The notable accomplishments of Lawrence O. Payne include his graduation from John Marshall Law School and his election to Cleveland City Council. Allen E. Cole’s 1935 photograph of the “Payne for Council” women’s basketball team is one of the better-known images in the African American Archives of the Western Reserve Historical Society. What sometimes escapes the notice of history students, however, is the fact that two of the athletes in this photograph were sisters. Jean Murrell Capers (standing on the far left), became a Cleveland teacher, an attorney, and the first African American woman elected to Cleveland City Council. Her sister, Alice Murrell Rose (kneeling, right), also became a teacher. Both were Kentucky natives who migrated to Ohio with other members of the Murrell family in 1919, during the Great Depression, and both attended Cleveland Public Schools.
A professional photographer in Cleveland’s black community during the mid-20th century, Allen Cole documented many African American families through his work. See more of his photographs in Digital Cleveland Starts Here.