Dream Town – Laura Meckler

Can a group of well-intentioned people fulfill the promise of racial integration in America?

In this searing and intimate examination of the ideals and realities of racial integration, award-winning Washington Post journalist Laura Meckler tells the story of a decades-long pursuit in Shaker Heights, Ohio, and uncovers the roadblocks that have threatened progress time and again―in housing, in education, and in the promise of shared community.

In the late 1950s, Shaker Heights began groundbreaking work that would make it a national model for housing integration. And beginning in the seventies, it was known as a crown jewel in the national move to racially integrate schools. The school district built a reputation for academic excellence and diversity, serving as a model for how white and Black Americans can thrive together. Meckler―herself a product of Shaker Heights―takes a deeper look into the place that shaped her, investigating its complicated history and its ongoing challenges in order to untangle myth from truth. She confronts an enduring, and troubling, question―if Shaker Heights has worked so hard at racial equity, why does a racial academic achievement gap persist?

In telling the stories of the Shakerites who have built and lived in this community, Meckler asks: What will it take to fulfill the promise of racial integration in America? What compromises are people of all races willing to make? What does success look like, and has Shaker achieved it? The result is a complex and masterfully reported portrait of a place that, while never perfect, has achieved more than most and a road map for communities that seek to do the same.

Includes black-and-white images.

*Part of the 2023-2024 By the Book series.

Pricing Details:

Non-Member-

Purchase the book from us and get half price of 1 admission to this event and access to the virtual book presentation via code provided at checkout.

Member-

Purchase the book at 10% off from our gift shop, and get free admission to this event and virtual access to the book presentation free.

Members save 10% on all museum store purchases!

Interested in becoming a member?

9.28.23 William Krejci Lost Ghost Stories of Cleveland

10.5.23 Carlo Wolff Invisible Soul: Uncovering Cleveland’s Underground Soul Scene

1.18.24 Laura Meckler DREAM TOWN: Shaker Heights and the Quest for Racial Equity

2.22.24 Stay tuned for details!

3.23.24 Family Friendly Finale – Stay tuned for details!

*Event prices and times may vary, check specific event page for more information.

Invisible Soul – Carlo Wolff

Cover of Invisible Soul, Carlo Wolff

 

Join author Carlo Wolff in discussing Invisible Soul: Uncovering Cleveland’s Underground Soul Scene with us at the Cleveland History Center on Thursday, October 5th!

In a neighborhood of clubs, theaters and dives, Black club owners, entertainers and audiences found security and joy in the throb of some of America’s most authentic music. The scene was sweaty, smoky, and sexy. From dusk to dawn, across three decades, the streets swayed to the sound of soul. And then it was gone. Invisible Soul tells stories of a boisterous, ballsy, bawdy time when entertainers and audiences brought heart and soul to this corner of the city.

*Part of the 2023-2024 By the Book series.

Pricing Details:

Non-Member-

Purchase the book from us and get half price of 1 admission to this event and access to the virtual book presentation via code provided at checkout.

Member-

Purchase the book at 10% off from our gift shop, and get free admission to this event and virtual access to the book presentation free.

Members save 10% on all museum store purchases!

Interested in becoming a member?

9.28.23 William Krejci Lost Ghost Stories of Cleveland

10.5.23 Carlo Wolff Invisible Soul: Uncovering Cleveland’s Underground Soul Scene

1.18.24 Laura Meckler DREAM TOWN: Shaker Heights and the Quest for Racial Equity

2.22.24 Stay tuned for details!

3.23.24 Family Friendly Finale – Stay tuned for details!

*Event prices and times may vary, check specific event page for more information.

Lost Ghost Stories of Cleveland – Bill Krejci

Rediscover Cleveland’s Forgotten Hauntings!

Hiding in obscure corners and in plain sight, chilling tales from Cleveland’s paranormal past await reawakening. A tale from 1840 places the city’s first haunted house on the windswept commons south of town. Hanged murderers were said to roam the corridors of the Old County Jail, and the 1885 disinterment of the old Cleveland Medical College graveyard led to reports of nocturnal phantoms throughout the excavation. With the construction of Bulkley Boulevard in 1912, many West Side homes were demolished. Also destroyed was the entrance to what neighbors menacingly called The Cave of Apparitions.

Take a step back in time with author and investigative historian William G. Krejci on this journey through Cleveland’s long lost ghostly past.

*Part of the 2023-2024 By the Book series.

Pricing Details:

Non-Member-

Purchase the book from us and get half price of 1 admission to this event and access to the virtual book presentation via code provided at checkout.

Member-

Purchase the book at 10% off from our gift shop, and get free admission to this event and virtual access to the book presentation free.

Lost Ghost Stories of Cleveland – Order here

Members save 10% on all museum store purchases!

Interested in becoming a member?

Experience the Art of Storytelling at Cleveland History Center! Join us for our Author Series for diverse narratives delving into vibrant tales of the past.
By the Book Series at the Cleveland History Center!

9.28.23 William Krejci Lost Ghost Stories of Cleveland

10.5.23 Carlo Wolff Invisible Soul: Uncovering Cleveland’s Underground Soul Scene

1.18.24 Laura Meckler DREAM TOWN: Shaker Heights and the Quest for Racial Equity

2.22.24 Stay tuned for details!

3.23.24 Family Friendly Finale – Stay tuned for details!

*Event prices and times may vary, check specific event page for more information.

Fashion After Dark Exhibit Opening

Join us for the opening ceremony of our newest exhibit, Fashion After Dark. Enjoy drinks, hors d’oeuvres, and live music with special remarks from Patty Edmonson, Museum Advisory Council Curator of Costume & Textiles.

Event Highlights:

  • Hors d’oeuvres
  • Open Bar
  • Tour of the exhibit
  • Access to museum galleries
  • Special playing of music box

 

About the Exhibition:

Fashion After Dark explores the relationship between fashion and artificial light, beginning with the introduction of gas in Cleveland during the 1840s. This exhibition simulates the atmosphere of an evening on Euclid Avenue through fashion, interiors, lighting, and sound.

Imagine a visual feast of shimmering silks, dazzling sequins, and sparkling gemstones. In the 19th century, gaslight brought eveningwear to life in an otherworldly way. Daylight stood in such stark contrast that some shops even offered specially-lit rooms for choosing silks, and style writers recommended the best colors and fabrics for gaslight in particular. Below stairs, working people kept homes with new lighting technologies running. Each room presents a time period and a theme in order to bring the story of fashion and lighting to life.

 

 

 

By the Book Author Series | Fashioning Black Womanhood: How African Americans Influenced the Fashion Industry and Fought for Equality Copy

By the Book Author Series | Fashioning Black Womanhood: How African Americans Influenced the Fashion Industry and Fought for Equality

Date: Thurs., Oct. 7, 2021

Time: 6:00pm

Program Description

From slavery to the present day, fashion has served an important means for Black women to express their identities and to fight for racial equality. This coming panel, concurrent with the exhibition Amanda Wicker: Black Fashion Design in Cleveland, will discuss how Black women carved themselves a space as fashion experts and influencers and how the industry became an avenue to claim freedoms in Cleveland and beyond.

Speakers include Patricia Edmonson, Museum Advisory Council Curator of Costume and Textiles at WRHS, Einav Rabinovitch-Fox, a fashion historian who will discuss her new book Dressed for Freedom: The Fashionable Politics of American Feminism, and fashion designer and entrepreneur/owner of Dru Christine Fabrics & Design, Dru Thompson.

About the Presenters

Einav Rabinovitch-Fox

Dr. Einav Rabinovitch-Fox teaches American and Women’s and Gender History at Case Western Reserve University. She examines the connections between fashion, politics, and modernity, and her writing appeared both in scholarly journals and books as well as venues such as The Washington Post, PBS, and The Conversation. Her book, Dressed for Freedom: The Fashionable Politics of American Feminism explores how women used fashion to challenge race and gender identities and to promote feminist agendas in the late 20th century.

Patty Edmonson

As the Museum Advisory Council Curator of Costume & Textiles, Patty Edmonson curates a collection of over 40,000 objects that tell the stories of Cleveland and Northeast Ohio. She received an MA from the Winterthur Program in American Material Culture and has worked at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Art. Her fashion exhibitions in the Chisholm Halle Costume Wing include Political Fashion Statements (2016), Wow Factor: 150 Years of Collecting Bold Clothes (2017), Mad for Plaid (2018), Si Jolie! French Fashion in Cleveland (2019), and Amanda Wicker: Black Fashion Design in Cleveland (2021). In addition, she curated the exhibit E. Theophilus Caviness: Church Community, Cleveland, and is actively working to create a more diverse textile collection that represents all walks of life in Cleveland.

Dru Thompson

“Dru” Thompson began sewing at the age of 13. Being inspired by the likes of Byron Lars, Thierry Mugler, and Gianni Versace, she went on to pursue and obtain a degree in fashion merchandising at the University of Akron. Soon after, Dru moved to Los Angeles, serving as a stylist and costume designer. She returned to Cleveland in 2001, and after taking on various roles at major fashion retailers, she decided to forge her own path and start a fashion business, now known as Dru Christine Fabrics & Design.

Having resided in some of Cleveland’s most historical and renowned communities, Dru has developed a diverse clientele across the growing city. She also shares her expertise by hosting fashion, style, and sewing workshops in her store, teaching fashion classes at the Cleveland School of Arts, and serving as the Arts and Fashion Writer for Cool Cleveland.

Dru Thompson has established herself as a well-recognized leader in the region’s fashion industry, public speaker, educator, mentor, and a model for small business success. Dru’s passion lies in offering designs for the bold and eclectic; preserving a studio that fosters creativity, ingenuity, and inspiration; and sharing her experiences with aspiring fashion designers and entrepreneurs.

To stay updated with Dru Thompson:

Official Website: www.druchristine.com
Facebook: Dru Christine Fabrics & Design
Instagram:@druchristine
LinkedIn: Dru Thompson
Twitter: @druchristine
Wordpress: “Hustle & Sew” www.druchristine.wordpress.com


By the Book Author Series

This event is presented as part of the Cleveland History Center’s By the Book Author Series. For more information about the series, including a full list of topics, please click here.

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours | Dec. 30

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours

From early settler traditions to department store palaces, Cleveland has always embraced its holiday celebrations in a big way. This season, the Cleveland History Center invites you to explore these beloved traditions with our Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours, held weekly beginning Thurs., Nov. 18. Tour the Hay-McKinney Mansion by candlelight, then enjoy festive refreshments to ring in the holiday season before exploring our museum galleries.

General Admission: $20

WRHS Member Admission: $15

Tour Dates: Thursdays, 11/18, 12/2, 12/9, 12/16, 12/23, 12/30

Tour Times: 5:30, 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30

Limit 15 participants per time slot

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours | Dec. 23

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours

From early settler traditions to department store palaces, Cleveland has always embraced its holiday celebrations in a big way. This season, the Cleveland History Center invites you to explore these beloved traditions with our Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours, held weekly beginning Thurs., Nov. 18. Tour the Hay-McKinney Mansion by candlelight, then enjoy festive refreshments to ring in the holiday season before exploring our museum galleries.

General Admission: $20

WRHS Member Admission: $15

Tour Dates: Thursdays, 11/18, 12/2, 12/9, 12/16, 12/23, 12/30

Tour Times: 5:30, 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30

Limit 15 participants per time slot

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours | Dec. 16

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours

From early settler traditions to department store palaces, Cleveland has always embraced its holiday celebrations in a big way. This season, the Cleveland History Center invites you to explore these beloved traditions with our Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours, held weekly beginning Thurs., Nov. 18. Tour the Hay-McKinney Mansion by candlelight, then enjoy festive refreshments to ring in the holiday season before exploring our museum galleries.

General Admission: $20

WRHS Member Admission: $15

Tour Dates: Thursdays, 11/18, 12/2, 12/9, 12/16, 12/23, 12/30

Tour Times: 5:30, 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30

Limit 15 participants per time slot

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours | Dec. 9

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours

From early settler traditions to department store palaces, Cleveland has always embraced its holiday celebrations in a big way. This season, the Cleveland History Center invites you to explore these beloved traditions with our Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours, held weekly beginning Thurs., Nov. 18. Tour the Hay-McKinney Mansion by candlelight, then enjoy festive refreshments to ring in the holiday season before exploring our museum galleries.

General Admission: $20

WRHS Member Admission: $15

Tour Dates: Thursdays, 11/18, 12/2, 12/9, 12/16, 12/23, 12/30

Tour Times: 5:30, 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30

Limit 15 participants per time slot

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours | Dec. 2

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours

From early settler traditions to department store palaces, Cleveland has always embraced its holiday celebrations in a big way. This season, the Cleveland History Center invites you to explore these beloved traditions with our Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours, held weekly beginning Thurs., Nov. 18. Tour the Hay-McKinney Mansion by candlelight, then enjoy festive refreshments to ring in the holiday season before exploring our museum galleries.

General Admission: $20

WRHS Member Admission: $15

Tour Dates: Thursdays, 11/18, 12/2, 12/9, 12/16, 12/23, 12/30

Tour Times: 5:30, 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30

Limit 15 participants per time slot

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours | Nov. 18

Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours

From early settler traditions to department store palaces, Cleveland has always embraced its holiday celebrations in a big way. This season, the Cleveland History Center invites you to explore these beloved traditions with our Holidays in the Hay Candlelight Tours, held weekly beginning Thurs., Nov. 18. Tour the Hay-McKinney Mansion by candlelight, then enjoy festive refreshments to ring in the holiday season before exploring our museum galleries.

General Admission: $20

WRHS Member Admission: $15

Tour Dates: Thursdays, 11/18, 12/2, 12/9, 12/16, 12/23, 12/30

Tour Times: 5:30, 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30

Limit 15 participants per time slot

History on Tap | Haunted History

History on Tap | Haunted History

Join the Cleveland History Center for a Halloween happy hour at History on Tap | Haunted History! Delve into the dark side of Cleveland’s history as you make your way through our historic Hay-McKinney Mansion, where you’ll meet some of the most notorious figures from our city’s past. Then, explore a selection of the strangest and spookiest items from the WRHS collection in a special pop-up exhibit, Oddities from the Archives. Be sure to come in costume and enjoy our Halloween-themed photo ops! A cash bar will be available with light snacks for purchase.

In addition to these offerings, we are proud to partner with The New Moon – a witch store and more located in Lakewood, Ohio – to bring tarot card readings to our guests. Readings will be provided by:

  • Dawn Bartos, owner of The New Moon, a solitary, eclectic, energy working witch that reads tarot cards, receives and gives spirit message readings for emotional healing, is a psychic medium, and candle soot reader.
  • Melissa Dean-Pardo, 1st degree initiate of the Cabot Tradition of Witchcraft based in Salem, MA, and practicing tarot card reader for 25 years.
  • Madison O’Reilly, an experienced tarot card reader who is able to detect attachments on people and zone in on energy disruptions to guide others on their path in their daily life and connect intuitively with their needs.
  • Marleigh McVeigh, a clairvoyant medium that reads tarot and runes and enjoys focusing on clarification so that clients can move forward within their lives.

Please Note: Tarot card readings are offered at a rate of $25 per reading (cash only). Signups are required, and readings will be administered on a first come, first served basis.

Tickets

WRHS Members | $15

General Admission | $20

Combo Tickets: History on Tap & All Hale’s Eve

Purchase a combo ticket and receive admission to History on Tap | Haunted History at the Cleveland History Center AND All Hale’s Eve at Hale Farm & Village!

WRHS Members: $40

General: $50

About All Hale’s Eve 

Sat., Oct. 23 | 7:00-11:00pm

Join us for an all-out Halloween bash on the farm! Explore the eerie beauty of the farm in candlelight while enjoying music, spooky Victorian traditions, and delicious beverage and treat pairings. Costumes are encouraged! (21+ only.)

Special thanks to our partner:

By the Book Author Series | Fashioning Black Womanhood: How African Americans Influenced the Fashion Industry and Fought for Equality

By the Book Author Series | Fashioning Black Womanhood: How African Americans Influenced the Fashion Industry and Fought for Equality

Date: Thurs., Oct. 7, 2021

Time: 6:00pm

Program Description

From slavery to the present day, fashion has served an important means for Black women to express their identities and to fight for racial equality. This coming panel, concurrent with the exhibition Amanda Wicker: Black Fashion Design in Cleveland, will discuss how Black women carved themselves a space as fashion experts and influencers and how the industry became an avenue to claim freedoms in Cleveland and beyond.

Speakers include Patricia Edmonson, Museum Advisory Council Curator of Costume and Textiles at WRHS, Einav Rabinovitch-Fox, a fashion historian who will discuss her new book Dressed for Freedom: The Fashionable Politics of American Feminism, and fashion designer and entrepreneur/owner of Dru Christine Fabrics & Design, Dru Thompson.

About the Presenters

Einav Rabinovitch-Fox

Dr. Einav Rabinovitch-Fox teaches American and Women’s and Gender History at Case Western Reserve University. She examines the connections between fashion, politics, and modernity, and her writing appeared both in scholarly journals and books as well as venues such as The Washington Post, PBS, and The Conversation. Her book, Dressed for Freedom: The Fashionable Politics of American Feminism explores how women used fashion to challenge race and gender identities and to promote feminist agendas in the late 20th century.

Patty Edmonson

As the Museum Advisory Council Curator of Costume & Textiles, Patty Edmonson curates a collection of over 40,000 objects that tell the stories of Cleveland and Northeast Ohio. She received an MA from the Winterthur Program in American Material Culture and has worked at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Art. Her fashion exhibitions in the Chisholm Halle Costume Wing include Political Fashion Statements (2016), Wow Factor: 150 Years of Collecting Bold Clothes (2017), Mad for Plaid (2018), Si Jolie! French Fashion in Cleveland (2019), and Amanda Wicker: Black Fashion Design in Cleveland (2021). In addition, she curated the exhibit E. Theophilus Caviness: Church Community, Cleveland, and is actively working to create a more diverse textile collection that represents all walks of life in Cleveland.

Dru Thompson

“Dru” Thompson began sewing at the age of 13. Being inspired by the likes of Byron Lars, Thierry Mugler, and Gianni Versace, she went on to pursue and obtain a degree in fashion merchandising at the University of Akron. Soon after, Dru moved to Los Angeles, serving as a stylist and costume designer. She returned to Cleveland in 2001, and after taking on various roles at major fashion retailers, she decided to forge her own path and start a fashion business, now known as Dru Christine Fabrics & Design.

Having resided in some of Cleveland’s most historical and renowned communities, Dru has developed a diverse clientele across the growing city. She also shares her expertise by hosting fashion, style, and sewing workshops in her store, teaching fashion classes at the Cleveland School of Arts, and serving as the Arts and Fashion Writer for Cool Cleveland.

Dru Thompson has established herself as a well-recognized leader in the region’s fashion industry, public speaker, educator, mentor, and a model for small business success. Dru’s passion lies in offering designs for the bold and eclectic; preserving a studio that fosters creativity, ingenuity, and inspiration; and sharing her experiences with aspiring fashion designers and entrepreneurs.

To stay updated with Dru Thompson:

Official Website: www.druchristine.com
Facebook: Dru Christine Fabrics & Design
Instagram:@druchristine
LinkedIn: Dru Thompson
Twitter: @druchristine
Wordpress: “Hustle & Sew” www.druchristine.wordpress.com


By the Book Author Series

This event is presented as part of the Cleveland History Center’s By the Book Author Series. For more information about the series, including a full list of topics, please click here.

By the Book Author Series | Virtual Book Discussion: A Choice of Weapons

By the Book Author Series | Virtual Book Discussion: A Choice of Weapons

Date: Thurs., Nov. 18, 2021

Time: 6:00pm

Program Description

This virtual discussion will focus on several of the major themes that Gordon Parks explored in his 1966 memoir, A Choice of Weapons.  Among other things, the discussion group will consider Parks’ Kansas roots, his challenging young adult years, his early work as a pianist, his foray into professional sports, his family life, and his discovery of professional photography – the weapon that would transform his life forever.

For more information on books by and about Gordon Parks, please click HERE.

Please note that this is a virtual discussion. Participants will receive access information upon registration.

About the Presenter

Dr. Regennia N. Williams

Dr. Regennia N. Williams is the Distinguished Scholar of African American History and Culture at the Western Reserve Historical Society and President of the Northeast Ohio Chapter of the Fulbright Association.  An award-winning historian, she is also the founder, president, and director of the Center for the Study of Religion and Spirituality in the History of Africa and the Diaspora (The RASHAD Center, Inc.). This nonprofit corporation creates, supports, and promotes arts and humanities programs in the Washington, DC Metropolitan Area and in the state of Ohio through performances of Black sacred music, producing popular and scholarly publications, and conducting research for the Praying Grounds Oral History Project.  Williams has also conducted oral history research in Newport News, Virginia; Washington, DC; Ile-Ife Nigeria; Macau, China; and Free State, South Africa. Her published works include books, book chapters, and articles in scholarly journals, newspapers, and magazines, and she is the founder and editor of The Journal of Traditions & Beliefs and the Traditions & Beliefs newsletter. Her chapter on “Race, Religion, and Reconciliation: Academic Initiatives, Leadership Development, and Social Change” was published in Leadership for Change: Developing Transformational Student Leaders through Global Learning Spaces (2021).

For more information on Dr. Williams’ publications and oral history research, please click HERE.

 


By the Book Author Series

This event is presented as part of the Cleveland History Center’s By the Book Author Series. For more information about the series, including a full list of topics, please click here.

By the Book Author Series | Black Politics and Black Power in Ohio, 1837-1860

By the Book Author Series | Black Politics and Black Power in Ohio, 1837-1860

Date: Thurs., Nov. 11, 2021

Time: 6:00pm

Program Description

In the 1840s and 50s, a remarkable cadre of Black leaders built electoral and political influence within Ohio’s rapidly shifting partisan terrain. Taking advantage of state Supreme Court decisions recognizing as “Caucasian” any man claiming he was “preponderantly white,” thousands of African American men voted throughout the state by the 1850s.  A fiercely contested 1856 congressional race between Lewis Campbell and Clement Vallandigham was one of many instances where Black voters were seen as crucial, and the Republican Salmon P. Chase was repeatedly derided as a “Negro Governor” whose election depended on their support. Finally, on Election Day 1860, the New York Herald, the country’s leading newspaper, proclaimed that Congress should invalidate Lincoln’s election because of Ohio’s “fourteen thousand negro voters.” Learn more about the power of the Black vote in Ohio in a panel discussion, led by Dr. Van Gosse, Professor of History at Franklin & Marshall College; Dr. Regennia N. Williams, Distinguished Scholar of African American History & Culture at WRHS; & Dr. John Grabowski, Krieger Mueller Chief Historian at WRHS.

Note: A 30-minute Q&A session will follow the presentation.

About the Presenters

Van Gosse

Van Gosse (he/him) is a Professor of History at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He is the author of numerous articles and books on post-1945 politics and social movements, including Where the Boys Are: Cuba, Cold War America, and the Making of a New Left. More recently, he has written on African American politics in the antebellum era, including his 2021 book, The First Reconstruction: Black Politics in America, From the Revolution to the Civil War. He is also co-chair of Historians for Peace and Democracy (www.historiansforpeace.org).

Dr. Regennia N. Williams

Dr. Regennia N. Williams is the Distinguished Scholar of African American History and Culture at the Western Reserve Historical Society and President of the Northeast Ohio Chapter of the Fulbright Association.  An award-winning historian, she is also the founder, president, and director of the Center for the Study of Religion and Spirituality in the History of Africa and the Diaspora (The RASHAD Center, Inc.). This nonprofit corporation creates, supports, and promotes arts and humanities programs in the Washington, DC Metropolitan Area and in the state of Ohio through performances of Black sacred music, producing popular and scholarly publications, and conducting research for the Praying Grounds Oral History Project.  Williams has also conducted oral history research in Newport News, Virginia; Washington, DC; Ile-Ife Nigeria; Macau, China; and Free State, South Africa. Her published works include books, book chapters, and articles in scholarly journals, newspapers, and magazines, and she is the founder and editor of The Journal of Traditions & Beliefs and the Traditions & Beliefs newsletter. Her chapter on “Race, Religion, and Reconciliation: Academic Initiatives, Leadership Development, and Social Change” was published in Leadership for Change: Developing Transformational Student Leaders through Global Learning Spaces (2021).

For more information on Dr. Williams’ publications and oral history research, please click HERE.

Dr. John J. Grabowski

Dr. John J. Grabowski holds a joint position with the Historical Society and Case Western Reserve University and serves as the editor of the online edition of the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History. His areas of expertise include local, national, and global migration and immigration, sports history, Cleveland history, the development of museums and archives, and the study of historical memory and its role in shaping an understanding of the past.

 


By the Book Author Series

This event is presented as part of the Cleveland History Center’s By the Book Author Series. For more information about the series, including a full list of topics, please click here.

By the Book Author Series | Chief Thunderwater: An Unexpected Indian in Unexpected Places

By the Book Author Series | Chief Thunderwater: An Unexpected Indian in Unexpected Places

Date: Thurs., Nov. 4, 2021

Time: 6:00pm

Program Description

In his presentation, Dr. Gerald Reid will focus on his recently published book, Chief Thunderwater: An Unexpected Indian in Unexpected Places, which tells the story of Chief Thunderwater (Oghema Niagara), a Cleveland-based Indigenous activist who played a vital role in the political revitalization of Hodinöhsö:ni´(Haudenosaunee/Iroquois/Six Nations) communities in Canada in the early twentieth century. He will discuss the development of his interest in Thunderwater’s story, present a synopsis of Thunderwater’s life, and offer a consideration of his political influence and legacy. Reid will highlight the importance of the CHC/WRHS collections for understanding and telling the Thunderwater story.

About the Presenter

Gerald Reid is Professor of Anthropology and Sociology at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut. His scholarly interest focuses on cultural and political development and revitalization among the Hodinöhsö:ni´ (Haudenosaunee/Iroquois/Six Nations) in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. His published work includes Chief Thunderwater: An Unexpected Indian in Unexpected Places (University of Oklahoma Press, 2021), “’To Renew Our Fire’: Political Activism, Nationalism, and Identity in Three Rotinonhsionni Communities” (in Tribal Worlds: Critical Studies in American Indian Nation Building, State University of New York Press, 2013), and “Illegal Alien? The Immigration Case of Mohawk Ironworker Paul K. Diabo” (American Philosophical Society Proceedings, Volume 151, No. 1, 2007).


By the Book Author Series

This event is presented as part of the Cleveland History Center’s By the Book Author Series. For more information about the series, including a full list of topics, please click here.

History on Tap | Euclid Beach Park

History on Tap | Euclid Beach Park

Join us on July 29 as we celebrate Euclid Beach Park with our History on Tap after-hours series. Enjoy special pop-up exhibits, food and drinks, and unlimited rides on the Euclid Beach Park Grand Carousel as you explore our museum galleries to learn more about the history of this beloved amusement park. Whether you want to relive your memories of the park or make new ones with your friends and family, this evening promises summer fun that you will never forget!

Including:

Behind-the-scenes demonstrations

Pop-up exhibits

Cash bar

Unlimited rides on the Euclid Beach Park Grand Carousel

Access to all Cleveland History Center museum galleries

And more!

This program is included with your museum admission. To purchase tickets, please click here.

The Consequences of Cleaveland

by John Grabowski, PhD | WRHS Krieger Mueller Historian

On July 4th 1796, on the bank of what is now Conneaut Creek, a group of surveyors led by Moses Cleaveland celebrated Independence Day.  Naming the site Port Independence, they fired off a salute, ate a meal of pork and beans, and drank to six patriotic toasts.   Eighteen days later they arrived at the mouth of Cuyahoga River, climbing up a hill on the east bank (near what is now St. Clair Avenue) to the heights over the river valley.

The river marked the boundary of that part of the Western Reserve to which Native Americans had ceded their claims in the Greenville Treaty of 1795, and it seemed a likely area to begin the exploration and mapping out of the lands now “available” to settlement.  Yet it took several weeks for Moses Cleaveland to decide if the site would serve as the center for the survey party’s work, and what some might call the capital of the Western Reserve.  He made that decision in August.  It was the best possible choice and considered naming the settlement Cuyahoga, but his colleagues convinced him that it should take his name.

This is a quick and far too easy summary of the founding of Cleveland for it misses the broader impact of the event.   When Cleaveland’s surveying crew began to lay out the lines that would define the townships of the Western Reserve, they were imposing a change on the landscape that exceeded anything that had come before.

(Map of English Colonies Bordering on Ohio River 1754)

Moses Cleaveland did not come to an unsettled or unknown land.   The area had seen nearly ten thousand years of human habitation, some nomadic and some permanent.   The Native Americans who were the first settlers made only minor marks on a landscape that had been shaped by geology and time.  They created trails, riverside settlements, and burial mounds.   The mounds were already ancient by the time Cleaveland arrived, yet they signified a deeper history than that which some people commonly assume.

Nor was Cleaveland’s survey party the first “European” group to visit the general area.  Indeed existing maps and narratives helped lead Cleaveland to the site that would bear his name.   French and English trappers had been active in the area – meeting European demands for fur by working with the native population.  And, this activity would have an impact on the ecology of the region reducing species beyond their normal, usual “take.”   The French and British would also begin to map the area, placing their own lines on the landscape in order to claim ownership, and they would go to battle over the trans-Appalachian west and in doing so involve the natives as allies and combatants.  These alliances and new ones would echo in the backcountry beyond the colonies during the American Revolution.

That process was a lead up to what Cleaveland’s surveyors would do.  They would set in motion a more detailed survey and division that would forever transform the land – according to some, for the better, and for others, perhaps, for the worse.

Certainly the New England style town commons, now Public Square, that they laid out in their first maps, indicates their desire to recreate a community like those they knew in New England.  Yet, it is important to remember that Cleaveland was a member of and working for the Connecticut Land Company, what we would today call a “real estate” investment company.  Its interest was in dividing and assessing the land for settlement and profiting by its subsequent sale.  Neither Cleaveland nor most of the other investors had any interest in settling in the area. In many ways this process still resonates today when open land or existing structures are developed or re-developed by companies whose primary interest is in profit.

(Early Drawing of Downtown Cleveland by surveyor Seth Pease)

It would take time, but in the short space of two centuries, indeed, in a mere single century, the lines Cleaveland’s survey team drew on the map of Northeastern Ohio (the Connecticut Western Reserve) to make the land logically marketable would provide the basis for the transformation of a landscape that had seemed eternal to its first inhabitants – a landscape that was heavily wooded, with a number of open streams and creeks, and with abundant wildlife.    It is a landscape that we simply cannot fathom today, except in some parks and rare corners of northeastern Ohio.

It is a story of a transformation that is well chronicled in the archival collections of the Western Reserve Historical Society in documents that provide valuable insights into the settlement of northeastern Ohio and, in some instances, which also record the thoughts of those who saw the eternal slip away.

Perhaps one of most powerful of these documents is in a very small notebook, in which John M. Holley, a member of the Cleaveland survey team, wrote down the words spoken by Red Jacket, an orator of the Six Nations and a sachem of the Senecas at a council between Cleaveland’s party and Native Americans which took place at Buffalo, New York on June 23, 1796.  The meeting was in order to resolve the issue of remaining Native American claims to the Western Reserve.

“You white people make a great parade about religion, you say you have a book of laws and rules which was given you by the Great Spirit, but is this true? Was it written by his own hand and given to you? No, says he, it was written by your own people. They do it to deceive you. Their whole wishes center here (pointing to his pocket), all they want is the money. . . He says white people tell them, they wish to come and live among them as brothers, and learn them agriculture. So they bring on implements of husbandry and presents, tell them good stories, and all appears honest. But when they are gone all appears as a dream. Our land is taken from us, and still we don’t know how to farm it.”

Red Jacket, who had received a peace medal from President Washington in 1792 would gain great fame as an orator.  His lifetime (1750-1830) witnessed enormous change: wars, a revolution, and the division and loss of the lands he and his ancestors had known for ages.  His words and his story prompt us to think not only about our past, as we celebrate the founding of Cleveland in July, but also about our future and the role we continue to play in altering the natural landscape.

Common Ground | The Voice of the Vote: The Shared Power of Cleveland’s Voters

The Western Reserve Historical Society is proud to once again be a part of Common Ground, the Cleveland Foundation’s community-wide initiative to inspire connection, build community, and create positive change. This year, we will be exploring the theme of People, Place, and Shared Power through two of our exhibits at the Cleveland History Center, Women & Politics and Carl & Louis Stokes: Making History.

On June 5, join our experts as we dive into these exhibits to discover how citizens of Cleveland have exercised their power to effect change on individual, local, and national levels. After the tour, participants will break into groups to answer thought-provoking discussion questions based on the exhibits. Finally, the groups will come back together to share what they have learned and explore how the lessons of People, Place, and Shared Power can be used to make changes within their community.

Registration for this event is free but required. This event will be held both in-person at the Cleveland History Center and virtually through Zoom. Due to current COVID-19 restrictions, in-person tickets are limited, but there is no limit on virtual participants.

History on Tap: PRIDE

History on Tap: PRIDE

In celebration of Pride Month, the Cleveland History Center is shining the spotlight on Cleveland’s LGBTQ+ history with History on Tap: PRIDE. Join us at the Cleveland History Center on June 24 for a historic happy hour celebrating Cleveland’s LGBTQ+ community, from its origins to the modern day.

The event will open with a brief presentation from our Cleveland history experts, followed by a networking opportunity designed to connect participants with the LGBTQ+ organizations within the community. Then, join us in the garden of our Bingham-Hanna Mansion to enjoy live music by the Dane Vannatter Trio, and explore our museum galleries, including our newest exhibit, Women & Politics, to learn about the LGBTQ+ trailblazers represented in the WRHS collection. A cash bar will be available (beer and wine only), and light refreshments will be offered for purchase.

Schedule of Events

5:30-5:45pm | PRESENTATION: Lucius and Chuck – Visible “Partners”?

Presenter: Dr. John Grabowski, Krieger Mueller Chief Historian

From the 1930s to the 1960s, Lucius Morris Beebe was an American celebrity.  Born into wealth, he became a syndicated columnist, author, gourmet, and ostentatious boulevardier who chronicled Café Society, the American West, and, most famously, railroads. But Beebe was also a member of America’s rather open wealthy gay society. He and his partner, Charles Clegg, lived, loved, and worked together for twenty-six years.  Their relationship ended only with Beebe’s death.

This presentation focuses on the story of “Luke” and “Chuck” but also explores the wider upper class gay society in which they lived – an interconnected community that included Cole Porter, Monty Wooley, and, importantly, several Clevelanders, including Jerome Zerbe, Leonard Hanna, Jr., and Winsor French.

5:45-6:00pm | PRESENTATION: Cleveland is So Gay!

Presenter: Ken Schneck, author of LGBTQ Cleveland and editor of The Buckeye Flame

Cleveland’s LGBTQ+ history exhibits the classic components of a Hollywood blockbuster: heroes, villains, epic crowd scenes, meet-cutes, and a soundtrack to end all soundtracks. We’ll take a quick tour through some images ranging from inspiring 19-year-olds to nefarious state senators to how a blade of grass almost caused the arrest of a cadre of protestors. And we’ll learn a heck of a lot about our LGBTQ+ Pride in the process!

6:00-6:30pm | Networking

Organizations Present: Plexus LGBT & Allied Chamber of Commerce; West 117 Foundation; The Buckeye Flame; PFLAG Cleveland; Western Reserve Historical Society LGBT Archives

6:30-8:00pm | Entertainment

Live music from the Dane Vannatter Trio

Cash bar

Museum galleries open

Pop-up exhibits

Admission

Event Admission: $25

WRHS Member Admission: $20

Includes admission to the Cleveland History Center as well as event admission.

To purchase your tickets, please click here.

Special Thanks to Our Partners