While living in the now-demolished Friar’s Club in Cincinnati, Ohio between 1941 and 1944, Lumen Martin Winter painted murals on the walls of the residents’ lounge. The 1,600 square-foot scenes, painted in tempera emulsion on a casein ground, depicted regional highlights of industry, music, religion, and literature.
Some time back, I was afforded an opportunity to view the private collection of airplanes of the late Walter Soplata in Ohio. Over the ensuing decades, he saved countless aircraft from being sold to the highest bidder and scrapped.
Amazon has been called the killer of the American indoor shopping mall in countless articles. But it’s been no secret that traditional shopping centers have been struggling long before the advent of online shopping, with the United States boasting more square feet of retail than any other developed nation by far. It is with some irony that Amazon is building new fulfillment centers on the grounds of two dead malls.
The end of 2016 is fast approaching with over 9,000 photographs snapped, 35,000 miles traveled, and 200 new locations explored and documented. Here are the top 35 images of 2016.
The Longaberger Company is a manufacturer of handcrafted maple wood baskets based near Newark, Ohio. At its peak in 2000, Longaberger boasted of sales at over $1 billion annually with thousands on the payroll. Today, the company has $100 million in sales and just 35 employees.
East Liverpool, Ohio, once lovingly referred to as the “Crockery City” and the “Pottery Capital of the World,” is the classic definition of the Rust Belt. Much like Pittsburgh with its reliance on steel mills and Cleveland with its manufacturing plants, East Liverpool was dependent around the pottery industry because of ample natural resources, access to newly laid railroads, the Ohio River, and an untapped market.
The former St. Joseph Riverside Hospital in Warren, Ohio is nothing more than a scrapped, flooded, and fire-damaged carcass of a building.
When the Dennison Hotel on Main Street in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio closed in 2011, it marked the end of a hoteling era. The single room occupancy extended stay facility once competed with the Browne Hotel, Fort Washington Hotel, Fountain Square Hotel, and others — all of which are long closed and demolished.
Several years ago, I was able to visit the former printing operation for the Crowell-Collier Publishing Company, once the world’s largest magazine publishing house, in Springfield, Ohio.
National Acme, located in Cleveland, Ohio, was one of the largest manufacturers of machine tools in the United States. National Acme began as the merger of two notable machine tool manufacturers, the Cleveland Twist Drill Company, and the National Acme Company.
The Warner & Swasey Company is a former manufacturer of machine tools, instruments, and speciality equipment, best known for its astronomical telescopes and turret lathes for astronomical observatories and military installations. It was founded as a partnership in 1880 by Worcester Reed Warner and Ambrose Swasey in Cleveland, Ohio.
St. Joseph Byzantine Catholic Church, formerly located in the Union-Miles Park neighborhood in Cleveland, Ohio, was recently demolished.
Molly Stark Sanatorium was a tuberculosis hospital in northeastern Ohio. Constructed during a time when the prevailing medical treatment for tuberculosis was sunlight, fresh air and rudimentary medicines, the building was constructed with large windows, porticos, balconies and rooftop verandas.
The Knox County Infirmary, located in central Ohio, caught fire on June 26, 2015. Eight fire and medic departments responded to the scene.
Located in central Ohio, the Knox County Infirmary served children, the elderly and those with mental or physical illness. The grand and imposing building was developed on the Bricker Farm near Bangs Station.
Exploring a temple, observatory and factory en route to Cleveland, Ohio is a good way to cap off a trip to the Rust Belt.
The last remnant of the historic Stearns & Foster Company in Lockland, Ohio tumbles down today. Interstate 75 in Lockland, Ohio will be closed around noon for about 30 minutes while the smokestack is demolished.
Light pollution eventually forced this historic observatory in Ohio to close.
With its understated exterior of beige brick, fronted with vacant retail and derelict apartments, one could not know that the historic Euclid Theater in East Cleveland, Ohio had its beginnings at the busiest street corner west of New York City.
The American retail landscape is changing. The love affair with the enclosed shopping center peaked about a decade ago and has been waning as consumers seek out revitalized urban centers and mixed-use retail, office and residential developments.