Baseball, beer help Wright Brothers’ hometown rise again

of grand homegrown commerce (the company took its headquarters and 1,250 jobs to Atlanta in 2009). Some parts of the city still reflect the malaise.

But efforts to diversify Dayton, trumpet its rich history and make it a cleaner, brighter, more interesting place are working.

The city spruced up the Great Miami riverfront, creating a family friendly downtown park. An old railroad freight house was converted into a popular public market. The city scored a minor-league baseball team — the Class-A Dayton Dragons — and put up a fan-friendly, 7,200-seat stadium. Fifth Third Field has sold out every single game since it opened in 2000 — the longest streak in any professional sport. The ballpark draws crowds even though the Cincinnati Reds, a Major League Baseball team, play just 55 miles (88 kilometers) away.

“Certainly this side of downtown wasn’t doing really well, and that started to change around the time of the ballpark opening,” said Alan F. Pippenger, whose venerable family business, the Requarth Lumber Co., is situated just beyond the left-field foul pole of Fifth Third Field. The Requarth building has been there so long that the Wright Brothers visited to buy lumber for their early flying machines.

When Pippenger came back to Dayton to take over the company in 1985, one of the only places to get lunch was the basement snack bar of the Sear’s store down the street. There are way more choices now. And more people around.

New restaurants and bars have opened up around the ballpark. Closed factories and warehouses have been converted to sleek apartments that are snapped up as fast they’re built. Construction equipment downtown has become a familiar sight.

Dayton also boasts a resident philharmonic orchestra, 2,300-seat downtown performing arts center and a nationally recognized art museum. Not bad for metro area with just around 800,000 people, including 140,000 in the city itself.

Here are five more reasons why Dayton is a happening place:

JOHN MINCHILLO — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Shane Juhl, owner and proprietor of Toxic Brew Co., poses for a photograph at his taproom located in the Oregon District, Tuesday in Dayton, Ohio. After experiencing its best days in the first half of the 20th century, Dayton is reinventing itself with impressive results. Minor-league baseball, a riverside park and a cluster of craft beer pubs are helping revitalize a downtown that had become frayed around the edges.