Polly Campbell: A great city takes dreamers – and doers

I’ve had a cartoon from The New Yorker pinned to my bulletin board for a long time. Two men, with hard hats and clipboards, are looking at a big hole in the ground with a skyscraper foundation. One is saying to the other, “I don’t know – seems like a lot of work.” 

It makes me think about one of the most amazing things about human beings. They build the building anyway. 

The theme of this Movers & Makers issue is the future city. I have a hard time imagining the future right now. But let’s say we correct income inequality, keep our ability to make decisions at the local level and are not blown away by extreme weather. Then, anything we build for the future will be the result of people saying, “That thing seems like a lot of work,” and then doing the thing anyway. 

That impulse can work at a municipal, corporate or institutional level, but when I think about what keeps Cincinnati a place where people still want to live, I think of what individuals and small groups have created. Sometimes they come from eccentric, super-personal visions that no one at a corporate or governmental level would ever think of. What they create gives the city texture, diversity, sparks of light. They create soul. 

My years covering restaurants for The Enquirer often introduced me to some of those people. Talk about committing yourself to a lot of work. I was touched over and over by the bravery of starting something as reliant on vision, hard work and luck as a restaurant. Now, writing these columns, I talk to people about their nonprofit organizations or causes they fight for, and I have the same feeling. 

I’ve never built up anything from a big hole in the ground. All I can do is give a little attention and love to those who do. Here’s a small sample of those who contribute to Cincinnati’s soul and who have made this a place I like living in.

First, we have the people willing to keep a small publication going, one that celebrates “arts & culture community, philanthropy.” Much work was done to allow you to hold it in your hand right now.

My husband and I are falling in love with Caffè Vivace jazz club, small enough that the music doesn’t just surround you, it enters you, and the audience understands the spirit of really listening. To make it even better, MC Sly Little hypes the band and gets the crowd warmed up, and starts sets off with one of his jazzy, improvised spoken word pieces. I love it. 

My daughter’s boyfriend is from Chicago, but he loves Cincinnati, maybe mostly on account of goetta, and at Thanksgiving, we did a deep dive. We visited butchers like Wasslers and Humbert’s, where the guys behind the counter knew everyone’s names and had a patter going and just made standing in line to buy meat an experience that felt like community. 

When I think about what open-minded, socially aware and competent women my daughters are, I appreciate the work by the teachers at North Avondale Montessori and Walnut Hills High School. And at Kennedy Heights Montessori pre-school, founded by families in the ’60s who wanted to make sure their neighborhood stayed strong and multiracial as others emptied out from white flight. 

The activist farmers I met doing a story about Black urban farmers: people who had an idea that neighborhoods could call on the skill of their residents and the energy of young people to grow food that people needed. I could cry – it’s so much work and so important and beautiful.

I appreciate the people who run for the local city council even though the odds are against them. It’s hard to knock on doors, but I appreciate the ones who did, to tell me about their plans for a future Cincinnati. 

You can’t have a great city without bookstores! I thought we’d lost them, but they’re coming back. I’m so glad people have faith that they can work by opening Downbound and Roebling and The Village Bookworm and the Bookshelf. Record stores too, including the beguiling and eccentric Hail Records and Oddities in Covington. 

I’d eat at Just Q’in even if they didn’t have good brisket and pulled pork. It’s a restaurant, but also a re-entry program for people who need help getting their life together and finding employment. 

Every time I pass the corner of 13th and Clay, dominated by the steeple of the old St. Mary’s Church since 1842, I can either stop for one of Brown Bear Bakery’s layered pastry versions of love and perfection on one corner, or stop in at Longfellow’s, the embodiment of what a good neighborhood bar should be.

We have kept places like Arnold’s, The Mercantile Library, Oktoberfest, The Cincinnati Music Festival, The Flying Pig, The FreeStore, Avril’s Meats, WAIF Radio, the Harvest Home parade, Black Family reunion going for 20, 40, 100 years. It doesn’t just take work to get them started, it’s also required to keep them going. 

Make your own list of the things that bring you pleasure and root you to your city. Participate. Go to board meetings, volunteer, become regulars and spend money. Nothing builds itself.

Polly Campbell covered restaurants and food for the Cincinnati Enquirer from 1996 until 2020. She writes monthly on a variety of topics, and she welcomes your feedback and column suggestions at editor (@) moversmakers.org.