Ice Cream Chronicles (Year 5): Four Scoops Along State Route 3

Placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973, the 1879-built
Wayne County Courthouse stands proudly in downtown Wooster.

Although the completion of Interstate 71 through Ohio didn't officially finish up until 1975, the freeway had usurped State Route 3 as the major route used to travel between Ohio's "Big C" cities years prior. However, the gains in terms of travel time for the new freeway sacrificed some of that bucolic countryside charm and small town atmosphere of its parallel highway neighbor, which was first established by state officials back in 1923.

On a recent travel day along Route 3, with summer heat and humidity in full effect outside, it was probably no surprise that ice cream quickly rose to the forefront of my mind. And considering the brutal conditions, it was probably no surprise that I double double dipped this day.

Just Another Flight (of tasty) Beer: JAFB Wooster Brewery (Wooster, OH)

JAFB Wooster is Cleveland Browns territory for certain, but it also
is the home for some respectably tasty, award-winning beers

A recent trip pursuing one of our new favorite pastimes for my spouse and I (antique hunting) brought us to the US-30 corridor right where it intersects with I-71 towards Cleveland. The hunting proved to be pretty good as we dug up some fairly unique finds at decent prices, and these ventures into unexplored (for us, anyway) parts of the state finished up in Wooster, a town of roughly 25,000 people named after Revolutionary War general David Wooster.

We had thoughts of dropping by the town's lone brewery, JAFB Wooster, after our day's hunting was over provided we weren't too tuckered out. However, the shopkeeper of the last antique store erased any doubts in our mind, as she gave her thumbs up to going and was more than happy to give us driving directions to their taproom, located just to the east of the main downtown area.

One thing that stood out immediately to us was the unique name of this brewery, and it was one of our first inquiries after we ordered our beer. As we found out from one of the bartenders that day, it came from struggle that JAFB brewmaster Paul Fryman had in finding a name for his new enterprise. A colleague of Fryman, perhaps in a little bit of exasperation over the delay, stated that the venture was "just another f______ brewery" (you can probably guess what word that starts with "f" was used.) That phrase inspired the acronym that became the name of his brewery, which opened its taproom doors to the public in 2012.