In his lifetime, Charlie Taft was many things: son of a president, Hamilton County prosecutor, gubernatorial candidate, and (perhaps most memorably) mayor of Cincinnati—so memorably, in fact, that he earned the nickname Mr. Cincinnati. Taft died in 1983, but his likeness lives on in all its animatronic glory at the visitor center of the William Howard Taft National Historic Site in Mt. Auburn.
An avid fisherman, Charlie is memorialized doing what he loved the most. His animatronic double, dressed in full outdoorsman’s regalia, sits on a stone beside a replica of his 1970s Ford Maverick, which carries his treasured canoe. With the press of a button, you can hear stories straight from the (robot) mayor himself. But don’t just stop by the visitor’s center to see Charlie. The historic site is packed with presidential artifacts and a knowledgeable staff eager to spread his message.
“You don’t have to be a historian to get something out of this,” says Fearghal Reid, vice president of the Friends of the William Howard Taft Society. “We’re such a divided country in terms of politics at the moment. President Taft is one of those presidents who, [regardless] of what side of the fence you’re on, you can find something to relate to.”
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