Gene Stern

Dear Phil: Methinks your posts are being read but most(like me) are too lazy to post responses. I just returned from Cincy where my family and friends celebrated the life of my Dad who died during Covid shutdown at nearly 103! We had to celebrate the life of a holocaust survivor who escaped his Nazi captors and certain death at the end of April 1945. My Mom was pregnant with me during this escape as my Birthday is Jan 4 1946. Cannot fathom why Cincinnati Chili is so hated as I always visit Skyline Chili on my treks back home. There are two Skyline Chili restaurants in Pinellas County Fl (where I reside).

BTW; How do I retrieve my photos/videos to post them on this forum?

Barbara Kahn (Tepper)

Condolences on the passing of your Dad, Gene.  His life story must have been amazing!

Ann and Jean, you make me feel better that I was not the only one who was introduced to Cincinnati chili as an adult.  I loved my mom's chili but after she was unable to make it in her old age when she was not well and cooking for one she really enjoyed buying it. I am told that my Aunt Marilyn, her youngest sister who died far too young, loved a chili dog.  I just never had the inclination to eat it when I was young because her home cooked was so good but I sure did eat White Castles at every opportunity.  

Stephen (Steve) Dixon

Catching up on a few things:

1) AP Chem?  Yeah, I wasn't in that class (makes hand-swooshing-over-head motion).

2) Paddling: I got hauled INTO a class to be paddled. I can't even remember who the teacher was but I was outside his classroom, in the hall during the lunch period. Evan Burkholder (I think it was) and I were playing the hand-slap game. Apparently, some of the slaps got quite loud.

This big guy comes blowing out the door, spots us, hauls us in front of the class, and pulls out a paddle worthy of a college fraternity. Each of us had to to the whole bend over and take a serious swat from this guy.

I'm pretty sure he was a math teacher. Another reason I never liked math.

And Phil, you continue to amaze. As I said before, this is like being enrolled in an online course. With no exams.

Philip Spiess

As I remarked above, I have never heard anyone say they "hated" Cincinnati chili; at most, "outsiders" appear to be indifferent to it (like Dave Buchholz's friend mentioned above).  I've never even heard it said by those Congressmen from Texas who annually hold a chili cook-off with Cincinnati Congressmen to "decide" which locale has the best chili.  Obviously, then, the Texans hold Cincinnati chili in high enough regard if they deem it worthy of a contest with their Tex-Mex trash.  (But, really, Texas chili and Cincinnati chili are two completely different dishes.)

Gene Stern

Phil et alWhat is the procedure to add a video or photo to my Forum comments?

Philip Spiess

Gene:  Dave Buchholz or Paul Simon or Ann Shepard Rueve will have to answer that question for you.

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

Gene, if you want to upload a photo, depends on your device. The following are screenshots of the steps I use with my phone 

1. On the reply page look for the picture icon on the top bar 2. Press the icon  3. Choose file will pop up 4. Select the picture (this from my photos on my phone) 5.I chose a picture of the chili I made Tuesday night 6.That my selections 7. Hit the upload button and a small image of your picture appears 8.The full picture will appear in the reply window and hit submit and 9. Voila!!

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

By the way, Skyline just opened a new restaurant in Springfield Ohio. 
If anyone is interested in buying a franchise, information is on the website https://www.skylinechili.com/

Philip Spiess

OMG!  It actually worked, Ann, when I found a photo that finally agreed to upload onto the system.  This is me at the 2014 graduation with my former boss (head of the Middle School, now deceased) at Browne Academy in Alexandria, Virginia, where I taught Middle School History and Geography to 5th and 6th graders for eight years before I retired completely.  Both of his parents were the Curators of Numismatics (coins, money, and medals) at the Smithsonian Institution and worked with my wife.  He was a great guy.  (We are lunching on the roof of the Lower School building; the Middle School building is on the hill behind us.)

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

Great picture Phil! Now you can post some pictures and we all know that adage...might save you several thousand keystrokes  

Gene Stern

Anne: Very helpful! Thank you

Gene Stern

Gene Stern

My Brother, Anatole, with the bench he made dedicated to my Dad at his Celebration of Life on Oct 9 at the Evergreen Retirement community on Galbraith Rd.

Gene Stern

Stephen: I am convinced the math teacher who paddled you was Biff Bailey (My football coach) whose classroom was on the lower level near the cafeteria. He also smacked me and David Schneider with a yardstick when we were too loud outside his classroom door.

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

So glad that helped, Gene. What a wonderful tribute to your father. My deepest condolences. 

Philip Spiess

THE EYES OF DR. T. J. ECKLEBURG  [cf. The Great Gatsby, chap. 2.]

 (Ann, now that I know how to post pictures, you've created a monster.)

Paul Simons

Gene - it seems right to combine celebration and condolence, appears your father's life and passing are cause for both. A very good thing that he and his family came to this country.

About events at the school - yes it was Bailey who did the paddling. Today's word would be "excessive."

About the mechanics of the website the icons are pretty tiny but they are intuitive. One that I like is the YouTube URL acceptor, another is the one that looks like a couple of links in a chain and as you'd expect it's for URLs - links

Philip Spiess

Gene:  A lovely tribute to your father, Victor Stern.  Do I understand that he was a survivor of the Holocaust?  My parents had a cottage at Evergreen until my father died in 2003; are there other memorial benches there?

As to Mr. Bailey's penchant for paddling, I wrote this up in Post # 6096 (9-26-2022).  I also mentioned the "Grand Moose," perpetrated and perpetuated in Mr. Bailey's home room [Room 118] by us 9th-grade guys -- but no one has commented on it (David M. Schneider, I'm looking at you!).  

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

Gene, I have a connection with Evergreen as well.
Long before it was developed into a retirement community, the area was owned by the Phillip Meyers family, who developed the Williamsburg Apartments in the 1960s. I lived in a townhouse there from 1979 to 1981. That's where I met my (future) husband Ed, who lived in the townhouse next door with his three teenage children, and two dogs.
Early one morning, bleary eyed, I was putting my dog out on the back patio. I looked over the privacy fence, and a horse stared back at me. My first thought was that my neighbor must have another big dog, but it dawned on me,"Nope, that's a horse".
Weeks later, after I had met the man next door, a conversation about the horse came up. Ed chuckled. He said that his daughter had discovered the stable on the adjacent property and made the acquaintance with the owner of the horses. They let her ride the horses whenever she wanted. Ed said, one night, it was too late to take the horse back, so she just tied it up on the patio. 
Ed and I became great friends, after that first conversation. We also enjoyed walking our dogs together every afternoon around that property. We didn't realize we "really liked" being together until after he moved.
I hadn't thought about that horse for years. I need to call my (now) stepdaughter and remind her. I'm sure that will make her smile. 

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

Phil, let the pictures begin!!!

Dale Gieringer

    Speaking of Cincinnati chili, here's another gastronomical delight from across the river that I don't remember from my days at WHHS, but which is featured in today's NY Times.  Savoring Bourbon, and Its Storied History, in Northern Kentucky..  What better tp accompany a four-way? Drive across the river to Covington or Newport and get snockered on bourbon from an authentic local distillery.  While you're at it, stop by the package store and load up on low-cost Kentucky whisky to smuggle back home.   Unless of course you'd prefer to stay in Ohio and enjoy a nice, cold Burger Beer.  

Philip Spiess

If y'all find yourselves in Bourbon territory or traversing the Dixie Highway, stop by Bardstown, Kentucky, to visit the Oscar P. Getz Museum of Whiskey History, housed in Spalding Hall, the former main building of what was variously over time a Catholic college, a seminary, an orphanage, and a boys' school; St. Joseph's Proto-Cathedral in Bardstown was once the seat of a Roman Catholic diocese that covered the entire Old Northwest Territory.  Oscar P. Getz was the late proprietor of Barton Distilleries and a collector of all things whiskey; his collection is now a fine museum on a lovely topic (said by one who should know in both cases).  As Bardstown is a ways from Cincinnati, it is probably advisable to stay overnight, in which case you'll want to stay at the Old Talbott Tavern in Bardstown.  Founded in 1779, it is believed to be the oldest continuously operating tavern hotel in the United States; Patrick Henry signed its 1785 tavern license, George Rogers Clark used it as his headquarters during the Revolutionary War, and a mural painted by associates of the exiled King Louis Philippe of France in an upper room was shot up by Jesse James.  ("Federal Hill," a.k.a. "My Old Kentucky Home," Senator John Rowan's famed estate, is nearby.)  Bardstown -- and Covington as well -- are part of the historic Kentucky Bourbon Trail (check out its website), in fact, practically its two ends!

Gene Stern

It is interstimg to see how many of us have connections to Evergreen. I have not seen any orher benches dedicated to past residents, so we may be the first to have done so. The building was also home to Myers Winery, and I was told that the largest wine cellar East of the Mississippi is located underneath Evergreen. My Mom was 93 when she pssed aboit 4 years ago at Evergreen.

We are off to Athens today, so I will probably not be on the Forum until after I return to the States on November 10 after we return from Venice.

Ciao!

Doug Gordon

Phil, re your post about the 1937 flood from last month, you might enjoy my grandfather's film on the event.

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

Doug,

Interesting film. My mother was a young social worker for the welfare department during the great flood. She told me about having to be rowed to people’s homes to deliver food and clothing. It’s amazing to me how much of the city was under water, familiar places like Knowlton’s Corner. Thanks for this bit of history.