West Side is the Best Side.

So here in Cincinnati there is an interesting division of the city.  As sure as I75 slices through the area, it divides the town into 2 distinct areas.  The East side and the West Side.  Now East siders do not really care about this.  They mostly live happily in their 'burbs unaware or mostly uninterested about what happens on the west side of 75. Westsiders on the other hand, love being Westsiders.  They love their high school football like its their children, their chili like its their mother and their neighborhood like its their dad.  Generations of residents of Bridgetown, Delhi, Mt. Airy and Dent are passionate about living on the west side.  The west side is so much an entity onto itself my good friend RJ would oft refer to my childhood home as "France"

I myself am a westsider by blood.  I lived with my grandma and grandpa since birth and they adopted me when I turned 4.  We lived in Bridgetown on Lakewood drive.  I walked to Oakdale elementary.  We shopped at Osterhues.  We ate at Ron's Roost, J&J's, and Putz's.  And we bowled at Western Bowl.  My dad's family were big time bowlers.   In fact when I was a month old I appeared on the TV show "King of Bowling" as my grandma held me while my dad bowled. We went on tournaments around the country.  But it was Western Bowl right down the road from us that we frequented.  When report cards came our Western Bowl gave student's with good grades free bowling and games at the arcade.  It was a big part of my childhood.  

Now its about to close.  After 52 years, the Hoinke family is shutting down the 60 plus lanes.  Some blame the economy.  Some blame the Ohio smoking ban.  Some blame the declining lack of interest in bowling. Either way it will be sad that a small business, so successful for so many years, host to an internationally renowned million dollar purse tournament, will soon be no more.    So get your bowling shoes and a bunch of friends and head to the Western Bowl.  I'll meet you at J&J's for a double decker before hand.

Whatever the cause for the closure, its not just a west side landmark thats closing.  Its a Cincinnati landmark...