A century ago, Orville and Wilbur Wright looked at their bicycles and said, “I think we might be able to fly these things.”
Today, some hearty fellow Daytonians followed in their footsteps, sort of. They looked at piles of debris and said, “I think I can row this.”
And then they tried.
At Riverscape, in the shadow of the Engineers Club and a statue of the Wright Brothers taking flight, we watched do-it-youselfers take part in Dayton’s Outrageous River Derby. If I heard emcee Commodore Jim Bucher of WDTN Channel 2 correctly, this was the 14th one.
But it was my first, and it turned out to be a beautiful day to hang out by the river for some silly fun. The gist of the event is this: Make a raft, any kind of raft, get it in the river, and race it down the river a hundred yards or so. Try not to sink.
Themes included a Lady Gaga boudoir and an Abe Lincoln who looked suspiciously like a plastic Jesus with an electrical tape beard. A last-minute entry was made of a pipe frame, cardboard, saran wrap and duct tape.
Was there lots of duct tape, you ask?
Did Wilbur wear a funny hat?
The paddle prizes didn’t go only to the swift. The judging panel included an engineer, some student artists from Stivers and K-12 gallery, who gave out prizes in categories like creativity and most-likely-to-sink before the race even started. I can’t tell you who won the superlatives because we’d taken a pause from the sun to get snacks for our boys.
Poor Man's Kayak, the derby winner
But then again, I can tell you who won: Everyone there because it was just goofy fun, a gorgeous blue sky, a soft breeze and a great time at Riverscape.
After we downed our snacks, we sat at the river’s edge and watched the race. Honest Abe got a little dishonest help from someone pushing, and Lady Gaga was surprisingly strong. What I mean by that is that I still have no idea how she stayed afloat.
But they finished second and third. The race went to Poor Man’s Kayak, which turned out to be a fine kayak indeed, held aloft by rows and rows of one-liter soda bottles on its underside and sped along by a very able rower with a great sense of balance.
I’m not sure we’d have made Orville and Wilbur proud, but I have no doubt our hometown ingenuity would’ve made them laugh.
