Images: White City Amusement Park Postcard photos courtesy of John Frato.

By John Frato, Carousel Operations Coordinator, Cleveland History Center

The financial success of the Humphrey Family at Euclid Beach Park spawned a number of amusement parks in the Cleveland area.  The owners hoped to garner a share of Cleveland’s growing amusement park market.  Each had their own plan for success which in many instances mirrored the Humphrey operation, but each added their own nuances to make their operations unique.  During this golden era of amusement parks in Cleveland, no idea or attraction was too grandiose as the park owners experimented on how to draw the most amount of visitors.   One of Euclid Beach’s most short lived competitors was located only a mile west of the Park’s entrance arch on Lake Shore Boulevard at East 140^th Street.  To put the location in perspective today, the Easterly Water Treatment Plant occupies much of the site.  Manhattan Beach Park opened to the public in 1900 as a summer resort.  Along with the beach that was available for swimming, a dance hall and baseball fields were also built.

In 1905, Manhattan Beach was purchased by Edward R. Boyce. He was the owner of Dreamland Park at Coney Island in New York.  His hope was to bring the successful concepts that worked so well at Coney Island to Cleveland. Visitors would be drawn to the park by the attractions and entertainment featuring celebrity performers.   Reportedly within a period of only eleven weeks Manhattan Beach was transformed into White City Amusement Park.  The park opened in 1905 with a scenic railway, dance pavilion, boardwalk, Shoot the Shoots (predecessor of a similar ride at Luna Park), and an animal show. White City shared a number of similarities with Euclid Beach.  Beyond the proximity of the two parks, they each shared a common street car line, Clevelander’s could visit both park’s in the same day, the original manager of Euclid Beach before the Humphrey management was William R. Ryan who coincidently was the manager of White City, their entrance arch’s on Lake Shore Boulevard were hauntingly similar, and each offered a beach along Lake Erie’s shore.

Unlike Euclid Beach, White City charged for admission and alcohol was available.   Another striking difference were their midways, Euclid Beach featured family friendly rides, attractions, and food concessions.  Along with the rides and food concessions, White City offered a number of unique attractions which included Drs. Couney and Stewarts Infant Incubator Hospital.  Park visitors could visit the state of the art facility and see up to twenty premature babies on display with their attending Cleveland physicians.  By today’s standards this would surely be viewed as a rather odd form of entertainment for an amusement park, but it did provide a much needed public service.  Facilities such as this were not common place and the care provided saved lives.  The hospital’s first patient and star performer arrived just in time for opening day in June 1905 and the hospital operated at almost full capacity the few short years the park operated.

White City entertainment concept was never fully embraced by Clevelanders and the entrance charge was definitely a contributing factor to its downfall.  It was also plagued by two major disasters.  The entire park was destroyed by a fire in 1906.  The park was quickly rebuilt but the grounds were ravaged again by a high wind rainstorm in 1907 and subsequently closed in 1908. There were a couple of rebirths that were not successful.  Going back to the Manhattan Beach days, the park re-opened as Cleveland Beach Park and operated again like a summer resort.  By 1911, the park was again in financial difficulty.  The bank sponsored auction brought a new owner.  M. F. Bramley purchased both Luna Park and Cleveland Beach Park with the intention of operating two amusement parks in Cleveland.  He upgraded the property in 1911 and re-opened as Bay Park.  Within several months, the park closed forever. White City is another amusement park in Cleveland that is a mere footnote in history.

By Robyn Marcs, Grants Manager at the Western Reserve Historical Society

A few weeks ago, I was driving home from the West Side Market with a friend who is new to the area.  During one of our conservations on the road she asked, “Did you know Superman is from Cleveland?” Of course I did! I think it’s one the first things that every Clevelander is taught, especially since my grandmother grew up only two miles from Jerry Siegel’s house on Kimberly Avenue.

Was it fate or an intervention from Kryptonians that brought the Shuster family from Toronto to Cleveland in 1924?  Whichever it was, it was certainly to pop culture’s benefit that the two young men who were, as The Saturday Evening Post once wrote, “two small, shy, nervous, myopic lads who can barely cope with ordinary body-building contraptions … [they were] the puniest kids in school picked on and bullied by their huskier classmates.”  It was said that their mutual love of science fiction started their now-famous friendship, which isn’t hard to believe.  Siegel was the creative brains behind the Superman character and Shuster brought his vision to life with his impressive character designs.  According to Jerry Siegel, it all came down to one fateful night in 1932 when he couldn’t sleep “when all of a sudden” the idea of a strong man the likes of Hercules and Samson came to his mind.  He wrote it down and the next morning when Shuster came over, he told him all about his new character—Superman.  Jerry himself served as the model for Superman and his future wife, Joanne, was the model for Lois Lane when Joe Shuster first drew them in 1935 at the Siegel home in Glenville.

Siegel and Shuster’s big break came in 1938 when they sold their first Superman comic to Action Comics for $130 for 13 pages.  This deal, of course, would come to bite them in the back since they essentially sold their rights to what would become one of the most famous comic book characters in history.  However, to Siegel and Shuster, they were just two young men who were elated to have their comic in print.  In fact, The Plain Dealer, their hometown rag, would be one of the first papers to publish the comic in the 1940s.

Siegel and Shuster were both the sons of Jewish Lithuanian immigrants who escaped the pogroms in Eastern Europe around the turn of the twentieth century.  Their families settled in the Jewish neighborhood of Glenville, and Jerry and Joe attended Glenville High School where they met.  In 1941, Siegel and Shuster, proud of their Jewish heritage, attended a benefit for The Temple (today The Temple-Tifereth Israel).  Shuster drew pictures of Superman for attendees while Siegel answered fans’ questions about their famed character.  Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver even attended this event.  During World War II, Siegel and Shuster drew Superman defeating Hitler, even Nazi Germany saw this comic and said that “Siegel was attempting to push his Jewish agenda.”

By the 1970s, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were shadows of their former selves.  Shuster, the artist, was going blind in one eye and Siegel was working a dead end job at Marvel Comics.  However, Clevelanders were always very proud of their native sons.  Today, the Jerry Siegel’s childhood home has an Ohio Historical Marker.  Where Joe Shuster once lived is now a vacant lot, but there is a fence commemorating him with Superman comics surrounding where his apartment building once stood.  Regardless, these two young Jewish men gave our city and the nation what we needed – The Greatest American Hero.

By John Frato, Carousel Operations Coordinator, Cleveland History Center

After Euclid Beach Park closed in 1969, the rides were disposed of in three different ways. Rides that would have been extremely costly and difficult to transport to a new location were razed. The Flying Turns, Thriller, Racing Coaster, and Over the Falls all fell into this category and were demolished. Other attractions were sold. A prime example of this category would be The Grand Carousel, which was sold to a ride broker in Pennsylvania and was quickly purchased for use at Palace Playland outside of Portland, Maine. The Humphreys kept a number of the rides for their own use. Almost all the rides from Kiddie Land most of which were located inside the Colonnade, along with the Rotor, Flying Scooters, Sleepy Hollow Train, Dodgems, Antique Car Ride, and Turnpike Ride were held back. A tract of land was purchased in Streetsboro along State Route 14 shortly before the Park closed, and the family planned on opening another amusement park there. Shady Lake, as the new park would be named, was developed slowly from 1969 to 1978.

The entire infrastructure of roads, pathways, sewer, electrical, and water service needed to be installed. A number of key maintenance employees were kept on, and the work began as soon as Euclid Beach closed, with the dismantling of the rides that were being kept, salvaging of much of the iconic green steel fence along with electrical boxes, switches, plumbing fixtures…just about anything that could be used at the new location.

When the park opened in 1978, an Arch quite similar to the one at Euclid Beach had been erected, a Wild Mouse Ride had also been installed in addition to the familiar rides transplanted from the old park, Although the park was located far from the shore of Lake Erie, there was a small lake on the property. Not surprisingly, Shady Lake Park had a very “Euclid Beach” feel to it. Many of the signs, the park benches, and even the ticket booths were transplanted to Streetsboro. Shady Lake had only a short life span. It closed in 1982 due to a family conflict over whether or not the Humphrey Family should stay involved with the amusement park business. After Shady Lake closed many of the rides were purchased by Old Indiana Family Fun Park outside of Indianapolis, Indiana. Old Indiana operated through 1996 when a tragic accident involving the Sleepy Hollow Train forced the park to close. An auction was held in February 1997 and the rides from Euclid Beach were scattered across the country and beyond. The Shady Lake Arch remained standing until 2004, and today the property is home to the Shady Lake Apartments and a Fifth Third Bank. It is a truly ironic twist that apartment buildings were built on the sites of both Shady Lake Park and Euclid Beach Park.

By John Frato, Carousel Operations Coordinator, Cleveland History Center

The Euclid Beach Park Company was incorporated on October 23, 1894, by John Flynn, John Irwin, Albert E. Thompson, Jerome B. Burrows, and Hylas B. Gladwish. Their business prospectus stated: “The lncorporators are convinced that a Summer Resort within easy reach of Cleveland properly appointed and conducted, will be both popular and profitable.” It goes on to state that estimates of admissions for a day’s outing in Cleveland proper and the surrounding communities were made. The estimated total spent by patrons annually was $455,000.00. The owners reasoned that a park like Euclid Beach, with its great lakeside location and superior amenities would garner a large share of that total.

When Euclid Beach first opened to the public on June 22, 1895, approximately 30 amusement parks were operating in Ohio, with even more opening after the Park’s inaugural year. Keeping in mind how much more difficult travel was 125 years ago, the vast majority of these parks posed no direct competition, but it is surprising to see how many amusement parks dotted Ohio’s landscape so early in the development of the amusement park industry. What makes the list even more impressive is that it does not include a large number of picnic groves/resorts that were also in operation.

Euclid Beach’s life span of 74 years pales in comparison to a number of other parks in the Cleveland area.  Chippewa Lake in Medina opened in 1878 and operated until 1978 hanging on to celebrate the park’s bittersweet centennial year.

Geauga Lake in Aurora also got an earlier start than Euclid Beach.  Opening in 1888, Clevelander’s enjoyed the thrills of its many rides and attractions until 2007.  One of the notable differences between Euclid Beach and Geauga Lake had to do with management.  Euclid Beach was owned and operated by the Humphrey Family 69 of its 74 operational years and the family’s management style did not change very much over the years.  A trip to Euclid Beach was like visiting an old friend.  There might be some new rides or attractions, but the park had a familiar “feel”.   Geauga Lake was owned by a number of groups during its lifetime.  Differing management styles resulted in changes that made the experience of visiting the park quite different over the years.

Idora Park, which operated in Youngstown, had a life span similar to Euclid Beach, operating from 1899 to 1984.  Puritas Springs Park located on Cleveland’s west side operated a few years fewer than the Beach.  The fun times and thrill of the Cyclone delighted park goers for 60 years until its closure in 1958.

Of all the amusement parks that operated during Euclid Beach’s lifetime, Luna Park located at East 110 Street and Woodland Avenue provided the stiffest competition to the Beach.  Glitz and glamour was the keynote for all of the rides and attractions.  Luna was more of an “adult” place for Clevelander’s to enjoy with risqué side shows and alcohol available for sale.  The park opened with much fanfare in 1905 and closed its doors in 1929 the victim of the economic hard times. Euclid Beach struggled during this period of time, but was in a better position to survive because it was not impacted by Prohibition and the loss alcohol sales.

Other parks came and went so quickly that they are mere footnotes in history.  White City was located a mere one mile east of Euclid Beach on Lake Shore Boulevard.  The two parks even shared the same street car line.  Unlike Euclid Beach with its free gate, White City charged an admission fee.  The park opened in 1902 and a short five years later closed its doors forever in 1927 due to a devastating fire.

Only two amusement parks that opened their doors in the Cleveland area are still operating today.  The first season at Cedar point was in 1870.  It opened twenty five years before Euclid Beach.   Unlike all of its contemporaries, it has not only survived but thrived over the years.  A small part of Euclid Beach lives on among the myriad of roller coasters that operate there.  It is not a”high ride” but an attraction some have described as a “carousel on steroids”.  Derby Downs (formerly The Great American Racing Derby at Euclid Beach) is a classic carousel that riders can race four abreast on hand carved wooden horses.

What is often referred to as a hidden gem here in Cleveland is the Memphis Kiddie Park.  Stuart Wintner opened the five acre park in 1852 on Memphis Avenue in Brooklyn on Cleveland’s west side.  He never envisioned Memphis Kiddie Park as being in direct competition with the other much larger amusement parks in the area, but felt a children’s park would be successful.   His vision was correct.  Over the years the little park has not only survived but thrived delighting generations of Clevelanders. Like Euclid Beach there has never been a charge for admission or parking.

There is not just one reason to the question for the closure of all of these amusement parks.  The answer is multifaceted with fire, storm damage, competition, Great Depression, World Wars, Prohibition, and changing social times all playing a role.

• Avon Park-Girard, OH – (1897 – 1920s)
• Brady Lake Park-Ravenna, OH – (1891 – 1944)
• Casino Park – Toledo, OH (Dates??)
• Cedar Point, OH-(1870 – Still operating)
• Chippewa Lake, Saville, OH – (1878 – 1978)
• Cleveland Zoo Kiddie Park- Cleveland, OH-(1950’s)
• Crystal Beach Park – Vermillion, OH – (1884 – 1965)
• Crystal Lake Park – Akron, OH (Dates??)
• Euclid Beach – Cleveland, OH – (1895 – 1969)
• Forest City Park – Cleveland, OH – (1883 – mid 1920s)
• Geauga Lake – OH – (I 888 – 2007)
• Gordon Gardens-Cleveland, OH – (1922 – 1927)
• High Bridge Glens – Cuyahoga Falls, OH – (1882 – 1920s)
• Kiddie Playland-North Randall, – (1950’s)
• Idora Park-Youngstown, OH – (1899-1984)
• Johnson’s Island – Sandusky, OH – (1894 – 1897 & 1904 – 1907)
• Lake Erie Park-Toledo, OH – (1895 -1910)
• Lakeside Park -Akron, OH – (1912? – 1917)
• Lincoln Park- Rocky River, OH – (1906 – 1920’s)
• Luna Park-Cleveland, OH – (1905-1929)
• Merrimack Park – Aurora, OH (Dates??)
• Mentor Beach Playland – Mentor, OH (Dates??)
• Memphis Kiddie Park1 – Brooklyn, OH – (1952 – Still operating)
• Meyer’s Lake Park- Canton, OH – (1902 – 1974)
• Mother Goose Land – Canton, OH (Dates??)
• Old Orchard Park- between Cleveland & Akron, OH – (1927 – 1933)
• Pera’s / Erieview Park- Geneva on the Lake, OH – (1946 – 2006)
• Playland Park – Akron, OH (Dates??)
• Presque Isle – Toledo, OH (Dates??)
• Puritas Springs Park-Cleveland, OH – (1898 – 1958)
• Riverside Park- Findley, OH – (1930s – mid 1970s)
• Riverview Park-Cuyahoga Falls, OH – (1921 – 1932)
• Riverview Park – Akron, OH – (1919 – ?)
• Sandy Beach – Akron, OH (Dates??)
• Sea World Ohio – Aurora, OH – (1970-2000)
• Scenic Park – Rocky River, OH – (1900 -1906)
• Shady Lake Park – Streetsboro, OH – (1978 – 1982)
• Silver Lake Park – Akron / Cuyahoga Falls, OH – (1876 – 1917)
• Springfield Lake Park – Akron, OH – (1914 – 1920s)
• Summit Beach Park-Akron, OH – (1917 – 1958)
• Toledo Beach-Toledo, OH – (1907 – 1930 & 1962 – 1970)
• Vollmar’s Park- Bowling Green, OH – (1900- 1948 & 1963 – 2001)
• Walbridge Park-Toledo, OH- ( 1888 – late 1950s)
• White City- Cleveland, OH – (1897-1907)
• White City-Toledo, OH – (1907 – ?)
• Wildwater Kingdom – Aurora, OH – (2005-2016)
• Willow Beach Amusements – Toledo, OH – (1929 – 1947)
• Willough Beach Park – Willoughby, OH – (1907 – 1926)
• Wonderland -Toledo, OH (Dates??)
• Woodland Beach Park-Ashtabula, OH – (1884 – 1952)

By John Frato, Carousel Operations Coordinator, Cleveland History Center

What is recognized as America’s first roller coaster type ride is the Gravity Railway located in Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania.  In the 1950’s, the town’s name was officially changed to Jim Thorpe after the famous Olympic athlete. Then In 1827, the Mauch Chunk and Summit Railroad was constructed to carry coal out of the mountain mines located there down a nine mile stretch of rugged mountain area.  The rail line was not only carried coal down the mountainside, but also miners returning to their homes.  A more efficient rail line was built in 1872 and the line was purchased by the Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ) in 1874.  Seeing the commercial value of offering rides to the general public, Theodore and H.L. Mumford leased the line from the CNJ and operated the railway as a tourist attraction until the Great Depression forced their closure in 1932.  America’s first roller coaster “thrill” ride began taking on passengers in 1874 and was an immediate success.  A young talented inventor rode the ride and his life path changed. That young man’s name was LaMarcus Adna Thompson. He was born in Licking County, Ohio on March 1, 1848 and is often referred to

as “the Father of the Modern American Roller Coaster”. Throughout his lifetime, he held over thirty patents relating to roller coaster technology. The original Switchback Railway built at Coney Island in 1884 was designed by Thompson working off of another inventor’s patent that was filed in 1878. Richard Knudson called his version of a gravity roller coaster the “Inclined Plane Railway” and it is strikingly similar to Thompson’s final design. The Switchback Railway that debuted at Coney Island on June 16, 1884 holds the distinction of being the first roller coaster type ride designed and built for the purpose of amusement rather than an existing rail line converted for that purpose. The ride consisted of two sets of parallel tracks descending in opposite directions from elevated towers. To complete their round trip riders had to get out of their cars after they came to a stop and ascend a second fifty foot tower to board cars to head back. The novelty of the new ride far surpassed any problems riders had with exiting their cars, re-boarding, or climbing the second set of stairs to the top of the tower to return.  Initially riders were not seated directly in front of one another as they are on modern roller coasters, but were seated in benches parallel with the track facing outward.  Even with all of its shortcomings, the ride was immensely popular and reportedly paid for itself during its first month of operation.

The original cost for the heart pounding six mile per hour ride that lasted one minute was five cents.  Thompson’s later rides were often referred to as Scenic Railways since they gave riders a panoramic view of the landscape as they traversed the tracks from one end to the other. His later designs had elaborate backgrounds of exotic foreign locales painted along the length of the tracks. The immense popularity of the new ride led to the formation of the L. A. Thompson Scenic Railway Company that oversaw the construction of rides across the country. It should come as no surprise that when rides were first added to Euclid Beach in 1896 a LaMarcus Thompson Gravity Roller Coaster was built. The Switchback Railway at Euclid Beach had a little over one thousand feet of track. Riders climbed stairs to the top of the tower where they boarded a car that was manually pushed out of the loading platform and hopefully gravity took the passengers to the opposite end of the tracks where the other tower was located. There they would disembark and the ride operators would push the car up to the loading platform in that tower. Once they were again seated, they would be pushed out onto the track for the return trip to the first tower…a truly exhausting amount of labor for a six mile per hour trip. The ride was dismantled and removed from the Park when the Figure Eight was installed in 1904.

The big question…can you still ride a Switchback Railway today? The answer is sort of…a modern version of the ride with a lift hill opened at a small amusement park located between San Antonio and Austin Texas in the small town of Seguin in 2015.

The Famous Switchback Railway was designed by the Ohio based Gravity Group for ZDT’s Amusement Park and is the first new wooden “shuttle coaster” built anywhere in the world in more than a century. Like the old Switchback at Euclid Beach it reverses course mid-way. Unlike the ride at the Beach it retraces its way back to the loading station backwards rather than forward. The “new” Switchback begins with a sixty three foot tall lift hill rather than a friendly push by Park employees, reaches speeds up to forty five miles per hour, and ascends a sixty four foot tower before rocketing back to the station along 1,980 feet of track (actually only about 1,000 feet of track but you travel it twice). A brake run at the bottom of the lift hill along with a section of switch track allows the coaster to safely operate two trains.

In August 1905, William P. Palmer, a resident on the “Overlook” in Cleveland Heights sent a letter to Mayor Tom L. Johnson complaining about the fireworks being set off during the Feast of the Assumption in Little Italy, located just below his house.  Johnson sent the letter to his police chief, Fred Kohler.   Kohler investigated the situation and replied to Palmer, noting that nothing could be done as the fireworks were set off just beyond the city limits.  He promised, however, to work with the community to try to quiet things down.

Interestingly, Palmer was the head of American Steel and Wire in Cleveland and also would become the president of the Western Reserve Historical Society to which he left an outstanding collection of material relating to the Civil War and the abolitionist movement.

Palmer’s issue with fireworks reflected a larger concern in Cleveland and other urban areas during the early Twentieth Century.   It was not only the noise, but the danger posed by fireworks.  The “Safe and Sane Fourth of July” movement began in Cleveland in 1908.   It followed on several major local firework related disasters.  In 1903 a fireworks manufacturing company located on Orange Avenue (near today’s main Cuyahoga Community Campus) suffered a massive explosion.  It destroyed twelve buildings and resulted in three deaths.   Later a display of fireworks for sale at a local Kresge store exploded when a spark from a sparkler set fire to a flag and then the counter.   Many people were burned and five were trampled to death as shoppers fled the inferno.    That resulted in the movement to ban fireworks and, indeed, in 1908 Cleveland prohibited fireworks in the city.  It was the first community in the nation to do so.

Nevertheless, the Safe and Sane ordinance allowed for professional displays and banned powerful or dangerous devices from sale.  Local noise or nuisance ordinances also impinged on the personal use of fireworks, but busy police departments had little time to enforce the laws.  One local policeman who did enforce the ordinance ended up shooting off the confiscated fireworks in his own back yard (which was adjacent to the author’s childhood home).  The cacophony of explosions were to continue on the Fourth of July with little interruption  — and, indeed, it accelerated in the past several decades with the appearance of fireworks “wholesale” sites alongside many state highways.  The only caveat was that the buyer had to sign a paper indicating that the devices would be used outside the state.

With so many loopholes, the state has just passed a law this year allowing for the legal use of certain fireworks – provided that local ordinances do not prohibit their use, and that they be used on specific holidays, including New Year’s Eve and Day, Chinese New Year, Cinco de Mayo, Juneteenth, on and around the Fourth of July, Labor Day, and for the Hindu Festival of Diwali.

The new law reflects not only the difficulty of banning fireworks, but also our desire to celebrate heritage and history with noise, color and light – a propensity that has expanded with the growing diversity of the nation.   It’s hard to imagine what Mr. Palmer would think if he were living on Overlook Road today — the Feast of the Assumption continues, as does the Fourth of July — and on the Lunar New Year and Diwali, Case Western Reserve University joins in the celebration with professional fireworks displays that honor the heritage and holidays of many of its students.

By John J. Grabowski, Ph.D., Historian/Senior Vice President for Research and Publications, Western Reserve Historical Society

When the first edition of the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History (ECH) was published in 1987 it was a landmark publication in a number of ways.  It was the first modern encyclopedia of a city and it was the first major work to include a history of Cleveland’s LGBT community and a number of the institutions within that community.   It was a small step, but an important one.

Equally, if not more important, was the formal establishment of a program to collect archival records and publications relating to Greater Cleveland’s LGBTQ community at the Western Reserve Historical Society in 1991.  It was created in partnership with the LGBT Community Center.  Aubrey Wertheim, who at that time directed the Center, played a pivotal role in getting the archives started.

Now over thirty years after these initiatives began we can measure their growth and, indeed, their success.   The number of collections relating to the LGBTQ+ community held at WRHS has grown immensely.    In 2014, the collections were central to the creation of an exhibit at the Cleveland History Center on the local LGBTQ community which ran during the Gay Games held in Cleveland that year.  Most importantly, the collections continue to serve the needs of researchers in the WRHS Library.

At the same time the Encyclopedia also continued to grow.  A second edition was published in 1996 to honor the city’s Bicentennial, but most importantly, the ECH went online in May 1998, making it the first urban encyclopedia accessible on the World Wide Web.   Moving online also made it possible for staff to quickly update the ECH.  The number of entries relating to the LGBTQ+ community has grown thanks to a number of authors including CWRU student interns and members of the community, most particularly John Nosek and Leon Stevens.   This summer, WRHS will host a CWRU student intern, Sidney Negron, who will process and catalog archival materials from the LGBTQ+ collections and write new articles for the Encyclopedia.   It’s an ideal combination, one that brings together these two important aspects of preserving Pride in Cleveland and one which also elicits a great deal of pride among those of us who have long worked on the Encyclopedia and at WRHS.

Photo: Buildings YMCA Old Central Building 1900s, Photo courtesy of the WRHS Archives.

By John J. Grabowski, Ph.D., Historian/Senior Vice President for Research and Publications, Western Reserve Historical Society

The NBA All Star Game’s arrival in Cleveland in February provides a good reason for looking at the history of basketball – and, that history is remarkable.  Today the game is played around the world.  Its global reach is reflected in the NBA.  Currently, 39 countries are represented by 109 players.  With 30 teams and a roster limit of 15 for each team, there are 450 – so the international representation is just a bit over 24%

That’s pretty amazing for a sport that was invented in the United States by James Naismith (1861-1939) who, by the way, was born in Canada.  Many, if not most people, know the story of Naismith using a peach basket and a soccer ball to create the game.  His thirteen original rules for the game still, in most ways, echo on today’s courts although the style and speed of the game are far different from what he envisioned.  However, the place (the YMCA) where he created the game is central to the internationalization of basketball.

Educated at McGill University (where he played football, lacrosse, soccer, and rugby – and also was a gymnast) he moved to the United States in 1890 to study at the YMCA International Training School in Springfield, Massachusetts.  It was there that he invented basketball.  The impetus for its creation was the need to provide bored and boisterous young men with a vigorous indoor athletic activity during the winter months.  The first game was played on March 12, 1892.

Perhaps at this point it is important to emphasize that the YMCA is the Young Men’s Christian Association.   The YMCA movement began in the mid-1840s in London and quickly spread well beyond England.  Cleveland’s branch of the movement began in 1854.  The common thread that bound all the early Y’s together was helping the many young men coming into cities lead a good, pure Christian life and thus avoid the temptations – bars, brothels, and bad company – that characterized growing urban areas.  The Cleveland YMCA stated its purpose as to prevent “the ruin, physical and spiritual, which overtakes so large a proportion of the multitude of young men constantly arriving in our city.”

It did not take long for the organization to realize that the best way to attract young men to membership and participation was through vigorous physical activity – it built teamwork, fellowship and also burned off energies that could have been directed to the dissipations of city life.   It was the leader in the national movement known as “Muscular Christianity” which ran against older notions that physical exercise, and sport where antithetical to a good religious life.  By the 1880s “muscular Christianity’ helped power a burgeoning sports culture in the United States.  It provided a good basis for what would become gym programs in schools, it buttressed a growing collegiate sports movement, and fit neatly into the life and politics of men such as Theodore Roosevelt.

That’s why basketball’s birth was in the confines of a Christian organization.  Indeed, by the late nineteenth century, the YMCA was one of the pre-eminent sports “powers” in the United States.  It fielded its own football team, captained by Amos Alonzo Stagg.  The team was known as “Stagg’s Stubby Christians”.  Of course the Y inherited a developing football culture, but it also invented another sport – volleyball.  And as a Christian, global organization linked to a strong missionary movement the sports the “Y” created reached a wide audience.

Within a decade of basketball’s invention, it was not only being played at the YMCA but at public schools, colleges, and social settlements.   Cleveland’s Hiram House Settlement was fielding basketball teams in the early 1900s and those teams reflected the immigrant communities that Hiram House served – some teams were largely Jewish and others Italian – and their battles on the court sometimes moved out into the street.

The game also quickly attracted women and also resulted in restrictive women’s rules for many collegiate women.  Interestingly the rules were written by a woman, Senda Berenson, who oversaw the physical education program at Smith College.  Yet, women, including the multi-sport star Babe Didrikson, would play by the general rules or some other modification of them.

Basketball also moved quickly beyond Protestant Christianity.   Played in the settlement houses of New York City it became “the” game of the children of Jewish immigrants and at one time was known as the “Jewish” game.  Soon, traveling teams of adult players were attracting audiences.  Among them were the Philadelphia SPHAs (South Philadelphia Hebrew Association) which dominated the game at the exhibition, semi-pro, and pro level.   Cleveland’s first basketball “impresario” in the 1920s was Max Rosenblum who also promoted amateur baseball, soccer, football, and bowling.

Basketball’s origins were in an increasingly segregated societyand that too was reflected in the YMCA.  The first Black YMCA was established in Washington D.C. in 1853, and other branches followed.   In Cleveland, the Cedar Avenue Branch became the Black YMCA, although there was contention in the community about accepting a segregated facility.  Eventually, in 1946, the YMCA established a policy to end segregation.

It was in this and other milieus that the sport spread into the African American community.  Indeed, even in settlement houses, such as Hiram House, there were Black teams and ethnic white teams.   The sport spread throughout the playgrounds in Black areas of the cities and also in schools, which even though not “officially” segregated, became predominantly Black.  The East Tech “Scarabs” in Cleveland became one of the city’s basketball powerhouses during the 1930s.  Nationally, Black teams, such as the New York Renaissance (the“Rens”) played and beat many of the best white teams.  One of the best early basketball players to come out of Cleveland, “Wee” Willie Smith, (who started playing at Hiram House)  played for the Rens and is now a member of the NBA Hall of Fame. Professional basketball, however, remained segregated until 1950 when the NBA would break the color barrier.

It took some time for professional basketball to evolve into the “mega” sport it is today.   The real base of the game for many years was in high school, college, and company teams.  In Cleveland amateur basketball predominated until the founding of the Cavaliers, Cleveland’s first NBA team in 1970.  Prior to that, the city had fielded several pro teams, including the Rosenblums, the Allman Transfers, the Cleveland Rebels, and the Cleveland Pipers.  The Pipers made history by hiring the first Black coach in pro-basketball, John McLendon in 1962.

Yet, to focus only on the pro-game is to ignore what began at the YMCA 130 years ago.  Today, hoops abound – on urban playgrounds, in backyards, on suburban garages, and on barns in the countryside.

An estimated 450 million people participate in basketball around the globe which ranks it fifth among all sports, and its global audience ranks third with an estimated 2.2 billion fans!  Given this, it should come as no surprise that the NBA’s roster reflects the world.   So, on February 20^th, Cleveland will, in essence, host the world  — thanks in large part to the YMCA!

By Robyn Marcs, Grants Manager at the Western Reserve Historical Society

Most Clevelanders can tell you where they were when our beloved Cavaliers won the 2016 NBA Finals. For me, my family and I had just come back from a Father’s Days barbecue. My mom and I watched the final minutes of the game and then jumped around our living room hugging each other crying while my Pittsburgher father mumbled something about not being able to make fun of Cleveland not having a championship since 1964 anymore. However, forty years before the 2016 championship, there was another miracle in Cleveland.

The Cleveland Cavaliers were a new team in 1976, having only been established six years prior. The team didn’t even have a set place to play until 1974 when the Richfield Coliseum opened with the hope that its convenient location halfway between Akron and Cleveland would draw more fans. The 1976 Cavs were led by Austin Carr, Dick Snyder, Jim Chones, veteran player Nate Thurmond, and Robert “Bingo” Smith.

It’s every sports players’ dream to have a game’s final moments fall on them, and Dick Snyder was no exception. The Cavs had finally made it to the first round of the playoffs, and the seven game series was tied at 3-3 (sound familiar?) on April 29, 1976. The final seconds of the game saw the score tied at 85-85. With four seconds left, Dick Snyder made a crucial two-point basket that put the Cavs in the lead, and when the Bullets tried unsuccessfully to close the gap, the Richfield Coliseum erupted into cheers for the home team. The late Cavs announcer Joe Tait emotionally shouted, “The Cavaliers win! The Cavaliers win! 87-85!” Fans flooded the court, and even tried to tear down the baskets!

While unfortunately the Cavs fell to the Celtics in the Eastern Conference finals 3-2 after star player Jim Chones broke his ankle, the legacy of the Miracle of Richfield lives on. It was the first time that the Cleveland Cavaliers showed themselves to be more than just an expansion team, and today Bingo Smith, Austin Carr, and Nate Thurmond have had their numbers retired by the team. And forty years later the Cavs brought the championship home in one of the greatest games of the NBA Finals. It just goes to show that you can’t spell “Miracle” without “CLE.”