So how, you were wondering, did Charles P. Taft's battered canoe get to star last week at a party honoring political strategist Brewster Rhoads?

        Hmmm . . . Occasion was a Charter Committee of Greater Cincinnati where members gave Rhoads the party's Charles P. Taft Civic Gumption award. It was the first time it has been handed out since 1998 because . . . we don't know — guess no one was showing much gumption on the political front. Rhoads' award was for “independence, tenacity and initiative.”

        Rhoads is a Democrat and never mind that Charterites were handing out the award, primarily for his work in helping push passage of a whole batch of school levies.

        So, about a zillion political types showed up to pay tribute — Bobbie Stern, senior stateswoman of the Charter party, Judge Ann Marie Tracey, Councilman Jim Tarbell, political insider Marilyn Ormsby and, in a surprise move, Hamilton County Prosecutor Mike Allen. He said later, “Brewster's as liberal as I am conservative, but what a brilliant strategist. I had to be here to pay tribute.”

        Oh yeah, about that canoe . . . Rhoads is a devoted — some would say maniacal — kayaker who can be seen rowing up and down the Ohio River, even at flood stage, even in the dead of winter, which is why some call him maniacal.

        His kayak fetish is why Charter Committee director Jeff Cramerding went to the William Howard Taft Birthplace and borrowed Taft's canoe, still with a Tom Brush for City Council bumper stick on the tail end.

        During Taft's days on Cincinnati City Council, his canoe, always lashed to the top of his beat up VW bug, got to be a running joke at City Hall. (He also used to insist that his tombstone at Spring Grove would say "Gone Fishin.' And so it does.)

        Sign up: It's never easy, as Bruce Stoecklin is finding out. Seems he's been beating the bushes lately, looking for volunteers willing to staff a display of the AIDS Memorial Quilt when a section of it shows here April 29-May 3.

        The quilt is panels made by relatives and friends of people who died withAIDS. Panels are made of everything from favorite ties to ball caps, photos, shirts and heaven only knows what else.

        Volunteers are needed to read aloud names on the quilt, help assemble and disassemble, comfort visitors, work the education booth and, well, just be there.

        Call him at 569-1420 for info.

        E-mail jknippenberg@enquirer.com. Past columns at Enquirer.com/columns/knip

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