When Summit County Judge Bill Spicer appointed Kenneth Claypoole to the Hudson School Board on October 16, residents were slightly shocked.
After all, Claypoole, a former board member, had been absent from the education scene for nearly a decade. And his tenure during the 1990s wasn’t exactly recalled through a rose-colored lens. Not only did Claypoole lobby hard to get prayer back into the schools, but he was also Ohio’s premier creationism crusader, fighting tirelessly to put God back into the state’s curriculum. At one point, he tried to remove the textbook The American People from Hudson High’s A.P. History classes, arguing it was “revisionist history.”
Whenever you have guys trying to ban books, you can be pretty sure you’ve got a nut on your hands.
Still, Judge Spicer thought Claypoole the best appointee of nine candidates. Never mind that Spicer only interviewed three, or that two of the three interviewed had once served as school board presidents. Simply remind yourself that Spicer is Summit County Republican Party chairman Alex Arshinkoff’s favorite sock puppet.
Arshinkoff, who has ran fierce campaigns for Spicer in exchange for various favors [“The Godfather In The Closet,” June 11, 2003], just so happens to be a resident of Hudson. Though he’s queerer than a three dollar bill, he’s also a big fan of religious zealots, judging from the company he keeps — he’s Ken Blackwell’s campaign chairman. — Denise Grollmus
This article appears in Oct 18-24, 2006.