Will Walnut Hills Rise Again?

September 12, 1940: A new-model Ford pulls away from the curb and heads west on East McMillan, passing a woman who’s little more than a blur on a bike. A man stands still, just a few steps into the street, debating his next move as pedestrians weave around him on the sidewalks and streets. Streetcar wires web the sky. Peebles Grocery closed nine years ago—so it goes when a depression hits—but the corner building has already been remade: Under a towering spire advertising the Paramount Theater, the rotunda at Gilbert and East McMillan sports window signs for Franklin Life Insurance Co., Paige Beauty Salon (air conditioned!), and McDevitt menswear shop, with full window displays and large striped awnings. Turnabout, starring Adolphe Menjou, is currently playing just down the block, and a tangle of signs and cars and people and shops stretch on beyond the camera’s frame.

Photograph from the Cincinnati Museum Center

September 12, 2015: It’s been raining all day, and a deep chill hangs in the air. A few couples walk hand-in-hand up Park Avenue; a drum beat thumps through the walls of the Brew House. It’s 7:45 p.m. and Music Off McMillan is underway. A man leans and wails on a saxophone in front of Cuts Plus Barbershop, standing on freshly poured sidewalks under the glow of bright new streetlights. Up the street another guy settles back in a chair, his gaze and electric guitar notes fading into the Kroger parking lot. Further than their sound can reach, an acoustic guitarist stands outside of Fireside Pizza’s open sliding stacker doors. He’s got one avid listener sitting next to him, while the rest keep warm inside. Down around the corner at The Greenwich, a neighborhood mainstay for two decades, the night’s closing band prepares to play, while the bar seats fill up across the street at Angst Coffeehouse.

Photograph by Aaron M. Conway