ANNOUNCER: Tonight on Showcase with Barbara Kellar, CEO of the Cincinnati Museum Center, Elizabeth Pierce.

Stay tuned.

Showcase starts right now.

[music] KELLAR: Elizabeth Pearce, it's so great to see you.

Oh, my gosh.

It's been a long time.

And we've -- lots of water under the bridge since we've been with you, COVID and all those wonderful challenges that make you stronger.

PIERCE: Yes.

Yes, indeed.

KELLAR: Yes.

So we're here because you're back.

You're up.

You're doing everything you ever did and doing it the best.

So we want to talk about The Museum Center.

PIERCE: Yes.

KELLAR: For those who just arrived in town, tell everybody where The Museum Center is and what it is.

PIERCE: So Cincinnati Museum Center has a beautiful home in the Union Terminal train station.

I think it's the best adaptive use of architecture anywhere in the world, but certainly in our community.

And, you know, we have the home of the Cincinnati History Museum, the Natural History and Science Museum, and the Children's Museum are all part of Cincinnati Museum Center.

And then we also have a partner in the David and Nancy Wolf Holocaust and Humanity Center, also inside Union Terminal.

So there's a lot to do and a lot to see and absolutely come down and visit us every chance you get.

KELLAR: Yeah, it's probably -- it is the number one spot for families to visit in the city because it has so many different exhibits and opportunities and place for the kids.

PIERCE: All ranges, all age ranges.

So, you know, little people want to -- you want to bring your little people to come to the Children's Museum.

And as they get a little bit older and they're in their elementary and middle school and high school, the other museums are full of great content and we've got special exhibitions and omnimax films and all the adults love to come and spend time there too.

KELLAR: Well, sure.

And you can -- you can set each generation to a different area.

It sounds phenomenal.

We want to talk a little bit today about a permanent exhibit that's there.

So whenever they come, they'll see it called Cincinnati -- PIERCE: Made in Cincinnati.

KELLAR: Made in Cincinnati.

Tell us about that.

PIERCE: Well, it's just one of my favorite exhibits that we've ever done.

And it takes all those stories that you know about Cincinnati or legends that you've heard and kind of puts it in one place and really talks about the manufacturing and the business history of our community, which some people might say, "Really?

That's interesting."

But it's fascinating.

KELLAR: Yeah.

PIERCE: And, you know, Cincinnati has been at the forefront of economic development since steamboats started to come down the river.

And it's given rise to so many of the things that continue to carry the regional economy forward.

So incredible stories.

We tell you things that were made by hand, Henry Boyd's bed, some of the art carved furniture, the early days of Rookwood pottery.

And then we go into things that are kind of what Cincinnati is known for, the making of the marketplace.

Think about all the products that Procter and Gamble has developed and the way in which Kroger has grown and evolved as a shopping experience.

And one of my favorite stories is that Cora Dow ran an incredible drugstore and pharmacy company as a young woman, when young women were not leading businesses.

KELLAR: No.

PIERCE: So great, great stories to come out of that.

And then we go into things that kind of were made by machine.

And there are so many innovations that have taken place in this community.

We talk a little bit about, you know, the original disassembly line of the pork industry is something that -- KELLAR: Disassembly, I love that PIERCE: The disassembly line.

KELLAR: So that sounds better than hacking, cutting up pigs.

PIERCE: Yes, right.

So that's the fancy word for it.

But it's the kind of thing that inspired other businesses as well.

So, we talk a little bit about the sausage making in the community in all ways.

KELLAR: German sausage.

PIERCE: Absolutely.

Goetta is a by-product of all of that.

And a wonderful story about the machine tool history of this community.

KELLAR: Milling machine.

PIERCE: The milling machines and how they really kind of gave rise to so many other industries around here.

So lots of hands on things that you can do in the museum and certainly in this exhibit.

And there's an incredible kind of little game that we play about companies who did really interesting World War II pivots.

So, there were companies that were making a product and they were then adapted to be part of the war effort.

There were baseballs where little radio transmitters were put inside the baseballs.

And that's how we were able to smuggle communication tools inside prisoners of war camp to help our people kind of -- KELLAR: Wow, I didn't know that story.

PIERCE: And Cincinnati is at the heart and the forefront of all of that.

KELLAR: Yeah.

I know that Wrights was the name of the factory where they made machine military things for the war effort.

So everybody pitched in.

The history starts in -- well, Bob Taft of the Taft family was on.

I've had him on and he talked about his great great grandfather, Alphonso Taft came to Cincinnati because it was a booming place.

PIERCE: Yes.

KELLAR: He was from the East Coast.

He could have gone to New York, but he said, "No, Cincinnati looks like the place to be," and it was.

PIERCE: Absolutely I mean, the frontier, really in the late -- or the early 1800s, so like 1840-ish, 1850, that economy is booming and we are the forefront of so many things as materials are coming down the river.

And there's a workforce here and more people are arriving.

And it just was kind of the right moment at the right time.

And then, of course, during the Civil War, Cincinnati is a place of manufacturing and commerce.

And I think what's incredible about Cincinnati is that we've had this diverse base of economic activity for a very long period of time.

And then you have all these other companies that feed into the bigger companies over time as well.

And so it's just been a place that has economically thrived because of our businesses.

So we really are excited to celebrate and tell the story of those businesses in the History Museum and put it in context.

KELLAR: Yeah, just give us a for instance, Procter and Gamble, the beginnings of Procter and Gamble are so fascinating.

And you know, most people say, oh, Ivory Soap.

Ivory Soap was manufactured before it began to float.

And yeah.

So tell us a little bit.

PIERCE: I mean, it's a little bi about that disassembly process of the pigs, right?

Like the by-products of of the meat packing industry gave rise to some of these other things, the products that Procter created.

And I think there's a story about Mr. Procter and Mr. Gamble running into Mr. Jergens along the Ohio River and kind of using their wherewithal to create new products and new industries.

And then that's continued to kind of give rise to more innovations around the world.

KELLAR: I was thinking the Emery Industries, was that candles?

PIERCE: That was candles.

KELLAR: And that was from fat.

PIERCE: Right, another by- product of all of that, too.

So it's just amazing to think about kind of the confluence of everybody who wanted to come and get their product to the river.

Right?

They came down the canals and the rivers and all of that and to get here to the Ohio River and then that kind of intersection of all those things gave rise to all these other products.

KELLAR: Yeah.

What are the displays like?

Are they films or are they dioramas?

PIERCE: A little bit of both, a little bit of everything.

And so we have this incredible experience.

It's about an 11 minute film, which is not even the right way to describe it.

It's an object theater.

So we have the real things and they're highlighted with music and then video around it and additional stories.

And you get to know all about kind of the molten steel that was part of the milling process and the steam that was created that gave rise to the first professional fire department in the world here in Cincinnati.

KELLAR: Really?

Is that why we have a fire museum?

PIERCE: It is why we have a fire museum and it gives rise to the insurance industry as well.

So it's an incredible kind of connection of all these things that flow from one to the other and ways in which different innovators were bringing forward.

We talk about King Records and Syd Nathan and all the music that came here as well.

So, so many things are made in Cincinnati.

KELLAR: Yeah.

And that started here and stayed here.

PIERCE: Yes.

KELLAR: Yeah.

We've had other companies like Federated that we've have moved on, but started -- and well, I don't know for sure they started here.

They might have been in Columbus.

PIERCE: Oh, with the Lazarus, Lazarus Company and then Lazarus and Shillito's merged and -- KELLAR: Yeah.

So you need to do that too, so I can come down and learn about it.

How long would you say people need to spend in any one exhibit to really understand it?

PIERCE: Yeah, I think, you know, 45 minutes in the Made in Cincinnati gallery gives you a chance to really soak in and play with things and then enjoy the film and its adjacent right to the Public Landing.

And so you're kind of immersed into that early era of 1850.

KELLAR: Yeah, that's perfect.

PIERCE: And you can see the little -- we have a little shadow herd of pigs getting on the steamboat to travel down the river.

And we make it kind of fun.

And then we did this wonderful thing with Rookwood Pottery.

So we talk about the early days of of Maria Longworth creating the Rookwood factory and putting women to work in the late 1800s in this very artisanal kind of experience.

And the team at Rookwood that's working there now helped us create an interactive where you can digitally see how you could glaze, really glaze the products and you can compare your artistry to the artisans of the day before.

KELLAR: I forgot about Rookwood and that's come back and they're making beautiful things.

Really, really great things.

We're talking about the landing.

So the Cincinnati that we were just talking about is right next to it?

PIERCE: Right next to it.

And you can literally walk through the storefront of Henry Boyd's Furniture.

Henry Boyd was an African-American man who paid his way out of slavery to then come to Cincinnati and set up a manufacturing, a woodworking shop downtown.

And so you can kind of literally walk through the front door of Henry Boyd's workshop and then see one of his bed stands that was created.

There are maybe three that I know of in museums.

Two are at our place and the other is at the National African American Museum in Washington, DC.

And Henry Boyd was a brilliant entrepreneur who created this incredible workplace for himself, and he faced racism and his workshop was burned out a couple times.

And he continued to to come back and be resilient and continue to be a thriving business person there in the Public Landing of Cincinnati.

KELLAR: So he made furniture?

PIERCE: He did.

He kind of came up with the the technique to tighten all the strings that held the mattress up.

So we all owe our good night's sleep to Henry Boyd because of his innovations.

KELLAR: Yeah, because ropes stretch and then you find yourself -- and I think I've been on a couple of those beds maybe in real distant hotels.

PIERCE: The sagging bed.

So he figured out a way to kind of use the tension of the pieces of the wood to hold the bed together and tighten all of that up.

KELLAR: Mr. Boyd I didn't know about.

PIERCE: I know, and he's a Cincinnatian and it's another story that we want to highlight and give people this sense of energy and pride about the community because we have amazing entrepreneurs.

We have had them since the earliest days of our community.

And we're hoping that that then inspires future entrepreneurs.

And you know, we have good friends that have been showcased in the Cincinnati Business Hall of Fame that we do with the Junior Achievement organization, and that is also featured in the exhibit.

So you can come in and learn the stories of all these people who have been inducted into the Business Hall of Fame over the last 30 years as well.

KELLAR: Wow, okay.

Yeah, we've been to a lot of those.

Tell us about some of the other permanent things that people, they probably can't do the whole museum in one.

PIERCE: Well, I would prefer that everybody buy a membership and then they could come a number of times and enjoy it.

You know, right next to the Public Landing and the Made in Cincinnati Gallery is another gallery called You Are Here.

And it gives us a sense of kind of the social and sports history of the community.

And we start with kind of very pop culture kind of things.

And then it goes deep into kind of the ethos of working in the community.

There's early days of WLW and understanding, like, television and radio in the community.

We have the original Skyline door, so you can come and see that.

KELLAR: Oh my gosh, how fabulous.

PIERCE: We talk a little bit about food manufacturing in the community as well.

And we even have the whistle from one of the Procter and Gamble manufacturing plants, you know, when the whistle would blow and it was time to show up for your shift.

And, you know, kids these days have no idea what that is or a punch card.

So they get to play with all of that and see different careers as well.

KELLAR: I should reveal at this point that I was a Procter and Gamble employee one summer.

I needed a job and I was just driving around looking for signs that say, you know, and jobs were scarce in those -- in the olden days.

And there was Procter and Gamble, I was in Saint Bernard, and help wanted.

And so I went in and they hired me and we were a group of college students, 6 or 8 of us.

And we did things like we, in those days, the those big boxes of Tide, I think there were like 20 pounds.

Oh, gosh.

And they would come down the line and the powder would go in.

And then we had to put the -- glue the tops back.

PIERCE: Oh, yes.

How quickly did you have to do that?

KELLAR: Yes, it was time and motion study.

I've always wanted to be at time and motion study expert.

And so we did that.

And you had to do it exactly the way they taught you.

Bum, Bum, Bum.

Bum.

And then with the glue.

And the regular employees worked on bonus.

So if they got things done quicker, they got paid bonuses.

Well, when they would put us on those lines, we slowed things down so much.

We were not popular.

They did not speak to us.

But we persevered and we kept going.

And another job was we were up on a platform and they had this thing that had little slots and there was a premium in new blue Cheer, it was a brush.

So we had to put a brush in each of those slots as they came.

Some of the audience may remember the I Love Lucy where she's working in a candy factory.

PIERCE: Yes, I was having that flash in my mind as you were describing this.

KELLAR: Well, that's sort of like it, except we couldn't eat the brushes.

We had to keep going and not miss any because the customer, Oh, no, there's no brush.

Where's my toy?

Yeah.

PIERCE: Yeah, I bet you're in some of our historic photos of women working on the manufacturing floor.

KELLAR: I could be, but I worked there six weeks, and I made more in that six weeks than I would have if I gotten a different job somewhere else for the whole summer.

PIERCE: Well, it's a great point.

Manufacturing has been a huge asset for this community and a huge creator of jobs and good jobs.

And it's interesting to see how advanced manufacturing is bringing a lot of that back, too.

KELLAR: Yeah, Yeah, I love it at cocktail parties, if I'm introduced to someone from Procter and Gamble, I can say, "I used to I used to work for Procter Gamble."

And then when they asked me what I did, that's -- But yeah, it was a great experience and I'm sure a lot, a lot of people started out in the factories and made careers out of it because Procter and Gamble paid very well.

PIERCE: Right.

KELLAR: Tell us about some of the other exhibits that people can see.

PIERCE: Well, one of my favorite things in the You Are Here gallery is this special quiz where you can sit down and test your knowledge about Cincinnati against other people that are there or your family members.

And people are just so delighted by it.

And, you know, things that go way back in history and then things that are more recent.

KELLAR: See, I'd be good at that.

PIERCE: You would be, yeah.

So wonderful stuff there.

And then, of course, on the science side, we have this incredible gallery, the Neil Armstrong Space Exploration Gallery.

And we tell Neil's story and we tell Neil's connection to Cincinnati as well, which I want everybody to know and love.

And in 2006, he donated his moon rock to -- he designated Cincinnati Museum Center to be the recipient of his moon rock.

And so we have this incredible story that he told at that event.

And he tells you all about Bach, the Rock.

And it's just charming and delightful.

And now we have a children's book called Bock's Great Adventure and it's based on Neil's story.

And and so we tell a little bit about kind of astronomy overall, what it was like to go to the moon.

And then also what is it like to go to Mars now?

And so giving kids a sense of like, you know, Neil did this many years ago, 50 plus years ago, but there is a whole other effort being led to send people back to the moon and then on to Mars.

And so we're helping kind of prepare the next generation of astronauts and physicists and engineers in all sorts of ways.

KELLAR: I think kids are really interested in space.

PIERCE: Yes.

KELLAR: They really are.

I'm not a science person myself.

I'm a humanities.

But the kids really love knowing about space and having those experiences.

And there's always something new to learn because there's always something new discovered.

PIERCE: So much good content that NASA is sharing with us on a regular basis.

And you know, this is one of these galleries that delights the grandparents and the parents as much as it does the young folks.

And the young folks are showing their parents and grandparents how to do the computer coding to make the Mars rovers move.

And, you know, there are local companies that are involved in all of this.

There are local companies that have stuff on the Mars rover and are part of the Artemis program as well.

So we're able to highlight some of that.

And then coming soon, in late September, early October is our Ordovician Gallery.

And that's a big fancy word for the local Cincinnati trilobites, the fossils that are at the bedrock of our community.

So as you drive through the cut in the hill or you see a landslide that takes place, you'll unearth Cincinnati fossils in your own backyard.

And they are these little marine animals that were around 450 million years ago.

And we are having this fabulous gallery that's really been almost 50 years in the making.

KELLAR: Really?

PIERCE: Something that they had at Gilbert Avenue and wanted to expand.

KELLAR: And they had that big mastodon or whatever it was.

PIERCE: We have him, too.

He's out at the airport right now.

But, you know, we have these incredible fossils, so we have local Cincinnati fossils.

And that gallery will be open in the fall.

KELLAR: If they're at the airport and see all those dinosaurs and they hear a voice, it's yours.

PIERCE: Yeah, Cincinnati Northern Kentucky Airport, CVG, has been amazing as a partner to help us showcase things and we had to take everything out of Union Terminal when we were repairing it.

And the airport was a great partner.

KELLAR: Yeah, oh I think I love it.

I love it, especially when they turn your voice on, you know.

Just the building itself is worth a trip.

PIERCE: Yes.

KELLAR: It's unbelievable.

PIERCE: Well, and now we're celebrating the 90th anniversary of Union Terminal this year, in 2023.

And so to think about all the people who have come and gone through that building and all the detail, all the incredible architecture.

And I'm so pleased the granddaughter of a gentleman named Edward Sforzina has just donated all of his drawings to us.

He was the interior designer and the furniture maker for Union Terminal.

KELLAR: Oh, my goodness.

PIERCE: And the Sforzina family has provided all of those those materials to us.

KELLAR: And they kept them all.

PIERCE: Yes, and he was based in New York and was part of the group that Fellheimer and Wagner, who came out to do the building.

And so all the, you know, just another treasure and another piece of the history.

KELLAR: Yeah.

When I was a kid, of course, Union Terminal was fairly new and those were days before air conditioning.

And we would take a ride down there and the fountains would be on and it would feel cool.

And my other first of my first experiences at Union Terminal is just fabulous, Harry Truman was coming to town, President.

And my father said, "You know, the president is coming to town, so we should see him."

So we got up, it was early in the morning, we went down.

And of course, the trains came in and there were like ramps where you walked up.

And we stood at the top of the ramp.

There were no other people basically.

He got off.

He had a Secret Service person on either side, two people.

That was it.

Harry, two service.

He walked by as close as you and I are in his little hat, you know, and his -- And today, can you imagine what it would be like for the president to come in at Union Terminal?

The entourage would be hundreds and hundreds and weeks ahead of time they scope out everything.

And then, but two Secret Service, that was it.

And I saw the president on that date.

PIERCE: That's amazing.

KELLAR: Yes.

So that's one of my claims to fame.

PIERCE: One of your favorite Union Terminal memories.

Where did you take the train to out of Union Terminal?

KELLAR: I can --you know what?

I don't remember exactly where we went, but during the war, when I was real little, everything was so crowded and it was soldiers, soldiers, soldiers.

And there was no place to really sit.

So the soldiers would have us sit on their knees.

PIERCE: Oh, sweet.

KELLAR: Yeah.

And you'd have your suitcase right there with you.

And those -- that was my memory of sitting.

PIERCE: You know, at one point during 1944, there were 34,000 people who went through that building in one day alone.

KELLAR: Wow.

PIERCE: I mean, it was such -- it was the crossroads of soldiers and service people.

KELLAR: That was when I was there.

PIERCE: All over the country.

KELLAR: Yeah.

And you really didn't travel much in those days because gas was rationed.

And of course, the trains were so crowded, but everything went for the service people.

PIERCE: And, you know, that's the other thing about Union Terminal, it was the original USO.

It started here in Cincinnati at Union Terminal, and it was staffed by Jewish and Christian and Catholic women who came together and really showcased what Cincinnati hospitality had to offer for these men who were, you know, making their way across the country had long layovers at Union Terminal and beyond.

KELLAR: I don't remember what year did the Terminal stop having trains?

PIERCE: 1972.

KELLAR: '72.

So it lasted a long time.

PIERCE: It did.

It did.

And then, you know, it sat somewhat vacant for a while and in disrepair.

And ultimately, you know, the shopping mall came to in it.

KELLAR: Oh, I remember Loehmann's.

PIERCE: Great pictures.

KELLAR: Yeah.

Yeah, but there are rooms, like your office.

PIERCE: Yes.

KELLAR: Those that are totally intact.

PIERCE: Yes.

KELLAR: If somebody wanted to see those, could they make an appointment?

PIERCE: Yeah.

You know, the Cincinnati Heritage program docents lead a tour on Saturdays and Sundays.

They start at 11:00, and generally they're on every hour and they will lead you into the Union Terminal President's Office, where you'll see this kind of moment in time frozen and give you a lot of different details about the history of the building.

KELLAR: Well, I love Union Terminal and I love you.

You're so fabulous and you've got a huge job, but you do it just brilliantly.

And we hope people will come start coming out.

Everybody's sort of beginning their life as it used to be.

PIERCE: Indeed.

KELLAR: And it's a perfect place to go, especially if you have somebody from out of town or kids, grandchildren, whatever.

PIERCE: On a rainy day or a super hot day or just because you're curious and you need, you know, you want to have a family memory together.

KELLAR: That rotunda just, you can have a hot dog.

PIERCE: It's breathtaking.

KELLAR: You used to.

PIERCE: There are hot dogs there, yes KELLAR: Thank you so much.

This was really fun.

PIERCE: This was so fun.

Thank you.

ANNOUNCER: Join us next week for another episode of Showcase with Barbara Kellar right here on CET.

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