Ritte's Corner

Henry Ritte lived at Church Street and Southern, a block from his saloon, after which Ritte's Corner is named.

There was a fountain for many years, dead center in the intersection.  It was donated by Dr. R. E. Carlton to honor the first young man from Latonia to go into World War I.  That honor went to one Walter Flake.

The people in the picture of Ritte's Corner are George Beuttel (barefoot boy on the left, nearest to the fountain); his brother Carl (the only barefoot boy on the right); Heine Maxwell, an L&N switchman; Vincent Keller, superintendent of “Devou Fields,” (Park); “Dutch” Flaege; Henry Tuptmann; Nick Thompson; Walter Ritte; Cecil Jones; George Childers, pitcher for the Holy Cross Standards; “Slim” Wellbrook; and “Little Hard Tail” Webster, son of L&N yardmaster “Big Hard Tail.”

The fountain was dismantled after a town physician,  who had a reputation for drinking, one Dr. Fenton “Doc” Adams, hit the fountain with his Reo Flying Cloud - an automobile - for the third time.  Some folks thought he was aiming at it by that time.

from Lisa Curtiss Gillham's Latonia