Baseball`s Pete Rose may be serving time for income tax evasion, but nobody in this rabid sports town is about to change the name of Pete Rose Way back to 2nd Avenue.
No sir. Not in a city that fielded America`s first professional baseball team. Not in a city whose team gave Pope John Paul II a Cincinnati Reds jacket.
Baseball is as sacred to Cincinnati as cable cars are to San Francisco, and Pete Rose, despite his fall from grace, is the local oracle.
And now, with the Reds still in front of the National League West division, delightful dreams of a hometown world series are dancing in the heads of Cincinnatians.
All of which promises to put more pizzazz in this river city`s fall season, one of the better times to visit. Summer heat is fading, the other pro sports team, the Bengals, is grinding up the gridiron, and another of the city`s festivals are on tap.
Oktoberfest, which draws a half million visitors for its Sept. 15 and 16 run, plays on Cincinnati`s legendary thirst for beer. The city, steeped in Germanic traditions, once was home to more than 50 breweries. Today, there are only two-Hudepohl/Schoenling and the Oldenberg microbrewery.
Held in a roped-off six-block area around Fountain Square in downtown Cincinnati, Oktoberfest features oompah music, dancing, Bavarian food and, of course, lots of brew. It`s the biggest Oktoberfest celebration outside of Munich.
No yawns inspired
Visitors to Cincinnati are usually surprised to find that it is a city with so much going for it. Some Midwest cities may be Yawnsville, but not Cincinnati.
It`s a lively place with excellent cultural facilities, a busy and attractive riverfront and a charming entertainment and dining district atop restored Mt. Adams. It`s a pretty city, built on seven hills (or more, depending to whom you talk), several large parks and the ever-present Ohio River. And it`s a distinctly different city, not a clone of Chicago, New York, San Francisco or Dallas.
How different?
Well, how about its passion for chili? Even Texans, who are gargantuan chili eaters, are amazed at Cincinnati`s propensity for the dish. The city has more than 80 chili outlets and Cincinnatians are forever comparing the product of the three main chili chains, Skyline, Gold Star and Empress.
But Texans also are a bit aghast at the ways Cincinnati devours its chili. It is offered in a variety of styles: Two-way, three-way, four-way and five-way, all relatively mild. The ”ways” refer to addition of items such as onions, beans, spaghetti and cheddar cheese.
Then there`s the matter of the flying pigs, which made a substantial number of Cincinnatians squeal like a stuck you-know-what.
Seems that Cincinnati has long been a major processor of pork products. So big, in fact, that over the years it acquired the nickname of
”Porkopolis,” a sobriquet many would like to forget. They much prefer
”Queen City of the West,” coined by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
The city isn`t as heavily in the pork business today, but its porcine past reared its snout again two years ago when the Bicentennial Commons park at Sawyer Point was dedicated. One of the prominent sculptures in this delightful riverfront park is a quartet of flying pigs.
”Yeow!” Cincinnatians howled, but despite their anguished oinks-dutifully reported in such publications as the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times-the pigs stayed.
Gateway records past
The whimsical porkers are part of Cincinnati Gateway, a massive entrance complex to the Bicentennial Commons that commemorates in iron and stone significant mileposts in Cincinnati`s history.
A 115-foot-high flood column, topped with a miniature ark, marks the crests of the three great floods here. The pigs are atop four replicated riverboat smokestacks. The Ohio River, which has played such a great role in Cincinnati`s history, is reproduced in a 710-foot-long concrete
miniaturization that includes a flowing channel and a model of every lock and dam from Pittsburgh to the river`s confluence with the Mississippi at Cairo, Ill.
Between the Commons and the Riverfront Stadium/Riverfront Coliseum complex is the Serpentine Wall, a winding wall of concrete steps that snakes along the river bank for hundreds of feet.
The World Series, if it comes to Cincinnati, will be played in October at Riverfront Stadium, which has become as much a symbol of Cincinnati as anything else since it was opened in 1970.
For most Cincinnati visitors, the river is where it`s at, but it`s the Kentucky side that gets the most nighttime action. At night, few scenes caress the eye as lovingly as the view of downtown from the Kentucky riverbank. Reflected in the river waters are the saucer-like stadium, the 48-story Carew Tower and other downtown landmarks.
This kind of ambience has prompted restaurateurs to moor a quintet of floating restaurants on the Kentucky side of the river. Mike Fink was the original; others are Crockett`s, Barleycorn, Newport Beach and the Waterfront. A huge new floating complex, Covington Landing at RiverCenter, opened recently. It features six dining and entertainment facilities in a 262-foot, four-deck side-wheeler and eight others on a floating wharf. It is next to the landmark Roebling Bridge, precursor of the Brooklyn Bridge, built by the same engineer.
Imitation side- and stern-wheeler boats are based on Riverboat Row, as this part of the river is known, offering sightseeing and dinner cruises.
Mt. Adams attracts
When Cincinnatians and their visitors aren`t playing by the river, they`re likely to be hanging out on Mt. Adams, a once-rundown hilltop community that has been yuppified into a chic area of restaurants, nightspots, boutiques, art galleries and restored homes.
Many of the city`s cultural institutions are in Eden Park, among them the Cincinnati Art Museum, Playhouse in the Park and the Krohn Observatory. (The Contemporary Arts Center, whose exhibition of the controversial Mapplethorpe works resulted in the arrest of its museum director, is downtown.)
But come Nov. 1 the Historical Society and the Museum of Natural History will move into the Museum Center at Union Terminal, utilizing the cavernous space within the enormous half-domed railroad station. Also in the new center will be a children`s discovery center, an Omnimax theater, environmental displays and the Dinamation traveling exhibit on dinosaurs. Amtrak will move back into the station next year.
Downtown life revolves around Fountain Square. Most of Cincinnati`s finest restaurants, like the perennially five-star Maisonnette, are found here.
Architecture buffs can feast their eyes on several downtown structures. The facade of the Kroger Co. is faced with a trompe l`oeil painting. Procter and Gamble`s twin-skyscraper headquarters is softened with block-long gardens. St. Peter in Chains was built in Greek Revival style with 12 Corinthian columns.
Other attractions in and around Cincinnati include horse racing at River Downs, whose meeting continues to Sept. 3 and resumes Oct. 13-Nov. 9, and at Turfway Park, another horse track in nearby Florence, Ky., with a fall meeting Sept. 5-Oct. 5 and a holiday meeting Nov. 25-Dec. 31. The Cincinnati Zoo has just opened an exhibit of komodo dragons, only the second museum in the country with the Indonesian reptiles. Coney Island, an amusement park with rides, picnic grounds and the world`s largest recirculating swimming pool, closes Labor Day. Kings Island, the Midwest`s largest theme park, runs daily to Labor Day, weekends only into October.
In Covington, MainStrasse Village is a restored German village with 46 shops. The Oldenberg Brewery offers brewery tours.
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More information: Greater Cincinnati Convention and Visitors Bureau, 300 W. 5th St., Cincinnati, Ohio 45202; 513-621-2142.
