State fair had double tragedy 118 years ago
Few are going to criticize someone for making an inconsequential slip-up at a press conference shortly after a tragedy.
But Gov. John Kasich’s statement that the one killed and seven hurt when a state fair ride broke apart last week represented the worst tragedy in the history of the annual event drove Dispatch researcher Linda Deitch to dig deep into the files.
She came up with a bizarre incident from Sept. 7, 1899, in which two state fairgoers were killed. It happened during a nightly re-creation of “The Battle of San Juan,” including a fireworks display and 300 soldiers from the Ohio National Guard, many of whom had served in the recent Spanish-American War.
On this particular night in front of the grandstands, the company that supplied the ammunition accidentally mixed live indoor target shells with the blank cartridges normally used. Killed were Pvt. Ravillo R. Smithson, 18, of the Ohio National Guard, and a spectator, Charlie Krag, 7. Another spectator was wounded but survived.
The remainder of the shows were canceled.
Brown bashes big bank execs
Sen. Sherrod Brown opposed the nomination of former OneWest Bank Chairman Steve Mnuchin as treasury secretary early this year. Last week the Ohio Democrat opposed President Donald Trump’s nomination of Joseph Otting, a former president of OneWest while Mnuchin was there, as comptroller of the currency.
“Mr. Otting’s bank made money by kicking seniors out of their homes and then turned around and said the government made them do it,” Brown told the Senate Banking Committee.
Pointing to a Dispatch story six months ago, Brown said nearly 2,000 Ohioans were foreclosed on by OneWest in just the state’s six largest counties under Mnuchin and Otting from 2010 to 2015.
On a related note, the Justice Department announced in May that OneWest subsidiary Financial Freedom had agreed to pay an $89 million settlement over complaints it defrauded the Federal Housing Administration in the way it used reverse mortgages from April 2011 through August 2016.
Beware! Economic statistics in use
For U.S. Rep. Pat Tiberi, Friday’s estimate that the nation’s gross domestic product grew an estimated 2.6 percent in the second quarter was evidence of economic improvements under President Donald Trump.
“To maintain this momentum, we need to continue pulling away from Obama-era policies that restrict growth,” the Genoa Township Republican said, noting a 1.5 percent average annual growth under Barack Obama.
Of course, economic growth numbers can be slippery ECOT’s ranking dethroned
For years journalists have written how the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow is easily Ohio’s largest online charter school. But that was before the state found that the school could document only a little more than 6,300 students, instead of the 14,000-plus claimed by the school.
That makes the Virtual Academy, sponsored by the University of Toledo, the state’s largest, with about 8,300 students.
Of course ECOT is again claiming around 14,000 students, but the state is examining that number.