I wrote the following about my part of the history of Dayton, Ohio’s Poetry Slam for a book about Mick Montgomery, the owner of our venue, Canal Street Tavern, back in 2018. The book never happened, so here’s my homeless essay:
I was a poet and organizer from Johnson City, TN, who moved to Dayton in 1998. I was involved in the local and regional events (down South, that was Southern Fried) since 1992. When I got here, there was no slam, and hadn’t been in a few years, though the event that once happened in Dayton was, from all reports, questionable in terms of the official title of “slam.” It was before my time, so I have only the reports of others, but they were reliable sources.
In the summer of 1999, I went to Canal Street for the second time, to meet Mick. The first time was a few months’ earlier, for a Floating Men concert. This time, though, I went to pitch the idea of creating and running the Dayton Poetry Slam. Mick was receptive, but he wanted the venue in our title, so we were the Dayton Poetry Slam at Canal Street Tavern, and we ran our first show in September of that year. We held a monthly reading with an open mic, a feature poet (30 minutes, paid set), and a competition “slam.”
In 2000, I sold Mick on the idea of hosting a regional event, as the regionals in this part of the country were weak at best. I branded it the Rust Belt Regionals, hosted it in the summer of 2000, and hosted again in 2001. It moved from there to Columbus, becoming a mobile regional event (as most regionals are). We also sent a team to Nationals. In 2000, it was in Providence. In 2001, it was Seattle. In 2002, Minneapolis.
One of my memories of Rust Belt 2001 was that the final night was held as the first half of the venue’s night, followed by Mojo Nixon. We had a time frame, but with such a big event, it was expansive, and the last thing to happen was the last-place team was to do a group poem. Mick was at the soundboard, ready to cut the sound and end the show, when Tim Stephens (a member of said last-place team) started licking the last-place trophy. Licking it. Mick stopped, and I guess it was an appreciation of the showmanship at that moment, but he let us finish the night.
I ran the Dayton Slam until March of 2003. At that point, I moved away, so I handed the reins over to Lincoln Schreiber. Lincoln moved the Slam away from Canal Street, but he did so because both I and Drew Perfilio (who was working at CST at the time) advised him to do so. I had a strong feeling that Mick was going to change our scheduling in a bad way, and that we would not be able to bring in an audience at all (and our audience was already waning, which was going to be Mick’s reason). Poor Link, though, earned Mick’s ire for the rest of his life. Anytime Link and Mick ended up at the same event, Link had another opportunity to be uncomfortable.
The Dayton Slam owed much to Canal Street and Mick, of course. It was our home for three and a half years, and it was the home of the first two Rust Belt Regionals. We were an active part of Canal Street, and we made friends with lots of people. Mick was fair and friendly, and I believe he honestly enjoyed what we were doing.
Feature Poets at Canal Street, by date
9/26/99 Jody Sigler (Chattanooga)
10/31/99 Dave Hounsel and Nick Piacsek (Lexington)
11/28/99 Christina Springer (Pittsburgh)
12/12/99 improv poetry
1/30/00 Bob Moyer (Winston-Salem)
2/27 Tara Sheth and Jason Carney (Dallas)
3/26 Patricia Johnson (rural Virginia, national champion)
4/12 Marc Smith (Chicago, slam’s founder), team choosing
4/30 Dave and Nick, Jody, team choosing #2
5/21 Team Dayton (Jim Dwyer, Furaha, Bill Abbott, Drew Perfilio)
6/29-7/1 RUST BELT REGIONALS
(Lexington, Kalamazoo, Dayton, Ann Arbor, Columbus, Chicago/Mad Bar, Chicago/Green Mill, Detroit) Win: Mad Bar
7/30 Marty McConnell
8/27 Kenny Mostern (California)
9/25 improv poetry
10/26 “Dead Poets Slam”
11/26 Michael Salinger (Cleveland)
12/20 Ed Mabrey (Columbus)
1/25/01 Kerran Brady (Johnson City, TN)
2/25 Dan Stevens (Kalamazoo), 1st Drag Slam
3/25 Jim Dwyer (Dayton)
4/29 Katie Daley, team choosing
5/20 Wammo (Texas, member of Asylum Street Spankers)
6/24 Team Dayton (John Booth, Nikki Allen, Jim Dwyer, Drew Perfilio)
7/12-14 RUST BELT REGIONALS
(Dayton, Columbus, Indianapolis, Pittsburgh)
8/26 Nick Fox
9/30 Davu Ayomi
10/28 Steve Marsh (Ann Arbor)
11/ Bomani
12/30 “Cover Slam”
1/27 Lucy Anderton and Dawn Saylor
2/24 Scott Woods (Columbus)
3/31 Soul Evans
4/28 Charles Ellik, team choosing (Meg Cavanaugh (dropped out before nationals), Furaha, Jim Dwyer, John Booth, Lane Martin)
5/26/02 John Sinclair (major 60s jazz poet)
6 not sure
7/28? Buddy Wakefield (was a no-show)
9/1 Scott Woods (Columbus)
9/29 Jason Ammerman and Ben Rose (Indianapolis)
10 not sure
11/3 Nikki Allen
11/24 Ed Mabrey (Columbus)
12/29 Drew Perfilio
1/26/03 Becky Austin and Jeffree Paul St. John
2/23 Jason and Kim Brazwell (Columbus), second Drag Slam
3/30 Ray McNiece (Cleveland, national team winner 1994)
Bill Abbott, poet, web page 