These were taken during a hike in the spring of 1977, mostly taken along the old railroad that is now the bed of the Little Miami Bikeway, near Kings Mills, the Peters Cartridge Plant, and Fort Ancient.

 

I recall that when we hiked this, we were on edge watching for "things" - the area had an abandoned "Deliverance" vibe to it and it didn't seem especially safe or hospitable to wander off the beaten path. The railroad bed back then had not been used since the very early 70s and we were essentially walking a path through people's back yards.

 

Probably taken with a Mamiya/Sekor 500 DTL using commercially processed Ektachrome. Scanned in the present day with the excellent Epson V700 flatbed scanner and (in some cases) manually retouched.

 

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Fort Ancient area, walking on the railroad tracks, south of Ft. Ancient, looking south, approaching the village of Senior.

 

 

 

 

Lots o' laundry hung out to dry. :) These houses are still visible from the trail when you are riding south of Ft. Ancient.

 

 

 

Probably closer to Fort Ancient. The trail back then looked so incredibly wild, like parts of Warren County in general back then. Today everything's so manicured and (ick) suburban.

 

 

 

Valley view from the overlook at Fort Ancient looking toward I-71, when the view was clear of trees. The houses and structures at the right in the picture are part of what is now "Kings Domain" Conference Center along Rt. 350.

 

 

Peters Cartridge Factory. In the pictures containing the square tower you can see round metal disks fastened to the sides near the roof. These were wartime (WWII) advertising signs for the NBC Radio Network.

 

At that time, it was possible to wander around inside the factory during the day and not be chased out by police or security. Of course, it was incredibly dangerous, with many holes with sheer dropoffs through the floor.

 

Seeing the hideously dangerous holes in the floor and piles of crap, it is clear that my friend and I were Darwin Award candidates that did not place that day.

 

 

 

 

Old time ad for "The Taylor Stoker" FWIW (seems to be state of the art for around 1917):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is just such a stark difference from today's view along the bike trail.

 

 

A lone cyclist climbs the hill westward up Grandin Road toward the village of Kings Mills.

 

 

Goodbye, Peters plant: my car (a 1974 Vega) is at the bottom right, and I recall climbing a staircase built into the hillside to get this picture. The "traffic volume" as such back then was probably a car every couple of minutes.

 

Thanks!

 

Time warp! That was really neat. Thanks for posting.

Incredible--thanks for posting.

Absolutely awesome.

Thanks, guys.

 

I see that on UO, content and story is king, and the technical precision can be secondary. Sometimes I get intimidated seeing the excellent work here with high end DSLRs and the like. But having an angle is key.

 

These photos definitely have their problems, including a lot of grain, weird color imbalance in some of the scans, and some blown out highlights.

 

I'll try to post more unique stuff like this. I had a period during my late grade school to early college years when I had a darkroom and was an obsessive amateur, so I probably have several thousand vintage negatives covering the mid 70s.