Episode 20 - Bill Kinzeler

[00:00:00] This episode of Ramblin on the River is presented by BB Riverboats. What does summertime in the Ohio River Valley mean to you? From the deck of a BB Riverboat, it means a breeze on the water, lush views, and a historic cruise by the Queen City skyline. BB Riverboats offers an experience as unforgettable as childhood summers.

This season, let our crew take care of yours as you cruise the mighty Ohio River. BB Riverboats. The river is waiting.

You're listening to the Ramblin on the River podcast, presented by BB River Boats. The Bernstein family has been a predominant name in Cincinnati's hospitality landscape since the 1960s, and this podcast will be a collection of the stories, tales, and experiences from their entrepreneurial [00:01:00] endeavors in the restaurant and excursion boat business.

Join as they take you on a A journey through the family's history in their own unique style. Now, here are your hosts, Ben Terry and Alan Bernstein.

We are finally back. We are alive. We are alone. It has been a long time. It has been a long time. I don't even know what I'm supposed to say. Well, before. When's the last one that we had? Thanksgiving. Up into Thanksgiving time. Before Thanksgiving. Yeah. Yeah, I think it was. November 26th or around there. At least that's when the files came.

That would be about right. And actually, it was the most successful episode we had done. That was with Josh Malin. By about three or four times. Oh, wow. Yes. Well, that's good. You know, let's see if our special guest can live up. Yeah, we'll see what [00:02:00] he can live up to on Popularity here, but yes, maybe we should tell everybody you're listening to rambling on the river. You are listening to what this is What was the introduction? What do you mean?

You remember ben talks before we normally do? Actually, you normally sit. Oh, I know. I don't, I didn't remember that. And you normally complain about the order. Well, I was going to say that everybody welcome back to rambling on the river. It has been several weeks since you've heard our glorious voices. A little more than two months.

I am complaining about the order in which we are introduced. You are joined by my father, Alan Bernstein, my sister, Terry Bernstein, and myself, Ben Bernstein. Yes. And that would be proper order. And this is episode number 20, with about a two and a half month delay. Okay. Well Now, if you would like to explain where we've been.

We'd love to. But before you [00:03:00] do we would love for you to go to our website rambling on the river comm we'd love for you to find us on Instagram and Facebook You can find that rambling on the river on each one of those platforms. If you'd like to email us, don't you email us?

I cast I get some emails calm We will all get those we love We love hearing from our We Yeah. We do. Yep. Are we still international now that we've had an hiatus? You know, while you talk, I will look up the current numbers. Okay. But I am sure after our viral episode a few weeks ago when we took exit stage left right after I am sure it will take some building back up to do.

Yeah, well, probably. But anyways, yes, we did take a quite a long extended delay. Well, most of it is medical. Well, that, but I've gotten several complaints. Like where, where are the episodes? Oh, I have not heard that complaint. But maybe that's because I've been sick and, and your mother has been [00:04:00] sick.

 The first delay. was around Thanksgiving when I caught pneumonia. And mom was sick. Mom was sick. That's when mom started getting sick. Yes. I was in bed for 10 days and It was, it was, yeah, it was at least 10 days.

Yeah, it was a bad. We got a lot done. We got a whole lot done. Yeah. I came back and hell, my office had been moved. So I started the delay. Then my wife, Mary then really put a delay in the delay. She caught several blood infections. How I don't know one, no, no, no, no, no. It was, there were several yes, they were the one that for me, well, the, the start isn't the important thing.

It's the end. was important. Are you making up your own medical diagnosis? Yes, I am a doctor of medicine, [00:05:00] honorary doctor, graduated from M. I. T. as a doctor or whatever. I don't even know. I think M. I. T. Is engineering. Yeah, it is. That's all right. Engineering doctor. It's all the same. That shows just how exceptional of an educator you have.

That's right. But mom is better. Mom is much better. They had a skip over everything. She spent a couple of weeks in the hospital a regular hospital, and then a few more weeks in a rehab hospital which made me the head of the household, which was a whole nother learning experience. Well, I mean, head of household only person in the household. When you only have two people in the household, that left me in charge of the household. We can assure you he has never been the head of household. That is correct. Even if he were the only person in the household, he has never been the head of household. That is correct. Terry, you ought to share the group, the tutorial that you had with him on how to start a [00:06:00] washing machine.

Well, no, I was going to just say, I think one of the very important things, how to change I did all that. Oh, no, she did there. No, I did all the laundry. . He would, he would be sitting there putting the, there is no way Bill, I could get a sheet on a bed. There is just not a, not a way, but the dishwashing was quite an experience.

It took me four times of washing the same dishes. Understand what I needed to do and somehow they still weren't clean. No, they were The first two times then he forgot to put the dish soap. So yeah, we did I didn't know where the soap was Well, not to digress. Do you remember when? We were children and you and Ben I think mom was sick then that's when I think she hit her appendicitis.

I was . Everybody was young and we put dawn, you dishwash, dawn in the dishwasher. If you look on the side of dawn, it [00:07:00] says dishwashing detergent. Yeah, but dish not, it says, it says. It says dishwashing detergent, not dishwasher detergent. Oh, I see. Yeah. So we had suds. Do you remember that? Oh, we had suds to the second floor.

You would like bubbles. Be sure to throw some Dawn in there. Oh boy. You had them all over that first floor. Just so everybody can picture this. It wasn't a little bit of Dawn. Fill up that entire little compartment. Well, the compartment, you had to fill it up. There were no shit uds everywhere.

Yeah. There, there were. Didn't you have to call one of my aunt aunts to come help you get rid of the suds? Oh yeah. I think Ant Laura came, came up. If I were an artist, I, it is still so clear in my mind. If I had any artistic talent, I could recreate it through the form of art, but you mean drawing drawing or Telling so a watercolor.

Yeah, you don't need to do that. If you have any imagination at all [00:08:00] You know that there were lots of bubbles. So you didn't do that this time. I did not because It was not a dog. It was not a dawn situation. I had to get a pod Well, let me explain it this way. Yeah. The dishwasher is a brand new dishwasher and I'm used to old dishwashers where the buttons are on the dishwasher on the, you know on the face of the dishwasher and this machine you're used to that, like you use dishwashers in the old days, a dishwasher had buttons on it that you pressed this dishwasher is on the door, the edge of the door.

That you open and close and it's quite confusing in my opinion So they're just hiding them from you. They don't want you to know where they are he doesn't want to live the dishwasher. I think it was a conspiracy. No doubt. That so I had help, from you terry you [00:09:00] Actually, it was mary first Even when she was six, she goes, press this button first.

And then that button, but she never told me that must've been only once. Cause I did the dishes every time I came to your house, which was every day. Oh, no, that's not true. Something I know you didn't do. You didn't clean the sink. Oh, yes, I did. No, no, no. Terry didn't. Oh, no. Because you are now the self proclaimed cleanest sink in Northern Kentucky.

There is no doubt about it. And that was a Don situation. Erica and I came over and he said, you should really go over to the sink and see how clean it is. S Did you clean the sink? Mm-hmm . Yeah, that's it. With He didn't clean the counter around the sink? No. . He just cleaned the sink. No, because every time I came over, I cleaned the counters, I put the dishes in the dishwasher and I took your garbage out.

I had the hot water going in the sink and I put the dawn in and I scrubbed it from top to bottom. All the way down to the drain. In the [00:10:00] drain, the whole thing. I hope everybody listening is rolling their eyes. I'm rolling my eyes. I'm sure my mother is rolling her eyes. Well, all I can say is this, when it was clean, I didn't use it for maybe a week because it was so clean.

Anyway. Okay. Should you introduce our guest? Oh. Gather around everybody. It's story time. On Ramblin on the River. Ramblin on the River. Ramblin on the River. So we have a stranger in the office here. He decided to come in and sit down and throw some headphones on. I think he's thinking he made a big mistake.

He's not really a stranger. He sits in our office all the time now. Oh, yeah. I'm the newest employee. Yeah. Volunteer. Volunteer. We're not allowed to have volunteers either. He's not really working for us. Well, he's working on an event now, wait a minute.

How many arguments have I shared with the three of you in this room? [00:11:00] The two of you? I, Ben, stay white. I was gonna say, I think he participates as much , in the business as he does does for river Roots. Well, why don't you start talking about him Okay. Directly instead of in the third person. Well, his name is Bill Kinsler.

Yeah. Junior. I think the second. The second is that a junior. No, it's the second. Well, in our case, there's a senior, a second, a third, and a fourth. Oh, I see. So it would be a junior. I thought it came after. I came after my dad. I guarantee you.

Well, his dad was a daily. Customer at the mic thing. And when I say daily, it literally was almost every day of the week.

Well, and it was on the wall there, wasn't it? What that one? Oh, Kinsler's Corner. Yeah. Kinsler's Corner. Well, we finally, when, you know, after a couple several years, you anointed it. We made it official. But Bill's dad took over Southern Harbor. We started the business in [00:12:00] 1956.

Okay, let's go back even further, because I think one of the coolest things Bill told me is Bill's. Dad and Clara Beatty, our brother and sister. That is correct. And that's how he's connected to explain it. Explain who Claire captain Beatty owned the Mike Fink before we bought it. It was over in Cincinnati.

It was, it was in Cincinnati and it moved to Northern Kentucky in Covington after a captain Beatty had a falling out with the city. I, I don't know all the details of that, but. It was a very polite term, falling out. Yeah. So. Was he a hardhead? Like was he throwing a fit? Do you know how hardheaded your father is?

You ever met your father? Daly. Magnify that like ten times and him assuming that he was never, ever wrong. He was a salvage operator on the river. I mean, John [00:13:00] Beatty. Not John Beatty. Not the Kinslers. The Kinslers owned Old Southern Harbor here in Cincinnati, which was the barges and towboats and all the boats that go up and down the river they would stop for supplies and crew changes and basically we were the switch engines that you would Be familiar with in the Queens gate train yard.

The mainline trains would come in or the mainline boats would come into the city and dependent upon the distribution of barges, we would remove the barges, from the larger flotilla or the toes. And then we would deliver them to the various terminals here in the city. And then when they were empty, we bring them back.

We'd clean them. Reload them if there was cargo available, put them back on the boat and say, see you later, son. Right. You, you understand that you're a little [00:14:00] confused. No, no, no, that, that was the business. That looks very natural to her. I was going to say that I was listening and trying to focus. Okay.

That's all right. John Beatty was actually the only fleeter in Cincinnati before we got into the business. And, and as a side item, he was at the time the preeminent salvoor in the Indian waterway industry. Right. Right. Which is what he was known for. Captain Beatty would do jobs that nobody else would do.

There was chlorine somewhere. 1962. There was other hazardous material, and John Beatty would, nothing would deter him. Right. Right. Right. And he became very famous all over the Inland Rivers. When you, you still mention the name of John Beatty and many people still remember all that. In Bill's case, his father was not John Beatty, [00:15:00] quite the opposite, a very nice guy, knowledgeable the guy that wants to talk to you and.

And gain information and all that. John was sort of of the attitude he, John Beatty, that he knew all the things. And that isn't bad because John did do things that nobody else would do. I mean It is amazing that he had the knowledge to do and do it successfully. So when, when Southern Harbor started in the late fifties, mid fifties Bill's dad came to the restaurant every, every day.

I mean, it was just a. An everyday occurrence and he brought a lot of people bill judd was one of his guys that he took to lunch quite a bit And is that how you met bill judd? I believe it is. I believe it is. Who's bill judd Bill [00:16:00] judd is was a marine surveyor here. Although he had a business He did core drilling for the Corps of Engineers.

Okay. So, he would drill down and say that there's good bedrock here, or he would drill and bring the soil samples back for analysis at the Corps of Engineers labs. Okay. Okay. So that was Bill's main business. He had some boats and barges and, you know, not, not big ones, not, not cargo barges.

He had little, you know, Flats little he always lived in that house in New Richmond on the river. Yes. Yeah, his grandson lives, right? I met I met his grandson the other day great guy and a new a newlywed And he's really excited about living there And I said you have a lot to live up to I said when the boat goes by at two three in the morning, they they honk their horn at you and A lot of people did that The [00:17:00] pilots at new bill would always blow a whistle when they went by his home always Or there were two people out on that.

They actually did that too one. One was Bill Judd, the other one, if you'll recall, and I think the three of you remember Virginia Bennett. Bennett? Yeah, sure. She's got a light named after her now. She is now. Well, the, we were there at the, the ceremony. Yeah. I don't think, Ben, you were there. I know the, the, your dad and I were, we, we took the boat down there.

I'm pretty sure I was there. The Coast Guard was there. I think I was in college, honestly. Well, there was, what, what happened that day? Is that Alan. Had, had Carrie take the bell down to where the light was dedicated that day, but that was also the day we put the ceremonial wreath in because she had just passed.

That is correct, Bill. That is correct. It was Monday that day. Yeah, it was. Yes, it was. When we, when we took the wreath down the the ramp with her ashes on it, she was We we may have I may [00:18:00] have some of virginia's remains in my hair virginia. Yeah Yeah, so to give everybody an idea virginia lived in ludlow, kentucky The apartment building there was right above the her light and it was right Almost on the border of ludlow and in covenant.

Yeah Right there when you're driving down route eight and it takes a sharp left turn over up and around The bend there if you were to continue going straight there was an apartment building Yes, she lived in one of those apartments Her balcony was adorned with navigation light. Yeah, man Every every tow boater that came by didn't matter what time of day right would always call her And she would always be up there to She came out in her nightgown.

She came out in whatever. And she was a legend on the river. Yes, she was. It's better than when dad comes out on his balcony in his underwear. That's not very pretty. He comes out and waves to the boat. I told my [00:19:00] wife, nobody can see me. And our boat called up and said, Hey, boss, nice underwear you got on , we would bring friends.

When you live on the river, you have to go say hello to the people, you know, Bill, when we were, when we were growing up. We would come home, you know, from an evening out, maybe a girl or in Terry's case, a guy was sitting outside. We'd have to go inside first, check the condition of Al, maybe even throw an Afghan, over him before we let them come in the house.

And do you know what he would do? He would come in and we would bring, I would bring my boyfriend in and he would then stand up and shake his hand. So then the Afghan would just fall to the ground. So he's standing there. That was an impressive. Hey, Hey, Hey, it's my house. They get me just the way I am. I am sure there's a lot of my friends listening.

All of my friends will know that is true. Well, you started talking about. The Mike Fink and my [00:20:00] uncle, and I think there's a really good story and actually how the Bernstein family got into the riverside of this, because prior to 1976, everybody knew the El Greco. And a Jewish family that owned a Greek or Thai restaurant.

That was their marketing. And you two might not be old enough, but that was their radio marketing. So anyhow, my illustrious uncle. Decided he'd had enough of Cincinnati. And I think Cincinnati was very glad to get rid of him. And probably a gentleman named Ben Bernstein decided that he wanted to expand his.

Yeah, it is. Yes. Junior. Yeah, the so, so Ben Bernstein and my uncle came to a deal and the, you know, Mike Fink was transferred from Beatty's Navy to Bernstein Enterprises. [00:21:00] And the boat was moved from Cincinnati Riverfront over to its position in Covington, right above the Roebling Bridge. And so this was in the, the.

Fall of 1976 and into the winter or not. Yeah. And then the year 1977 was a pretty. Yeah. Pretty benign year. Benign year. And, and so Ben and everybody is thinking, this is really cool. And he had a management or a maintenance agreement with my uncle to consult with him on how to keep the boat in place, you know, during the annual cycles of the river.

Right. High water, wind, storms. My uncle. Going back to what was said earlier, it was either his way or no way. And after one day, the, the, Alan here, in his younger days, [00:22:00] tried to pump up the tires on the ramp with a hand pump. Well that, we didn't know it was a hand pump when he sent us down to the, the, the room.

That's something that would do. That's called the bilge area. Did you get, did you get like one of those pumps to pump up like a basketball? Yeah. Yes. Yeah. That was it. Well, how long would that take forever? Well, these are semi tractor trailer. I know. I'm sure it's like blowing in the wind. I do not know how long it would take you to put 50 pounds or 40 pounds.

But you were going to try. Well, we got it. He was going to follow the orders of the cat. That's right. Certainly. And so our maintenance guy at the time said Dink? Dink Scheidel. Yep. He said, there's no way we're, we're doing this. He ran up to the gas station, got air in his air tank and came back and pumped the air, put the air in.

It took about 30 seconds. Thank God you'd still be there. I think we would be, but that angered my [00:23:00] uncle. And he basically quit the agreement. He said, that's it. I can't deal with you folks. And so the way he went then we go into the fall. Just over pumping up a tire? Over pumping up a tire. Because he had a pump.

And that's what he thought we should use. That part, that part is not. Fiction. That's fact. Yeah. Yeah. That really is the way it happened. And we said goodbye and then, sorry, go ahead. Yeah, no, then I interrupted, bill. Then this comes is a good No, then. Then we have the infamous winner of 1970. 70, 78. God, I wish I was older.

Well, you were one. I was one I think. Yeah. I was born in 76, so. I believe it's the coldest winter in recorded history in Cincinnati. Just about. I mean, it has to be. It was below zero for three consecutive weeks. Oh, it was miserable. Oh, [00:24:00] it was. My father and Ben had become friends and he was visiting The Mike Fink on a regular basis for a number of reasons.

One, that's where he did business. Number two, it had the best seafood bar in the city. No doubt. No doubt. And as the winter progressed in 77, the river became colder, the weather became worse. And by new years of 77, January of 78, the river was already freezing. Not little ice, it was accumulating ice, big ice.

And Ben had one of these, oh, moments. You can say it. Oh, shit moments. Oh, okay. Well, I don't know who you're probably. We're not on network radio. Right. Ben had the sense to realize that he didn't know what he didn't know.

And he called my dad up and said, I am [00:25:00] afraid that the Mike Fink is going to go southbound and she's got no engines and nothing else and it's not a good situation. So my dad, he talked, he comes down to where I was officed at and said, son, go take the boat up. Ben Bernstein needs some help. So we took our 2400 horsepower boat up from Ludlow.

I sat outside the. Mike Fink for 48 hours, at least. Yeah. And the only two people that were on the Mike Fink or Ben Bernstein and a very young with hair, Alan Bernstein, you had hair. Oh, he did. He did. I think grandpa Ben lost his hair at like 18 or 19, right. Right. Right. When he went to the army. Yeah. I had hair until about.

Thirty, maybe twenty nine thirty and then it started. Oh, you had a full head of hair at [00:26:00] the time, but the only food that they had on the boat were steaks. So we had, we had, I was in the pilot house. We had an engineer and a deckhand, Ben Bernstein, Alan Bernstein, five of us, forty eight hours and I don't think any of us went to sleep because the Licking River.

Was pouring just ice out and everything it was, we had the boat and this was a good size boat, 2400 horses. That makes more sense why he was afraid that the boat was going to go southbound was because the, the weight of the ice. And in fact, Bill's dad taught me that you let ice build up just a little bit around your hall. So that your hall doesn't get hit by big chunks of ice. You let it grow a little bit. Then you keep that because you don't want it, to accumulate.

So you know, if you can get a foot or two around your hall. Yeah. And [00:27:00] I, I said, that's genius. I mean, I, I would have never thought of that. Some of the simplest things, are genius. Well, although carrying that out would have to be difficult. I mean, executing that plan. Is not an easy plan. It is not because his dad knew exactly what to do.

I wouldn't know the first thing. So that, that was the first time I learned about ice. Well, you were, we were a year being on the river. I mean, just barely. Yeah. We did barely had no idea. We had no idea. Yeah. Well, that started a very long relationship and we're looking here 2025. And so that was almost 50 years because I'm almost 50 years old.

That's right. Knocking down that. So The family, the, the two families have had a, a symbiotic relationship now for close to 50 years. Yeah. The Kinsley [00:28:00] family. He, he had a couple of brothers. Yeah. Yeah. Two brothers. And his mother was Margaret.

Yep. Had a boat named after her. That was the boat that came and saved her ass. That's right. And, and I got to ride the Margaret , from Huntington, West Virginia, back to Cincinnati when we bought the, the famous barn. The seaplane hangar. The seaplane hangar. The seaplane hangar. Yeah. Yeah. That was another. Deal is my dad calls me up. I'm running captain. I've got nine loaded barges of coal for a power plant. We're coming down on Huntington. He said, where are you at, son? I said, I'm coming down on Huntington bridges. He said, stop the boat. Ohio river company just sold Ben Bernstein and old airplane hanger that is up in upper Huntington.

I said, yeah, I'm looking at, he said, stop the boat. Go pick it up. Go get it. And you [00:29:00] will see Alan Bernstein, he's already up there. So. Did you buy it without asking anybody? No, I didn't buy it. My dad bought it. Did he ask you? Hell no, he just said go out there. I'm just wondering. No, he did the same thing.

Ben operated with Alan the way my dad operated with me. It was a good idea. Son go do it. Go do it. That's right. So, hello. We picked a vote up. Hello. That's the difference. Hello. This, this, this Alan here. Hello. Doesn't necessarily always have good ideas. That's the big difference. He's got ideas, he's got ideas, doesn't big ideas, doesn't always have good ideas, and he, he is got passion.

Yeah. So anyhow, we picked the boat, the, the bar job. And this hangar is so big I can't see around it. The pilot on the boat can't see around it. So we had, Alan Bernstein was on the bow of the boat with the deckhands and they talked us through the [00:30:00] bridges. All the way down the river, talked us into the green up and, and melt all log and I was never so relieved to get a damn barge off that boat than I was when we got in here to Cincinnati.

So that was number, that was another one. But then Terry, what you and I were talking about, and I want to fast forward almost 40 years is what, what we were talking about the other day, five years ago or six years ago. When, when did we rip the power lines out? Oh, goodness. It was 2000. Yeah, it was 2014, 2015.

Oh my God. Time flies when you have 2015. It was in the winter. Well, it was in the spring. It was in spring. It was in the early spring. Then we we moved up to the temporary offices up on 4th Street in Newport Because because the headlines broke. I'm Just moved up to Hebron, Kentucky. I, told my wife, Kath, [00:31:00] Alan's going to need some help. I'm going down and helping. I come home like three days later because everything is a mess. Carrie and, and the crew was out here and it was everything we could do to keep this boat going.

Or what this facility wasn't here at the old facility and keep this thing in on the bank. And so he hadn't gone home. I hadn't gone home and my wife said, I don't expect to see you. You're right. So after the third day, there was nothing left in the tank for him or me or Carrie Snowden or anybody else.

But they needed a place to put the Bell Cincinnati. And so the option was take her down here to Taylor park feature, put the ramp down and then somebody tender so that she can stay safe over the night. So again, that was, that was, that was you. I sat out in the middle of [00:32:00] the water when, when everything happened, I was on the bell, sat in the middle of the water for three, four hours, and then we pushed it into the point.

In fact, cause they, they did some land work over there for a while. The indenture because the river was so high the indenture where we originally pushed in that in the shirley b2 Where we originally pushed him was still halfway up that that's when my bill was in law school And he would go to school.

He would come sit on the boat all night long and then he would Go to go back to school. Well, but again everybody in this organization And a couple volunteers just had spent three days and we were, I say it again, we were just done. So Alan says, do you know a pilot that can just sit and watch this bell overnight?

And I said, yeah. Yeah, I got an idea. I called my guy that I worked with on the boats. His name was Shirley Cyphers out of Louisville. Shirley, I need you to come up [00:33:00] and sit on the Belle Cincinnati. Just keep her nosed in on the bank. Would you come? And he said, yeah, but I, you know, I make 300 a day on the, on the towboats.

I need 300. Let me see what I can do. Allen. Allen. Allen. No, you're not here, Allen. Alright, Allen. 300. I'm not paying 300 just to have somebody look at my boat and keep it safe all night. What are you going to do, Allen? I'll just camp out myself. So he stubborn, he went up, I said, Alan, this is not a good idea.

So I don't know who the deck cam was, but Alan went up on that boat that night and slept on the Sett. Mm-hmm . In the wheelhouse of the, of the Belle, Louisville or Bell Cincinnati. I'm sorry, bell Cincinnati. And I went home, , and the next day he came back and he said. I had [00:34:00] a good night's sleep last night.

What'd you do? I slept on my bed. So that was, let's go back to the ripping out the power lines, weren't you at the home somewhere when we ripped the power lines? That's why I was stuck out on the bell. So I took the bell off the dock. Carrie and whomever else was working, we were repositioned after the flood.

We were repositioning. The well the first the initial flood we were repositioning the old wharf Because we had gotten Too far down the river cali whompers. We were we were a little cali whompers So I took the bell off went out in the middle of the river They raised the spuds up It moved and I think a face wire snapped and everything went so in order to keep the thing from floating down river, he just rammed it into the, into the, to the bank and in doing so ripped out all the power lines.

Oh, I thought you were the one who rammed [00:35:00] it into the bank and ripped out the power lines. No, but I mean, after that, I think I was out in the middle of the water for four or five hours. Remember the river is very high. I can't go anywhere. So. You're just, you know, trying to keep it keep in between the bridges.

I think the river was almost in flood Because I don't think that you could get under the bridges no, that's what I was saying. Yeah, he was stuck right? Yeah, we couldn't go anywhere couldn't get onto the dock. So that's that's after After however many hours. Didn't we send you to the public landing? That was a different time.

That's when, I think, that wasn't that year. That's when the river got up to 50. I think you tied to a mooring. We did. We absolutely did. It wasn't on the public landing. And then we left the boat over there for two or three days. It's the only place that we could get it was really accessible.

Mm hmm. Yeah, absolutely Yeah, that reminds me of the flood when I ran into the homeless guy that you left our pontoon boat with I wasn't a [00:36:00] flood That was where I met the guy who told me that you had left our pontoon boat with the homeless man That was I went over to a comedy show. I mean somebody take take a care of the boat Ben went over across the river with the pontoon boat, and he docked it on the public landing, and I guess there was a homeless guy there, and he paid him some money to watch the boat to make sure I came up, I said, yeah, you're going to be here, I said, yeah, I'll give you some money if you make sure nobody messes with the boat, and I was like, I'll give you half of it now, and he said, no, just give it to me when you get back.

Well, I felt pretty good about that. So left it there, went up to, it was a big comedy festival. They had, it was like two, three hours and came back and there he was. So a couple of people looked at it and admired how people looked at him on our boat and wondering what the hell he never stepped foot on the boat, just kind of sat there fast forward flood.

You remember when we did Walnut [00:37:00] Hills high school, that we had to go over the Because there was no other there was no other place. You remember it was too high. Yes, and we pulled in over there Yes, and there was a homeless man Sitting there. I know the owner of that. He said I I know the owner of that boat and I said really I said, so do I how do you know him?

He said well, he brought his pontoon boat over to the public landing one day and he left it with me So I called ben. I said, i'm sorry. Did you leave our pontoon boat with a 100 true story? He's like yes, it did actually Well, hey, when you got to go to a show, you got to go to a show.

Resourceful. When you meet a homeless guy and he doesn't want any money till the job's done, you feel pretty good about that. I hope you took care of the dude. Oh, I gave him plenty. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I'm sure by the time he came out, he had. Wasn't feeling any pain. Yeah, I was driving the boat and I wasn't, oh yeah, I was just up there watching comedy actually.

Oh, anyway, sorry. [00:38:00] That's a little aside. We got a little stray. You had sold something to aquamarine.

You had a little tiny work bar. So he calls me up and he said, I've got this little house barge that needs to go up to aquamarine. Well, this little house bar was a floating piece of crap.

That goes for a lot. And so he, that's the description of our fleet collector. Yeah. And the Shirley B was in the process of being sold to David Smith. Anyhow. And I get on, on the Shirley B and get behind the barge. Carrie puts the face wires on and he says, you know, you can't run this boat very hard because she's got a keel cooler leak and we'll burn the engine up.

So, I mean, it is pool water. It is the. September, something like that, [00:39:00] we go up there and from here for the audience, it is only like three and a half or four miles from here where we are currently located up to aquamarine. It took us four hours to get up there because we couldn't put the boat in anything above neutral.

That's right. And, and thanks be to God that, that, Carrie had a lunch box or something with him. Cause he kept pulling food out, you know, it should have been some of those MREs that you got for Christmas. And it took us four hours to get, get up there. And I said, I don't care about this. I I'm I've got to go to the bathroom.

So we turned the boat around and we got back home in about an hour. And yeah, it wasn't even that long. It wasn't, it wasn't that long. So anyhow. But the, the, the moral of that story is that when Al tells you it's only going to be a few hours, you better [00:40:00] pack your lunch. You better pack your lunch. But isn't that the truth?

To the audiences out there, that is out there, I mean, this family is absolutely great.

I think we're dysfunctional, but we're great. I, I do think, no. My daughter and my son, you've our family out and functional. I'm, I am very proud of that. They have taken to this business. I don't think either one of them wanted to, or may maybe not wanted to, but they, well, I you went to work for the Marriott.

That was fired me. Well that yeah, we how many times I can't tell you how many times that happened Oh my god, that's actually twice a day for it My favorite story 45 years because it shows our are inherent genetic stubbornness with each other. I graduated high school, 1999 [00:41:00] to the year 2000. And he said, he said, well, you know, it's the millennium.

If whoever doesn't work, everybody's not working New Year's Eve. You're fine. That's correct. I'll see you later. I was a senior in high school. I said, I'm not going to miss this for, for one cruise. So we went I had already, well, in September of that year, when we started school or August, whenever it was at my high school, there was a school to work program.

And, so you went to school for the first couple periods of the day at about 11 o'clock you left and you went to a job, so. As part of that, I had already gotten a job. It was when, the airport Marriott opened out in Hebron and they had literally just opened, I mean, I, I think we were there on the first day.

I mean, I think that another one of my friends had actually gotten there, gotten the job there. And that's what I ended up at Josh. No, John Krantz. So I went out there. [00:42:00] And ultimately worked in the kitchen. And so I was working there for a couple months at this point, and dad said, well, if you're not working New Year's Eve, you're fired.

I said, we'll see you later. So I went and I worked in the kitchen and actually. Thankfully, very, very much did. I can find my way around the kitchen a little bit. Not like my sister can, but my fiance enjoys that. I cook a lot and her kids. Yes. Can at least make something semi flavorful. And so I worked there for a while dad said your fire said okay, so we got it a while It was a you was like, yeah It was like a year's time and finally he broke and said you stop this shit right now.

You're coming back to work Tell them that you're putting your notice in the shit ends now And that's why I ended up coming back here and well Been here ever since well my point I had intentions of going anywhere else. Well, you were into the restaurant scene And [00:43:00] not really the boat scene.

I didn't come here till 2000 I know I I know but that wasn't by choice No, I wanted to because I wanted to go to fire school. I don't remember you ever wanting to I I Always felt like I was missing out and I wanted to go to but nobody would let me You Come like grandma wouldn't let me come when I was at Sloppy's they wouldn't let me take off to go to fire school when everybody went because I thought that would be the coolest thing ever and Some other things I wanted to work on the boats on New Year's Eve and I was at Sloppy's.

Yep Yeah, well, I mean it I guess I shouldn't have said you didn't want to it was I think a good practice that you worked at several different places Before you got to your family business just to know that other it was my family business I know it was I got to spend a lot of time with my grandmother.

Yeah, which I learned Probably more than that might be [00:44:00] worth a college education on its own. She was a fabulous cook, fabulous. And I, I, I think you will never forget working with your grandmother, no, no matter what. That was one of, when Bill and I were talking about what we were going to talk about for the show, one thing he mentioned was that.

My grandmother went to his mother's funeral and how that meant a lot to him. Well, that's correct. But Your grandmother was a force And you know, I don't know where the other 19 editions of this have gone with the family, but so you're saying you haven't listened to every episode though. I didn't know we let you on as a guest and you haven't listened to every episode.

Well, no, because I just started in November. He's a volunteer. Yeah. Well, that was actually in August. So I didn't know that you had this until like [00:45:00] November cause I came in one day. It was on Wednesday. And I said, well, where's Terry, where's Alan? Oh, well, they're downstairs in, in Ben's little room. And so I finally got it invited into Ben's little room in the cave.

But yeah, the cave,, but podcast central for the, for the audience, if they haven't gone into Shirley, just a little bit, let me say this. She was a force to be reckoned with and whether it was as the greeter and head honcho and bullwhip operator at Mike Fink, or as a hostess to a party or some event, you knew Shirley was around and she was a little bit vocal.

And you knew, just a little, just a little, but underneath [00:46:00] everything, this was a truly gracious woman. And as I told Terry you know, her being of a Jewish background and we being Catholics, I wasn't quite sure, you know, where everything stood, but in her, Later years, she had a manservant that brought her to my mother's funeral.

And it was to, to Terry's point, it was so gracious. We sat there in the back of the room and all pretense just dropped there. There was nothing. It was just a woman here to honor another woman. And that's what Terry, it meant so much to me and for the audience that never had the opportunity to meet. The patriarch and matriarch of the Bernstein family [00:47:00] they missed two pieces of work.

Well, she was a, she was a driving force. She had an opportunity to entertain heads of states from a lot of different countries of the world when we lived in South America. My dad worked right at the very beginning for President Kennedy and oddly enough, today's news with USAID was the beginning of what my father Was a part of it.

He was, he was employed by USAID. And at that time, this is a very beginning. They were giving underdeveloped countries. Lots of money to try to keep them from going communist with Castro and they thought Castro was going to infiltrate all of South America and make it a pretty big communist area. So she, she was no shrinking violet with [00:48:00] anybody.

She met women heads of state as well as their, their spouses who were the heads of state. And she had to entertain. She was a well rounded very knowledgeable, a very intelligent lady and had, I think the personality that most restaurants really strive to have.

At their front you want to you want somebody at the front door who's going to say hi How are you doing? And that is an art that is lost. It's an art that is I cannot Today you go to a restaurant very few. They don't even say hello to you. I don't I don't even know Oriana walk and shelley's. Yeah, both of those Yeah, grandma grandma was that way with with a hundred families or two hundred families.

I mean, we're close with the Wongs. We're close with, with Shelley in Fort Mitchell and [00:49:00] that, that kind of stuff. Those kind of Family places are really the only you're you're never gonna get that in any sort of chain restaurant. Even an upper scale chain restaurant.

You know, you have to remember when we were in business in the early 60s There were not a lot of corporate restaurants. I mean, most of the restaurants were independent. I'd say one of the big drops of our restaurants were the influx of the corporate chain restaurant. Yeah, it was different. It became much more difficult to, well, it's hard to compete with them too, because they can buy in bulk and they can, well, when the general public thinks a good steak dinner was going to Outback Steakhouse and not.

The Mike Fink restaurant. I always say if, if, if our restaurants could have made it through till now, they would be, oh, no doubt, but no doubt. Just could, you couldn't weather that storm. Just remember we bought El Greco in 1968 and sold it in 1990 [00:50:00] something. Yeah. It was a long run for a independent restaurant.

Probably 95 because I graduated in 94. It became Mrs. Side bottoms or something. But anyway, now it became a part of it. I am really tickled that I brought Shirley up. So that the spontaneity of you three on past events, you got to see this listening audience. You've got , three people here.

They're all smiling at each other. So you've done a good job. No, and she was really even more so than my dad. Now, my dad had personality that was commanding people to listen to his stupid story, his joke it, it was different. Mom was sort of the genuine. Yeah, but we got 20 plus years with her after him.

Yes. The problem is he died so young. I mean, he died in 19 91, 1, and he was young. 19. He was 71 when he died. 71. Yeah. But grandma lived, I mean, until when did what? It's only been [00:51:00] 20, 20, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But your dad understood why the Lord only gave him one mouth because he would sit back and listen. , I've was in a lot of meetings with him and your grandfather, your dad was a visionary. And that's why. When you look at the transition of Cincinnati and the waterfront in Cincinnati and the transition in the waterfront in Covington, Newport, your grandfather was instrumental behind that. But he knew at those meetings, let all these other people talk.

And then he assimilated everything. And when he came out with a plan. And I can tell you that a lot of those plans, my dad wasn't as influential as yours in this respect, but those two sat in my bank and they talked about the embassy suites and they talked about the area and he [00:52:00] had the vision and Covington landing and all this other stuff.

And so the again, between the families, a symbiotic relationship between the two families. But the fact that we're talking about your grandmother and your mother and your father and things like that This is pretty cool. Mm hmm a smart man. Yep, very much So and if you want to hear more about them You can go back to episode 3 and listen to an episode all about grandma and grandpa.

Oh, really? I don't I don't amazing that was the way back To episode three, okay What about do are we gonna do the word of the day we can we can move on from there? We because we have a guy that can explain if anybody's confused over it I don't know if anybody's going to be confused, but now it is time for rambling on the rivers.

Word of the day. So [00:53:00] here we are, Back to Al's favorite portion of, Oh, absolutely. Would you like to introduce the word? Do you remember what the word is? I, I did, and I, I wanted to make sure at the beginning that it wasn't collywompers because we've already done that, but the word of the day today is deadheading.

Deadhead. Deadhead. There you go. Okay. He didn't remember. But, but, okay. How do you spell that? Is it hyphenated? Oh yeah. Well, here's the spelling. Go on. D E D. Dead. H E D. H E D. Hyphenated. Hyphenated. Oh gosh. So what is deadhead? No, deadhead. Deadhead. But it's also, deadheading is not incorrect. That is Well, because if you're in the act of deadhead, , [00:54:00] you are deadheading, you're just, that's easy for you to say, just digging yourself further hole.

Okay. Bill, you want explain? Deadhead . Deadhead. Deadhead. DEAD. Oh, it's an A in there. I didn't, I I didn't know that. . HEAD. Okay. And for those in the audience, don't write it down. You'll never remember. . Deadheading is. Deadhead is when a boat, towboat, has no barges in front of it. And you are basically repositioning or heading to a new location without any commercial traffic or commercial enterprises being barges in front of you.

And it's very similar to when the airlines reposition. They're airplanes. Airplanes in the late evening so that they can reboot. We use the morning, we use deadhead all the time, right? We say when we, [00:55:00] the passenger, when we're taking it, you know, we drop the passengers off and we deadhead to the next location.

That's, that is correct. He's coming from a tow perspective. I know. Those towboat is and, and, yeah, but you're dead. Hey, well. No, you're criminal. We deadhead without passengers on board. That's exactly right. You, it's our cargo. Your cargo are the barges in front of you. So that's deadhead. Yeah. And I would say my wife, my soon to be wife, beautiful wife she deadheads quite a bit.

But that Delta or the airlines repositioning their crew. around the country. So she may, she may be on a, on a flight in Atlanta and need to get back to Boston, which is her base, and she will deadhead. They will pay her to work a flight that she's a passenger. She's assigned a seat.

Right. And just to get her back to her base. Right. And I think I I would imagine trains Trucks, all kinds of things. Deadhead. Well, when you see it, an empty truck going, basically [00:56:00] they're there. I don't know if they use terminology is called Bob or a Bob tailing. Oh, Bob tailing. Okay.

Okay. I'll be with the train guy today. I'll ask him. Okay. Yeah, that's right. That's right. It's the train guy. Courtney's husband. Oh yeah, you will. There is some current events. The commandant of the United States coast guard. Was relieved of her duties, her duty under a new administration. And that was a bolt of lightning, I think, delivered to the military. 

But. It wasn't the fact that she was not competent because she was a very confident, she was told. And I know her very well and knew her when she was coming up the ranks, she is not an incompetent person. So it wasn't for competency. It was simply a change of administration and thought.

That was sort of big news within the Coast Guard. . Ben and I went to Savannah for the Passenger Vessel Association meeting. The passenger vessel annual meeting just happened. [00:57:00] Yep. In Savannah, Georgia next year. Where is the big meeting? In Cincinnati? Yeah. Actually no, Covington, Kentucky.

Well, it's Cincinnati, Covington. The area. The area. I learned a lot at this convention. There were a lot of, we, it was great. It was a great convention. We will have all major. excursion boat companies here in Cincinnati. In late January, late February, February, yeah, yeah, yeah. And we've had it once before and it was very twice, twice before it was very successful.

We, people still remember the last Cincinnati meeting when we went to the Reds, we had fireworks. Well, I will say I'd spoke at the president's dinner the last night of the convention. Mm hmm. I got up and said, okay. There was about 200 or 250 of you, in Cincinnati for our last convention. You remember, it was right [00:58:00] out of COVID.

It was supposed to be in California. It was supposed to be in Long Beach. And California said, no, you're not coming. Six weeks before the convention. That's right. That's right. The the family that, that owns the boats out there said, you don't, you don't want to come here. Well, yeah, right. You can't come here.

Yeah. So we scrambled in and pulled off a convention here in Covington. So I got up and I said everybody who was in Cincinnati a couple of years ago, raise your hand. And you know, the people who were there, I said, now do me a favor. I said, every one of you raise your hand. There's a lot of hands at your table that weren't there.

I said, go ahead. Once I'm done, go ahead and tell everybody. How amazing of a convention it was and understand that next year, when you come to Cincinnati, it's going to be even bigger and even better. And everyone was like, ah, so hopefully we will, we will see a well, the biggest, I think there were two big hits, the bourbon.

Well, the bourbon and the fireworks. No, I think horse racing was as good as fireworks. They all talked about horse racing, though. They really did. [00:59:00] But fireworks were, nobody was expecting fireworks. Nobody. Nobody also knows what the hell we're talking about, but, well, it's an event. It's a big event when you have all the operators around the country.

I, I My favorite thing to do in the world is plan a party. Yeah I'm good at it. You are damn good. Yep So anyway that I think those are the probably the big current events of well We didn't even play the the bumper music, but that's that's fine that work Oh, okay, but I do have some update before we go.

Okay, we are wrapping up but before we go We are currently in 23 countries Some of the new country Wow Oh The Democratic Republic of the Congo. Okay. Columbia, Denmark, Slovakia, the Philippines and Hong Kong. Well I wonder how we sound all the way in Hong Kong. I think they look at him like, what [01:00:00] are these crazy Americans?

I would love to have the translation in in their language. What of all the stuff we're talking about? Yeah. And I will say, I do want to shout out to Josh mailing, who was our episode 19 guests, who was our, what, two and a half months ago, he was our most recent guest his episode went. In our terms, viral.

And had five people instead of one person. Previously, our largest audience is about 800 people. Okay. Josh's episode is just under 1700. Wow. So anyway, Josh, thank you. We miss you. We'll have to bring him back. Yeah, we'll have to bring him back. Bill, we expect you to be at least 2000 listeners by this time.

You better start calling, dial in for dollars. Absolutely. Well, as long as my volunteer status stays, I might be invited back. Well, other than that [01:01:00] please go and like, and subscribe us on your favorite podcast platform. Come find us on Facebook and Instagram. And we'd love to hear from you by email podcast at BB river boats.

com. We are glad to be back. We promise you we're going to be back on more of a regular a regular basis. We have, we already have quite a few of them in the calendar. So, you should start hearing us a little more often. We apologize for the delay, but unfortunately the holidays came, we had some sicknesses and now we're all back, we're healthy and we're ready to go.

So we will see you next time.

Thank you for listening to the rambling on the river podcast presented by BB river boats. Stay tuned for the next episode of our podcast and remember to like subscribe and follow us on all your favorite podcast platforms.[01:02:00] 

The previous episode was brought to you by BB Riverboats. The moments that await just around the river's bend are what we look forward to each day. Watching high school sweethearts tie the knot. Or watching them celebrate 50 wonderful years together. A group of old friends reuniting for one more adventure.

Or young minds embarking on their first. At BB Riverboats, we believe a cruise on the mighty Ohio is where lifelong memories are made. And that once you experience it, you'll want to share it with others time and time again. Plan your group event at BBRiverboats. com. Journey Aboard.