Posts filed under ‘a Cow -elle opinion’
The Continuing Pictorial of an “appeal”ing demo
In January of this year I attended along with Busters House Blog the Demolition Board of Appeals hearing- we were rather surprised at the condition of one of those being appealed
“As Seen In Lorain: 3620 Clifton Avenue and the second chance
In yesterday’s Morning Journal, there was an article about the decision made by the Demolition Board of Appeals to add 16 more houses to the demolition list. In that article, it was mentioned that the owners of one of the houses on the demolition list were given a second chance to make repairs. Even though it was noted by Demolition Board member, 5th ward Councilman, and neighborhood resident Eddie Edwards that “Before the sale, the house sat empty for about five years, with its doors and windows open and generally falling apart…” and “The new owners also waited a year before taking action to repair it…” AND the Board went out to see this house for themselves AND took the Fire Chief with them AND talked to the unhappy neighbors – the owners have $17,000 and a plan and that was enough for the Board to grant them a second chance.
ED NOTE WONDER IF THE REALTORS WHO ARE CONCERNED ABOUT POINT OF SALE INSPECTIONS HAD THIS ONE IN MIND????
http://www.morningjournal.com/articles/2013/06/18/news/doc51bfd70faaa52594866940.txt
LOCAR Board President Chad Schneider. “It needs a lot of attention.”
Many members will oppose the legislation in its current form, Schneider said. The new rules would slow down real estate transactions and make a complicated process even more complicated
TOTALLY OFF THE GRID!!!!
Well maybe if the point of sale WAS a little more complicated AND SOME TEETH IN THE PROPERTY CODE-
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2013/02/14/the-cowboys-of-lorain-no-more-shooting-blanks-part-7/
we wouldn’t be having to face the ” complicated appeals for demolition” because the property would not make a demolition list in the first place .
Busters House revisited the Clifton House this week and the finding can be found here on Lisa’s Blog
Whatever happened to 3620 Clifton Avenue?
http://bustershouse.wordpress.com/2013/06/16/whatever-happened-to-3620-clifton-avenue/
“How long does the City have to let this go on? Are the owners now caught up in the cycle of permit perpetuity? As long as there’s a permit in the window, the City will continue to watch from the sidewalk.”
Who is Who in the 052- New Blog
Will the information make a difference? Will the 44052 be better off for the information- I have my doubts.
On my way to the meeting for the Admiral King Elementary playground destruction and more “poor ” quality of life issues
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2013/05/28/an-open-letter-ward-2-needs-you/
I received yet another Registered Sex Offender notification in our neighborhood. He now dwells right across the street from the Admiral King Tribute Site.
As is my want, I drove past the Admiral King Tribute site on my way home to check out the area, make sure the lights were working, the plants needing water, any issues etc.
This site that took so much organization, community, donations, a place for people to come, sit awhile and ponder, young lives lost for their country , history, the lake, the port, a place I hoped of honor and serenity, a rebirth of community!
So imagine my bile to the throat reaction when, as I drove past the anchor and sitting on the front steps I saw this particular pedophile ( as per his record) enjoying a can of beer , watching the kids playing in the neighborhood , benefitting from the peace and tranquility of a late spring evening, the warm breeze. Maybe I am being unreasonable but I did not expend what little time and energy left to me for HIS and HIS ILK’s benefit.
Of course, giving him the benefit of the doubt ,
maybe he was returning to the family home from his incarceration
NO! another rental with the owner living elsewhere in this case North Ridgeville!
I found myself more than a little irritated that once again a multi- unit out of town landlord was determining the quality of life in this old neighborhood.
“
For Rent One City- Who dictates the health of your neighborhood? “
And so, the birth of a blog- Who is Who in the 052?
1. Every Wednesday I will be going through the alphabet of RSO’s starting with A- and those on parole in this neighborhood of 44052.
2. I will put up their information and if they rent the property owners information and also the crime statics for that week as well as links to those agencies.
NOTE: ALL information is already public record and available to those who wish to access the various sites. I am just putting the information in one place. JUST the FACTS
However after I get through the 139 and counting RSO’s in he 44052 and 90 of those on Adult Parole I may take a look at the “charities” their finances , and the who is who and who gets paid what!
So here is the link to the Who is Who in the 052
http://lorentalinfo.wordpress.com/
and it can also be found on this blog’s blog roll side bar
Revisionist History/Writing – The Temptation – Guilty- Not Guilty
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-21380622
Richard the 3rd- his remains have been found beneath the parking lot in Leicester. He did apparently have scoliosis but not the withered arm and hunchback as portrayed by so many Shaksperian actors through the centuries. Poor old – well young Richard really- ( he was only 32) he was much maligned by the most famous playwriter of all William Shakespeare- who promoted for the Tudors 
.
Why was that?- was poor Richard the Plantagenet a victim of 16th century swift boating
( Since the political smear campaign conducted by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth against John Kerry, the term “swift boating” has come into common use to refer to a harsh attack by a political opponent that is dishonest, personal and unfair.
It seems the Tudors didn’t like the popular Plantagenets and so since, in the long ago ,having deformities of the body was equated with evil deeds and beings ; poor Richard was given a withered arm and devil’s hunchback by William Shakespeare
( And all you directors and actors -will you now be changing the portrayal” of Richard the Third- or will we, because it is Shakespeare , continue to perpetuate the myth?)
WoM Blog Logo Scott Bakalar
Craig Foltin when he was Mayor of the City of Lorain was accused (by me) on the old WoM Blog of revisionist ( writing) found here -
http://thbarchive.wordpress.com/2009/07/11/the-foltin-fiasco-and-the-pd-and-wom/
You can read more from the Wom on the subject
http://thbarchive.wordpress.com/2009/07/11/foltin-responds-bakalar/
To me, this revisionist writing showed a character flaw. However, even the disappearance of the articles on the WoM has caused history revised by omission , as unless archived by me , the events as originally written have disappeared as though they never happened.. Ironic????
So to MY dilemma:
Angela , Sue and Tim Lombardi
I was accused, within weeks of my son’s death, when our world was in turmoil, of not knowing my son by Angela ( Lombardi) ritchey ( Angela Ritchey DO. )
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2010/04/20/i-didnt-know-my-son-chris-ritchey/
So I went on a journey in search of my son
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/category/chris-ritchey/
through his art work- all that was left of him to speak and speak it has!
During the course of that journey I touched upon where he may have, in the family gene pool, been given some talent. This led to posts on family members long gone.
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2010/04/18/unfinished-portrait-the-artistic-gene/
In the months that ensued, I found a few cousins who had been searching the internet great- granddaughters, grandsons etc. coming to my blog. Families tend to drift apart through the generations; they had information I never heard and I had information about our respective shared ancestral grandfathers. It was very confusing there were a lot of John Henry’s and Jacks and Millicents etc. in the family tree.
To put faces to names, I spent a few days drawing up notes and family photos to go with each family story or event in order to clarify the who is who!.
I, of course, came to my part of the family tree- It was so hard to put my son down as deceased I found I couldn’t write the word for hours- I kept coming back to it and its finality!
Then we came to the “married” part. I truly agonized, I hesitated………….
Chris was married for just over a year( about as long as he experienced the chemo and non cure!) – and it is a day I wish NOW never happened June 7th - it is very painful in light of what transpired – as it was the day vipers came into control of our lives .
But my dilemma, if I left the space blank- as the
“tree” would go down through family members to come there would be an omission.
I would be guilty, by that omission revising an albeit insignificant historical fact( since there were no children) but I would be revising our history by ommission .
BUT as a mother, having watched and lived through the pain caused by Angela Marie Lombardi ( ritchey)DO I no more wanted her name associated in anyway in any part of our family – for perpetuity -she does not have a place in Chris’ “family” . I wish I could expunge the memory of them all!
We have a lot of scandals in our family but they for the most part show character and can bring a smile. So I pondered and pondered :
Do I become one of the guilty of “revisionist writings/history” for my own painful reasons or do I add the event that my son married and died and left a widow ?
This may not seem such a dilemma to you, as readers, but my being as honest as I can be and damn the consequences- got in the way of my need to expunge the events of my son’s death and the people who caused such pain out of my life was overshadowed by “truth”. .
So I finished my part of the notes for the family tree with the following –
Christopher David Ritchey
born – August 21st 1980 died of cancer December 3rd 2009 -no children
Note : ( although he was married for a few months we don’t consider ” her” as part of this family in any way). My particular scandal can be found here http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2010/12/11/december-11th-the-beginning-of-the-beginning/ – for those family members interested in knowing more .
Chris had a BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art and was an art director for Wyse advertising
He has a category on my blog – found here
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/category/chris-ritchey/
with regard to his story and his life
As for the rest of the family scandals – they are much more interesting and a couple are the stuff of novels and I am content that I have been as true to history as I can be
June 7th my day of infamy!
The BE all and END all of BASKETBALL
The HOOPLA!
I am not a fan of “basketball” although I have written about it and its “king”
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2010/07/09/le-brawn-is-gawn-thank-gawd/
I was first introduced to the game by its sound, as a neighbor’s son got his hoop on the garage. All evening long even after dark ( on came the security lights) day after day, night after night you could hear the thump , thump, thump bang shake rattle of the back board hour after hour..
Luckily for me, we moved . My introduction to the sport of basketball was a negative, it ranked up there with barking dogs and Chinese water torture.
In recent days in this neighborhood we have seen an elementary school playground become the place , not of children’s laughter as they slide down slides, climb and play ball, but of consternation and criminal activity; definitely not the intended use of the facility .
Not playing around; Disturbing activity at Admiral King Elementary playground draws concerns
http://www.morningjournal.com/articles/2013/05/23/news/doc519d8ef1646e8056846889.txt
It had become the “gathering place” of “ASB’s” anti- social behaviourists”- these are the young ADULTS who move in , take over and generally don’t give a damn for society except their own. There was much ta do in the neighborhood anger and complaints about the behaviours emanating from the playground long after school was over.
“I’ve seen grown men urinate on playground equipment, people having sex on the slides, smoking pot and who knows whatever else,” Watchorn said. “There are basketball games that go on till all hours of the night, drug deals; terrible language; it goes on constantly.”
Even the intended use of the ” hoops” by the neighborhood children was negated. Instead the ASB’s took over.
Ironically, as I have watched the dialogue unfold menacing and disgusting behavior ( abhorrent to those of us in another society) , open foreplay, fornication , foul language that was as repetitive as the thump, thump, thump, bang, rattle off the backboard- urination on the equipment , culminating in a neighborhood arsonist ( who also went to the playground for the “hoops”) setting fires not once but apparently 3 times but it was the request to remove the hoops that caused consternation among some of the powers that be!
“Where are their priorities ?”
I was amazed therefore, to see how even those who proclaim their place in leadership and society focused not on the “quality of life issues” but becoming irate and passionate about saving “basket ball hoops” on a ELEMENTARY SCHOOL playgound . Some of the people, for whom I have the greatest respect, were defending basketball hoops rather than the quality of life of individuals who are affected by this anti- social behavior.
.
Lorain school officials remove basketball hoops from Admiral King(Morning Journal)
http://www.morningjournal.com/articles/2013/05/31/news/doc51a81782a0f5e691538371.txt
Anti Political Correctness Ad by Chris Ritchey
The priorities seem very confused to me so let me be clear:
1. The repetitive noise of the “game ” hour after hour after hour into the early morning has been shown to cause heightened stress levels which in turn can cause health problems . Your decisions ( BOE and Lorain City schools) could be seen to create a possible public/ private nuisance and not only in the Admiral King Elementary neighborhood. .
“To constitute a nuisance, either public or private, the acts complained of must either
cause injury to or obstruct the reasonable use or enjoyment of another’s property”
A common, or public, nuisance is the doing of or the failure to do something that
injuriously affects the safety, health or morals of the public, or works some substantial
annoyance, inconvenience or injury to the public. Commonwealth v. South Covington &
Cincinnati Street Railway Co., (1918), 181 Ky. 459, 463. To be considered public, the nuisance
must affect an interest common to the general public and it is not necessary that the entire
community be affected, so long as the nuisance will interfere with those who come in contact
with it in the exercise of a public right. W. Keaton, D. Dobbs, R. Keaton & D. Owen, Prosser &
Keaton on the Law of Torts, 645 (5th Ed. 1984).
/”private nuisance”
A private nuisance is an interference with a person’s enjoyment and use of his land. The law recognizes that landowners, or those in rightful possession of land, have the right to the unimpaired condition of the property and to reasonable comfort and convenience in its occupation
2. In this particular situation around Admiral King Elementary,for those BOE members who are trying to save hoops rather than quality of life for their neighbors:
These hoops are being denied to the very children for whom they were meant ! You are introducing an element to a playground that adversely effects your young students.
I don’t think that was the intended use of such equipment
3. If Lorain City Schools wish to give the general population access to the “basket ball ” courts etc. then there must be accountability by the Lorain City Schools. You are confusing a playground with a public park, in my opinion. I don’t believe it is up to Lorain City Schools to provide entertainment to adults at the expense of the children , students and neighbors. Apparently these full court hoops are becoming a magnet for moronic behaviours.
There has to be “rules’ – LCS – you do not let your students run amok in your buildings and playgrounds , spitting, urinating , acts of a sexual nature during the school day. Why then, should you allow such usage after hours? It doesn’t make sense! Does your definition of quality of life and responsible behavior end at the end of the school day?
SOURCE
No , if the desire is to keep this equipment available to the “general public” then it carries with it the responsibility of “refereeing ” of the usage .
It means signage, limited hours and “policing”- NOT BY THE NEIGHBORHOOD, NOT BY THE RESIDENTS, NOT BY THE LORAIN POLICE DEPT BUT BY THE OWNERS OF THE PROPERTY- LORAIN CITY SCHOOLS ( and apparently since the State of Ohio paid 81 percent for the building of the new facilities ) BY THE STATE!
To those that cry foul to the taking down of the hoops I would suggest “involvement” , intelligentsia, and consideration for those who feel the ripple effect of your decision-making!
An Open Letter – WARD 2 -NEEDS YOU
This past week, in this oldest neighborhood of Lorain, Charleston Village has seen the arrest of an alleged arsonist, who twice returned in the same amount of days to a brand new elementary school’s playground to destroy.
http://www.morningjournal.com/articles/2013/05/26/news/doc51a184a4e642d416047198.txt
The video in the article shows the aggression of such an act and the aftermath
Photos LORAIN 365
Yes, this “alleged arsonist” is just the latest escalation of anti social behavior in Ward Two, Lorain Ohio.
We hear the cries of citizens take back your neighborhoods. Oh! and some of us we have tried to do so in many ways in the past two decades, but we who are still left in these older neighborhoods are as burned out as our playground .
AN OPEN LETTER to those who are the deciders!
For two decades a group of volunteers in the Lorain’s oldest neighborhood known as Charleston Village Society have tried to preserve a quality of life in our neighborhood. We have worked to preserve Lorain’s history and heritage, to maintain a neighborhood , started the block watch program 20 years ago. We were and are very involved in community but we are weakening fast.
We watched with sadness as our two large school buildings in this Lorain oldest community- Irving and the “old” Lorain High/ Lorain middle school- sat empty and forlorn. We rejoiced when a new elementary school was built and named after one of Lorain’s national and internationally recognized hero Fleet Admiral Ernest J King and Constellation Charter Schools saw the old Irving as an asset rather than a demolition .
We have also watched the “allowed” deterioration of our housing stock even as the State of Ohio asked of this community we preserve the historic aspects of this neighborhood . We have watched the loss of our merchants in our downtown area, a quality of life deteriorating with each placebo policy that came down to us. Some died , some left and some “exist” afraid in our streets.
However, we also see hope with the new policies being developed by the current Ritenauer Administration and a refocusing of efforts along Broadway , 100 percent trash pick-up and inspections. BUT if we are to stop the rot we will need “MORE”! We need teeth in our ordinances and accountability
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2013/02/14/the-cowboys-of-lorain-no-more-shooting-blanks-part-7/
We have tried to honor Lorain in all our efforts, with the help of the City of Lorain’s administrations/councils , Lorain City Schools and our sister organizations to feature in a unique way Lorain’s maritime history, honoring the fallen of the Iraq/ Afghanistan War as well as Admiral King’s birthplace.
Over the years we have , pleaded, pointed out the problems hoping we weren’t tilting at windmills, fought ideas we deemed detrimental not only to this neighborhood but to the city herself e.g. Condo”s in Veterans Park
An Eastern Shawnee Casino founded upon the desire of Craig Foltin to get a ” seat at a table” and our tax money spent for his cause – this was the “diversion” , the carrot to dangle in front of a desperate community that was never ever going to go anywhere the “hype of hyperbole” costing thousands and thousands
Casino deal raises doubts; Foltin slammed on cost of tribe negotiations
SOURCE: The Chronicle-Telegram Shawn Foucher September 13 2005
http://www.aproundtable.org/news.cfm?NEWS_ID=755&issuecode=casino
We have partnered with various groups ( 40 individuals in a Community Safety Forum ) to focus on a target area in order to turn the tide such as the Pilot Program for Community Safety, eventually centered in South Lorain under Father Thaden .
However, that particular pilot program failed after an initial success . The approach was one that needed a five pronged approach for success , Lorain Police Dept, Lorain Building Dept ( City of Lorain) Clergy and Social Service Agencies Lorain City Schools , Community ( neighborhood) surrounding the target area at the center of which was Lincoln School.
Sub police station – Lorain City Police
Pre School – Lorain City School
Information and Referral – El Centro
Employment – El Centro
Financial Literacy/ Housing program – El Centro
Senior program – El Centro
Youth Leadership program – El Centro
Once again the effort failed due to the lip service of the then City of Lorain Administration- Mayor Craig Foltin and the withdrawal of the Lorain City Schools bricks and mortar.
http://chronicle.northcoastnow.com/2007/08/14/lorain-schools-taking-back-lincoln/
Just over a year ago, the Lorain Schools allowed the vacant Lincoln Elementary School to be transformed into a community center set up to honor a teenage girl who was fatally shot by a stray bullet while she was in her living room.
On Monday, the Lorain school board voted to reclaim the building.
Lincoln Community Center Director Leon Mason said he found out about the board’s intentions to terminate the lease on Friday and called the move a shock. Violent crime has drastically decreased since the center opened, and Mason said he’s worried that the board did not give him enough time to find a new location.
The effort died aborning but the talk the talk continued :
Lorain officials look to youth programs to decrease violence
http://www.morningjournal.com/articles/2009/07/05/news/mj1274020.txt
We ,in this oldest neighborhood of Lorain were woken in the early morning after a Day of Pride to the stench of burning once again.
Lorain City Schools has called a “community meeting “ Wednesday May 29th at 6 at the Admiral King Elementary School – apparently to last 1 hour !Here we go again !!!
“
In response, school administrators have scheduled a one-hour community meeting for 6 p.m. Wednesday at the elementary school as a way to engage the public on how to better the schools’ playgrounds. Morning Journal May 24th.
We have also over the years witnessed the pressure cooker release meetings
Give the outraged whatever the situation a chance to sound off, have their say , limited their time to two or three or five minutes , nod in agreement , smile yes we will work toward an end , all will get on board all smiles and shaking hands at the feel good scenario. And in a few weeks all this will be old news and we can get on with the whatever the particular powers that be were doing before so annoyingly interrupted.
LIP SERVICE has become the reaction. The cynic, I have become, waits to see the latest “talk the talk” outcome.
Well no matter, this is just an old ward with a plethora of social service agencies , major multi rentals, dilapidated buildings along our main thoroughfare , crime , a dumping ground for the Registered Sex Offenders and those on parole (90 parolees alone in the 44052 zip code and 138 RSO in 115 locations). Smugly referred to by those in better wards better communities as “Low – rain”.
L-R Veterans Park ( toilet?) Historic Mayor Kings Home Washington Ave ( owner 64 other properties) and Business on Broadway ( owner owns over 200 properties)
To you that have discounted this ward and her ills let me just say this – so goes Ward Two “Low rain” so goes Lorain. The lack of enforcement of building ordinances( such as they are)- the lack of accountability by those that use this ward to line their pockets while prostituting her housing, the lack of “judicial intestinal fortitude”, the “politics that drive decisions, the LIP service has culminated in what you see in this ward today.
HOWEVER Lorain, this ward is also the ward where Lorain can turn into a positive direction
Photos MARK TELEHA
Photos DAN BRADY
We have reached a tipping point – our “alleged” arsonist – a resident within two blocks of the school, lives in a rental whose owner lives in California , they also own another home on the same street- which is another “nuisance” to those that still try live here in this neighborhood. The drug dealer arrested just three months ago
Suspected drug dealer near Admiral King Elementary school arrested
http://www.morningjournal.com/articles/2013/02/21/news/doc5125ac6fde860351228060.txt
also owned by a multi property owners.
We are the cancerous core of the decline of Lorain, but we are also her HOPE .
To you council representatives you need to stop the rot here and now!
We are the only ward where development can take place. Ward two has the lakefront, we have the river front, we have the business/ commercial district, we have the seat of government , the port, we are the on the scenic highway and byways trail, Lake Erie circle tour, theatre and we have Lorain’s history!
There will be no rebirth of a downtown whilst the neighborhoods along the Broadway corridor are decayed and only fit habitation for miscreants , vermin and thugs, where the only profits being made are on the backs of nuisance housing.
The Judicial Branch- we are tired of revolving door sentencing- time to start using the powers you have on your benches !
It is all very well for the churches and social service agencies to have compassion for the indigent in this area
http://www.loraincounty.com/homelesstaskforce/who-we-are.shtml
however the compassion has to have accountability to the population who wish to get a book from the public library, attend a church service, to go to the bank, to walk into a jeweler or a print shop. attend a festival on our river front , to be able to sit on a park bench in Lorain oldest park enjoy her fountain without the stench of human feces.
Your compassion has responsibility to those individuals as well.
Our “worth” or lack thereof is spreading to your neighborhoods – homes derelict or selling for less than an automobile – has already caused a significant monetary loss to the “newer homes” in the “good wards”. The neighborhood issues of safety along with a failing grade has already caused Lorain City Schools distress, loss of students and monetary damages you can ill afford. .
Lorain YOU are perceived by those outside this community by what is happening here in Ward Two - we can either make or break you. It is time you ALL pay attention to what is happening here because we are the symptom of a greater terminal disease. !
It is UP to Lorain’s government, Administrative, Legislative, Judicial to focus on this ward. It is up to the Social Service agencies the churches to also take responsibility for their compassion. It behooves the Lorain City Schools to listen and see what is happening in your neighborhoods because like it or not you are part of the system- your decisions affect our community too!
It is up to you to get involved and find the intelligence and guts to sort out the problems because we who still try and “live” here are reliant upon just a “few ”
as our last line of defense to support us and they too are out numbered as the placebo policies are spreading out from our core! We are literally going down in flames in this “old” ward two
A Last Post – Oh dear…. thinking ahead
The last few days have found even my “auto pilot” the part of me that takes over in my “present life” having issues. I usually rely upon my auto pilot to see me through the days when my brain has me elsewhere in the past.
However something is amiss, I have waited to have it “clear” or like some kind of emotional pacemaker kick in . Not happening.
Although I have been busy what with
Pride Day, Settlers’ Watch, reading about “circumvention and diversion ” which is ripe for a post, Success for All fiasco, transparency in the hierarchy of Lorain City Schools, Cheryl Atkinson and her 76 trombones, scholarships and how Thomas the Tank Engine and the Cuyahoga Valley trip “tanked”, arson and cretins of Lorain
any number of subjects I am in a sort holding pattern
As I walked back from Settlers’ Watch last night knowing that I had a post half-finished to put up for this morning I started to feel quite unwell. I wondered
is this it? Am I done with this planet?
I wasn’t too concerned, I admit it, after all I had had shower and clean underwear but the thought crossed my mind if I tanked the last post on my blog would be the last thing written, my last words so to speak. Oh! I have my obituary half written – after the dreadful obit with regard to my son no other bugger is writing mine so that has to be finished so it can be the “last post” . I wonder if you know how weird it is to write your own obit?
People eating and laughing and sharing news of the day in the ICU waiting rooms whilst waiting for my son’s last breath left me disgusted and full of anger. The Gypsy Caravan that attended my son’s last days was to me abhorrent and tasteless and not of my culture or his and robbed death of dignity .
I read his Obituary on Saturday in the local paper. Was this my wonderful young man whose life was put into so many cents a line? Was this MY Chris – I could not let that be the last words written about my son so I have composed a letter which I hope will be a more fitting epitaph to one whose passing has broken a mother’s, father’s and sister’s heart.The Unbearable Pain of Being
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2009/12/07/my-only-son-chris-ritchey/
So you will have to be patient those that would like to know more about the above mentioned situations in Lorain and elsewhere until I find my center again or my auto pilot kicks back in! 
The History Park- 1812- 201 hundred years – a recorded city park – Veterans Park Lorain Ohio
ED NOTE_ I wrote this last year as the park now known as Veteran’s Park was celebrating 200 years as a recorded park- I am not sure why I didn’t publish at the time – maybe I was in one of my “dark places in my other world where apathy for this life reigns supreme” – I don’t know but as we are coming up to Pride Day and Memorial Day I would hope there is no apathy from any of us for this little green space -
Two hundred years a deeded city property since 1812 – HAPPY ANNIVERSARY????
iS THIS HOW WE CELEBRATE – LORAIN??????????????
I started, yesterday afternoon, to write the recent history of veterans Park aka settlement meeting space, Lorain Public Square, Washington Park and Veterans Park , Lorain Ohio. – Oh! how easy it would have been to have gone back to January 2006 archives on the WoM Blog and list the links but that has disappeared and with it a record of a fight by a community to hold what was deemed worthy.
In the closing months of 2005 the Foltin Administration along with Community Development Director Sandy Prudoff, Jon Veard and Morning Journal editor – John Cole, in their infinite wisdom, decided the historic park should be condos. Foltin and Co started the wheels in motion to make this little park unworthy of its heritage .
Mayor Foltin quietly stopped work and maintenance on the park so that after a period of months the park and its infrastructure started to rapidly deteriorate. The fountain no longer was turned on, said to have major problems ( which turned out later to be a false statement)- graffiti wasn’t removed – only the grass was cut – the vagrants were allowed to use it as John Cole’s editorial stated as a “piss park”. In truth Craig Miller the Safety Service Director told me the park would be “blighted”. Events happened when Jon Veard let the plans out of the bag prematurely and I, along with others, started fighting to stop this fiasco of finance.
It was a nasty fight pitting Veterans groups and the community- I was the subject of editorials and nasty letters , name calling and ridicule but we fought for that park.
Thankfully city council ( who had also been kept in the dark about Foltin and Co’s plans ) stepped in and saved the park. Foltin tried to say the pumps weren’t working on the fountain and it would cost thousands to repair, walls would have to be taken down this was not the case. He tried to use the veterans as a tool to sway city council . You can find the council minutes here …..
Minutes Vets Park City Council June 5th
I have been down this path once before - No more turning a deaf ear and a blind eye and doing just enough- The maintenance on the park, the safety of this park the heart of this oldest neighborhood, an integral part of the port area and Broadway development should be a showcase. People and organizations have cleaned painted and honored their citizens in this park for centuries . We have to stop the rot NOW!!
Children should play under those trees not have to worry about who is doing what disgusting thing , people should sit on benches without having to move bedding , I should be able to sit a listen to a fountain and smell the perfumed breezes of flowers not of human excrement . ( check comments after the previous post). This little park is in fact not very large , some “upmarket” properties have more land mass. It is manageable!
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2012/08/18/the-progess-then-and-now-veterans-park-lorain-ohio/
On the 7th of September 2006 I wrote – Silent Witness
“Nothing but a place for deadbeats and bums!” “ It has outlived its purpose” There is nothing historical about that park!” The city can’t afford to keep it up” It is a “piss park!!Nobody uses it, it is worthless!
So said John Cole and his editorials
The year is 1807 Azariah Beebe and his wife becomes the first family to settle in Black River Township. Nathan and Horatio Perry erect a house at the mouth of Black River and open a store for trade with the Indians. The area begins to be known as the Black River settlement.
“Of the first settlers, some men walked the entire distance from Connecticut and other places, some rode horseback part way, sharing the horse with others. Some rode in ox carts; some drove oxen; some came part way by land, and the rest by water; some came on sleds in mid winter; some plowed through the mud of spring or endured the heat of summer, some had bleeding feet and some serious illness.
Sometimes it was a bride and groom who started alone; sometimes it was a husband, wife and children; sometimes it was a group of neighbors who made the trip. Children were born on the way and people of all ages died and were buried where they died.
But after they arrived, their experience was almost identical.A removal into the depths of the Ohio woods, where a man was directly placed face to face with primitive conditions, brought him at once to the practical contemplation of his problem and the solution was in his own hands; food, shelter, raiment. Here was the earth, whose soil was to furnish bread and clothing, but it was covered with a thick growth of great trees to be removed before it could be planted. Their trunks and barks must be converted into houses.
A temporary supply of food was carried by the immigrant with him. In making his way to his purchase he pursued the trail that led nearest to it, and, with his ax, opened the rest of the way. The point gained, the same implement cut down and prepared the tree trunks for the first cabin, which the hands of the whole party, women and children as well, helped to place in the low crude walls of the primitive structure, while the bark of the basswood and elm made the cover. Doorless, floorless, windowless, chimneyless, the pioneer eagerly took possession of his cheerless cabin.
Thousands of them within 70 years were built and occupied in the Lorain woods. Men and women lived in them there; and children – all the elders of the new generation – were born in them. Death came in them there; and there young women became brides and dwelt the happy wives of happy husbands
.
Of all the dwellings in the woods, scarcely the site of one can now be identified.
Next to the erection of their own cabin, the most important event was the arrival of another family in the woods and the erection of their dwelling received the joyous help of every male within 10 miles of it
No one born of later years can comprehend the strength and warmth of the bands of sympathy and fellowship, which united the first dwellers in the woods in wide neighborhoods.”
A History of Lorain J.B. Nichols 1924
In the next 5 years the little settlement grows all the while they struggle the new nation continues the birthing process.
1807 UK Leopard fires on the US Chesapeake and impresses 4 men
1807 September 1 Burr is acquitted of treason
1807 December Congress passes TJ’s Embargo Act banned all US trade to keep it neutral. Failure. Manufacturing N benefited. S and shipping hurt bad
1808 US bans the slave trade
1809 March 1 Non-Intercourse Act. repealed Embargo, open trade but not with UK&Fr
1810 Macon’s Bill #2;if 1 country accepts US neutrality US would trade
1810 Napoleon falsely repeals the Berlin and Milan decrees
1811 November WH Harrison’s troops ambushed by “the Prophet”
1812 state of US troops: ~12000. Commanders political appointees, weak
1812 June 18 US declares war on UK
1812 July William Hull (US) tries to invade Canada. rooted. Hull sentenced to death for cowardice. Madison pardons
1812 August-December the US Constitution and United States win sea battles, raise morale
1812 December Madison reelected. (every wartime president has been reelected)
1812 December UK blockade of Chesapeake and Delaware Bays
and in the little settlement , now Lorain, Ohio, they also contribute to the founding of a country , of a state of a city
1808 Ferry charges across Black River: hog and sheep (each) – two cents; footman – six cents; man and horse – eighteen cents; loaded wagon and team – sixty cents; and all other carriages – thirty-seven cents. On July 22, 1808 local groups petition Geauga County Commissioners to have Lake Road continued on toward Sandusky. Lake Road is surveyed by Amos Spafford.
1810 John S. Reid arrives to build a house, then returns to Newburgh (near Cleveland) to get his family. Daniel Perry and family settle west of Black River in early March of 1810. The Shupe, Quigley, Lyon, Kelso and Seeley families settle in or near the Black River Settlement. On September 24,
1811 John S. Reid’s family moves to the area. William Martin establishes a farm, three miles west of Black River, on the little stream once called “Martin’s Run” (which runs through what is now Columbus Park). Quartus and Aretus Gilmore join the Black River Settlement.
1812 Edmund Gilmore and family move to Black River. Edmund Gilmore builds county’s first barn. John S. Reid is commissioned Postmaster for “The Mouth of the Black River Post Office”, October 23, 1812. John S. Reid builds the Reid House Inn and Tavern. John S. Reid builds a ferry opposite his block house. Judge Nathan Perry, Sr., (from Cleveland, Ohio) passes away while visiting his son, Nathan Perry in Lorain. Azariah Beebe and his family left the Black River Settlement, relocating on the Huron River to the West. John Lyon is born. He is the first White child born in the Black River Territory. On August 15, 1812 the news of Hull’s surrender to the British fans rumors of a British invasion of Ohio. A “War Scare” is started by a false report of the burning and capture of Fort Huron by Indians. A Militia post is established at Black River to ensure citizenry that they could safely return to their homes and cabins.
***1812 recorded Lorain Public Square (According to Lorain County Recorder Judy Nedwick, the park has been a part of the plat of Charleston since 1812. Since that time, the county records show, the park has remained property of the city. Morning Journal Jan19th 2006
1813 Guns of the Battle of Lake Erie can be heard at Black River on September 10,
1813. Legend has it that Johnny Appleseed (John Chapman) planted apple trees in this area and informed settlers of the results of the Battle of Lake Erie.
The decades roll by; those who form this community are born and die, are greeted and mourned, are forgotten or are remembered in the pages of dusty history books. They all contributed, those who sat beneath the trees, played in the grass, watched as horse and buggy gave way to automobiles.
All through the wars and trials and tribulations stood a little place of green, sometimes forlorn, sometimes beautiful and cared for and then in the year, 2006 insulted and deemed worthless.
This silent witness who cannot speak for itself and so has to rely upon the sons and daughters of those that now call this “settlement “ home. Those who see the beauty and the living green memorial to those who through the years have founded a Nation- The United States of America- silent yet in it’s own way a testament of all that has gone before.
Lorain will not have any “formal ” celebration this year of the Battle of Lake Erie , as will other lakeshore communities, but the City of Lorain and her citizens can at least make sure the little green space who witnessed America’s struggle in 2013 is worthy of remembrance
I’ m CRUSHED- but not around here- Why not???
I wrote a post that has sat in my drafts folder for two years . I was on the look out for “tumbled glass mulch for the Lorain Admiral King Tribute landscaping around the anchor.
As the project for Fleet Admiral King progresses and things such as anchors get added so the site so the site plan changes.
As I looked at the site , knowing what it takes to keep all the plants watered and weeded over at Settlers’ Watch I knew we couldn’t go the same way with the mound that will form the “hook” of the anchor at the Admiral King Tribute site.Black mulch with maybe an outline of white and silver planting outlining the hook ( drought tolerant plants) would be a possibility.
The anchor from the previous Admiral King High School would be the center piece but how to display it rather than just sticking it on a concrete pad.
As I looked out at the blue lake I thought of blue crushed glass mulch… I know they have it in fact……….My quest to find it locally has been a trip……. Never heard of it- No nothing like that they don’t make that errrrr excuse me but….
So I checked with Lorain County Solid Waste our recycing over-seerer ;they sent me to Republic who are in the recycling business and a nice chap named Brian told me “never heard of it”
Hey I know I can be cutting edge but this stuff goes for quite a bit of money and obviously the local recyclers don’t watch HGTV because they would know this stuff is used for more than making bottles and it is expensive..
Just look at the things you can do with itI know What happens to old windshields in New England but what happens in Lorain just used for making more bottles?
Since I will have to “import” recycled glass ( Let me tell you they don’t make this recycling thing easy around here and from having to pay for shipping which is as much as the product I will have to see if I can adapt the design and not use so much shipped in recycled glass with some of our “known marble chips SIGH
http://www.agreenoffice.com.au/green-office-services.html
Well I had success I found the glass mulch in cobalt blue and had to ship it from New Mexico. Then came the Eric Barnes Heroes Walk project, once again I wanted to use the glass mulch for around the tribute signs. I did have to have some shipped from Pennsylvania this time – again at an expense. $100.00 per 50 lb bag for recycled glass. In Texas you can pop along to the recycling center and fill up a bag of the mixed stuff for free.
I have heard a lot about recycling , I have heard a lot about needed jobs , well just a suggestion how hard can it be to recycle our waste glass tumble it and sell it at the average cost of $100 a 50 lb bag other states and communities are making a great deal of money.
Just check out what Cumberland County is doing
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/technology/2012/04/turning-beer-bottles-garden-mulch/1812/
Is there anything high-speed flexible impactors can’t flail into gold? Not bloody likely, given the magic they’re performing with garbage glass in Tennessee.
While you and your friends might sell beer bottles to acquire more beer, or use them to build wicked steampunk goggles, the Cumberland County Recycling Center is grinding them up to make cheap mulch and road salt. Wait: That’s actually possible? Hell yeah, it is, and here’s how it works
In fact in New Zealand they are experimenting with different shades of crushed glass for their reflective properties in helping the “wine” grapes – Ohio wine growers interested??
I think we in Lorain County are missing out on a lucrative opportunity- if we have the “bottle”. (Synonyms bottle [British slang], bravery, courageousness, daring, daringness, dauntlessness, doughtiness, fearlessness, gallantry, greatheartedness, guts,)
The longing for the magic to come back- one man’s belief another’s terror
William Holmes Sullivan · The Fairy Ring; The Enchanted Piper · 1880 · Oil on board · 9.00 x 12.50 cm · From the Leicester Galleries
It was such a world of wonder and magic when I was a child. There were definitely fairies in the bottom of our garden. On dewy mornings I would carefully search the grass for the silvery fairy rings, where they left their mark having danced in the moonlight.
Photo source
http://fairyroom.com/2013/01/a-treacherous-beauty-the-hazards-of-entering-a-fairy-ring/
Each May the bluebells would appear and I just knew the fairies, imps , pixies and elves made good use of their tiny bells for hats and drinking cups.
Hedgehogs, which are now popular pets here in Ohio, were used by the fairies to ride through the gardens . A saucer of milk would be left out each evening on the door step so they could slake their thirst.
The rockery at the bottom of the garden housed all sorts of wonders, now I see nothing but hiding places for snakes and mice and creepy crawlies, but then I saw tiny houses for the wee folk.
There was a magic in my youth- being the only girl in a mainly all boy street – I was accepted for the most part as one of the “gang”. I admit they always made me the robber, or the Indian to their cops and cowboys but I was included. How was it my parents and other parents of the street let us roam over to the “gasometer” and the ponds and streams where fishing for “newts” was the adventure of the day? I am struggling to remember what we did with them after an afternoon of catching them .
It was such a different time – a time of innocence -even though we played among some of the bombed out buildings of post war London. I don’t remember ( apart from being a girl) references made to our playmates ethnicity or religion , we played and lived in a magical place of childhood innocence .
Of course the magic has been replaced by awareness, even my children in their own neighborhood, as they were growing up, would not have been allowed to wander out of my sight or those of the neighbors. There were no adventures for them with the newts in the gasometer ponds.
No! now the magic is in a kingdom in Florida, California or even Paris. My grandchildren flew away to play in the magic and be sprinkled with a different sort of fairy dust as terror was rearing its dark and ugly head below them at the Boston Marathon .
And whilst they giggled and laughed with pirates and princesses horror once again scarred our world. A horror , whilst new to America and Boston, was so reminiscent of other horrific acts of terror in my own home – London- perpetuated by the IRA.
You can find the shameful very long list of bombings in the UK in the 70′s 80′s 90′s , 2000′s here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_terrorist_incidents_in_Great_Britain
You will note that whilst the majority of the dozens and dozens of bombs exploded in the UK were IRA ( Roman Catholic by faith)( although Protestants have also caused terror too )- According to media reports the Catholics and the IRA were helpfully funded by Noraid ( Boston and New York). The latest threat is Islam – a group that Representative Peter King ( a “republican” in more ways than one)
Peter Thomas King (born April 5, 1944) is the U.S. Representative for New York’s 2nd congressional district, serving since 1993. He is a member of the Republican Party and represents the central Long Island district that includes parts of Nassau and Suffolk counties.
King formerly served as the Chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, where he drew attention in early 2011 for holding hearings on the extent of radicalization of Muslim Americans. He also sits on the Financial Services Committee and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. He stepped down after his seventh year as Homeland Security Chair because of self-imposed Republican term limits. He remains a member of the committee.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King
However, ironically this same man, according to the New York Times in 1986, was characterized as an open endorser of the IRA and their cause.
http://www.nytimes.com/1986/10/26/nyregion/l-peter-king-and-the-ira-394786.html
Peter King is (or was – is he toning it down for this, his first statewide race?) the only elected officeholder in this state who is an open endorser of the terrorist Irish Republican Army and supporter of its Noraid fund-raising arm in this country. I am sure Mr. King will welcome the opportunity that the articles didn’t provide, to clarify his relationship, past and present, with the Noraid gun-runners, and to specify whether he continues to support the I.R.A.’s ”armed struggle” against Ulster’s right to political self-determination In Ireland, the civil war among the Catholic nationalists – never mind the struggle for Ulster’s Anschluss, which has significant minority support – ended in the 1920′s. Apparently it lives on in the Irish Catholic chauvinist ghettos of Nassau.
You can read more of Peter King’s walk the walk talk the talk with the terrorist organizations and in bed with the Boston-based NORAID funding group here
http://www.counterpunch.org/2010/12/02/the-hypocrisy-of-peter-king/
“And yet thousands of Americans, including people who live in Boston, gave millions of dollars to NORAID which was used to buy guns and Semtex and support the Provisional IRA terrorist infrastructure.”
Jonathon Ball and Tim Parry victims of the Warrington bombing
Children and innocents maimed and killed then too, mothers losing sons, all for a “cause” an ideology that does not accept another’s beliefs or ways, a dictatorship of beliefs.
http://thatwoman.wordpress.com/2008/06/08/when-is-it-ok/
And once again on Monday last in Boston – the magic in the world was lost, replaced in the rockery by the snakes and rats and vermin who breed in the dark rankness of the interior .
The daffodils are blooming , magnolia blossom waving to a blue sky now tainted by man. The grass was wet with dew this morning but I didn’t see any fairy rings just the toadstools( fungus) circling , indicating rottenness beneath the ground – no dancing fairies.
What is left of the magic world of innocence ? Just the pain of those that bully using faith and religious beliefs to cause more suffering. The world needs more magic and less organized religions and their fanatics! Every single person who has ever contributed to the causes of terror as they celebrated their own cause de jour no matter your beliefs is as guilty, in my opinion, of the murder of children, magic and innocence.
Source The Economist The New Wars of Religion
http://www.economist.com/node/10063829
Illustration by Jon Berkley
Clotted Cream, The Grey Lady , The Iron Lady, The lost gardens
As most readers are already aware my brain, since the death of my son, has taken various detours from the norm. I seem to be on a memory hyperdrive although most of my recent memories are harder to pull up. It is like I am no longer part of their making- robotic actions and going through the motions seemingly haven’t imprinted on my little grey cells.
Fragmented as I am sights, smells objects can send me on a journey and to places long forgotten; such a journey was “triggered” yesterday by my husband bringing in a jar of Devonshire Clotted Cream from Giant Eagle. He must have been in a particularly loving mood as it cost $9.00 for this 6 oz jar. A rare extravagant for one who preaches to us daily about the cost of bread and milk .
He had remembered a holiday in England where we were driving through country roads from London to Devon. We were off the beaten path thanks to my mother’s remembered direction. The weather was beautiful but the petrol was running low. All the way along mum had wanted to make sure we would stop for a Devonshire Cream Tea but thanks to her directions we knew not where we were.
http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1697858
**NOTE THIS PETROL STATION IS IN SOMERSET NOT DEVON OR CORNWALL BUT AS CLOSE AS I COULD GET TO THE AMBIANCE OF THE MOMENT
Finally, a little old-fashioned petrol station came into view with a lovely cottage tea room off to the side . Gratefully we filled the tank and made our way to The Grey Lady Tea Room.
My mother, happy at last, enquired to the lady running the tea room –
Oh I can’t wait for some “real devon” clotted cream
“Madam “
said the lady with a tone that could freeze tea water solid-
” you will not find “Devonshire” Clotted cream HERE- YOU are in CORNWALL!!!
My mother had well and truly put her foot in it as there is quite a rivalry between whose clotted cream is best – that of the county of Devon or that of Cornwall -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clotted_cream
To change the subject and to ease ruffled Cornish feathers I asked about the name of the tea room.
original artwork 1859 Daniel Macnee
Apparently the “grey lady” referred to was a ghostly inhabitant of the old cottage whose lover was lost ( in the sense of missing on a battlefield) so his fiancée, the lady in question, never went into mourning black until she had received confirmation of his death- but always wore grey. He never returned to her and apparently she still waited patiently by the fireplace for news long, long years after her death.
I tried to find the tea room on the internet this morning but I suppose, like most things, it has long since closed ; not many would find their way off the major highways to support its existence.
However, my mind soon segued from the Grey Lady to The Iron Lady and the news that Maggie Thatcher had died.
Ah! Maggie love her or hate her but you knew she was there
“
In politics, if you want something said, ask a man; if you want to get something done, ask a woman.”
I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.
Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy.
The lamp sitting on the desk in my living room is a poignant reminder of her policies. It is nothing special to the onlooker just an old-fashioned oil lamp ( except it is not so old) . My father purchased the lamp due to the miners strike, Maggie Thatcher and the trade unions , you never quite knew when the lights would go out in London.
As I looked at the lamp this morning, I thought of Maggie Thatcher, the people who are apparently rejoicing in her death . Maggie’s position on the Falklands War. I was at home that year on another trip I watched the patriotism, the news and the young men going to their death. I was proud of the land of my birth, she gave us that pride.
I know most of us thought the Falklands was some island off the coast of Scotland – the association with the dreaded French – errrrrrrrrK the French ( cringing with disdain) well the thoughts about the French will have to wait for another post.
Maggie, who was “our council person” at one time in Finchley, who dared opine council meetings should be open to the public . Maggie who alway took a long beat/ pause before answering an interview question. No ! you may not have liked her , you may not have agreed with her policies but you knew who she was and for that I admire her.
My internet search for the Grey Lady took me on another journey and another “lost” only this time the grey lady was in a lost garden – The Lost gardens of Heligan
http://www.heligan.com/
where giants, sleeping ladies and legends can be found in amongst the ancient woodlands in Cornwall. You can even stop for tea but remember don’t ask for Devonshire Clotted Cream 
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