Our Local Visionary

By Carl Nelson

I heartily second Theodore Dalrymple’s recent admonitions regarding public noise, “All Quiet”, including this one. “Unnecessary noise should be regarded in the same way as cigarette smoke now is, a pollutant that infringes the rights of anyone subjected involuntarily to it.”

Harmar Tavern, Marietta, Ohio’s oldest tavern “known for our “Sure to be Famous” Bologna Sandwich”, was first started by a Marietta visionary who during his service during WWII noted that there were two taverns opposite one another in an area he frequented when on leave on the West Coast. On the one side of the street was a tavern featuring loud music and entertainment. On the other side was a quiet tavern offering none of this. The noisy tavern across the street attracted a large rowdy crowd and all the wrong sort of people just passing through. While the quiet tavern served a smaller, steady, loyal clientele, and the atmosphere was peaceful and neighborly. That’s the kind of tavern he decided to own when he returned to Marietta, Ohio. No music. No TVs. No radio. Just a neighborhood bar promising a bit of quiet, restful fraternity in the dim cool out of the midday Ohio heat.

When I first stepped into the Harmar Tavern in the ‘90s, out of the hot bright afternoon sunshine, it was very quiet. And as my eyes adjusted I saw a bar extending the length of the shotgun style frame establishment. There were bar stools and then enough room for one row of tables opposite the bar. There were no sounds save the lilt of occasional words dropped here or there. Some homemade horse radish and pickles in Kerr Jars were displayed for sale on the table nearest the front shop window. The mugs of beer were delivered quite cold with a thick skein of ice melting down the sides.

I recall sitting at a middle table against the far wall and enjoying an Almost Famous Balogna Sandwich with my future wife and a draft of beer, while watching the stray customer arrive, say a few words, and then receive his beer. The old fellow who sold fishing worms in the bait shop kiddy-corner shuffled in, parked his cane, and ordered his afternoon brew. I can still remember the tinkle of his change striking the counter and echoing throughout the quiet tavern as he fingered out the charge for his day’s reward. I can’t locate charms like that much anymore, as televisions with their big screens have since arrived at the Harmar. But it still charmed a poem from me:

Harmar Tavern

Years ago, the old fellow from the worm shop nearby

would shuffle in for his afternoon beer to escape the heat.

He’d rest his cane and in the cool, inner twilight,

I could hear the coins chatter on the bar top.

He used to work for my mother in law’s, mother’s, third husband’s

engineering firm called, “Dig it, Ditch it & Dam it.”

 

The mugs were brought out freezer cold

and the beers served with a thick skein of ice on their sides.

Jars of homemade horseradish sat for sale on a front corner table.

And the fried bologna sandwich was still “Almost Famous”

and came with a side.

 

Fellows would sit in the quiet bar in the mid-afternoon,

which stood halfway down a brick, tree-lined

neighborhood of narrow working-class homes,

with the Union Headquarters just up the street,

and a guy selling farm produce from the back of a truck

parked a block or so away

where the crossroads met before the bridge

across the Muskingham into Marietta.

 

I enjoyed my first fried bologna sandwich here

and haven’t ordered anything else, since.

You sit back and watch the TV and barmaids;

meet with friends.

Currently, one barmaid has a circular maze tattoo

on her right outer thigh.

To struggle with it over five seconds

would be considered leering,

so I’m toying with the idea of taking a photo

and solving the problem at home.

 

The Appalachian area, which encompasses where we live, was a jumping place back in the Guilded Age. And a lot of industrial titans were created who grew quite wealthy, and who then in their waning years left much of their wealth – as was the custom of this age – to charitable endeavors. The hills are sprinkled with small private colleges, and large theatres from the era, which brought culture and learning to the rural inhabitants – farmers, oil and coal workers, – and the city factory hands. Some time ago we spent a few days vacationing in a rented cabin on the grounds of Oglebay Resort – the public benevolence of one such a business titan – to the north, in the hills outside Wheeling, WV.

The resort hosts a magnificent outdoor pool. Certainly one of the largest I’ve ever experienced, rimmed by lovely grounds on three sides and the Crispin Center – an magnificent, granite, multistoried mansion of the old style, whose big windows and balcony ornament on the fourth side. The pool featured large inflatables for kids to summit and jump from, plus spraying water fountains and climbing rocks – all in a huge stone basin of lovely clear pool water. The families clustered in chairs and under umbrellas scattered along the broad cement poolside walking areas. The sounds were of nature, splashing water, and joyful children yelling and calling from the amusements with an undercurrent of murmured parental approval. It was as if we had been dropped in an American Elysian field with Olympic sized pool and gamboling water sprites.

Then two large speakers at the pool’s end began blasting AM radio. And all of these lovely sounds were drowned as if in a tsunami – by an ad for auto tires! Then it was rock and roll interspersed with more loud, blaring local advertisements.

I listened for a while, a bit incredulous, waiting for someone to do something, until finally, I decided to act, myself. I strode over to where the speakers were blaring looking for an attendant to discuss the matter with, but there was no one about. I supposed they were inside on a break or carrying out another duty of some sort. Feeling the rage I imagine Jesus must have felt when clearing the Temple of its moneychangers – I unplugged the speakers.

The quiet and restored calm was nearly palpable. Walking back to my spot poolside, I received applause from several of the others relaxing poolside and felt vindicated.

Unfortunately, when the attendants returned, the one seemingly in charge noted that the sound had been unplugged and plugged it back in. This pissed me off. So I walked back up and explained to her that people were enjoying the natural sounds – and the auto tire ads not so much – and could we just leave off with the canned ‘music’.

She eyed me and replied that only the attendants had the power to alter the sound system. And that someone had unplugged the speakers. And that if she found out who had done so, or if they tried it again, they would be in trouble.

I suppose after Jesus had cleared the Temple, the money changers swarmed right back in again, also.

***

You might think that I am making a big thing of bothersome noise. But the same noise which drowns out the sublime poetry of the personal interactions in a local pub, or drowns out family life during an outing at a magnificent outdoor pool left as our heritage – is very liken to the incessant noise of the propaganda which is currently muffling our American life and traditional culture throughout the media and our institutions. This evil didn’t manifest from out of nothing. We’ve been hearing the growling sounds grow louder over our lifetime. Boom, boom, boom! came the Boomers.

Very few want it, but the powers-that-be (and who are they?) won’t let us turn it off. The lies continue. Normal life is smothered. These oppressors won’t listen to the citizens or even the market. They have mandates! They make encroaching regulations! And they conduct lawfare with all the powers of the government at their disposal. And the powers-that-be (whoever they may be… who knows?) won’t be stopped and cancel those who try.

Perhaps we don’t have all the pieces (evidence) of this malign design – but the image for the picture puzzle they are assembling is clear and is dystopian. And its sound is the everpresent buzzzzzzzzzing of propaganda, like cicadas everywhere driving the suffering citizen crazy. This incident during our swim at the Oglebay Pool mimics the same menacing airs of our situation today as we endure the unrelenting boilerplate propaganda over all of the legacy media for Biden’s Amerika.

But it’s not their pool! And it’s not their country!