The Dreaded Ice Cream Man

The ice cream man–a symbol of summer, childhood, hot days, and the best of neighborhoods. So why is it that Terrace Park has never allowed the ice cream man into the loose boundaries surrounding this child infested village?

Well there really isn’t a totally good answer, but I can tell you my opinion.

The ice cream man is someone every kid looks forward to seeing out on a hot July day when the road is boiling under your feet. But sadly for the kids of Terrace Park, overly protective mothers and a suspicious police force have banned and discouraged any ice cream men from entering the town. A few would still sneak through back in the day just to make a couple extra bucks off the numerous kids attracted to ice cream like moths to light.

So, Mr. Jay Gohman, how about letting the adolescents of your town live a little? Terrace Park is a safe enough neighborhood with enough people outside and aware that one ice cream man isn’t going to cause problems.

The School System

Terrace Park nowadays is a K-6 elementary school that is available as an option to those who live in Terrace Park, Plainville, and even William’s Meadow. Terrace Park though was not always just an elementary school, oh no, it was much, much more.

When the original building was constructed in the year 1913, it was a K-12 school, which of course included the historical Terrace Park High School. TPHS was open to all people living in and around Terrace Park, who were the appropriate ages of course. This high school had everything you’d see in modern high schools such as an auditorium, sports teams, extracurriculars, and the one thing that always defines Terrace Park: community.

After 44 years of existence, Terrace Park High School seized to exist in the year 1957 when Terrace Park decided to join the Mariemont City School District where it still remains today. It is one of two feeders into Mariemont Junior High and then Mariemont High School from the district. The other  schools being only Mariemont Elementary School after Fairfax Elementary was torn down and recreated as the new junior high building.

Terrace Park has changed quite a bit in the past few years, and the entire district has as well. On May 4, 2010, a levee was passed to remodel all the schools, except for the high school which had already been redone, to make the learning environment better for the students. The plan, which was at last finalized in 2011 just before the demolition of the old elementary school began, came out to cost $12.5 MILLION just for the destruction and rebuilding  of Terrace Park Elementary.

Once the reconstruction of the school was underway, all the students in the school were moved onto the back lawn and put into temporary “modulars” until the school was to be finished for the 2012-2013 school year.

Finally, after spending the entire 2011-2012 school year confined in the modulars, the school was set to be opened and ready for the next coming year. Now, the students at Terrace Park have a new school building with more room, modernized classrooms, and more efficient energy conservation that will hopefully save the district money over time.

TP Drawing Back

No one seems like they can truly “escape” from the many great things that Terrace Park has to offer. Safety, community, courtesy, care for one another, and love are only a few great things about this place. That is what draws so many happily married couples back to this community like moths to a lantern.

Of course those of you who live in Terrace Park as young adolescents are thinking “there is no way in H-E double hockey sticks I’m ever moving back to Ohio, I’m going to college as far away as possible and never turning back.” This sudden burst of wanting to never return is only because of the great things the community provides parents.

Think about it, where else can you let your kids roam around everyday of summer and just expect them to come home to engulf whatever you’ve whipped up for dinner?

It’s not just the safety though that makes TP a parental unit’s and/or legal guardian’s paradise. Having your children grow up in such a welcoming community can teach them what it really means to be accepted and wanted by every person around.

Things are not always fun and games though if you’re a teenager. You are encumbered with responsibility, and anything you mess up on is known by the entire community within 2 hours of the incident’s occurrence. So it’s no wonder every cognizant teen in the TP area wants to GTHO (get the heck out) ASAP (as soon as possible).

Later though, as it happens with every generation while they’re away at college, they have this sort of epiphany where they realize how special Terrace Park is, and what it means to them.

I’ve seen it with my mother, her mother, and her mother before that. Not to mention the countless names and faces we see throughout the high school who’ve come back. All in all Terrace Park has so many great qualities, and although not every teenage hooligan might realize it now, one day they will see what makes TP one of a kind.

The History of the Terrace Park Bubble

Living in a small community sure has some major benefits. There are plenty of things to do while also having a safe environment for children and those who call themselves “young adults”. Whether it’s knowing everyone in the neighborhood or being able to walk everywhere you go, Terrace Park is a high quality town in many regards.

One thing though that does derive from such a small town atmosphere as this one is a sense of not just safety, but also containment. The “Terrace Park Bubble” has evolved over time, but since the beginning it has had both a positive and negative effect on its inhabitants.

This is not a literal bubble as some of you may suppose, but metaphorically speaking it does have the same sort of effect. Regular information can flow in and out freely, but anything can also be covered up.

The parents of the children who freely roam the streets of Terrace Park make up most of the side who’d say this is a positive thing. They get to keep their innocent little ones from the horrors of the outside world. Keeping their kids’ minds pure and functioning are the two goals of parents around Terrace Park.

But with an upside, it only makes sense for there to be a downside. Kids who are about age ten and below don’t really look out for themselves or want to get away. I myself was once a “mamma’s boy,” but the day did come when I needed to step off of that nest, spread my wings and hopefully fly. The pubescent stages of a young boy’s life are a time of many big changes, including thinking they are completely independent and are ready to be on their own.

Well let me be the first to tell you, they’re wrong. The thing is that a mother, if she had a choice, would keep you cooped up in the quiet and safety of your room way past your teenage years. This isn’t a good thing either, so the happy medium seems to be knowing a little bit about the world and how it works before you get as far away as you possibly can for college.

Kids around the Park don’t really know much of the outside world. Words like “crime,” “theft,” and “robbery” aren’t commonly used considering the extremely low rates of every imaginable crime. Crime in Terrace Park riles up everyone in the town, and they go door to door with their pitchforks and torches trying to find and capture the perpetrator. Okay, maybe it isn’t that big of a deal, but it’s still practically unheard of.

The “Terrace Park Bubble” seems to end up doing more good than it does bad, which makes this small suburban town even more of an attractive and safe place for people of all ages.

Terrace Park’s Landmarks: Railroad Station

Terrace Park, as you may have learned before in my recent posts, is not just a small suburban community on the outskirts of Cincinnati. Oh no, it is much more than that. It has a rich history that has been passed down from generation to generation. Within this history are tales, tales of the many buildings and landmarks that make up Terrace Park, Ohio.

The Railroad Station of Terrace Park is an old but very historic place. Although this exact railway station is not still standing, the place where it was is still perfectly intact. It’s also a lot closer to home than I ever knew before.

About 3 weeks ago, as we were sitting around the dinner table discussing any topic that popped into someone’s head, my aunt brought up something that I had never heard before. It was that Terrace Park used to have a railroad station that ran through it to bring goods and people into Ohio. Not only did it exist, she told us, but her house where she resides today was the old railroad station back in the day.

The fact that I had never heard anything about this before truly baffled me because this is the kind of stuff I like to know.

My aunt’s house, located just down the hill from St. Thomas Church, was the perfect place for this station to be placed. It’s surrounded by woods, a river, and is right along the area of what is now Wooster Pike. I’ll never look at that little house the same again.

Now there’s a fun fact for you.

The Terrace Park Historical Society

The Terrace Park Historical Society, founded on September 14, 2001, is an important part of the village as a whole. This society’s main goal is to educate both children and adults on the subjects of the history and preservation of Terrace Park. All in efforts to help people, in and around the village, understand and appreciate the rich history of the area.

But how did this group come to be?

On the night of November 15, 2001, in the St. Thomas Church, the first meeting of what is now known as the Terrace Park Historical Society took place. This gathering consisted of the forty-eight founders, eager to make a big difference in their little community. The original Board of Trustees that was established that night was as follows: Carol Cole, president; Betsy Holloway, vice president; Kay Pope, secretary; Bill Holloway, treasurer.

The Society has many archives consisting of documents and artifacts prevalent to the village itself. These documents are important to keeping the history of Terrace Park in one place as well as making it easy to relay this information to the many members of this historical group. Not only does the Historical Society save its own history, but it also encourages everyone around the community to write and share their own memories of the village. Whether it’s memories of adults or children, the Society continues to gather diverse perspectives of the town that encompasses them all.

The Historical Society is made up of approximately 250 people, but that number continues to grow as it has over the past 11 years. It is a non profit organization that receives many generous donations from its members. This society publishes a quarterly newspaper, as well as hosting four meeting every year.

They are not only about keeping important documents that relate to the village, but they also want to preserve all of the historic buildings around the neighborhood. These historic buildings, some of which date back to the early 19th century, are extremely important to the society. So because of this rich history, the Historical Society has set up laws, along with Cincinnati, that disallow the destruction of these village landmarks.

The Terrace Park Historical Society continues to achieve its goal every day, and no matter what, always keeps the deep history of the village safe.

What is Terrace Park

Terrace Park is a small suburban village located in Hamilton County, OH. According to the 2010 census, Terrace Park’s population totaled 2,251 people. Of these 2,251 people, there are 615 families and a total of 758 households.

The village takes up a total of 1.22 square miles, 1.17 square miles of which is land. Terrace Park Elementary, the town’s K-6 elementary school, feeds into the Mariemont City School District.

But this place is more than just a village, it is a community brought together by every individual looking out for his or her neighbor. It is about keeping each other, as well as the community, safe.

Not many other places can say this about their town. So how did this loving and caring community come to be?

In the month of January 1789, Abraham Covalt established Covalt Station in the area now known as Terrace Park, OH. Covalt Station was a small fortified settlement that was surrounded by various Shawnee settlements, and the Shawnee were very hostile to the white settlers who were claiming their land.

Finally in 1792, they ran the white settlers out of Covalt Station due to the continuous attacks by the Shawnee on the fort. It wasn’t until after General “Mad Anthony” Wayne defeated the Shawnee and a treaty was made that the white settlers were able to return to the area.

Upon their return to Southwest Ohio, which was now part of the United States, the settlers became subsistence farmers, raising both cattle and chickens in order to feed the family.

As time went on, and more roads and railroads were established, Terrace Park began to expand due to its new found easy access routes. The community then began to slowly move away from an agriculture based economy into a more industrialized way of life. As the Native Americans became a distant memory, so did farming.

Finally, after the evolution of this former “Covalt Station”, Terrace Park is what it is today.