By Stan Purdum
The title above — “What adventures seem always at hand” — is in quote marks because it’s not from me. It’s from Charles T. Merriner. He has a connection to what follows here. (More about that connection in a moment.)
Not long ago, while answering a submitted question here in Road Bike Rider about what bicycle adventures are possible when a person can only get away one day at a time, I told about my friend whose goal is to ride in every county in our state (88 counties in Ohio), and my goal to plot a continuous road cycling route that follows the portion of Ohio River that borders our state. You can read that Q & A at this link.
But how do you define “adventure.” The writer, Louis L’Amour, once said, “Adventure is nothing but a romantic name for trouble.” That is sometimes true, but more often it’s an interesting experience of something new. And by that definition, the ride recounted here qualifies as an adventure.
This week my county-chasing friend, Peter, and I came together on a ride to make progress on both our goals at the same time. When comparing notes on our individual progress, we noticed that two of the counties Peter had yet to ride were along the river, on a stretch that I had not ridden yet either. We enjoy pedaling together in any case, but now we had a dual purpose for doing so.
Our ride was neither epic nor unusual, though we did get a sense that not many people explore this part of Ohio by bicycle. Yet it provided a safe, scenic bounty of fun, a great day outdoors, an opportunity for a delicious meal and an unexpected encounter with some local history. It was an “adventure … at hand” as Merriner would have said.
The two counties Peter wanted to hit were Washington and Monroe. The seat of Washington County is Marietta, which was founded in 1788 and was the first permanent U.S. settlement in the Northwest Territory. We began our ride a few miles upriver from Marietta on State Route 7, in the little river town of Newport. We parked our cars in a community lot behind the local fire station, not far from the large, silver Hi Carpenter Memorial Bridge, a cantilever truss structure that connects Newport with St. Mary’s, West Virginia, across the river.
Rolling north from Newport, we found Rt. 7 had three-foot-wide paved shoulders on both sides of the road, which made safe cycling space. The shoulders continued for all of our 50-mile round trip. There was an occasional-to-moderate amount of traffic, including some large trucks, which must have been engaged in local transport or construction runs, since long-haul traffic uses the interstate route, a few miles inland.
Bordering the river, Rt. 7 runs on mostly flat terrain, with some gentle rising and falling here and there. We pedaled through the tiny community of Wade and then the larger but still small towns of Grandview and New Matamoras. Not long after that, we crossed into Monroe County. I snapped a photo of Peter standing beside the sign that marked the boundary between the two jurisdictions.
Beginning to get hungry, we paused at a very small place called Fly, which had an eatery. A woman entering told us the place had good food. It was puzzling, however, because the sign above the door looked like it had some letters missing, and what was left spelled “Fatal Day One,” with some odd spacing between the letters. But a motorcyclist who had stopped to read the historic marker next door about the still-running Sisters Ferry across the river, recommended that we instead wait until we got to Sardis, six miles further upriver, and eat at a restaurant called “Marv’s Place.” We took his advice.
In Sardis, we found Marv’s place in an historic wooden building. The establishment is one block off Rt. 7, on the river side of the highway, and without the biker’s recommendation, we’d have likely missed it.
Inside, it felt like we’d stepped back 100 years to a cozy café with pies and other desserts displayed on the counter, and an extensive menu that offered a wide selection of breakfast food, sandwiches and full meals. The service was prompt and efficient, and while waiting for our food to arrive, I noticed the comment from Merriner painted on the wall in a script font. The full quote was “The river before us, rolling hills behind … What adventures seem always at hand.”
Our server asked if this was our first time at Marv’s and when we said yes, she brought us paper placemats that told the history of both the building and the restaurant. The two-story edifice was constructed 1894 as a department store, from which the owner boasted one could buy “everything from a tack to a steam engine.” Over the ensuing years, the building served successively as a shirt factory, an assembly point for Model-A Fords, a casket factory and an apartment building. In 1947, it was purchased by Marvin and Ethel Merriner, who ran a grocery out of the east side of the building and a pool hall out of the west side, with apartments on the second floor. The establishment became a community gathering place.
Marvin died in 1964, and his son, Charles inherited the building. Though he was living in South Carolina at the time, where he was a college dean, he eventually returned to Sardis where he spent his final working years with the Monroe County school system. At some point, he penned the lines quoted above.
After Charles passed away in 1998, his children considered tearing the building down, but Sardis residents pleaded with them not to, as they considered the building irreplaceable. So the Merriner clan instead restored the building and opened the restaurant, calling it Marv’s Place in honor of their grandfather, though they also say MARV’S is an acronym for “Marvin’s Aging Relatives’ Venture.”
The history printed on the placemat is quite entertaining. One of Marvin’s grandchildren is James L. Merriner, who is the author of several historical novels based on secrets, scandals and schemes of some of history’s most notorious figures. My guess is that he wrote the Marv’s Place history, which concludes, “Marvin used to say, upon confronting a construction project: ‘Figure up all the labor and materials you could possibly need, Cost them down to the penny. And then double it.’ Unfortunately, his relatives did not take that wise motto fully to heart.”
After enjoying our meal, Peter and I headed back toward Newport, well satisfied with the adventure the ride had provided us. See our route here.
Peter, by the way, has now ridden in 75 of the 88 Ohio counties.
Take a look at the webpage of Marv’s Place. The home page includes a great aerial video of Sardis, and, more pertinent to our ride, it shows both Rt. 7 and the Ohio River flowing into the distance.
Stan Purdum has ridden several long-distance bike trips, including an across-America ride recounted in his book Roll Around Heaven All Day, and a trek on U.S. 62, from Niagara Falls, New York, to El Paso, Texas, the subject of his book Playing in Traffic. Stan, a freelance writer and editor, lives in Ohio. See more at www.StanPurdum.com.