From The Vault: George Bush draws 10,000 supporters to Fountain Square in 1988

CINCINNATI – As 41st President and a VP running for the White House, George H. W. Bush had many connections with the Queen City. Most were political, as you’d expect. A few seemed to come straight from the heart. Like the time President Bush took an unplanned trip to a hospital to visit a high school honor student who had been shot outside his school in 1990, leaving him paralyzed. Derrick Turnbow’s fight to survive and graduate became an inspiration still felt today. And like the time Bush 41 met privately with the family of Army Pfc. James Markwell of Sharonville, who was killed by gunfire in the 1989 Panama invasion. A baseball player at Yale and a big fan, Bush seemed to genuinely enjoy hosting the 1990 Reds at the White House after they swept the A’s in the World Series. Thirteen years later, he subbed for Bush 43 and threw out the ceremonial first pitch when the Reds opened Great American Ball Park in 2003.