ARTS & CULTURE
The Vent Haven Museum (pictured) in Northern Kentucky has been hosting the international ventriloquism ConVENTion since the 1970s. P H OTO : H A I L E Y B O L L I N G E R
Dummies, Idols and Nostalgia at Greater Cincinnati’s Vent Haven ConVENTion Remembering four decades of magic, camaraderie and brilliant performances hosted by Northern Kentucky’s — and the world’s — only ventriloquism museum BY DA N N WO E L L E RT
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icture it. It’s 1979 at the Vent Haven ventriloquism ConVENTion in Erlanger, Kentucky. I’m 8-years-old and I’m surrounded by kids my own age who — like me — are aspiring “vents.” The experience is magical, full of performances by professionals who make the whole thing look easy. Even at this age, I know that Northern
Kentucky is ground zero for American vents. The Vent Haven Museum — the world’s only ventriloquism museum — has been hosting this international event since 1975, with around 500-600 attendees each year. Vent Haven is located in Fort Mitchell, just 15 minutes south of downtown Cincinnati. Founder William Shakespeare Berger was a Cincinnati
businessman and amateur vent who acquired a collection of more than 500 dummies from 1910 until his death in 1972. The museum, made up of four small buildings on Berger’s former home, has doubled in size through donations of vent materials since its 1973 opening. It now boasts 900 (and counting) ventriloquist puppets, some more than 150 years old, as well as an exhaustive collection of ephemera — photos, scripts, posters, recordings and more than 20,000 letters — and archives documenting the art form. A recent capital campaign will enable the museum to break ground this September on a larger, more climatecontrolled building. The 45th ConVENTion took place July 14-17 at a Holiday Inn near CVG, with the annual tradition being less convention, more family reunion (last year was canceled due to COVID). From sunrise to sunset, attendees experienced master class seminars from the most brilliant ventriloquists in the country like Jeff Dunham, Jay Johnson, Tom Crowl and Liz Von Seggen. The evening performances could have been straight
out of any Las Vegas venue. Filmmakers and authors Bryan W. Simon and Marjorie Engesser also brought their new book, I’m No Dummy Everyday: 365 Days of Ventriloquial Oddities, Curiosities, and Fun Facts, with proceeds benefiting Vent Haven. In 2010, Simon produced the movie I’m No Dummy, the only feature-length documentary about ventriloquists, and went on in 2018 to follow that up with I’m No Dummy II. It’s thrilling that so many professional ventriloquists and aspiring performers come together to lift each other up and improve skills. During the 1979 convention, I’d already had several months of practice with the help of vaudeville star Edgar Bergen’s record and developed a character with my own dummy. At one point during the event, I found myself practically shoulder to shoulder with a young Jeff Dunham, who had started going to the ConVENTions with his father a few years before. Similarly, I was at my first ConVENTion because of my father. Dad is a super-fan of vaudeville and slapstick comedy, so this event was
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