And They Called Him Johnny Appleseed.

Since this is my first appearance in RnB, I might as well include a little background on who I am. My name’s Joe. I grew up in a small town about 15 miles south of Youngstown, Ohio, later moved to Warren, then skipped the last day of high school to “temporarily” move to Wooster, Ohio because I had to get away from my dad, who I haven’t seen or talked to since. Here I am. It’s five years later, I’m 23 years old, and still living in my mom’s basement.

Free food. No rent. Red meat and potatoes for dinner every fucking night. I don’t wear it as a badge like some people do, but I’m a vegetarian, so I don’t eat much when I’m at home. A lot of people around here don’t like me, but that’s fine with me. I’ve been known to wear a pink muscle shirt, put temporary tattoos of grizzly bears on my neck and say homosexual things in a Southern accent when I’m in public and there are hicks around, so I don’t blame people for disliking me. I don’t care. So you can see how living with mom in Americawoodvilleburg might be a small problem for me. My problems with the natives are self-inflicted, mostly, but whatever. I’m just responding to my surroundings.

I have moved out of my mom’s house a few times, don’t get me wrong. I spent a while living in Cleveland, some time in a prefabricated duplex in the part of Wooster where I am told is the best place in town to buy drugs, and a year in near complete isolation in a town that is almost as depressing as Youngstown; Butte, Montana.

But, it’s better here in Lynyrd Skynrd country than it was when I first moved to Montana, in spite of my usual not-eating-that-often-ness at mom’s house. Out there, I was terrified of driving alone in my Mazda which is covered with anti-Bush stickers, so to compensate, I listened to blaring Johnny Cash everywhere I went. Thanks to him, I was invincible.

I have exactly three hobbies. Obviously, industrial and urban decay is one of them. The others are BMX and mountain bikes and playing music. I’m a bassist. I’m in an experimental/noisy rock band called ”Silver Linings”, and another one that started out as a “serious” project called ”Those Gays”, but eventually devolved into an excuse for me to scream “we’re coming for your marriage” into a microphone over pirate music, lie on the floor and mock Ted Nugent fans while I make feedback, or do other weird things that are only funny to my friends and me. I am also always willing to help out non-shitty bands with their bass/noise/guy-with-a-deep-voice needs. Just ask!

But enough of that. You don’t care about this crap. So here are some photos of a small town in north-central Ohio called Mansfield.
If you’re not aware and want to go there, Mansfield, Johnny Appleseed’s hometown, sits almost exactly halfway between Columbus in Cleveland. From the north, take I-71 south to US-30 west. From the south, 71 north to 30 west. Easy.

When you’re in the right area, you’ll be greeted by this off to your left:

I’m not really sure what it does, but it’s on one of those streets that are crisscrossed by abandoned train tracks. 50 years ago, I would have never driven my car down that street. It was probably a busy place.

Mansfield is the kind of town where you can be in a beautifully restored downtown business district with a nice central park filled with stone benches and huge trees one second, cross the train tracks, and be in front of this the next seconds. No bobsyeruncle jokes here. Sorry about the huge wall. The “Start a Business” sign was irresistible.

Here’s a closer shot. I tried to get a cut-and-paste pan of the abandoned Westinghouse building on OH-39 and OH-545, but I don’t have a tripod so it didn’t work. You can’t really get a feel for how huge it is from this picture. More from this stop below.

From another angle. It’s too bad all the empty 40 oz. and malt liquor bottles that line the building didn’t show up in this picture. My god, I’ve never seen so many.

This looks like a suitable place to get raped. Fortunately, the only problem I had was the husky teenager who yelled something from a passing car. Because it was Wednesday evening, I’m pretty sure he said “all you can eat.”

A walkway connecting the huge building shown in the above photos to another building across the street. See those small white patches near the sidewalk? Someone needed those just to get by. More liquor bottles. This place is a fucking dump.

The main building. I used to work at a radio station in Mansfield, and they sponsored live music at the venue that’s still inside. Book your band now! (I doubt anyone will show up. You have to play Kiss covers or expendable indie-rock in a town like this if you want people to come to your shows.)

Just about two blocks away on OH-545, I looked up just as a red light turned green and noticed this. It wasn’t my intention to take one of those faux-artistic photos. I was trying to drive, smoke a cigarette, and take a picture at the same time.

Just beyond a smashed-in doorway. No police were around, so I went in and found this. I wasn’t even raped a little bit during this trip.
There’s so much more than this in Mansfield. Unfortunately, by the time I got there I only had a half an hour or so before dark. I wanted to visit the grounds of the Mansfield State Reformatory, which is about one or two miles from these factories, but the photos wouldn’t have turned out if I tried to take them at dusk. I live about 25 minutes away from the town, so I’ll go back when I have more time. There are many more sites like this all across the city. It was built around the central park that I mentioned above, and years ago, I’m sure it was a great place to be. Now the majority of Mansfield is reduced to 200 dollar a month rental homes and rubble.
“If you lived here, you’d be home.”


Next: Detroit-Superior Trolley Tunnel Tour

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