In the small town of Fort Mitchell, Kentucky, just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati, hundreds of dummies – from Shari Lewis’s playful puppet “Lamb Chop” to Jeff Dunham’s fuzzy, purple “Peanut” – line the walls of the only museum in the world dedicated to the art of ventriloquism. Vent Haven Museum opened in 1973, spawned from the personal collection of founder W. S. Berger, who spent many hours backstage with his father, who was a stage actor. While working his way up from mailroom clerk to president of Cambridge…
