Images of the unique Baby Doll Dance on Rust Wire

For over 100 years the Italian Catholic community in Lowellville, Ohio near Youngstown has celebrated a unique tradition. 

A person casts out the demons and bad mojo from the past year and celebrates life by spinning around in a large paper mache figure loaded with burning fireworks. Dangerous? It's a little toned down now, and they no longer blow the figure's head off. Zambelli Fireworks even helps with the design.

Check out the post on Rust Wire.
A longer article in The Youngstown Vindicator

Cash Mob movement taking off in Youngstown, hitting the Touch the Moon Candy Saloon

People all around are catching the Cash Mob trend, linking online and picking a time and place to meet and support a local store or series of stores.

Follow the Youngstown Cash Mob on Facebook

On Twitter @YoungstownCashM

See Defend Youngstown for a good recap of local news and events

Youngstown's Rust Belt Brewery looking to expand, turns to Kickstarter

From The Vindicator

"The brewery has struggled to meet rising demand for its product, especially after it introduced four of its beers — the Irish Red Ale,

Blast Furnace Blond Ale, Coke Oven Stout and Old Man Hopper’s IPA — in six-packs late last year.

Beer was previously available in 22-ounce bottles; the switch to standard 12-ounce bottles doubled labor time, including labeling and boxing, which still is done by hand."

Rust Belt is already stocked at local Giant Eagles and a other stores in the Youngstown, Akron and Cleveland area and it's beer distributor would expand sales into Columbus and Cincinnati... if Rust Belt can produce enough beer.

Check it out on Kickstarter.

Wow, Youngstown having troubles with downtown free parking. Installing Meters

Who knew poor, depressed Youngstown is now having some pretty big parking problems. More than a thousand people now work downtown with more nearby at YSU. An emerging retail revival is causing big problems for store owners as parking for potential customers is taken by downtown employees, exploiting the two hour free street parking by moving their cars around every two hours.

The city plans to install meters. Good for them!

Back In Youngstown For The Holidays? Tour The Thriving Tech Incubators!

The holidays can be a strange bittersweet time in cities in which so many have left.In both Cleveland and Pittsburgh,the diaspora swells The Warhol,Carnegie and Cleveland Museum after Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Recently, cities like Cleveland and Youngstown have made efforts to reach out, make connections and counter some of the negative opinions many who left may have had. Not an easy task, in a few short free days, most people are spending with their family.

Youngstown is providing tours of it's hot and rapidly growing, downtown technology incubators.

From I Will Shout Youngstown

Thursday, Dec 22
Tours from 9am to 5pm leave at the top of the hour, led by YBI Chief Evangelist Jim Cossler. RSVP needed.

Friday, Dec 23

Tours from 7am to 10am leave at the top of the hour, led by YBI Chief Evangelist Jim Cossler. RSVP needed.

Monday, Dec 26

Two tours at 11am and 1pm leave at the top of the hour, led by YBI staff.
Meet Dean Abraham of YSU's STEM College!
Check out the new OH WOW! Technology Museum!
Discounts for downtown eateries!

call 330-599-4583 to reserve a spot

Children's Science Center in Youngstown gets 1 Million Dollar Anonymous Gift

While Youngstown is showing some progress, money is still pretty hard to come by.
This sure sounds like great news for a new kids science center there.

Project To Bring a Fish Farm To Youngstown's Idora Neighborhood

Idora has come up here before. It lost it's classic amusement park to a fire, it's carousel is now under The Brooklyn Bridge and many of it's houses have been abandoned.

Still recent efforts have created urban gardens and sustainable agriculture which both adds some life and employment while making the area healthier and more attractive.

See the details and consider supporting them on Kickstarter.

Idora Park Update: Carousel Finds It's New Home In NY

The last significant remnant of Idora Park may never come back to Youngstown but it sure will be a big star in the bright lights of NY.

"It’s a pretty dramatic location, between the Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges, and the carousel will be sheltered in a pretty ritzy pavilion, a $9 million transparent acrylic jewel box by the French architect Jean Nouvel. The horses, originally installed in a theme park in Youngstown in 1922, are now looking pretty good themselves: Their glass eyes glitter; they have brass tags denoting their fine lineage, the Philadelphia Toboggan Company; they’re costumed in sweet sherbet colors of peach and tangerine. There’s a palomino here, a bay there, a line of ponies. Each is different: one, perhaps an American Indian pony, has two feathers on its decorative, or what carousel aficionados call its “romantic” side, the one that is visible to spectators. Another has a shawl across its back and a clutch of roses at the saddle. A Gypsy woman’s horse, no doubt."

Let Youngstown become the really livable, affordable, creative place NY once was. We take the people and the energy and they get the shiny museum pieces in plastic boxes for tourists too look at. Fair trade.

My previous posts about this.

See The Idora Park Carousel : In New York

Letter From Youngstown : Can The Idora Park Carousel Return?

Idora Park Carousel Update

Youngstown State University Holds It's First National Alumni Networking Event

Some folks from YSU were handing out flyers telling people about this at the most recent Pittsburgh Gallery crawl.

The somewhat positive upside falling reliability of state funding is that many schools are working harder at building social connections to their alumni and wider communities.

Thursday's event featured gatherings in 10 U.S. cities. Some of the places included Columbus, Phoenix and Washington D.C.

Those at the Youngstown event, held at Cassese's MVR Italian Restaurant & Bar on Walnut Street, hosted a webcam session that broadcast to the other cities. During the webcast, former students talked about new projects happening at the campus.

Rust Wire Looks At Highway Socialism's Tragic Impact On Youngstown

Youngstown, Ohio, is a city in many ways struggling with success to revive it's beautiful downtown and create a financially sustainable path for livable urbanism. Residents have overwhelmingly supported a program to more rationally use the city's smaller resource base by shrinking streets and rightsizing neighborhoods--in a region in which not only the city but the surrounding area have lost 6% of their population in the last decade alone.

Meanwhile, the city competes with a county and state bent on socialising wasteful roads which bleed the city's tax base for ever spreading suburban sprawl.

From Rust Wire

"State Route 224 in Boardman is not the type of road that planners or sustainability advocates would delight in seeing replicated. Traffic slogs down this commercial corridor at a snail’s pace most times of day. The local paper, The Vindicator, described driving on the street as everything from “exasperating and near impossible to unbelievable and scary.” (It just underwent widening.)

The entire six-mile commercial stretch of SR 244 lacks a foot of sidewalk space. So as much as a headache as it is to drive on, it’s far worse for pedestrians. Furthermore, stormwater runoff from the acres of parking lots along this route have contributed to a persistent and costly flooding problem in Boardman Township."

People in these often Republican suburbs need to understand the process and ethics behind this for what it is-Socialism.

So how did Western Reserve rocket up the infrastructure priority list in the Youngstown area? Well, again, that’s a matter of public policy in a state that continues to favor growth. Because Boardman and Canfield Townships are unincorporated, they won’t have to pay a dime to widen Western Reserve. It’s a county road — that means the county picks up the bill. Many suburbs, including Boardman Township (population 37,000) benefit from remaining unincorporated, allowing them to foist many of their infrastructure costs onto the county.

The injustice of this whole arrangement is that the costs of widening the road will be shared by all residents of the county — including the people who live in Youngstown. Youngstown’s roads will go unmaintained, and the county will continue to draw money from central city residents and redistribute it into the suburbs and exurbs.

To a large extent this story could have been with a few revisions been about the insane, ugly and destructive sprawl around Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Akron, Detroit or an endless number of cities.

A piece by Chuck Banas, titled, "The Sprawl Bubble" might the best succinct description of the problem.

All of this is stupefyingly expensive. These indirect costs constitute the majority of the expense, yet remain invisible to most people—spread-out in the form of local, state, and federal taxes, or camouflaged as municipal bond debt or various other forms of government debt. So in addition to being redundant, this means that suburbia is a doubly expensive living arrangement.

The other point that I’m trying to make is that the migration of wealth to the suburbs has not been a free-market phenomenon. Customer choice is only a small part of the equation, or this wouldn’t have happened in virtually every American city at the exact same time in the exact same way. Which, of course, is exactly how it did happen.

I assert that much of the economic crisis we’re seeing today is simply the end result of decades of bad decisions driven by bad economic, transportation, housing, and land-use policy.

Plans In The works To Transform Historic Youngstown Building Into A Boutique Hotel

Have to get back to Youngstown soon and really check it out. For a place that was absolutely flat on it's ass, a lot of low key positive things seem to be happening there exploiting the richly historic and well designed downtown and a good synergistic relationship with Youngstown State University.

Developer Envisions Wick Building as Hotel

"Out-of-town visitors to the Youngstown Business Incubator, the university, and to venues such as the Covelli Centre have no choice but to stay in the suburbs because of the lack of guest lodging downtown, Marchionda said.

"The initial reports suggest there's a need for more rooms than we first intended to build," he elaborated. Just how many rooms the new hotel would provide remains under study. "We're moving aggressively to do what we want to do there -- build a boutique hotel," the developer said.

Marchionda said the new hotel would be similar to Glidden House in Cleveland, an upscale hotel on the campus of Case Western Reserve University. "It would be an independent operation run by a group that invests in these types of things," he said, not a chain. "They would be an owner/operator and partner with us."

Should all go according to plan, Marchionda said he could proceed on the project over the "next few months," and begin work in earnest during the first quarter of 2012."

One problem that usually comes up with hotels on historic urban blocks is that the need for parking often results in tearing down one or more neighboring buildings--as is proposed for the planned renovation of East Liberty's Highland Building-and almost every hotel renovation in Detroit.

Simply Slavic, Pan Slavic Festival in Youngstown Today

This is a cool idea-Youngstown is having a festival celebrating the food, beer, music, art of Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Macedonia, Bulgaria, The Czech Republic, Russia, Poland and The Ukraine.

12 noon-8 PM in downtown Youngstown Followed by The Slavic Disco

For more info

Idora Park Carousel Update

Photo by Brent Burket

Well, the bittersweet moment has come for lovers of one of the last remaining pieces of Youngstown's lost Idora Park.

The wealthy woman who bought the wonderful, historic carousel and painstakingly restored it has finally gotten her wish and is placing it in a concrete and glass pavilion almost under The Brooklyn Bridge.

This should be a happy tale, but partly because the park is so small and needs no further attraction beyond the views of New York and the Brooklyn Bridge itself, many resent this addition--underlying this is a lot of subtext about gentrification. It's all worthy of a book or a documentary.

Here are my two earlier posts about the carousel and Idora Park.

See The Idora Park Carousel in New York

Letter From Youngstown : Can The Idora Park Carousel Return?

Mahoning Commons Spring Festival in Youngstown

Spring is in the air with it's bounty--A Pittsburgh Gallery Crawl, Lawrenceville Art All Night, Bob Qualters at BE Galleries, The closing for The Samuel Rosenberg's students show and I'm sure lots more. Anyway, if you should be in or around Youngstown this two day festival may be a very good way to see the creative energy building there.

Mahoning Commons Fest is a biannual event that has incorporated a majority of the businesses located on/near Mahoning Avenue in downtown
Youngstown, Ohio.

Inspired by the biannual Open Studio Sale held at the Ward Bakery, the business owners banned together to create a unique event that promotes the betterment of the Mahoning Commons district and encouraging the expansion of the Arts & Entertainment district in Youngstown.

A refurbished turn of the century trolley shuttles the patrons (for FREE) from Fellows Riverside Gardens to the Lemon Grove in downtown – including stops at the eight to ten businesses that lay between. Each of the business owners offers a different experience for the participants. The experience is one that includes food, fine/performing arts, local musicians, hand crafted beer and unique shopping opportunities.

The Mahoning Commons Fests create fun for the entire family while exploring our wonderful city!

Jubilee Limosine's trolley will be running for the duration of the event - the event times are as follows;
Saturday April 30th from Noon - 5pm
Sunday May 1st Noon - 5pm
With extended hours on Saturday night at select venues.

Noon to Five both days in the heart of historic Youngstown.

More info

Mahoning Commons Spring Festival on Facebook

Help Build A Skatepark In Youngstown: Cool Video About The Bridge Project

A great video I found on Rust Wire, about an effort to build a high quality skateboard park in Youngstown Ohio--sparked by someone who moved from Atlanta.

So far I have found several other places with info on the skateboard scene there, but none with clear info on who to contact or how to support or give money.

See more on I Will Shout Youngstown

DeKorda Jackson, The founder of this project is on Facebook

Youngstown Story on BBC America Friday : "Rust Belt Chique"

Still looking at the Levi's Braddock campaign and up pops another story about the "trendy Rust Belt", this time focusing on Youngstown. Hat tip to Burgh Diaspora.

Friday, the BBC America series will air the third part of it's Rust Belt profiles series with a look at Youngstown.

The stories of these places have never seemed more interesting or relevant to lots of people.

For whatever reason, I was not able to load any of these videos. Hope you have better luck.

Letter From Youngstown : Can The Idora Park Carousel Return?

I may be crossing a bit of a line in publishing this email I received about the Idora Park Carousel, the last major fragment left of a beloved local amusement park. Read my earlier post about it. I replied to the email with a request to post it but haven't heard back. I am taking a shot at publishing it. It's the only small thing I can do to try to make something happen. It's up to the people of Youngstown to show they want it back and can realistically show it the love it deserves.

Hopefully this will catch someone's eye and spark some movement.

"Hello , I am a proud resident of Youngstown Ohio. I was loking for some information on the Beautiful Idora Park Carousel. I call her " Idora" . I do realize that she has been beautifully restored, and resides under some bridge, in Brooklyn, NY. I have also heard that she is not particularly wanted there In her new( hopefully temporary) home. My heart aches, just thinking that Idora ( the carousel) is not wanted there, and we sincerly want her back. Idora belongs in Youngstown Ohio. OK she was put on the auction block. I was pretty young when the Idora Carousel was auctioned off. Not that I had the money to purchase her,but I believed, like I know many here in Youngstown, felt that one of our more well to do, residents would step up and rescue " Our Beloved Carousel" Unfortunatly that did not happen, and we lost Idora. It is a great loss for our area, and we still feel the loss today. We want her back. I realize that a Jane Walensa bought, and restored her, and that is something to be thankful for. Knowing that Jane loves her also help a little. However Idora belongs here in Youngstown Ohio, It's her home. Perhaps Mrs. Jane Walensa can offer to give her back to her hometown. I am sure that even Jane would want The Idora Park Carousel , to be settled in a place that truly loves her , and wants her back. It was a huge mistake to let her be auctioned off so easily, without fighting for her. It was a bad time for our city, at that particular point in time. We had lost our steel mills,and our economy was hiting theskids. We were in shock. Trying to figure out what happened to our economy, and where do we go from here. then the fire hit Idora Park, and the owner decided to auction off what was left. Our town has finally after long last had some great breaks lately, and we are on our way back, hopefully, thank God. all I know is, that whenever Idora Park is mentioned, The next words words are always the same. The Carousel should never have been on the auction block, and let go the way it did. Help us get her back."

Thank you.

It's a strange, sad situation with the potential for a very happy ending.

A little context might help which I might give in a later post. Just like the reader of the letter, what upset me most is that it's mostly not wanted in NY, or at least in the place Jane wants to put it.

This is similar to the Mellon Arena, Lower Hill story, in that you can't easily separate an object or buildings value or meaning from it's historical and cultural setting.

Free Outdoor Movies In Downtown Youngstown

A few short years ago, there was very little good happening in downtown Youngstown, in spite of a pretty big university sitting on a short hill within walking distance and a core of buildings that usually shock people with their beauty and quality.

Now there's a pretty active restaurant and club scene and the full residential restoration of one of the biggest buildings in town. Actually, it sort of looks like a little small business mecca is developing.

It's hard to say where this all started but one big thing was the opening of a technology incubator which offered, I think free rents and some of the resources of Youngstown State to small start ups.

Other small and incremental changes brought activity and made people more comfortable in the downtown. Like the free outdoor Summer movie Mondays on The Covelli Center Lawn.

Every Monday till August 30Th

June 28 Star Trek: The Future Begins

July 5 Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

July 12 The Time Travelers Wife

July 19 Tyler Perry’s Meet the Browns

July 26 Twilight New Moon

August 2 The Blindside

August 9 Casablanca

August 16 The Princess and the Frog

August 23 The Dark Knight

August 30 UP

Details and more positive news about Youngstown can be found on I Will Shout Youngstown.

Readers of this blog know I'm pretty interested in that area. It's just too well located and has too many assets to be ignored.

Would anyone in Youngstown or with a good knowledge of what's going on there like to post on this blog? Email me at Diggingpitt@gmail.com.

My Cleveburgh Mental Map Part 1

I never learned any even simple graphics programs, but I thought it might be good to put up a mental map of the region to more clearly define my primary area of interest.

Greater Cleveburgh

Northwest Corner --- Lorain, Ohio (or actually the middle of Lake Erie north of there-if your trying to keep things lined up)

Southwest Corner ---- Athens, Ohio (Home of Ohio University)

Southeast Corner -----Just southeast of Cumberland, Maryland

Northeast Corner -----Around Olean, New York

Why not it stretch a bit east and include Columbus or take it up to include Buffalo or Southeast to Baltimore and DC? Mostly, because one has to stop somewhere and this seems like a very logical place to start.

Why isn't State College included? A better question might be, why is Penn State really in the middle of nowhere at all and what effect does that have on it's value?
Is it really that crude and cras to talk about our return on investments this huge?

By the way, the People who built the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad seemed to have been thinking along these lines. Notice also the dense network of roads and cities in the center of this map--Warren, Youngstown, Akron that were built on a very clear logistical logic. Westinghouse, Cranberry, right near the middle of the map.

See The Idora Park Carousel : In New York

I imagine if your from Youngstown or have any memories of Idora Park, this video is very bittersweet. The truth is that I find this almost too upsetting to post about and I know almost nothing about this.

However, I can tell you as a former New Yorker, Your Carousel is very much alive--or at least perfectly restored and housed almost in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge cause i've seen it.



From The Wikipedia

"The park (Idora) opened as Terminal Park on May 30, 1899 which was Decoration Day. At that point in American history, it was common for trolley parks, or amusement parks, to sprout up at the end of trolley lines to generate weekend revenue. Without an admission fee, anyone who had the money for the trolley fare could go. The park's first season presented its guests a bandstand, theater, dance pavilion, a roller coaster, a circle swing, and concession stands. By the end of 1899, it was renamed "Idora Park" as a result of a contest.

When a bridge spanning the Mahoning River opened on Youngstown's Market Street on May 23, 1899, the entire South Side was unrolled for development. The trolley line linking the downtown to Idora Park ran south on Market, west on Warren, south on Hillman Street, Sherwood west to Glenwood Avenue, then cruised through Parkview Avenue (west) into the Idora terminal."



And then it died slow and ugly like a lot of things around those parts. But never forgotten.



Even more sad is that a lot of folks in NYC, don't even seem to want the Carousel--which to them is little more than an object, now so apart from the place that gave it meaning. Is there even a remote chance it could come back to Youngstown--perhaps as a centerpiece of it's downtown?

Interesting, that's for sure.