Barbara Kahn (Tepper)

I love old houses too and live in one built in 1930 that's been in my husband's family since it was new. 

By the way, have you seen the HGTV Urban Oasis Sweeptstakes house is in Cincinnati this year?

https://www.hgtv.com/design/hgtv-urban-oasis/2018/galleries

Philip Spiess

Paul (and others):

There are three Frank Lloyd Wright houses in Cincinnati by my reckoning:  the Cedric Boulter house, 1 Rawson Woods Circle, Clifton, built in 1954 (near the Rawson Woods Bird Preserve); the Gerald B. Tonkens house, 6980 Knoll Road, Amberley Village, built in 1955 (near French Park); and the William Boswell house, 8805 Camargo Club Drive, Indian Hill, built in 1957 (near the Camargo Country Club).  Since Frank Lloyd Wright died in 1959, all of these houses were done very late in his career, designed in his Taliesin West studio (possibly assisted by his student-associates).  

Barbara Kahn (Tepper)

It's possible that someone who went to WHHS lived in that Frank Lloyd Wright house in Amberly but I cannot remember. Anybody know?

Gail Weintraub (Stern)

Barbara, I believe that Jane Tonkens, WHHS Class of 1963, lived in the Amberley Village Frank Llyod Wright house.

Philip Spiess

Gail:  Wow!

Barbara Kahn (Tepper)

Gail, You have a fabulous memory! I knew there was someone who went to Walnut Hills in the FLW House but couldn't remember the name. Thanks so much!

Paul Simons

I remember her driving a new Oldsmobile - her family had a dealership if I remember right. A number of people at WHHS drove sharp cars. Convertibles etc. in that student parking lot. In many cases classier than the teachers' cars. Life in the fast lane, for some. But there were"jalopies" too. Like mine.

Philip Spiess

I remember the day I drove our carpool to school and was halfway home on my usual after-school schoolbus when I suddenly remembered the family car was still at school.  I had to get off at Samuel Ach School and walk back all the way down the hill and up the other hill to Walnut Hills to get the car.

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

I just want to congratulate Ira and Wendy, who were engaged and married “under the dome” in the WHHS Library!! Sursum ad summum to you both!!

Ira Goldberg

Many thanks for your well wishes, Ann et all. Turning a page in a new chapter of life, as many of you have done. Had a smallish wedding, with one family essentially meeting the other. Stories abound for another day. 

Judy Holtzer (Knopf)

Congrats to Ira and Wendy. What a sweet place serving as a wedding chapel. I can't wait to hear those stories!

Steven Levinson

Ira and Wendy, heartiest congratulations and best wishes.  Ain't serendipity grand?

All the best,

Steve

Philip Spiess

Sunday, November 11, is the 100th Anniversary of the Armistice that brought World War I to a close.  If you want to celebrate in regal style, watch Charlie Chaplin's 1918 film on the war, Shoulder Arms.  Like his World War II movie, The Great Dictator, it is one of Chaplin's greatest films, and can be found on the Internet.  (Your Cultural Historian at work.)

Philip Spiess

More on the 100th Anniversary of the Armistice bringing World War I to a close:  Although the Armistice was widely hailed because it brought the "Great War" (a really stupid enterprise, if you look into it) to a close, the "Versailles Treaty" Peace Conference, conducted by the French under Clemenceau, the British under Lloyd George, and the Americans under Wilson -- the Italians under Orlando were basically there in name only -- (and a true peace was never signed among the belligerents) was a disaster, as written about by the British economist (and member of the Bloomsbury Group) John Maynard Keynes (The Economic Consequences of the Peace, 1919), who attended the Peace conference -- the Peace, as written, brought about World War II.

From a cultural history standpoint, World War I had the best songs ever of any war, even including the Civil War; these musical tributes were led, of course, by the compositions of George M. Cohan; that is why his statue stands in Duffy Square (a part of Times Square) in New York.  But more:  World War I had probably the best outpouring of war poetry of any other war (unfortunately, many of the poets died in the war).  Probably the two most famous poems are the Canadian John McCrae's "In Flanders Fields" (1915) and Alan Seeger's "I Have a Rendezvous with Death" (died 1916; published posthumously).  Even the British novelist and poet Thomas Hardy wrote a poem, "'And There Was a Great Calm' (On the Signing of the Armistice, November 11, 1918)."

But now let's shift to irony and historic preservation (my profession over the years):  the Armistice (read:  German surrender) was signed in a wooden railway car in the Forest of Compiegne, France, by the viciously gloating French premier Georges Clemenceau (the "Tiger of France") and some pathetic German politicians, who were later executed for their "crime" (the signing of the surrender, i.e., the "stab in the back") by Hitler's death squads.  (Kaiser Wilhelm II had already abdicated and fled to his royal cousins in Holland.)  This railway car, you may suppose, became an important French historical monument, preserved on the site of the Armistice signing as a precious historical relic.  Come 1940 -- and the Germans under Hitler invade and conquer the eastern half of France.  Hitler personally visits the railway car at Compiegne, which he uses as the site for making the French sign their surrender to the Germans.  Surrender signed, Hitler (who literally dances at the surrender; you can see the films) has the railway car and its tracks packed up and shipped to Berlin to form a museum of German victory.  Count five years later:  Allied bombers, attacking Berlin, hit the museum and the railway car and all its accoutremonts go up in flames.

O tempora!  O mores!

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

The renovation of the Union Terminal is complete. It was opened Sunday to honor service veterans for Veterans Day, since it played such a significant part in the lives of the military during WWII. The terminal will open to the public on November 17.

This story aired last night. Great memories of going to the station to meet out of town relatives when I was a kid, then shopping at Lohmann’s in the eighties. Of course, that was the location for our 40th reunion dinner in 2004, and the location for the Children’s museum and OMNIMAX theater where I’d take my grandkids. The youngest grandkid is driving now, so I’ll just have to make a special trip to see the renovation for myself.

Enjoy!

P. S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY Paul Simons!!

http://amp.wcpo.com/3089958844/wcpo-airing-saving-union-terminal-documentary-sunday.html

Ira Goldberg

Yes! Evidently it is actually your Birthday, Paul Simons. Hope you are taking the day off. It IS a federal holiday!

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

A little more about the Union Terminal renovation:

http://www.wvxu.org/post/see-union-terminals-pierre-bourdelle-murals-first-time-decades#stream/0

Stephen Collett

Wow, thanks Ann. What beautiful interior details in Union Terminal. I would love to be there on the 17th, and anytime thereafter. 

Dale Gieringer

     In case you haven't heard (ha!) , we are being smothered by smoke from the fires in California.  It's been one week now since the Camp Fire started, and this is the worst day yet.  Even our neighbor's yard across the street is obscured in a pall of gray.  People are walking around in facemasks.  Mind you, the fire is 140 miles away from us in the Sierra foothills!  When I first moved here in '72, I was impressed by the air quality in the Bay Area, where the wind blows fresh over thousands of miles of the Pacific and in through the Golden Gate.  But when the Diablo winds blow in from the east, it can be hell.   Last week we had been enjoying crystal clear skies, allowing me to track a rare visit of the asteroid Juno with binoculars  (probably my last chance to do so, since it's barely visible every 13 years).   Thursday morning I walked into the Whole Foods Market under bright, blue skies.   Walkiing out the door, I was greeeted by ominous gusts of wind and  dark wisps of horsetail clouds rushing in from the east.   Shortly thereafter came the smell of smoke, which has lingered with us ever since, leaving grimy deposits on clear shiny surfaces.   This is the driest autumn on record in N. Cal since the mid-19th century. Usually the rainy season begins in earnest in late Oct., but we have had just one brief sprinkle here since June.  That's five years of drought in the past six years.  Credit global warming and population growth for what seems like a growing descent into ecological apocalypse.   I'd send you a picture of the view from our window, but there's nothing to see except gray.   A few days ago it cleared up enough to snap this sunset. (Dave Buchholz probably has better photos, but this will give you the idea).

Thomas Lounds Jr.

It's a real tragedy as  to what is happening to California.  We will be thinking about you, Dale.  Ann, thanks for the photos of Union Terminal.  I am old enough to remember when the terminal was wall to wall with solders, sailors ( one of whom was my Dad), marines , nurses, etc . during the early '40,s   I even remember the trains being so crowded that I had to sleep under one of the seats when traveling with my Mom and Dad as Dad was being assigned to the Pensacola Naval Air Station.  I will put a visit to the terminal on my next visit to Cincy.

Philip, I just heard or read about some things that are disappearing from use. Someone's post about P&G reminded me.  Bar soap is disappearing.  So is letter-writing.  I would name more but the thing that seems to be disappearing the fastest is my memory.  

David Buchholz

Mine aren't any better than Dale's, but for the record, here they are: Sunset, Sunrise, Apocalypse... It's all one and the same.,

Philip Spiess

Dave:  Thanks for the word "Apocalypse" -- it says it all (and very apropos for your pictures!).

Mr. Lounds:  Thanks for that wonderful paragraph on war train travel -- we all (in the Class of 1964) came too late after that to know about it!  I have not yet seen any bar soap disappearing; I can still buy large packages of Ivory Soap here in the Washington area (maybe it is used for money-laundering).  However, I do know that Procter & Gamble has long since outsourced, or sold off, most of its products; it is now, it seems, just a distributer of its brand products.  Letter writing, I realized some time back, has been replaced by e-mail (still my medium of person-to-person expression), and, more recently, by Facebook (my wife's medium of expression) and by Twitter (our president's medium of expression).  Historians may lament the disappearance of paper-based correspondence from future historical archives, but we know that nothing ever disappears in e-space and the Cloud, and we can always get Julian Assange and Wiki-Leaks to download it for us.

As to memory loss, remember that there are three clear signs of creeping senility:  first, your memory starts to go . . . and I forget what the other two are!

Ira Goldberg

Phil, so that's the reason I no longer smell the fragrant odors in the Mill Creek valley around Bond Hill's Norwood Exit when I force drive grandchildren past the home of my youth! Dave, such a tragic set of blood-red sun photographs to see that the word "specter" comes to mind. I cannot imagine starting over as so many must do, nor the grief suffered by the human toll. Please, SF friends, breathe safely.

Thomas Lounds Jr.

I am aware that P&G has sold off a good number of the brands that I worked on in the Media Section of the Marketing Department during my ten-year stint with them as the first African-American they hired into their executive ranks. (Boy, could I tell you the stories about my groundbreaking experience in that regard beginning with the 17 prehiring interviews including meeting with the then Chairman, Howard Morgens ). In any event, can anyone tell me if they continue to use/refine the brand management system for which they became famous and, as a result, were regularly raided for leaders at other companies.  Every time I come to Cincinnati, I am amazed at the ever sprawling P&G footprint on the downtown.  I can remember when the 11-storied Headquarters nearest neighbor was Gusweiler Pontiac! In fact, Ann Gusweiler is a member of my class of '56.  I know this is somewhat removed from our normal chatter but I am curious about the extent to which P&G is still involved in the affairs of Cincinnati including its educational progress. 

Philip Spiess

Mr. Lounds:

Not being either in Cincinnati, nor in the business world, nor, indeed, a member of the Procter & Gamble staff or community, I cannot answer your question, but I can inquire about these:

(1) How, if P & G has spun off so many of its brands to others (Smuckers got almost all of its food brands), how has it stayed among the top companies in the U. S.?

(2) What, if all industrial production at P & G has been farmed out to other concerns or regional plants, goes on at "Ivorydale" on Spring Grove Avenue?  I have noted, last time I was in town (2004), that some of the remarkably "English"-style industrial buildings there were either torn down, or renovated in a truncated manner, or were leased out (?) to other small businesses.  A sad close to one of America's most remarkable 19th-Century industrial complexes, designed by Solon Spencer Beman, designer of Pullman, Illinois, another national industrial landmark, south of Chicago.

(3) Circa 1972, when P & G sought to expand its corporate headquarters on 5th Street east of Government Square in downtown Cincinnati, it became involved in an historic preservation fight over Wesley [Methodist] Chapel, the congregation of which it had forced out (with big bucks) and whose property it had taken over, to tear down Wesley Chapel (which it did).  In the process, it destroyed one of Cincinnati's most important Greek Revival landmarks, also a site where Revolutionary soldiers were buried in the crypt (supposedly protected by national law, but apparently not), as well as a nationally historic site:  former President John Quincy Adams gave his last public speech there when he dedicated the Cincinnati Astronomical Observatory on Mount Adams, and it was the site of President William Henry Harrison's funeral service.  In fighting to save the building, my boss, director of the Cincinnati Historical Society, Richard W. Haupt, lost his job (a number of P & G executives were on the board of the historical society or were friends of members).  Happily for me (and him), he later was my boss (and friend -- again) at the National Trust for Historic Preservation here in Washington.  But my question is:  given the expressed "need" by P & G for that particular parcel of land in downtown Cincinnati, how come, after some 40 years, when I last passed that area, there was still nothing built on the site (except a garden)?