My Bicentennial Moment

Today, the United States of America remembers that day, two hundred and fifty years ago, when an assembly of men risked everything to declare thirteen colonies an independent nation (or, to be more precise, "Free and Independent States").

I remember a day exactly two hundred years after that day, and exactly fifty years before this one.

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I got a lucky break that summer, landing an internship at a presigious graphic design studio in downtown Cincinnati, at the Gywnne Building, headed by the art director/designer/photographer/renaissance man George Tassian. When I wasn't doing that, I was helping organize folk music concerts, and hanging out at the coffeehouse scene, and at the University of Cincinnati, where I was a student, hence the internship.

Her name was Karen Grey. She was a sweet, redheaded, girl-next-door, Suzy Sorority type, who laughed at my jokes. We worked together in the Shows Department at Kings Island in the summers of 1973 and 1974. We each had our own reasons for moving on after the magic died, but we agreed to spend the Fourth together, walking down International Street one more time, for old time's sake.

His name was Jack Rouse. As the founder and president of Kings Productions, the company that concocted magic for the masses every year during the off-season, he was the genius behind the live show productions at the park. Back in 1973, I was honored when he choose me among the four guys who dressed up as the cartoon characters known as The Banana Splits for a special film previewing the new park in Richmond known as Kings Dominion, especially as I was the only rookie among the foursome. He always remembered me, and always had time to speak with me. Karen and I were both thrilled to meet with him again, still down-to-earth, yet still larger than life, as he ventured around the park to review the fruit of his labors.

They were Paul Revere and the Raiders. They were past their heyday in the 1960s as the fun pop rockers on the Top 40, but after many years (not that many when you look that far back), and a few changes in lineup, there they were, all five still rockin' with the colonial cosplay schtick, the guitar section still prancin' in perfect sync, as Karen and I looked down from our vantage point at the International Restaurant. The fireworks would soon go off at ten o'clock, as we always knew they would, and when it was over, I took her home.

I saw her again about four years later, at Arnold's Bar and Grille downtown. I was laid off from that sweatshop-with-ferns known as a design studio, and preparing to get the hell out of Dodge City. She was at a table with some friends of hers, and told me she was engaged. I remember her telling me he was a doctor. Naturally.

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I also remember a few dissenting voices fifty years ago, taking at least some of the romance out of the romance that was American history, but it was nothing like what we have today, a bunch of cocktail party radicals bloviating on television on how awful this country is, even as millions do whatever it takes to get here, including my two step-grandchildren from the Philippines, who couldn't be happier than to fit like a glove into American life. The Washington Post has reported on what the America of 1976 thought it would be like in 2026. Ever wonder what we got right back then?

And let's not forget the victories of Team USA in the World Cup, and what "futbol" players of other countries are learning about America.

And so it goes.