By Lauren Bishop
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Things are getting a little nutty in the Village of Glendale.

Dr. Thomas Todd, Glendale Mayor, and Walter Cordes, Glendale village administrator, pose with a large squirrel in downtown Glendale Tuesday June 8, 2004. (Brandi Stafford/ The Cincinnati Enquirer)

A few weeks ago, a fiberglass squirrel took up residence in the village square, the heart of the northern Hamilton County community. And next spring, at least 14 more will begin appearing in various locations around the less than 2-mile-square village.

They'll make up the aptly named Squirrelly Gig, the village's own version of Cincinnati's Big Pig Gig. In the community of 2,200, where black squirrels might just rival the number of residents, village officials thought it would be one of the more visible ways they could celebrate the village's 150th birthday next year.

"It was kind of a whimsical idea that we kept bantering around for a couple of years," says Mayor Thomas Todd, crediting councilwoman Monica Alles-Whitefor coming up with the idea.

Last year, the village asked sculptor Eric Kilb, whose Cleves studio produced more than 400 pigs for Cincinnati's public art project in 2000, to make the 4-foot-tall, 40-pound squirrels. The model: A metal squirrel doorstop, a popular Glendale knickknack.

Public art projects have become old hat for Kilb, who started out making Frisch's Big Boy figures. Since the Big Pig Gig brought his Glass Hand studio some prominence, he's made the Flower Power pots for the Cincinnati Horticultural Society, bearcats for the University of Cincinnati's Mascot Mania, and tigers, jayhawks, dragons and horses for other cities.

"This is the first I've heard of a squirrel," he says.

Each fiberglass squirrel will be lined up with a sponsor, who will reimburse the village for the $1,500 cost of each squirrel (including a $300 honorarium for each Glendale artist's decorative touch).

Todd drafted Ellen Bockenstette, a teacher and artist who painted a pig for the Cincinnati Opera Guild, to solicit submissions from artists, who will paint the squirrels.

Several squirrels have already been lined up with sponsors, says Robyn Carey Allgeyer, the project manager of the sesquicentennial:

A committee of village officials will determine where each squirrel will go. Kilb has made five so far. The sole squirrel in the village now crouches safely inside the glass entryway of the village office after hours, but on most mornings staff members take him just outside the door.

The squirrel - smooth to the touch, hollow and at the moment just plain gray - has people chattering, say village staff members. Then there's the display of sesquicentennial mugs, hats and flags and bumper stickers that read, "I brake for squirrels." (Todd already has one on his car.)

"We're a small town, but it's caused quite a stir," says village administrator Walter Cordes.

Next door at the Bluebird Bakery, owner Jenny Dennis examines a triangular curb outside that she thinks would be the perfect place for the shop's own squirrel - maybe one decorated like a bluebird with feathers and a beak, she says. She would be thrilled to do the honors herself.

"I thought it'd be really fun," she says.

Bakery customer Brian Campbell, a Glendale resident and Greater Cincinnati property manager, says he thinks any squirrels that end up in the square could help draw some foot traffic to businesses there. People often drive past on East Sharon Road without seeing the entrance to it, he says.

"The square needs some attention," he says. "It'd be great if we had a square like Hyde Park."

After the sesquicentennial, sponsors can donate the squirrels to the village, keep them or auction them off, donating the proceeds to Glendale's sesquicentennial fund and a charity of the sponsor's choice.

But the black squirrels don't appear to be going anywhere.

"It's like everybody else," Bockenstette, the squirrel committee chairwoman, says. "They like it here."

E-mail lbishop@enquirer.com

Glendale's 150th