The city of Wilmington in Ohio, a “poster child of the Great Recession,” saw its unemployment rate shoot up to 19 percent after DHL, one of its biggest employers, left. The story of how the city is bouncing back:

Ironically, Wilmington’s reputation as the face of the recession ended up working in its favor. The endless media attention—The New York Times, CNN, USA Today, Jay Leno, Rachael Ray, Glenn Beck, 60 Minutes (twice) were among the dozens of outlets that covered DHL’s story—kept the politicians interested. And the political attention—from the governor’s office to the Oval Office, with two Congressional hearings thrown in for good measure—kept the focus on the crisis and possible solutions. “I wanted to stay on the front page,” Raizk said. “When you get pushed back to page 10, everybody forgets about you.”

At the Air Park, Kevin Carver put his energy into creating a functional Port Authority, which was essentially a shell when he was hired, with no staff, budget, or operating procedures. Then he turned to the central task: Figuring out how to redevelop a sprawling facility that was once the engine driving the local economy.