PigBoy

Lookin' crappy, not surprisingly. Behold the power of maps. :wink:

Nice find. What is the parking lot with the "subject" label in the photo?

I should get the ColDayMan tour one of these days...

Thanksgiving to Christmas is a hellish time for my family (my parents own a retail store), so we don't really ever get to actual events and I can't help you there. However, for Christmas lights you can check out Clifton Mill. Here's their web page with a bit of info and a few pictures of the insane number of lights. I vaguely recall other Christmas light things (Eastwood Park, maybe?), but it's been a long time. There may be some Christmas-y things downtown, too, but I don't really know. And consider the Icefest suggestion hereby seconded!

There will be helicopters--the wave of the future!

Very nice! Thanks for showing Franklin; I've always wanted to see some Franklin pictures here. (My apologies if somebody has posted Franklin pics before and I'm forgetting.) Those murals are great. The first one you showed looks very realistic, at least in your photo.

Vandalia was named vandalia because of Vandalia, IL. The National Road Ends in Vandalia, IL and someone decided to stop before they got to the end of the road. They named their city after their intended arrival city. Cool, thanks for the info. I looked at the city web site for Vandalia, Ill. and it says: The origin of the name is uncertain, but the name probably is derived from the Germanic Vandal tribe. Other explanations of the name hold that it is a latinization of a Dutch family name or that it refers to a small Indian tribe of the early 19th century.

Nice! I didn't know Zanesville had a historic district like this; I should take a look sometime.

Is that the same T-shirt as in the photo monte posted?

I'm having a hard time not laughing up here in Wisconsin. Don't worry, you won't hear traces of that accent in Dayton except from the occasional misplaced northern Ohioan or Michigander, etc. Speaking of which, you will be required to hate Michigan and everything it stands for. A number of years ago my parents had Moon Mullins doing some of that folksy advertising on his radio station, and they say they could always tell which customers had heard about their store because of that... by counting the number of teeth and so forth. :-D (I know, it's mean to joke about, but it must have been true!) I feel like I may have posted that little anecdote in the past... sorry if I'm repeating myself.

^ This is the thread I started on the topic earlier this year, y'all: http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=2753.0

I think the accents can sort of be split in two. A lot of people speak with something of an Appalachian accent, some very strongly, and a lot of people speak with just the standard Midwestern accent, which is what I would consider the native accent. You'd better not let montecarloss catch you saying that! :wink: (I'd also say it's flat out wrong to think of Cincinnati as in the South, but that discussion's been held already.)

I walk... less than a mile, about 15 minutes. At such a short distance there's no reason not to walk, but even if I wanted to employ another mode of transportation, driving (parking) would be pretty much impossible, and the bus is not convenient.

ColDayMan, do you have any comments on some of the ways in which Dayton's African-American communities are unique? I don't want to stray too far off topic, but it seems relevant since we're sort of talking about Dayton's culture.

Jeff is the resident expert on heritage issues, so he can fill in the details, but I think the dominant ancestry, if there is one, is German, although it's much less evident than in Cincinnati. There is a pretty strong Appalachian background to a good portion of Dayton's population, though, and you're much more likely to notice that. As far as the influence it has on things, I'll just let Jeff address that. Like mrnyc said, it's a pretty safe bet that Jungle Jim's will have whatever food you're looking for. Plus singing robots!

Heart attack, eh? Better cut back on the onion rings and cheeseburgers. (Or is it---God forbid--too much chili? :-o)

Hi there, welcome to Dayton! I'm one of the locals (even if I'm not living there at the moment), but I'm really bad at giving this kind of advice, which is why it's good I don't work for the CVB or something. I'm particularly bad at restaurant advice, so I'll leave that for others to give. The Oregon District (which is downtown-ish) is sort of Dayton's happenin' place, but to be honest I don't know what to recommend or not recommnend there--again, I'll let somebody else do that. I suppose some must-do things are the same as what a tourist (if there ever were such a thing) would do-- Air Force Museum, Wright Brothers sites, etc. Dayton has a single A minor league baseball team; if you like baseball, thier games are pretty popular, though as far as I know they're all still sold out, so you either have to buy lawn seats on game days or find somebody to buy tickets from. Cincinnati is an hour away so it's easy to go see the ever popular, but often losing, Reds (or to see many other things besides sports). Dayton's art museum (the Dayton Art Institite) is no world-class museum, of course, but it's pretty good from what I understand (I wouldn't know what makes an art museum good or not). There is a farily new performing arts center downtown, and as in many cities, traveling productions of various Broadway shows come to town. Dayton has also got a ballet company, and probably some other performing kinds of groups that I'm forgetting--there's got to be a music one, but I can't think of the name. Shopping, unfortunately, is generally not an interesting experience in Dayton, though I don't know if you care or not. There are only a handful of retail places left downtown and no other little shopping districts that I can think of, though some of the suburbs retain the small-town main streets with some shops. Most retail is in subruban strip malls, etc. The two major malls are the Dayton Mall in Miami Township (near 675 and 75) and the Fairfield Commons mall in Beavercreek (675 and North Fairfield Road). Both of those of course have the usual surroundings of big box stores and other sprawly things. The Greene one of those "lifestyle center" malls, is under construction in Beavercreek on the county line (675 and Indian Ripple Road). In terms of getting around, if transportation is what you mean, driving is rarely a hassle. Generally the only traffic backups are on I-75 at the usual rush hour times, but any problems are nothing compared to our neighbor to the south, Cincinnati. The bus system operates only in Montgomery County except for a stop at Wright State University. I don't know where you are living, but if it's Beavercreek or Fairborn, you won't have access to the bus. I'm can't think of what else to mention at the moment. If you have any specific questions, I'll be happy to try to answer them. And I'm sure ColDayMan and others will be along to answer your questions as well (and to do a better job of it). I'm very sorry for the losses you suffered due to the hurricane. I hope you can be happy in Dayton!

Can I just say that the name "Buttermilk Towne Center" makes me want to vomit buttermilk? Is Buttermilk the name of a place, or is it a random word somebody chose?

Can I ask a stupid question? What are XML and RSS feeds? Stop laughing at my ignorance! EDIT- okay, never mind, I think I figured it out on my own. You can laugh at me now.

Hey now, that was supposed to a "describe the location where you live" thread, not "state the city in which you live." You people have ruined it! You can all go to hell!! :-D I'm surprised by Cleveland's poor showing in this poll so far. All the Clevelanders here, yet only two of them are actually natives?

Those of you listing all the places you were born or raised or have lived--which one are you voting for in the poll? By the way, for me: Born in Dayton area (WPAFB specifically; lived in Beavercreek), but moved away one year later Burke, VA (DC area) Mililani, Hawaii Back to Dayton for a long stretch Since a month and a half ago, Madison, Wisconsin If my family had not returned to Dayton, I'd probably be hesitant to say it's where I'm from, but since we did, it's definitely "home".

Excellent!

Springfield is so 20th century. It should be Dayton-Springboro! And while I see that the poll is very inclusive as far as terrestrial locations go, what about Jupiter? WHAT ABOUT JUPITER??

I didn't know anyone built covered bridges anymore. It sounds really cool, especially with the walkway on top.

I don't know how accurate that group is being, but the kind of reverse gerrymandering, if you will, that they're talking about doesn't sound so great, although it's probably better than regular gerrymandering. By reverse gerrymandering I mean creating weird districts in an effort to force them to be competitive. It would be nice if the districts somehow actually related to population centers, like not splitting metro Dayton among three districts when most of it could fit into one, etc. I guess I'll have to go read all the details on the plan.