In an Ohio town, fostering community over cream puffs
When Larry and Malana Monson packed up their life in California and moved to this tiny town in southeast Ohio, they did so with the dream of opening a bakery and leading a simpler life.
What they found was a community hungry for a place to gather to enjoy some living – and, they hoped, the occasional cream puff.
Built around the railroad when coal and other commodities poured out of Appalachia, Corning today is a one-stoplight village, its main street bookended by an American Legion and an Eagle’s fraternal order. Until the bakery arrived, the street was mostly desolate, marked by buildings long shuttered and empty.
Many of the older folks who’ve grown up here lament the way they’ve seen the town
Cheaper housing draws outsiders in When lunch means the gas station deli
