Things to Do in Whitehall

Opened during the 1950s, Skate America has sent multiple generations of Grove City residents and visitors whirring across its spacious skating floor. Today, the facility accompanies trips around the rink with laser-light shows, a 10-foot video screen, and DJs who spin family-favorable jams, such as Top 40 hits and auto-tuned remixes of the alphabet. The snack bar—better known as Pizza Town Café—fills free hands with fresh eats, and in the game room, high scores turn into piles of tickets that can be traded in for prizes or used as makeshift stunt cushions beneath bunk beds. In addition to public sessions, Skate America also plays host to birthday parties and group functions, as well as year-round lessons for amateur wheelers.

Brady Konya and Ryan Lang aren't from Ohio, but they loved the area for its business-friendly community and rich natural resources, and decided Columbus was where they had to build their distillery. The duo's passion for the Midwest colors everything about Middle West Spirits, from the name down to the Ohio-grown soft red winter wheat in their whiskey and award-winning vodka, which they also infuse with honey and vanilla beans or stone fruit. Inside the distillery, which sprawls over 3,200 square feet of open air, Brady and Ryan craft these artisan OYO spirits—named after the original word for the Ohio River Valley, pronounced o-y-o_—in 600-liter pot-and-column stills. Hand-built onsite by German craftsmen using copper, stainless steel, and bits of Saturn's rings, these stills earned Middle West Spirits a place on _Popular Mechanics' 5 of the World's Most-High-Tech Distilleries list.