African American Archives Auxiliary

Cleveland, Ohio and the Rise of Gospel Blues

Posted on by enoggle

By Regennia N. Williams, PhD

Distinguished Scholar of African American History and Culture

The Shields Brothers established their gospel quartet in 1928 and kept the group together for 70 years. (Photograph by Allen E. Cole; courtesy of Frederick Burton.)

In Post-World War I Era Cleveland, a popular destination for African American migrants from the South, gospel music became increasingly popular.  This growing popularity was due in no small measure to the business acumen of people like Claude Shields Sr., quartet singer and owner of the Shields Brothers Cleaners on Cedar Avenue.

After the 1920s, quartet artists and their fans did not hesitate to participate in and promote live concerts, make studio recordings, and, in some instances, write books about gospel’s influence on other styles of American music, including Rock and Roll. Arthur Turner (second from the right in the above Shields Brothers photo), for example, also served as the long-time manager for Cleveland’s Elite Jewels, “The Gospel Songbirds of the North,” and one of the city’s most popular female quartets.

The cover of Frederick Burton’s Cleveland’s Gospel Music. (Arcadia Publishing, 2003)

Frederick Burton, whose family migrated to Cleveland from Tennessee in the 1960s, is the author of Cleveland’s Gospel Music (Arcadia, 2003) and founder of the Gospel Music Historical Society. In 2005, he and other artists participated in “Nearer My God to Thee,” during the Rock Hall’s  tribute to Sam Cooke, a Mississippi native and migrant to Chicago. Cooke gained a national following as a member of the Soul Stirrers gospel quartet and as a solo artist.

In The Rise of Gospel Blues: The Music of Thomas A. Dorsey in the Urban Church (Oxford, 1992), Dr. Michael Harris suggests that Dorsey, a Georgia native and former pianist for blues legend Ma Rainey, was “The Father of Gospel Music.” Dorsey became director of music at Chicago’s Pilgrim Baptist Church in the 1920s and later founded the National Convention of Gospel Choirs and Choruses, which many Clevelanders still support today.

 

New Costume Acquisition: Dr. Tameka Ellington

Posted on by enoggle

Images courtesy of Dr. Tameka Ellington

By Patricia Edmonson, Museum Advisory Council Curator of Costume & Textiles

The WRHS costume collection is ringing in the new year with an exciting acquisition. Dr. Tameka Ellington, formerly of Kent State University, is taking the next step in her career to write, speak, and share her expertise with others. As part of that process she has made her work in surface and fashion design available and the WRHS will bring in four of Dr. Ellington’s garments.

In her own words, Ellington’s work tells the stories of her ancestors: “Asante Sana (thank you in Swahili) is the name I have chosen to represent my total body of work.” She looks to a number of African regions and countries for inspiration, and has hopes of one day learning more about her own tribe and heritage.

Dr. Ellington works with natural fibers and uses techniques such as wax batik with resist dying, digital textile printing, and non-traditional leather tooling. The four garments coming to WRHS include The Offspring, Royal Mbebana, The Origin of Anansi the Spider, and How the Zebra Got its Stripes. Their arrival is part of a larger initiative to create a more diverse costume collection. Dr. Ellington grew up in Cleveland and graduated from Glenville High School before continuing her education. Today she lives and works in Akron, and WRHS is excited to create an ongoing relationship and make plans to display her garments in the future.

Join our Discussion with the Rev. Dr. Marvin A. McMickle

Posted on by enoggle

Contributed by the Rev. Dr. Marvin A. McMickle, Author, Let the Oppressed Go Free: Exploring Theologies of Liberation

Born in Chicago, Illinois in 1948, Dr. Marvin A. McMickle is a 1970 graduate of Aurora University in Illinois with a B.A. in Philosophy. His alma mater also awarded him the degree of Doctor of Divinity in 1990. He earned a Master of Divinity degree from Union Theological Seminary in New York City in 1973 and did two additional years of graduate study at Columbia University in New York. He earned a Doctor of Ministry degree from Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, New Jersey in 1983. He was awarded the Doctor of Philosophy degree (Ph.D.) from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio in 1998. He was also awarded the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters by Payne Theological Seminary in Wilberforce, Ohio in 2010.

 

He was ordained to the Christian ministry in 1973 at Abyssinian Baptist Church of New York City where he served on the pastoral staff from 1972-1976. He served as the pastor of St. Paul Baptist Church of Montclair, New Jersey from 1976-1986. He was pastor of Antioch Baptist Church in Cleveland, Ohio from 1987-2011. During that time, he led the church in establishing a ministry for people infected with or affected by HIV/AIDS. This ministry was the first of its kind in the entire country. The church also instituted a community tithing initiative in which the church tithed out 10% of its annual budget to various community programs and agencies. Dr. McMickle was named Pastor Emeritus in 2018. He became Interim Pastor in May 2020. He was also a member of the Board of Trustees of Cleveland State University in Cleveland, OH, president of the Cleveland NAACP and Urban League, and president of the Shaker Heights Board of Education.

 

Dr. McMickle was the Professor of Homiletics at Ashland Theological Seminary in Ashland, Ohio from 1996-2011. Upon retiring he was named Professor Emeritus by the Board of Trustee and the faculty. He is the author of 18 books. He has authored dozens of articles that regularly appear in professional journals and magazines. He is a member of the Martin Luther King, Jr. International Board of Preachers at Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA. In the winter semester of 2009, he served as a Visiting Professor of Preaching at Yale University Divinity School. He was also an adjunct instructor at Princeton, New Brunswick, and New York theological seminaries.

 

Dr. McMickle served as the 12th President of Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School from July 2011 to June 2019.

 

He is an active member of the Progressive National Convention and American Baptist Churches (ABCUSA).He is also a Life Member of Kapa Alpha Psi Fraternity and a member of Sigma Pi Phi.

 

Dr. McMickle has been married to Peggy Lorraine Noble since 1975 and they have one son, Aaron who resides in New York City with his wife Pilar and their two daughters Aaliyah and Lola.

Buffalo Soldiers

Posted on by enoggle

By John Lutsch

The name ‘Buffalo Soldiers’ conjures up images of the Old West, where blue-clad cavalrymen galloped from their stockade forts to confront restive Native American tribes. With the clarity of hindsight, the romanticized notions of chivalry and valor associated with the cavalry have become a bit tarnished as awareness has increased regarding the mistreatment of indigenous peoples.

‘The original Buffalo Soldier’ photo courtesy Buffalo Soldiers MC

The real Buffalo Soldiers, however, were a largely forgotten group of six African American cavalry and infantry regiments, created by Congress in 1866. Ironically, they were a minority group facing discrimination who were tasked with suppressing another discriminated-against American minority rebelling against life on Indian reservations. They fought their way from West Texas to Kansas, on to Montana, eventually being billeted in San Francisco, where they became acting federal park rangers in the Sierra Nevada. Their exploits are chronicled in the Buffalo Soldiers National Museum in Houston, Texas.

‘Buffalo Soldiers Ride in Glenville parade’ photo courtesy ClevelandPeople.com

Fast forward to around 1993 in Chicago, where African American police officer Ken Thomas founds the ‘Buffalo Soldiers Motorcycle Club’ to promote a positive image of Black motorcyclists which would counter the prevailing perceptions of motorcycle clubs as ‘gangs’. Members were recruited from active-duty and retired military, law enforcement, and professional groups. The aim was to create not only an active brotherhood of riders, but an organization whose interaction with the community was based on charity, goodwill, and education.

The Buffalo Soldiers quickly grew to become one of the largest African American motorcycle clubs in the United States, with over 5000 members in around 140 chapters. Unusually, women were encouraged to become members in their own right as well.

Gone are the days when Buffalo Soldiers mounted up for adventure in frontier America. Now they straddle their ‘iron horses’ with a different and more positive approach to their mission; to give back to the local community, and to keep alive the memory of those African American troopers who faithfully served their country for nearly a century.

Stay tuned for more information on the Buffalo Soldiers when the Crawford’s exhibit ‘Open Road: The Lure of Motorcycling in Ohio’ begins in Mid-April, 2022.

The Gift of Black Sacred Music: Our Stories, Our Songs, and Our Sources

Posted on by enoggle

By Regennia N. Williams, PhD
Distinguished Scholar of African American History and Culture

 

 

On Sunday, October 24, 2021, hundreds of gospel music fans helped celebrate the 85th anniversary of The Elite Jewels, “The Gospel Songbirds of the North,” at the Sanctuary Baptist Church in Cleveland, Ohio. Mrs. Willie Mae Reese (pictured here) is the lead singer and current manager for the Elite Jewels. In the summer of 2021, she agreed to be one of the narrators for the Western Reserve Historical Society’s A. Grace Lee Mims Arts and Culture Oral History Project. An Arkansas native, Mrs. Reese shared stories about her family life and education in the South, her migration to Cleveland, her love for music, and the people who inspired her to tell the world about the place of the Elite Jewels in the history of Black gospel quartet singing. Excerpts from her July 2021 interview are included in this special “Home for the Holidays” issue of our newsletter.

Mrs. Willie Mae Reese. (Photo by Regennia N. Williams)

 

The following passages are taken from a July 2021 oral history interview with Mrs. Willie Mae Reese. Dr. Regennia N. Williams and Ms. Kathryn Oleksa conducted the interview.

 

Early Life in Rural Arkansas

I was born in Jericho, Arkansas, and I grew up on a farm that my grandfather [Walter Adams] owned. He had horses, cows, pigs, chickens, and lots of farmland. He just raised everything there on his farm –including cotton. He had sharecroppers who also lived with their families in one of the other eight houses on our farm. The [Black] sharecroppers would plant their crops, and then they would give my grandfather a certain portion of that crop for staying there . . .

. . .There was a funny thing about it, though. White people would sometimes come to our farm. If you wanted a car, for example, they would drive that car all the way from Memphis, Tennessee, and let my grandfather see it. If he didn’t like the car, they would drive it all the way back to Memphis–and bring him another one to look at! The White people wouldn’t call him “Mr. Adam.” They would only call him “Uncle Walter,” because they didn’t want to say mister. That’s just the way that it was.

 

Music, Education, and Migration

sic, so I guess that’s where I got it from. For as long as I can remember, I’ve always loved gospel singing. I started out singing solos, and I just migrated into quartet singing. When I was a child, we even had a little singing group with our cousins . . .

I never rode a school bus. My sister Myrtle and I walked to school. When we graduated from the grade school in Arkansas, my sister and I moved to Memphis, Tennessee to live with our aunt. In Tennessee, we attended Booker T. Washington High School . . .

When I moved to Cleveland with my parents, I attended Cuyahoga Community College and studied Office Administration. Later, I started taking bass lessons from a professional [union] musician, and I am still taking lessons!

 

Mr. Arthur Turner and the Elite Jewels: Sources of Inspiration and “The Gospel Songbirds of the North”

In Cleveland, I always heard the Elite Jewels on the radio. They had a regular broadcast, and Mr. Arthur Turner was their manager. I thought that the Elite Jewels had the prettiest harmony that I had ever heard. I really, really wanted to sing with them, but I never thought I would get a chance to do that.

By the grace of God, Mr. Turner heard me singing a solo at a Baptist church in Cleveland, and he invited me to come to their rehearsal. I was about 30 years old at the time, and I started singing with the group soon after that. I don’t think anybody in the Elite Jewels had any formal training. It was just a God-given talent. We enjoyed singing, so we just kept doing it.

Mr. Turner made the Elite Jewels, because he had all of the contacts. He handled all of our management-related activities: he booked all of our concerts, he planned all of the programs, he collected the money, he maintained the equipment up. If we needed new equipment, he would go get that equipment. Of course, we paid for it, since he took it out of our money . . .

We performed with all the big groups, including the Mighty Clouds of Joy, Shirley Caesar, and Inez Andrews’ group . . . We recorded for major labels like Savoy, and James Cleveland even invited the Elite Jewels to head the quartet section of the Gospel Music Workshop of America, because he loved the Elite Jewels, but we decided not to do that . . .

It was a traveling group, and we went everywhere. The Elite Jewels had lots of opportunities, because they didn’t just sing for Blacks; they sang for Whites, too. The Whites loved the music as much as the Blacks, so the group performed for both groups. Sometimes, we couldn’t even stay in hotels; we would stay in the homes of Black people along the way . . . You always feel left out when you are not allowed to eat where everybody else eats, when you are not allowed to stay where everybody else stays, because the hotels were for Whites . . . That’s the way that it was in the South. As a matter of fact, it was like that in some of the Northern states, too, but you never let that stop you. If we had let that stop us, I wouldn’t be singing today.

After Mr. Turner retired and I took over as manager, the group was still travelling. We just kept on pushing and kept on singing.

Members of The Elite Jewels are shown performing during the group’s October 24, 2021, 85th anniversary concert. Mrs. Reese is seated on the far left. (Photo courtesy of Regennia N. Williams.)

Greater Cleveland Urban Film Festival closing night at the Cleveland History Center

Posted on by enoggle

By Regennia N. Williams, PhD
Distinguished Scholar of African American History and Culture

On Friday, September 17, 2021, the Western Reserve Historical Society (WRHS) partnered with the Greater Cleveland Urban Film Festival (GCUFF) to host the closing night event for GCUFF’s 10th Annual Greater Cleveland Urban Film Festival. WRHS staff and members of the African American Archives Auxiliary (Quad A) were among the more than 100 guests who came to the Cleveland History Center for the awards program and the screening of “A Choice of Weapons,” the new documentary film inspired by the life of Gordon Parks.

Photographs by Brian K. Artisan and Mychal Lilly

 

Dr. Regennia N. Williams delivered opening remarks and made a special presentation during the program.

 

Pictured here are members of the African American Archives Auxiliary, including African American History Archivist Patrice Hamiter (fourth from right).

 

(left to right) Donna Dabbs, GCUFF’s Executive Director, is shown here with Quad A members Felicia Haney and Rhonda Crowder during the Awards Ceremony.

 

GCUFF team members are pictured here at the registration table in the Crawford Auto-Aviation Museum.

Learning from a Cleveland Legend: A Conversation with Leon Bibb

Posted on by sbrosious

By Todd Michney, Ph.D.

Journalist Leon Bibb recently spoke to me about his family roots, his youth growing up in Cleveland’s Glenville neighborhood, and where African Americans stand in the aftermath of the Trump presidency. Bibb studied journalism at Bowling Green State University, served with distinction in Vietnam (winning a Bronze Star), and worked at the Plain Dealer before starting a storied television career. In 1972 with WCMH in Columbus, he became the first Black news anchor in Ohio. In 1979 Bibb moved back to his hometown to join WKYC, and from 1995-2017 he anchored for WEWS, where he continues as a commentator. Bibb is a longtime resident of Shaker Heights.

 

Mr. Bibb began by explaining how he came to be born in Alabama in 1944: although his parents arrived in Cleveland in 1940, his mother returned to her ancestral home to give birth to him when his father, who worked for the U.S. Navy Department, was sent to serve in World War II. After initially living with his father’s relatives on East 86th Street in Cedar-Central, Bibb’s parents moved the family in 1947 onto Parkgate Avenue in Glenville. “You’re gonna pay big time to live out there,” their relatives told his father, “You’re going out to the Gold Coast and it’s expensive.” While still a predominantly Jewish area, Glenville was the city’s most up-and-coming Black middle-class neighborhood. His parents went in together on a duplex house with his father’s sister and her husband who was also a veteran; they were attracted by the stately Miles Standish Elementary School across the street and the Cultural Gardens at the end of the block. “We were surrounded by the Black professionals,” Bibb told me, “doctors, an architect, people who owned funeral homes, dentists, teachers, and assistant principals of schools.” As for Glenville in the 1950s, he joked, “if you could not find it on East 105th Street, you probably could live without it.” There were movie theaters, a new car showroom, hat and shoe stores, delicatessens, grocery stores and markets, hardware stores, pharmacies, soda shops and more. There was Scatter’s Barbecue, and nightclubs like the Tijuana and Café Society where the country’s biggest jazz bands stopped on tour. He watched the neighborhood’s demographics shift as he advanced to Empire Junior High School and then Glenville High School; only five white students remained by the time he graduated in 1962. “It didn’t worry me too much,” he recalled, because the people who were moving in were Black people who seemed to be very nice, and we were all very nice.”

 

“I don’t know how my childhood could be better,” Bibb emphasized. He and his friends spent their time playing Little League baseball at Gordon Park, where they named their teams after the star Cleveland Indians players: the “Colavitos,” “Helds,” and “Dobys.” The City’s Recreation Department and Board of Education kept the playground at Miles Standish open in the summer, even sponsoring crafts classes and other activities; Bibb learned to play the ukulele. Twice a summer the Show Wagon would perform for kids and parents alike, with a band or quartet, baton twirlers, maybe a comedian or ventriloquist. Bibb and his friends even organized track meets for a friendly competition with nearby Pierpont Avenue: “We would have a 100-yard dash, a 50-yard dash; we would have the 200-yard dash, the mile bicycle run. We would have a stopwatch and keep records – and we did this all by ourselves, there were no adults involved.” He felt he had been largely shielded from the hurts of racism, aside from a handful of negative encounters with kids from the Sowinski area, a Polish enclave on the other side of Rockefeller Park.

 

Mr. Bibb recalled family trips to visit relatives down South, or for funerals, and how his parents instructed him and his sister that they would be avoiding gas stops or bathroom breaks after crossing the Ohio River. On one trip around the time Emmett Till was murdered, his father had made a tense but successful stop in Kentucky for Pepsi-Colas to go. “I know it was hard, because you want your kids to know that they’ve got rights. But they also wanted their son to not be murdered,” he reflected on his parents’ dilemma. “All that is part of what it takes to survive in America and be Black,” he noted in referring to the organizations African Americans have built for self-advancement, notably fraternities and sororities which can now count Vice President Kamala Harris among their members. “Since 1619, we’ve been a strong people who just don’t go away; our strength is in our stick-to-it-iveness, our pursuit of education and dealing with the racism which is always out there.”

 

Todd M. Michney is a native Clevelander who teaches at Georgia Tech. He is the author of Surrogate Suburbs: Black Upward Mobility and Neighborhood Change in Cleveland, 1900-1980 (University of North Carolina Press, 2017).

Photos: 1-Leon Bibb in 4th Grade, early to mid-1950s. 2-Leon Bibb and his cousin Allen Moreland on Parkgate Avenue. 3-Leon Bibb’s father (Leon Bibb, Sr.) with his sister Shirley in front of the Bibb home at 9122 Parkgate Avenue.

 

Women Making History | Zelma Watson George

Posted on by sbrosious

Zelma Watson GeorgeZelma Watson George became a symbol of African American achievement in several fields ranging from operatic diva to United Nations diplomat. After moving to Chicago with her family she earned a sociology degree from the Univ. of Chicago and studied voice at the American Conservatory of Music. Later she added advanced degrees in personnel administration and sociology from New York University.

Her journey would bring her to Cleveland to examine the John G. White Collection of the Cleveland Public Library. She would go on to write a musical drama based upon her research, “Chariot’s A’Comin!”, which was telecast by WEWS-TV in 1949. That year Zelma assumed the title role in Gian-Carlo Menotti’s opera, The Medium, at Karamu Theater. She was selected by Menotti himself to repeat her triumph in an off-Broadway revival of the work. As an African American appearing in a role not written for one per se she was likely New York’s first example of non-traditional casting.

In the 1950s Zelma served on several government committees at the national level, culminating in a world lecture tour as good-will ambassador and an appointment as U.S. alternate delegate to the United Nations General Assembly (1960-61). From 1966-74 she served as director of the Cleveland Job Corps. Following her retirement and the death of her husband, she lectured, wrote, and taught at Cuyahoga Community College.

Women Making History | Fannie Lewis

Posted on by sbrosious

Fannie Lewis

Fannie Lewis earned her tough as nails reputation as a tireless leader and dedicated public servant who worked hard to improve conditions in not only her own ward, but also the city of Cleveland.

Fannie Lewis was born in Memphis, Tennessee, but her heart was in Ward 7 of Cleveland, which she represented for almost 30 years. Lewis first gained public attention when she was photographed talking to National Guard troops after the Hough riots. After the riots Lewis became a recruiter for Neighborhood Youth Corps, and was eventually promoted to recruitment coordinator. Wanting to take a more active role in her community, Lewis ran for City Council in 1979, and began her first term as councilwoman in 1980. During her time in office she advocated for voting rights, the Cleveland school voucher program, the construction of new expensive homes in the Hough area known as “Fannie’s Mansions”, and she was also responsible for the “Fannie Lewis Law” which required that city residents make up at least 20 percent of the work force on city construction contracts that were above $100,000. Serving for 28 years, Lewis is the longest-serving female council member in the history of Cleveland, and was inducted into the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame in 1996.

Women Making History | Rowena Jelliffe

Posted on by sbrosious

Rowena Jelliffe and Karamu House

The dream of Rowena Jelliffe was to build a center where people of different ethnic cultures could find common cause

coupled with hard work materialized into the establishment of Karamu House, a nationally recognized interracial community center. Mrs. Jelliffe, born in 1892 in New Albion, Illinois. It was her early upbringing that Mrs. Jelliffe often credited for giving her a sense of dedication to the ideals of gender and racial equality. She came to Ohio in 1910 to attend Oberlin College, where she was the president of the Oberlin Women’s Suffrage League and met her future husband, Russell, who also campaigned for women’s rights.

After marrying in 1915, the Jelliffes moved to Cleveland where they were hired by the Second Presbyterian Church to conduct neighborhood improvement projects. They bought two houses and named them Playhouse Settlement. The settlement welcomed all races and educated the neighborhood residents through art. The Gilpin Players, the first theater group, was started in 1920, and in 1927 the theater opened. The theater was called Karamu after the Swahili word that means a place of joyful meeting. After moving in 1950, the name of the settlement was changed to Karamu House. Through the Jelliffes’ work, Karamu House prospered and expanded its programs.

Besides working on projects related to Karamu House, the Jelliffes were also involved in the establishment of important civic welfare organizations such as the Cleveland Metropolitan Housing Association, the Community Relations Board, and the Cleveland Urban League. They were delegates to the 1921 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) convention in Atlanta and they attended the Pan-African Congress in Paris. In 1963, the Jelliffes retired from Karamu House and spent much of the 1960’s campaigning for civil rights. After her husband’s death in 1980, Mrs. Jelliffe served on the boards of the East Cleveland Theater and the Fine Arts Association of Willoughby

Women Making History | Lethia Cousins Fleming

Posted on by sbrosious

lethia fleming

Lethia Cousins Fleming was many things throughout her life; campaign organizer, women’s and civil rights activist,wife, and politician, to name a few. Although Mrs. Fleming was most well known for her work in politics, both locally and nationally, she was also a twenty-year employee of the Cuyahoga County Child Welfare Board where she worked following an unsuccessful bid for her husband’s city council seat in 1929.

Born in Tazewell, Virginia in 1876 to James Archibald and Fannie Taylor Cousins, Mrs. Fleming was educated in Ironton, Ohio and later at Morristown College in Tennessee. Following college, she returned to her home state where she was a suffragist and taught for twenty years, until her marriage to Thomas Wallace Fleming in 1912.

After their marriage, the couple moved to Cleveland, where Thomas, a lawyer, would later become the city’s first African-American councilman. Only two years after the move, Mrs. Fleming became the chairwoman of the Board of Lady Managers at the Cleveland Home for Aged Colored People (later the Eliza Bryant Center) and was also part of many national organizations. She was a charter member of the Urban League of Greater Cleveland, the Traveler’s Aid Society, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (Cleveland Branch). An ardent supporter of the Phillis Wheatley Association (PWA), her fundraising efforts led to the purchase of the first PWA building.

Though she did not win her husband’s city council seat after his imprisonment, Mrs. Cousins was active in politics on a national and local level. She worked on galvanizing support among African-American women for three Republican presidential candidates: Warren G. Harding, Herbert Hoover, and Alfred M. Landon. She chaired the executive board of the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs and served as president of its Ohio federation. She served on the executive board for the National Association of Colored Women and the National Council of Negro Women, in addition to serving as president of the National Association of Republican Women and executive director of the Republican Colored Women organization.

Then & Now | Amanda Wicker

Posted on by sbrosious
Students at the Clarke School of Dressmaking and Fashion Design

Contributed by Patty Edmonson, WRHS’s Museum Advisory Council Curator of Costume & Textiles

The Hunt family lived in Hancock and Washington Counties, in Georgia, at the turn of the 20th century. In 1900, Henry Hunt farmed and his wife Barbara cared for their five (eventually eight) children, including Amanda, born March 5, 1894. Mandy, as she was then called, became increasingly close with her mother and siblings after her father died in the following decade; as an adult, she lived with brothers Julian and Albert at various times. Perhaps because her parents could neither read or write, Amanda was driven to pursue her own education and career at Tuskegee Institute (now University), and as an apprentice to Addie Clarke in Washington D.C. Around 1924, Amanda married fellow Georgian McDuffie Wicker. The couple lived briefly in Savannah, Georgia before moving to Cleveland where Amanda started her dressmaking business and McDuffie worked as a Barber. The Wickers were hardly unusual in their move north, and were part of what is known as the first Great Migration. Black rural southerners sought opportunities in cities like Chicago, Detroit, and Cleveland. The first wave of migration began around 1916, when cities experienced shortages of industrial laborers during World War I. Amanda Wicker was a member of Cleveland’s “Georgia Club,” which provided southerners a place to connect and celebrate their Georgian heritage. Clevelanders from other southern states organized similar clubs. By 1936, approximately 15,000 Georgians lived here in Cleveland. Although Amanda’s mother remained in Sandersville, Georgia, she visited her daughter frequently.

After 1925, Amanda operated the Clarke School of Dressmaking and Fashion Design from her home on Cedar Avenue. During the late 1920s the Wickers lived on Cedar Avenue, and after McDuffie’s 1929 death Amanda continued to live and work at various addresses along Cedar between East 89th and 95th Streets. [Map] Perhaps the biggest landmark in her neighborhood was, and still is, the Antioch Baptist Church at the corner of Cedar and East 89th Street. Amanda was integral to the church; she served as a charter member of the Beehive Bible Class, was a member of the Cora Boyd Mission Circle, the Fifty-Plus Club, and the Ta-Wa-Si- Club. At the end of her life she lived in Antioch Towers senior apartments.

Located primarily at 8911 and 9202 Cedar Avenue, the Clarke School offered classes for this predominantly African American neighborhood until the 1980s. Although anyone could take classes, many pupils were students from Central High School, which, along with Wicker, created an annual student fashion show beginning in 1941. The accompanying publication, called The Book of Gold, helped raise funds for student scholarships. Wicker and her instructors taught drawing, pattern drafting, tailoring, millinery, and other course. The lay person could sign up for a course to revamp their own wardrobe, but her focus was on preparing young people for the garment industry. Students could learn how to operate industrial machinery and other skills related to mass production. In 1948 the school became G. I. approved, which meant that veterans enrolled and changed the makeup of the student body for a time. Amanda worked with the Veteran’s Administration liaisons to spread awareness of the program for Black veterans. Beyond running a school and teaching the trade, Amanda Wicker worked with personal clients and served as the second vice president of Cleveland’s chapter of the National Association of Fashion and Accessory Designers, operated for and by Black designers.

 

dresses from the Clarke School of Dressmaking and Fashion Design

 

Amanda Wicker impacted Cleveland through her civic work of providing important skills to young people and actively engaging her neighborhood. In June of 2021, the Cleveland History Center will open an exhibit about Wicker and her work. The exhibit will share, for the first time, 14 garments made by Amanda, as well as the rich photographic archive of the school, and thus a community. Visitors will come away inspired by the story of a self-made Black woman who lifted those around her.

 

Then & Now | Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Cleveland 

Posted on by sbrosious

Contributed by John J. Grabowski, Ph.D., Historian/Senior Vice President for Research and Publications, using resources from WRHS’s African American Archives.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. visited Cleveland on numerous occasions.   He first came to the city on August 7, 1956. At that time he was the leader of the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott and he reported on it before the National Negro Funeral Directors Convention held at the Hollenden House Hotel.

During the 1960s his visits became more frequent. He spoke at a number of churches, including Antioch Baptist, St. Paul’s Episcopal in Cleveland Heights, and Cory Methodist Church.   When he appeared at Cory on May 14, 1963, a crowd of 10,000 to 14,000 lined the streets as he arrived.   The church could only seat 5,000, so extra appearances were soon set up.   While many of these visits focused on Civil Rights actions in the South, by the mid-1960s his appearance in Cleveland focused on issues in the city. In 1964, a week after winning the Nobel Peace Prize he came to Cleveland to lead a “march on the ballot box”. Other visits that year continued a focus on voter registration.

He returned to Cleveland a number of times in 1967 and these visits focused again on local issues relating to Civil Rights, the treatment of the Black community, and again voter registration.   He played an important role in getting voters to register during Carl Stokes’ mayoral campaign that year.   His last appearance that year in the city took place on December 16 when he participated in a debate with James C. Davis, President of the Cleveland Bar Association on the topic of civil disobedience.

In 1968 he returned to speak to a small group on the east side early in the year.   He was scheduled to return to the city on April 10th.   That would not occur – he was assassinated on April 4th. Robert F. Kennedy, who was scheduled to speak at the Cleveland City Club the following day did so, with great sadness.   His speech was titled “On the Mindless Menace of Violence” and within his prepared remarks he noted “This is a time of shame and sorrow” and also focused on the issues facing poor people in the United States, referring to that situation as “another kind of violence” which resulted in “the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books, and heat in the winter.”   In two months Kennedy would also be the victim of an assassin.

The Western Reserve Historical Society is fortunate to have in its collections a number of images of Dr. King during his visits to Cleveland. Many of them were taken by Max Schoenfeld , a labor, peace and Civil Rights activist.   He was also a member of the executive board of the United Auto Workers Local 45.   His large collection of negatives document not only Dr. King’s visit, but also protests in Cleveland led by the United Freedom Movement. Maintained in the Society’s secure negative vault, they form an extraordinary document of the 1960s a time of change that has yet to see its complete fulfillment.

Then & Now | Martin Luther King, Jr.

Posted on by sbrosious

Contributed by Patrice Hamiter, African American History Archivist, using resources from WRHS’s African American Archives.

This Martin Luther King Jr. Day seems particularly poignant against the backdrop of recent events that seem to chip away at the “dream“ that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. envisioned. This is currently evidenced by the insurrection on our nation’s capital, the rise of racist subversive groups, voter suppression, the ravaging effects of the coronavirus on black communities, police killings of black men and women, and violent protests and riots.

No one can argue the significance of Dr.’s King’s legacy; living a life of activism that has generated monumental strides for equality, and reach far beyond the civil rights movement. In just over a decade he accomplished what few could in a lifetime, but it was only the beginning.  We continue to face the challenge of gaining civil rights for all, and like Dr. King, we have to understand the impact of working together to push for one common goal.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a Baptist minister and an iconic activist who led marches and protests for black people’s civil rights, right to vote, desegregation, and labor rights. One of his first and most notable acts of activism was leading the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott. When on December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white a man on a city bus.

The boycott lasted for 385 days, and became so intense that Dr. King was arrested and his home was bombed. The boycott ended on December 20, 1956 and resulted in the United States District Court ruling in Browder v. Gayle that ended racial segregation on all Montgomery public buses. The boycott transformed Dr. King into a recognizable activist and leader during the civil rights era, and in 1957 he rose to national prominence by becoming the president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).

The SCLC practiced nonviolent protest tactics, and though there were many stand-offs with segregationists and police that sometimes turned violent, Dr. King the son of a minister, remained committed to advancing civil rights through non-violence and civil disobedience. He was inspired by his religious beliefs, and the non-violent activism of Mahatma Gandhi. Ironically, the FBI labeled Dr. King a radical, and made him the object of many investigations trying to link him to communism.

As the head of the SCLC, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was the most visible spokesperson in the civil rights movement.  In addition to helping organize non-violent protests, he was arrested and jailed for ignoring an Alabama state court injunction against demonstrating. It was during this time in jail that he penned his now famous Letter from a Birmingham Jail, which was in defense of non-violent resistance to racism. Later that year, four young African American girls died in a racially motivated church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama at the 16th Street Baptist Church. Dr. King delivered the eulogy for three of the slain girls.

In 1963 Dr. King helped organize the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, or as it’s most commonly known, the “March on Washington.” The march made specific demands to help end racial segregation in public schools, address civil rights legislation, employment discrimination, and protection of civil rights workers from police brutality.

The march was criticized because it was originally conceived as a forum to air grievances about the desperate condition of southern blacks and to publicly denounce the federal government’s failure to safeguard the rights and safety of civil rights workers and blacks. Some felt that organizers gave into pressure, and criticized the march as being too sanitized. Malcolm X dubbed the march the “Farce on Washington”, and the Nation of Islam forbade its members from attending the march.

Despite the tensions and criticisms, at the time the march was the largest gathering of protesters in Washington, D.C.’s history. With more than 200,000 people attending the peaceful event, Dr. King delivered his now famous I have a dream speech. The march, along with Dr. King’s speech, which is regarded as one of the finest in the history of American oratory, helped to put civil rights reform at the forefront of the United States agenda, and facilitated passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Dr. King’s non-violent approach was not universally accepted by some members of the black community who were angry at the violence against blacks.  Malcolm X, accused Dr. King of working “to keep Negroes defenseless in the face of an attack.” And black psychologist Kenneth Clark called the philosophy of loving one’s enemy “psychologically burdensome.” Nevertheless, on October 14, 1964 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. won the Nobel Peace Prize for his commitment to achieving racial equality through nonviolent actions, and his activism and leadership in the Civil Rights movement.

In 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. led marches in Selma, Alabama to call attention to it’s history of using violence to prevent African Americans from voting.  Due to the marches, seven months later President Lyndon B. Johnson sent a voting rights bill to Congress that would expand the 14th and 15th amendments.  The bill banned race based restrictions, making discriminatory voting practices illegal. It was quickly adopted by Congress and signed into law as the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965, and is considered to be one of the most far-reaching pieces of Civil Rights legislation.

Dr. King was killed on April 4, 1968 during a trip to Memphis, Tennessee to support striking sanitation workers, but he didn’t die in vain.  There has been progress and people of color contribute to almost every facet of society. More African Americans have professional and political positions, access to higher educational opportunities, the black middle class has grown, there are more black millionaires, and more persons of color have significant roles in the television and movie industry. Among the greatest accomplishments was the election of Barack Hussein Obama in 2008, as the first African-American President of the United States.

But, despite these strides, African American still face inequalities which prevent them from assuming their rightful place in this country, a country they built.  Outright racism, policies that don’t effectively address systemic racism, and a complete lack of attention to important issues continue to create large disparities within education, health-care, employment, and fair treatment within the justice system.

This only means we have more work to do. Martin Luther King Jr. Day is the only federal holiday appointed as a national day of service to motivate and inspire everyone to volunteer to help improve their communities.  This is a creed that all Americans should be striving for and carrying with them every day to honor Dr. King and his legacy, so that life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness can be within every American’s reach.

 

Martin Luther King, Jr. Day | Book Recommendations

Posted on by sbrosious

Below you will find a series of books related to Black History in Northeast Ohio that are available now in the WRHS Museum Store and online:

 

image from Change Sings 

Cellist Donald White: Making History While Making Music

Posted on by sbrosious

Written by Dianna White-Gould
Guest Contributor

Cellist Donald White and his wife Dolores White, a pianist, composer, and educator.

Monday, October 7, 1957, was the day Donald White, a young African American cellist, had envisioned for a lifetime. He was on his way to take his seat in the cello section of the internationally acclaimed Cleveland Orchestra in Cleveland, Ohio. The orchestra was celebrating its 40th anniversary and had just returned from a triumphant European tour. This was a childhood dream of his when he was growing up in Richmond, Indiana. Now he was going to be joining one of the greatest symphony orchestras in America at a very significant time in history, the Civil Rights Era.

Before 1957, there were no African-Americans hired as full-time members of the five major symphony orchestras. White’s hiring was a historic moment in the midst of the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement. His tenure in the orchestra spanned from 1957 – 1995. He has the distinction of being the longest-serving African American member of one of the top five orchestras.

White was a native of Richmond, Indiana and the middle child of his family’s seven children. He started playing cello when he was 16, and he was drafted into the Navy in 1943. After leaving the Navy, he earned a music degree at Roosevelt University in Chicago. Following a successful audition with Maestro George Szell, White was invited to join the Cleveland Orchestra.

Darrow White and Dianna White-Gould perform in Reinberger Chamber Hall, Severance Hall.

Donald White and his wife, pianist, composer, and educator Dolores White, lived in Cleveland and raised two children, both musicians. Dianna is a graduate of Oberlin Conservatory where she studied piano and music education. She went on to obtain a Masters Degree in Piano Performance. She has frequently performed the works of her mother and other African American composers, including Hale Smith and H. Leslie Adams from Cleveland, Ohio. She is on the faculty of Tri-C and The Music Settlement and is the vocal director at Dike School of the Arts. Darrow is a Heights High School graduate and Hall of Fame Member from 1977 for Outstanding Musician. He went on to graduate from Yale University,

Hartt School of Music, and Boston University and has a Doctorate in Music Education. He works as an educator in Virginia.

Cover of the program for a Memorial Tribute Concert to cellist Donald White. (Praying Grounds Collection, Michael Schwartz Library, Cleveland State University.)

Zephrine Burks Shares Her Story | Faith, Family, and Fashion Series

Posted on by sbrosious

Part II in the Faith, Family, and Fashion Series for
The WRHS “Share Your Story” COVID-19 Digital Collecting Initiative
Tonya Byous, M.Ed., Interviewer and First Lady of the Philippi Missionary Baptist Church
Regennia N. Williams, PhD, Scholar-Consultant

“Even though times have changed, I still believe in giving God your best with your dress.”  –Zephrine Burks

Rev. Samuel Burks and Mrs. Zephrine Burks are pictured here with their children, c. 1961.

Mrs. Zephrine Burks can point with pride to her many accomplishments as a musician, educator, wife, mother, grandmother, great grandmother, and former First Lady of her church. At the age of 90, Burks is especially proud of the fact that faith, family, and fashion consciousness continue to play important roles in her daily life, even in the era of COVID-19 and social distancing.  

Born in Cleveland in 1930 to Sadie Mae and William Buchannan, Zephrine was named after her mother’s music teacher in Tuskegee, Alabama, her parents’ birthplace.  Like her mother and namesake, she also loved music.  In describing her introduction to the formal study of music, she stated: 

Rev. Thomas Lee, the Pastor of Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church, announced that any parent who wanted their children to take piano lessons could bring them down to the church, where a professional music teacher would offer lessons, and the church would pay for the lessons.  Fifteen students started, and two students completed the course of study. I was one of the students who finished the program.

Her piano lessons began in 1937, when she was seven years old.  At the age of nine, she began to play for the Sunday School at Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church, and she still has fond memories of growing up in the church:

I was the only child, and my mother saw to it that I was always well dressed.  When we were getting ready for church, my mother would say, “Always give God your best,” and she would dress me accordingly.  I continued in that same manner with my children and grandchildren.  

Zephrine attended Cleveland Public Schools, graduating in 1949, the same year in which she married Samuel Burks.  After her marriage, she followed her husband to and played piano for her father-in-law’s church, St. Joseph Missionary Baptist Church, and Rev. William D. Burks was Pastor. When her husband became pastor of St. Joseph Missionary Baptist Church, which was later renamed Olive Grove Missionary Baptist Church; Zephrine became the First Lady of that congregation.  

According to Zephrine, she never wanted a preacher for a husband.  As she put it, 

When Rev. William Burks announced that his son Samuel Burks had accepted the call to ministry, the church clapped, and I cried. I went home and told my mother, and she said, “Listen to me, if the Lord called him, you pray and ask the Lord to make you the minister’s wife that He would have you to be.  Encourage him [your husband], and the Lord will bless both of you.” It was my mother who encouraged me, and I followed her advice.

After becoming a member of the local Minsters’ Wives Club, the women who inspired her most were Clara Banks and Anna Chatman, First Lady of the Original Harvest Baptist Church, who was fond of saying, “Zephrine you can do it!”  At the Olive Grove Missionary Baptist Church, First Lady Zephrine Burks also became the Minister of Music and a Sunday School teacher. Pastor and First Lady Burks would raise six children while working as servant-leaders in the church, and all of the children studied music.

First Lady Zephrine Burks and Rev. Samuel Burks (center) and their six children.

As a 19-year-old, Zephrine Burks had joined the Cleveland Baptist Pastors’ Wives Club, and she served as the secretary for that organization when Sadie Allen was the president.  Under the presidency of Anna Chatman, the name of the group was changed to Cleveland Baptist Ministers and Pastors’ Wives. Today, Burks serves as the chapter vice president.  Burks also served as president of the Calvary Hill Baptist District Association Women’s Auxiliary for over 20 years. In describing her various leadership roles, she said,

Whatever I did in the church, at the District level and with Ministers’ Wives, I did it all because of my love for Christ. It was important to me that my children and grandchildren serve the Lord with the same enthusiasm and adoration! I tried my best to be an example for all of them –and the members of the church that my husband and I led.

Even though times have changed, I still believe in giving God your best with your dress. I often tell young Christian women going to church [and wearing short dresses and skirts] to, “Tell your shoes to give a party and invite your dress down!”

Mrs. Zephrine Burks is shown her with her granddaughter (and interviewer) Tonya Byous, First Lady of Cleveland’s Philippi Missionary Baptist Church.

Find out more about the Western Reserve Historical Society’s “Share Your Story” COVID-19 Digital Collecting Initiative HERE.

 

 

Then & Now | African American Cultural Garden

Posted on by sbrosious

By Patrice Hamiter, African American History Archivist, and Dr. Katrena Kennedy

The development of the African American Cultural Garden is a project that has been 60 years in the making.

From the beginning, the Gardens, which set out to honor and celebrate the diverse ethnic communities of Cleveland, fell short when they reflected only those groups who were of European culture and heritage; excluding any non-European immigrant and migrant representations.

But time passed, and the 1960s came in with the Civil Rights movement on an upswing, and the Cleveland Cultural Gardens Federation (CCGF) had its first ever conversation about race in 1961.  They momentarily questioned the representation of African American history and culture within the Gardens; a “Negro Garden” was the phrasing, but after a brief consideration the CCGF decided against it.

Their decision was mainly based on a magazine article that claimed that Negroes no longer followed the customs of Africa; and that America is where the Negroes’ roots were. So the consensus was that any cultural expressions related to African Americans’ should be placed within the American Garden.

Not long after, African American Councilman Leo Jackson proposed a Negro garden. Later that year he won a 25-7 roll call vote to have the city purchase property at 931 East Blvd; a site adjacent to the existing cultural gardens, but not contiguous to it. But even with Mayor Anthony Celebrezze’s support, the measure was eventually blocked by the Finance committee in 1963. After which, the idea faded from public consciousness and several years went by without a resolution.

Then in 1969, Booker T. Tall, a Cuyahoga Community College professor who was also an active member of the Western Reserve Historical Society’s Black History Archives Project (now the African American Archives Auxiliary of the Western Reserve Historical Society), began what turned out to be an eight-year long labor of love to claim a spot for the African American Cultural Garden.

The African American Cultural Gardens Federation, which was started in 1971, was also a part of the journey. Members included Clarence Fitch, Carol Bugg, Bob Render, Glen Brackens, and the local chapter of the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life & History.

Initially, committee members had problems trying to join the all-white Cleveland Cultural Gardens Federation. The CCGF required that all members already have a cultural garden before joining, but the only way to actually obtain a garden was to have the federation’s approval. In time this requirement was waived and Booker Tall became the first black member of the CCGF in 1974.

The group diligently worked to gain support to bring an African American Cultural garden to the Cleveland Cultural Garden grounds. They had planned to accomplish this by way of a media campaign throughout the city of Cleveland. However, they faced some opposition in 1976 by way of councilwoman Mildred Madison. Councilwoman Madison, whose home was across the street from the proposed garden site, blocked the vote to sanction the location because she complained it would drive down property values, and increase traffic and potential vandalism. But the committee continued its efforts and eventually found a site within the contiguous gardens.

As a result of the campaign, on October 23, 1977, the African American Cultural Garden (at that time it was called the Afro-American Cultural Garden) was dedicated by then County Commissioner George Voinovich. He along with Kenneth Johnson cut the red, black and green ribbon, opening up the garden.  Mayor Ralph Perk was also in attendance along with over 200 supporters. The location of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive at the St. Clair exit is where Tall stood and declared the four-acre area the future site of the African American Cultural Garden.

It was proposed at the time of dedication that six notable African Americans with Cleveland ties would be honored by markers. They were Richard Allen, who was the founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church; Garrett A. Morgan, traffic light inventor and businessman; Jesse Owens, Gold medalist in the 1936 Olympics; John P. Green, Ohio legislator who introduced the bill to make Labor Day a holiday in Ohio; Langston Hughes, a playwright, poet, and novelist who was a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance; and Jane Edna Hunter, who established the Phillis Wheatley Association.

But unfortunately, this version of the garden never came to pass. After Booker Tall passed away in 1994, and for several years after, the construction of the African American Cultural Garden lay mostly untouched.

Then in 2000, the late Mrs. Cordell Edge, who was a longtime Glenville resident, was appointed to engage a committee to cultivate and develop the African American Cultural Garden. Mrs. Edge formed the African American Cultural Garden Community Support Group. But her interest and involvement with the African American Cultural Gardens began in 1998 when she became a friend of the Cleveland Cultural Garden Federation, and eventually a delegate to advocate for the African American Cultural Garden. Due to Mrs. Edge’s work, interest and support for the garden gained momentum.

The garden has also received support from two Cleveland mayors who have been instrumental in moving this effort forward. During his time in office former Mayor Michael White (1990-2002) committed about $250,000 in funding for research and design costs. And in 2012 the Association of African American Cultural Gardens (AAACG) became a non-profit organization, electing Carl S. Ewing as its president, who worked with Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson who organized a task force and secured over $500,000 to develop and implement a plan for the garden.

Prior designs for the garden were proposed by both architects Robert P. Madison, and Jim McKnight, but the current design is by local architect Daniel Bickerstaff II, of Ubiquitous Design, LTD.  He was commissioned to design the African American Cultural Garden, and according to the AAACG website, it will be designed as the “Past, Present, and Future Pavilions”.

With ground being broken in 2016, the first major installation of the three-phase design of the African American Cultural Garden was completed; the “Past Pavilion”. The concept of the Past Pavilion is to translate the experience of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. It represents the corridors and dungeons in the slave castles along the western coast of Africa.

The Past Pavilion also includes an Infinity Fountain that depicts the illusion of the tranquility of the Atlantic Ocean as seen through the Pavilion’s “Doorway of No Return”.  The “Doorway” is a sandstone structure that portrays the notion of unknown transition. The Middle Passage of the Pavilion alludes to the sense of going down into the bowels of the slave ships.

With the first phase now complete, the journey that started 60 years ago is ongoing. Currently, AAACG is continuing its fundraising efforts to secure funds needed to complete Phases Two and Three of the African American Cultural Garden.

If you’d like to learn more about the African-American Cultural Garden, please visit  https://www.clevelandculturalgardens.org/gardens/african-american-garden/  and http://aaacg.org/. And to learn more about the garden’s design, this video of architect Daniel Bickerstaff explains more about his concept at the 2016 Juneteenth celebration and ribbon-ceremony in the African American Cultural Garden https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZtX798LvU4.

Then & Now | Stephanie Tubbs Jones

Posted on by sbrosious

Stephanie Tubbs Jones was the first African American woman from Ohio elected to the United States House of Representatives, and served the state’s eleventh congressional district for nearly ten years.

Tubbs Jones was born in Cleveland, Ohio, to Mary Looney Tubbs, a factory worker, and Andrew Tubbs, an airline porter at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport. She was the youngest of three daughters, all of whom were raised in the Glenville neighborhood of Cleveland.

Tubbs graduated from Collinwood High School with acclaim and began college at Case Western Reserve University in its first year of federation, 1967. At CWRU, Stephanie Tubbs Jones founded the African-American Students’ Association (now the African American Society). Jones earned her Bachelor of Arts in Sociology and a minor in psychology in the spring of 1971. She was in Delta Sigma Theta, a predominantly black women’s sorority founded in 1913. In 1974 Tubbs Jones graduated from CWRU School of Law with a Juris Doctor (J.D.).

From 1976 until 1979 Tubbs Jones worked as the assistant prosecutor of Cuyahoga County and was elected as a judge for the Cleveland Municipal Court in 1981. Tubbs Jones was appointed to the Cuyahoga County court of common pleas in 1983 by Ohio Governor Richard Celeste. Tubbs Jones served there for eight years before being appointed prosecutor for Cuyahoga County.

Tubbs Jones was named Chief Prosecutor of Cuyahoga County in 1991. She was the first African American prosecutor in Ohio, as well as one of the first African American women to become the prosecutor of a major American city.

In 1998 Stephanie Tubbs Jones ran to replace Cleveland’s 11th district Congressman of 30 years, Louis Stokes. Tubbs Jones ran on a platform of political experience and community service, winning the Democratic nomination and continuing on to win the general election with more than 80% of the vote. She was re-elected four times and served in congress until her death in 2008.

In her first year as a congresswoman, Tubbs Jones wrote and passed the Child Abuse Prevention and Enforcement Act of 1999. Tubbs Jones’ legislative focus on children, education, and healthcare lasted throughout her time in Congress, and she authored and passed several more bills to promote healthcare and child welfare. Tubbs Jones also served on the House Ways and Means Committee, where she supported Social Security, Medicare, and progressive pension laws.

Tubbs Jones spent much of her congressional career on the House Ways and Means Committee; after the 2006 election Nancy Pelosi selected her to chair the House Ethics Committee. Tubbs Jones co-sponsored legislation to broaden health care coverage for low and middle income people and legislation to promote programs that supported the re-entry of convicts into their communities. She authored legislation that required certification for mortgage brokers and stiffer penalties for predatory loans. Tubbs Jones was also an active member of the Congressional Black Caucus.

Various prominent political figures fondly recalled Tubbs Jones after her death, as former President Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary Clinton said that she was “one of a kind” as well as “unwavering, indefatigable.” Barack Obama said “It wasn’t enough for her just to break barriers in her own life, she was also determined to bring opportunity to all those who had been overlooked and left behind – and in Stephanie, they had a fearless friend and unyielding advocate.”

 

 

Race and the Politics of Respectability | The 1920s from the Vantage Point of Ida B. Wells

Posted on by sbrosious

Regennia N Williams, PhD
Distinguished Scholar of African American History and Culture

At the start of the “Roaring 20s,” Ida B. Wells was a journalist, educator, author, suffragist, clubwoman, social reformer, leader in the anti-lynching movement, and a wife and mother.  A native of Mississippi, she was born in slavery in 1862.  By the time of her death in Chicago, Illinois in 1931, she had achieved a fame that was rare for any woman, regardless of race, class, ethnicity, and nationality.  In her lifetime, she would claim friends, allies, rivals, and enemies on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean and across the color and class lines that frequently divided blacks and whites in America, including those in Cleveland, Ohio.

Wells’ biographer Paula Giddings described her as one of the most uncompromising leaders of her time.  In ‘Ida: A Sword Among Lions’, Giddings recounts the story of Wells’ work with and, sometimes, disagreements with such leaders as suffragist and diplomat Frederick Douglass, historian and fellow founding member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) W. E. B. Du Bois, suffragist Susan B. Anthony, & Frances Willard of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WTCU).  

Articles in the black press and other publications suggest that Wells, despite her many disputes with some well known leaders, also found trusted allies in the National Association of Colored Women (NACW) and among mainline black churches across the country, including Cleveland’s St. John African Methodist Episcopal Church. It is interesting to note that some poor and working class African Americans found the “uplifting” messages of NACW members and other “respectable” reformers somewhat off-putting, since they reflected certain class and cultural biases regarding alcohol consumption, church decorum, and clothing etiquette.

Tragically, despite the best efforts of Ida B. Wells and other African American suffragists, within a decade of the 1920 ratification of the 19th Amendment, thousands of black women in the South would join the ranks of the politically disenfranchised, just as black men had done so in the decades following the 1870 ratification of the 15th Amendment.  African Americans’ ongoing desire to secure and exercise voting rights would, however, help to fuel the Modern Civil Rights Movement after World War II.