on an uncharted, South Pacific Island.  They are stranded there four years and, with the help of their companion with a scientific background, achieve outstanding success in domesticating their wilderness.  Remember his Journey to the Center of the Earth and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea?  This one is an equally marvelous read.  Don't know why it took me this long to find it.


Seal Team Six by Howard E. Wasdin

A stunning peek at the training, often horrific experiences and ultimately, life as a civilian SEAL veteran.  The book brought home our indirect experience with with a passage involving SEAL Medal of Honor recipient Tom Norris whose brother we met at the SEAL Museum in Florida last winter.  The book was published before the SEAL's recent elimination of Osama Bin Laden so it is in no way capitalizing on that event.  It's a very quick and poignant read.