Maria Vega: Chairperson
Matthew Heller: Vice-Chair in charge of Site Coordination
Michael Bradshaw: Vice-Chair in charge of Programming
Kara Pennella: Secretary/Treasurer
Tanya Ellenburg-Kimmet: Immediate Past Chairperson

The schedule for remaining Steering Committee meetings for the 2012 planning season is as follows:

• March 30, 2012
• May 25, 2012
• June 22, 2012
• (July 22 – July 24: OLSSI 2012 @ Wright State University)
• Sept. 28, 2012
• November 30, 2012

As usual, these meetings will be held at the State Library of Ohio in Columbus.

If you'd like to come, drop us a line at olssi.chair@gmail.com so we know to expect you. We’ll forward you directions, or you can visit our Meeting Schedule for a map!

We’d love for you to join us and help plan OLSSI 2012!

Maria Vega, newly elected OLSSI Chairperson, takes office:

And here, Madam Chair outlines her goals for the coming year:

We are still gathering together our pictures but look for those to be here soon! If you have some that you'd like to submit, send them to: olssi.photos@gmail.com.

If you enjoyed yourself at OLSSI, please consider joining the Steering Committee. (It's almost as much fun as OLSSI itself!) Our next meeting will be Friday, September 16, 2011 at the State Library of Ohio in Columbus. We would be thrilled to have you there!

James Willis:

Born and raised in upstate New York, James has been chasing after ghosts and visiting crybaby bridges for over 20 years. In 1999, he moved to Ohio and founded The Ghosts of Ohio, a nationally recognized paranormal research organization. A sought-after public speaker, James has been known to entertain both young and old alike with tales of his strange and spooky travels across the United States.

James is the co-author of Weird Ohio (2005) and Weird Indiana (2008) and was also a contributing author to Weird US (2004) and Weird Hauntings (2006). He currently resides in Columbus, Ohio, with his wife, a Queen-loving parrot, and three narcoleptic cats.

Weird Ohio:

Ah, Ohio, so nice and normal. We have apple pie heroes like Hopalong Cassidy, Neil Armstrong, Thomas Edison, and Doris Day. Our state bird is the jaunty and ever popular cardinal, and our state flower is the carnation, found in the buttonholes of politicians and bridegrooms everywhere. We started America rolling by opening the country's first gas station, and we have a museum dedicated to America's music, rock and roll. Why, we're just so all-American normal, it can bring a tear to the eye. Okay, fine. But there's something else we have a whole lot of, and that's...weirdness. Yes, the Buckeye State has lots and lots of strange people and unusual sites, and they burst forth from every page of this, the biggest, most bizarre collection of Ohio stories ever assembled: Weird Ohio.

So turn the pages and visit with the Melonheads, have a fun day at Satan's Hollow, Hell House, and the Devil's Pit, but watch out for the Demon Tree. Bike with Oxford's phantom bicyclist, chat with the Lady in White, check out Oberlin's giant three-way plug and the really big rocking chair in Austinberg. Tiptoe through Dublin's concrete corncobs, take a brief detour down the world's shortest street, and look for Bigfoot in Minerva. And as night descends, gaze longingly at a whole bunch of abandoned drive-in theaters.

Yes, it's all here—weirdness in the heartland. A brand-new entry in the best-selling Weird U.S. series, Weird Ohio is chock-full of everything your history teacher never taught you. Some of the people you'll meet and the places you'll go are disturbing, others are hilarious, but all are very, very weird. We guarantee you'll enjoy the journey.

Find out more on Monday afternoon at OLSSI 2011!

We hope to see you there!

Here she is, already in the mood for her deliciously horrifying prize: a DVD set of classic horror movies and a hardbound copy of Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies, as presented by OLSSI Chair Tanya Ellenburg-Kimmet!

• Christina Duffy, Dunbar Library of Wright State University
• Nicole A. Thomas, Robinson Music Library of Cleveland Institute of Music
• Paul Campbell, Alden Library of Ohio University