When a Small Ohio Town Dies

I wasn't going to talk about.  It's too sad.  It hurts.  But not talking about it hasn't made it go away.

Wilmington, Ohio, is just a tiny spot on the map.  You would zip right past the exit on I-71 heading north to Columbus or south to Cincinnati. 

But when you take the time to look closer, you see a town of 13,000 people.  Part of the town is historic.

Part is agriculture.


But all of it is people.  All they wanted was a decent paying job and a safe place to raise their children.

And then this happened.  The biggest employer in the county and surrounding counties just pulled out.  DHL decided that their shipping hub in Wilmington was no longer profitable.  Approximately 8,000 jobs were lost.

It didn't stop there.  Many of the businesses that built up around the air park left too.  I have no idea how many jobs that eliminated.

The local hospital started to have problems.  Most of these unemployed people eventually lost their health insurance which left the hospital dealing with Medicaid payments or no payments at all.  This is the hospital where both of my children were born.  My mother had her hip replaced there.  My father died there.  It matters to me.

The hospital has been sold to an out-of-state group.  The employees are hoping that there will be very few changes.  We also thought DHL would never leave.  Time will tell.

Of course, houses are abandoned.  If you need to leave the area to find work and your house won't sell, you have to leave it all behind.  That goes against how these people were raised.  You pay your bills.  You fulfill your obligations.  And you don't leave your memories behind. 

Other things happen when a town dies.  Drug dealers know where to find the weak and the lost.  I have friends with children who are heroin addicts and prescription drug addicts.  The front page of the local paper covers the drug bust of the day.  Meth labs are in the house next door.  When there is no hope and no money, people resort to ugly ways to make a living.

A friend's husband was a mechanic at DHL.  They just built the house of their dreams.  He has been working out of state for the past year.  After 25 years of marriage, they are seeing each other on the occasional weekend, holiday and vacation.  They are the lucky ones.  They still have a home and they still have an income.

Perfect strangers are willing to tell you their story.  Yesterday, I was shopping at the local clothing store and started a conversation with a clerk.  She lost her job at one of the companies located near DHL.  She is currently working three part time minimum wage jobs.  Her husband works at the hospital.  She is worried.  Everyone here is worried.

If you want to know more, here is a youtube video that says it all.


This is happening all over the country, but this is where I raised my children.  This is where I worked for many years.  It matters.

Selling Scrubs in Ohio

In case you stumbled upon my site looking for excitement in Ohio or you were just plain bored, I wanted to let you know where I'm hanging out.

We have a medical uniform business...two stores and a website.  I decided that blogging about scrubs would potentially put more money in my pocket. 

Oops.  Did that sound crass?  Well, I don't know about you, but I need money more than I need followers on a personal blog.  I loved my followers and I still follow some blogs, but this is business.  I need to put on my serious face and get down to flooding the market with blogs about scrubs.

Oh yes, this is Elvis.  He was at Caesar Creek Markets in Wilmington, Ohio, this weekend.  We sell scrubs there.  My life is full of amazing things.

So...if you are interested in the wild and wacky world of flea markets, there will be a little of that at my new blog findohioscrubs.blogspot.com.  And, everyone knows someone who wears scrubs, so send them my way.

I'm also available to blog about your business....for a fee, of course.  Call, write, send a carrier pigeon.  We'll talk. 

200 Years in Clinton County Ohio

I was going to entertain you with "Tales From the Flea." my place of business on the weekends, but something more important came up.

The Sabina Historical Society, in lovely Sabina, Ohio, is only open one day a month, from 1-3 p.m. and today was the day.  How could I resist?

As I've mentioned before, history is at the bottom of my list of interests.  It actually makes my eyes cross, and I develop narcolepsy.  I've fallen asleep twice just writing this sentence.

But, I have driven past this building for years on my way to visit my mother who is a resident of Autumn Years Nursing Home which is right down the street.  And, my goal is to visit places that it seems no one else visits, so here goes. 

O.K., class, what was this building originally?  Who said a gas station?  That's right little Billy, this was once a Sinclair Gas station with a dinosaur and everything.  Then it became a bank and ten years ago, the historical society moved in.

No, you can't do a drive through.  You have to get out of the car. 

While you're gazing down the main street of Sabina, let me give you the basics.  Sabina, Ohio, is in Clinton County.  The 2000 census counted 2,780 hearty souls here.  Rumor has it that this number will go down after the 2010 census.

The median family income was $35,795 at that time and 12.9% of the residents lived below poverty level. I'm not thinking these figures have improved any.

That's enough.  The town is small and most people are poor.  Let's go inside.

Sabina has an elementary school, but like most small towns in Ohio, it consolidated years back.  The local students have to leave town to attend middle school and high school.  When that happened, all of the high school trophies were left without a home.

The historical society took the trophies and the display case.

 People have donated cheer leading outfits and letter jackets. 

Somebody was cleaning out the attic I'm thinking.

A local resident made this doll house and donated it.

Look at the detail...a little quilt, a tiny dressing mirror, itsy bitsy pictures....who am I kidding?

Why would anyone take several years of their life to do this?  I do believe you can visit historical homes where the real items are in adult size.  You don't need a magnifying glass to look at them.

Ahhhh, the mystery of the human psyche.

This toilet plunger looking thing was used for washing clothes.

Thank God for washing machines.

And yikes, this was used  to curl hair.

Dr. Frankenstein must have had something to do with this.

Then I found out that this is Clinton County Ohio's bicentennial year.  I need to get out more.

I have been seeing these quilt designs on local barns.  My little brain hadn't made the connection that something was up.

There are 54 of these in the county. 

I found a few on the way home.

Why didn't I get out of the car to take a better picture?

It's 94 degrees and if I get out of the car and walk onto someone's property, I'll either get shot or I'll have to talk to the local farmer while I melt into a little puddle.

I've sweat enough for this blog.

There was one thing I had to clear up with Sharon Roberts, the President of the Sabina Historical Society, who was gracious enough to spend time with me.  (I was the only person there.)

Why, oh why is Sabina the Eden of Ohio?

I liked her answer.  She said that at one time, around 1810, the area was a swamp.  When the swamp was drained, or whatever you do to get rid of one, crops grew like crazy.  The ground was mega fertile.

And then, I just had to ask her about Eugene,  a local legend.  I do have the brain of a 12 year old boy.  She gave me reams of articles but I actually found a YouTube video that you have to watch.  It has to do with an embalmed body that was on display in town for many years.  Fast forward 5 minutes into the newscast.  You'll love it and I know you don't have anything better to do.


If you want any brochures about the Bicentennial or the barn quilts, let me know.  Sharon dumped a pile of them on me. 

Tomorrow...I promise..."Tales From the Flea."  And, there will be no more sweating for this blog

Friday in an Ohio Cemetery

My blogger friend, Scott at "Finding Another View," scottlawphotography.com, has a Phun Phriday challenge that I can tackle.  He wants photos of anything phun, weird or creative.  You get it don't you?  Photography....phun?  Those shutterbugs.  They are a phunny bunch.

As it happens, today I did something phun and weird in my little part of Ohio.  Creative?  More like phoolish.  O.K., I'll stop that.

Even though it is 100 degrees outside, I was willing to walk in the woods, but then I saw this on my patio.

I wasn't about to put a ruler next to this monster to impress you with its span.  Let's just say that my size nine shoe wasn't big enough to cover it.

Seriously.  Sort of.  Anyway, I realized that fighting my way through the woods could put me in contact with one of these.  It could ride home in my hair.

Shoot, I could ride home on it.

So, I did the wise thing and went for a walk in Sugar Grove Cemetery in Wilmington, Ohio. 

I'm just inside the gate, and I'm already sweating like a pig.  No, pigs don't sweat.  How about sweating like a pack of menopausal women in July?  I hope that paints the picture.

I raised my boys in Wilmington, Ohio.  When they were little guys, I would take them for walks in this cemetery. 

What?  It wasn't creepy.  They loved it.

There are cannons in the cemetery.  Every little boy wants to play with a cannon.  Hang on, but I'm going to give you a little history lesson, and this is from someone who flunked History 100 twice in college.

This is Soldier's Point, a triangular section of 60 graves that honor Civil War veterans who had no other means for burial.  In 1927, the GAR (Grand Army of the Republic) erected this monument and flanked it with two cannons made in 1861.

To back up a little, Sugar Grove Cemetery was organized in 1857 by a group of Clinton County residents who saw the need for a centralized burial location.  People were just planting their loved ones willy-nilly all over the place before the founding fathers put their heads together.  They started with 22.5 acres but after additional purchases, it now covers 110 acres. 

Cemeteries are interesting places.  I'll prove it to you on my little tour.

The smallest section of the cemetery is reserved for pets.  There are 144 dogs, cats and a skunk buried here.

 Don't pack up Fluffy.  There aren't any spots left.

I have no idea why the cross is in the tree, but it's interesting, right?

This is the Charity Section, established in the 1860s for transients...people who died with no identification.












They have numbers.

Remember to keep your I.D. on you or you could be number 108.

On a serious note, I was sad to see how shabby the cemetery is looking.  Wilmington has had a huge loss of jobs, and I'm sure there have been cuts.

This monument is surrounded by a branch.

All of the headstones seemed crooked or something.  Don't these seem sort of crunched together?

 And nothing had been mowed or trimmed.

Don't you think that when a tree has one branch left, it should be cut down?

This is a yucca plant gone wild.

I'm going back with pruning sheers.

Bear with me on this.  It's noon, it's 100 degrees, and I have sweat pouring in my eyes.  Mascara is running down my cheeks.  I smell like I should be a permanent resident here.

I know you can't really see it, but that black spot on a headstone is a vulture. 

I swear.  I tried to get closer for the sake of my art, but it flew away.  I think it was looking for me.  I think I smelled too bad.

O.K., Scott.  Is this phun enough for you?

I did go home and shower just in case the vulture followed me.  You all can stop holding your noses.

Check in tomorrow for Tales From the Flea.  I'll be working at my scrub store at Caesar Creek Markets and there are always photo ops.