Ottawa County Time Traveler
Eastern Ottawa County Past & Present
OCTOBER 2025
In this Issue
POLIO IN PORT CLINTON
THE MARBLEHEAD MILE #7  -  Jamestown Neighborhood
BOOK LOOK  -  Ghosts & Legends of Lake Erie's North Coast
OLD NEWS - from the Digitized Microfilm collection at IRPL
GENEALOGY  -  Family History 101
DID YOU KNOW ?
OUT AND ABOUT
POLIO IN PORT CLINTON
by Linda Higgins
 
October is Polio Awareness Month and October 24th is World Polio Day. At one time, poliomyelitis raged throughout the world. Today, wild poliovirus transmission only occurs in pockets of Afghanistan and Pakistan: It’s almost been eradicated.
 
Polio, referred to at one time as infantile paralysis, attacks the central nervous system and can lead to paralysis or even death. The name derives from the Greek polios (gray) and myelos (marrow), referring to gray matter in the spinal cord that is affected by the poliovirus. It was acknowledged as a viral entity at least as early as 1400 BC in Egypt. By 1789, Michael Underwood had developed a clinical description of the scourge. In 1908, Karl Landsteiner and Erwin Popper further expanded those documentations and, in 1948, John Enders, Thomas Weller, and Frederick Robins grew the virus in tissue culture cells. For their work, they received the Nobel Prize in Medicine or Physiology in 1954. Jonas Salk and his team developed the first inactivated polio vaccine, licensed in 1955; Albert Sabin’s team produced a live, attenuated oral polio vaccine in 1961.
 
There are three types of polio: abortive, non-paralytic, and paralytic. All present viral symptoms of fatigue, headache, sore throat, nausea, and diarrhea. The non-paralytic type adds light sensitivity and neck stiffness. Paralytic polio adds loss of superficial reflexes and muscle pain or spasms, leading to paralysis. In the worst cases, the throat and chest are paralyzed and the patient needs breathing support or will die. Although most patients recover, many suffer lifelong paralysis or muscle weakness.
 
There was one documented case in Port Clinton in 1944. Then, in 1948, the epidemic hit the Port Clinton community with full force. Among others, five members of the PCHS football team were infected.
 
Don Rhodes, well-known Catawba Island resident, was one of those football players. Richard (Dick) Davids, his teammate, contracted polio on September 3 and died five days later. He was buried in Lakeview Cemetery at age 17, one of 87 in the country to die in 1948, 36 in Ohio. His father, a former mayor of Port Clinton, died two months later.
 
In hospital isolation, Rhodes wasn’t allowed visitors, but could contact his family through a window in his third-floor room. He was not placed in an iron lung to aid his breathing muscles, as many victims were. Rhodes said he never recovered his “physical stamina,” although he went on to live a long life.
 
Rhodes speculated about how the players caught the disease. He did not seem to think much was different among them, as they all worked out the same, at the same time. The whole team had their breaks at East Harbor, ate the same foods, and went in the water in the heat, but only the five were affected.
 
Davids did cut his foot on a clam shell. And some of them drank water from a puddle on a tennis court during one of the practices, but Rhodes felt that nothing else was different from the routine days that the whole team endured.
 
Bill Belshaw, also on the team and now in the Port Clinton Athletic Hall of Fame, had a locker next to Davids and did not contract polio. He said Davids came in from practice one day and “threw up all over the place.” Belshaw never saw him again.
 
Football practice and games were canceled for fear the exertion and bodily contact might spread the disease, but schools were not closed. The county health commissioner, G.A. Poe, was quoted: “If schools are ordered closed, church services, theaters, or gatherings of any kind must also be banned and . . . a complete quarantine with children strictly isolated in their own homes must be enforced.” It was felt that the community would not tolerate a complete shutdown. The community did voice strong opinions, both pro and con, about the vaccine and procedures. Ultimately, families decided which activities they and their children would avoid.
 
Polio is highly infectious through nasal and oral secretions, as well as contact with contaminated feces. There is no cure, but prevention by vaccine has proven highly effective and safe, and the vaccine is still recommended, due to the risk of imported cases. 
 
Use this link to see or share the article online:  Linda
  
THE MARBLEHEAD MILE #7  -  Jamestown Neighborhood
by Lorrie Halblaub
 
In this series we are taking an historical look at an area that covers approximately a mile of Main Street in downtown Marblehead. Heading east from the Village limits, we will discover the facts and the stories of how Marblehead became what it is today.  [This is the 7th article in the series.]
 
The next few streets we see as we head east on the Marblehead Mile have a nickname.  They are called Jamestown.  Jamestown is a small neighborhood that includes the streets of Stone, Perry, James, and Frances that run north and south, and Elliott, Barclay, Church, and Prairie Streets that run east and west. The reason it is called Jamestown is because the original developer of this area was Colonel John H. James.
 
To explain this, we need to go back to the Revolutionary War.  After that war,  in 1792, land in this part of Ohio was given to Americans whose homes had been burned by the British. Our peninsula was given to folks from Danbury, Connecticut.  Each lot’s size was dependent upon how much each Connecticut family lost in the war.  However, not everyone wanted to move west to claim this land, so land speculators bought tracts of land from the Fire Sufferers. Our peninsula was the northwest boundary of the Firelands and other towns in Ohio were named for the Connecticut towns where their people could claim land, like Norwalk, New London, and Groton. 
 
The Jamestown land was purchased by land speculator Oren Follett.  You may have heard of the Follett House in Sandusky which is now a museum.  Colonel James purchased this part of the peninsula from Follett, and he subdivided it for residential building.   It was the James family that donated the land for James Park.
 
Local legend has it that over the years Marblehead has had 30 bars. Part of that reason was that each ethnic group who came to the area wanted three things - their own church, their own market that sold their ethnic food, and their own bar.
 
Jamestown Tavern, at 902 West Main Street, is named for the area but that wasn’t its original name.  Originally it was the Ontko and Dorko Café and Bar, which opened around 1900. It was run by John Dorko and Frank Ontko.  This bar catered to the quarrymen by opening at 7 am so men getting off 3rd shift had a place to have a drink and unwind before they went home to sleep.  During Prohibition the bar was turned into a furniture store.  After Prohibition, Andrew Dorko made it a bar again. In 1993, the Klacik family took over the bar and called it Kootz’s Village Inn until 2000. At that time, Mark Sauvey and Pat Fontana bought it and renamed it after the Jamestown Area.  Today is serves great food, has live music, and even hosted a book club called Books and Brews.  
   
You can use this link to read or share this article:  Lorrie
 
 
BOOK LOOK  -  Ghosts & Legends of Lake Erie's North Coast
Ghosts and Legends of Lake Erie's North Coast by Victoria King Heinsen
Ghosts and Legends of Lake Erie's North Coast
by  Victoria King Heinsen

The residents of Lake Erie's North coast have trouble leaving-even after they die. The area is flooded with the spirits of locals, some friendly, some not. See the sorrowful eyes of the Hauntingly Beautiful High School Student, who floats the corridors looking for her lost boyfriend, and head to an old Port Clinton hotel to watch the ghost of a maintenance man wander haphazardly through the inn, making routine repairs. Read about the figure that lurks in the clock of the Port Clinton Courthouse every night, never moving, simply watching, until disappearing with the sun. Local ghost tour guide Victoria King Heinsen has a personal connection with every story, and her firsthand accounts will turn every paranormal skeptic into a believer.  [From publisher marketing]


 
OLD NEWS - from the Digitized Microfilm collection at IRPL
 
 
 
GENEALOGY  -  Family History 101
With so much information available online, it can be overwhelming to know where or how to start working on your family history. There's a book for that.
 
Actually there are many, many books for that, but it's easier to start with just one. So this month we'll highlight this one - Family History 101 {A Beginner's Guide to Finding Your Ancestors} by Marcia D. Yannizze Melnyk   In nonfiction:  929.1072 Melnyk 2005
 
 
From the publisher marketing --
 
... ease into family history with:
  • Straightforward tips on tapping the power of the internet.
  • Checklists, forms, case studies, and illustrations that make getting started fun and easy.
  • Guidance on maximizing existing information, finding more, and what it all means.
  • Tips and techniques for recording and sharing all the wonderful family data you will uncover.
    ... Start learning about the past and your family's place in it today
DID YOU KNOW ?  
 
It's that time of year again - for ghosts, goblins, witches, and ghouls. And if you've lived around here a while, you know it's also time for HalloWeekends at Cedar Point.
It seems like there's always been Halloween at Cedar Point, but actually the first HalloWeekend was in 1997. It lasted for just three weekends that first year. Over time there have been changes to the event and its length. A favorite aspect of HalloWeekends for me was added in 2004, the Graveyard on the Midway. Also known as "the Land of Lost Thrill Rides" where you can see gravestones of rides from the 1960s on that are no longer running at the park. Happy Halloween!
 
OUT AND ABOUT  
 
 
Click on Cedar Point to find more HalloWeekends information on their webpage.