Heritage Tourism is a billion dollar industry and a generator of many service/retail type jobs (which Cincinnati could use with a large under-educated population).
But we do virtually nothing to promote what we have. No major advertising campaigns to try and snare a well educated, well traveled, demographic who goes to places like Charleston, Savannah, San Francisco, to see the architecture and history preserved.
Excellent post. The mix of topography and great architecture, even the generic vernacular architecture, is special.
There is no support for preserving Cincinnnati because the WWII generation was brainwashed into believing that Cincinnati was "old" and should be bulldozed. The bulldozers were cheered on, they coudln't come fast enough. I still hear old people suggest tearing down the whole city. Old Cincinnatians don't think that the city is special in any way.
Weren't old people everywhere this way to some degree? What is it that makes Cincinnati unable to see what places like Boston or Savannah have seen?
"old people"...what about their kids, who are adults now.
Not likely. I'm 50 years old and never had a problem getting along with the World War One or World War Two generations while growing up and living in New England. Even as an adult this was true.
Fast forward to the last decade while living in the Kansas City area. Another matter entirely. The people in my generation and older are messed up. At least most of the natives are. We're from different planets. Can't relate to them at all because we are physiologically completely different and come from different cultures. Sadly, I converse better with 20 somethings here than my own generation.
I've found that the Cincy area has some great neighborhoods and architecture that seems to have been saved. Covington has a lot of great old homes and buildings that are being fixed up and this seems to indicate a sincere interest in preserving local history as well as structures of historical interest or importance. I don't see much of this in the KC area but I guess that is because it is a newer city and has far less older architectural gems as a city like Cincy.
I can only offer the experience of older people I've known, none of whom lived in Boston or Savannah. But I look at my parents, their siblings, and even my grandparents, and all of them wanted new-new-new. Perhaps that's a reaction to living through the Depression, or to earning working class wages. As soon as either of my grandmothers, or some of my older aunts and uncles, could afford a new sofa, or a new dining room table, or new kitchen appliances, they bought them. My grandparents never moved out of their homes, but their kids did, and moved to the 'burbs where the houses were new.
My younger aunts and uncles -- the ones just a few years older than me -- tended more to move into older houses and fix them up, and treasure family heirlooms and antiques, and were only too glad to haul away what Grandma decided was "too old" for her.
>What is it that makes Cincinnati unable to see what places like Boston or Savannah have seen?
Well I think the historic areas in Boston and Savannah, specifically, can be recognized as being such by average people. The North End and Charleston and Beacon Hill are pretty obviously unique. The famous part of Charleston is also quite obviously unique.
Aside from Mt. Adams I don't think the historic areas in Cincinnati are completely distinct from something that exists elsewhere. Over-the-Rhine is obviously a lot like Brooklyn and other areas of New York City. And actually the architectural style is a lot like the North End although the North End obviously has twisting narrow streets.
It's really not tough to imagine tourist bus tours leaving Fountain Square showing off OTR, Dayton St., Clifton Gaslight, Northside, Spring Grove Cemetery, North Avondale, East Walnut Hills, Key's Crescent and other east side mansion streets, Hyde Park, Mt. Adams, Newport Mansion Hill, and the Covington Riverfront. That's at least a 2 hour if not 3 hour tour.
I can only offer the experience of older people I've known, none of whom lived in Boston or Savannah. But I look at my parents, their siblings, and even my grandparents, and all of them wanted new-new-new. Perhaps that's a reaction to living through the Depression, or to earning working class ages. As soon as either of my grandmothers, or some of my older aunts and uncles, could afford a new sofa, or a new dining room table, or new kitchen appliances, they bought them. My grandparents never moved out of their homes, but their kids did, and moved to the 'burbs where the houses were new.
In New England people like old, old, or older. Preserving the areas Colonial architecture and history is of paramount importance to virtually every community. My home town of Simsbury, CT has several homes that pre date the 1800's that were built during and prior to the American Revolution. Years ago my aunt and uncle had some friends that bought a home in Branford which is a suburb of New Haven. That home was built in 1711.
While Cincy may not have the Colonial era architecture it still has a lot of great stuff from the 1800's that should be preserved for future generations.
Apparently we did have a handful of colonial-ish early 1800s buildings in the West End where the public housing and I-75 is now. When City Hall was built, that point was the center of the basin, and the lost residential area just to its west was apparently quite eclectic architecturally. The suviving "City Hall West" blocks between Central Ave. and John St. give some indication as to what was lost, which tended to be single family town homes of a very high quality.
We tend to think that what was lost in that area was simply a continuation of OTR or more of what survives in the West End around Dayton St. when apparently it was something quite different. So we did really lose a piece of the city's architectural lineage. The smear campaign devised to get the public angry at the west end was based in zero facts whatsoever, aside from the part of the neighborhood that was actually vulnerable to flooding, which was the poor section down by Dalton St. When we hear "West End" today the insinuation was that it was always poor, when the parts above the flood plain were apparently quite attractive.
....a good example of older architecture in that western area would be the Betts House and one of the houses across the street. Betts is very early 1800s, but there is a perhaps 1820s-era townhouse in the row of houses across the way.