By Mark Mosgrove

    Medina County high school cheerleaders were dressed in their school colors and donned pompoms. A rock band sang the song I Need Somebody, with the male singer crowing, “I need somebody . . . somebody like BUSH!”
    And a very large blue banner was tied to the top of the old county courthouse. It proclaimed, “Say Goodnight, Mike!”
    It’s not every day the Vice President of the United State -- and soon-to-be-President -- visits your hometown. On October 7, 1988, the future leader of the free world stood on a podium in front of the Medina County Courthouse. Yes, it was George Bush -- the older one, not the one now running for president . . .
    I remember ninety-year-old Derwin Nettleton, a former Hudson car dealer in Medina (how many of you remember the Hudson -- I don’t, it was before my time), walking up to the Square from his W. Washington St. home for probably his first chance to see a person of such prominence. Then there were the little ones, toddlers on daddys’ shoulders who no doubt don’t even remember that they saw a President of the United States.
    The most vivid memory of the event was the long wait for Mr. Bush to arrive. There were only three things to do to entertain yourself while waiting. Number One, seeing which of the television reporters you could recognize in the designated media area. Number Two, seeing how many men dressed in black with guns you could spot perched on top of the rooftops, peering down into the crowd looking for potential trouble. And Number Three, trying to figure out who in the crowd was really an undercover secret service agent. My vote was for the transvestite . . .
    It was next to impossible to move, for fear of losing your spot. With the trees on the Square, those people further back from the podium really couldn’t see much.
    Governor George Voinovich was also there, as well as all the local Republican party officials. They tried to keep the crowd energized for the impending arrival, but as time dragged on the people started to get restless. And it was one of those fall days where there was a nip in the windy air, but you’d still be sweaty under your jacket.     Just when you thought that it was not worth waiting, they’d make another announcement of Bush’s impending arrival to try to keep the crowd pumped up.
    But eventually a large motorcade headed southbound on I-71 from Cleveland-Hopkins airport and took the Route 3 exit.
    Once Bush arrive, the crowd went wild. Yes, it was indeed worth the wait. Blue Bush/Quayle signs flooded the scape. One wonders how many people thought the same thing as me: “Man, it sure would be easy for someone to knock him off . . . One good shot and . . . Let’s hope that if it ever happened, it doesn’t happen here!”
    Bush talked for about 20 minutes. The speech touched pretty much on all the points we remember Bush for -- “Read my lips, no new taxes . . . a thousand points of light . . . Michael Dukakis the furlough king . . . ”
    But it was really the aftermath of the visit that brought the most debate. It was classic “small town gets it’s twenty minutes of fame.” The local Republicans touted the event as though it was The Second Coming; meanwhile, the local Democrats touted it as the second coming of Ronald Reagan’s lunch.
    And no one can say for certain how many people attended the rally. Local Republican leaders estimated the crowd at 20,000 strong; not surprisingly, the Democrats estimated the crowd as low as 3,000, pretty much all Republican supporters who would vote for Bush, anyway. I guess it depends on who is doing the countin’. My guess is that the truth - like in most cases in politics - was somewhere in the middle.
    In the next day’s edition of The Medina County Gazette, it was reported that workers in the old courthouse, who had complained long and hard about the quality of cleaning in the building, were shocked that the front windows of the building were cleaned for the first time in years.
    “Some expressed hope Democratic candidate Michael Dukakis will come back and speak from the rear of the building,” the Gazette reported. “Those windows have yet to be cleaned.”
    With another George Bush setting his sites on the White House in the 2000 election, someone should invite the former president’s son to make a campaign stop here. Afterall, no presidential nominee named Bush has ever lost an election in which he visited Medina County. You’ve got to like those odds, Junior Bush. Maybe we’ll see ‘ya all next fall?