Black Toledo: A Documentary History of the African American Experience in Toledo, Ohio 9789004281899, 9789004281882, 9004281894

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Black Toledo

Studies in Critical Social Sciences Series Editor David Fasenfest (Wayne State University) Editorial Board Eduardo Bonilla-Silva (Duke University) Chris Chase-Dunn (University of California-Riverside) William Carroll (University of Victoria) Raewyn Connell (University of Sydney) Kimberlé W. Crenshaw (University of California, la, and Columbia University) Heidi Gottfried (Wayne State University) Karin Gottschall (University of Bremen) Mary Romero (Arizona State University) Alfredo Saad-Filho (University of London) Chizuko Ueno (University of Tokyo) Sylvia Walby (Lancaster University)

VOLUME 117

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/scss

Black Toledo A Documentary History of the African American Experience in Toledo, Ohio

Edited by

Abdul Alkalimat Rubin Patterson

LEIDEN | BOSTON

Cover illustration: As shown clockwise starting at the top left: Art Tatum (from the William P. Gottlieb collection at the Library of Congress, public domain), Ella Stewart (© Toledo Blade (1983)), Wilbert “Skeeter” McClure (© The Blade (2015)), Stagecoach Mary (Mary Fields, author unknown, public domain). Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Alkalimat, Abdul, editor. | Patterson, Rubin, editor. Title: Black Toledo : a documentary history of the African American experience in Toledo, Ohio / edited by Abdul Alkalimat, Rubin Patterson. Description: Leiden ; Boston : Brill, 2018. | Series: Studies in critical social sciences, ISSN 1573-4234 ; volume 117 | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2017037826 (print) | LCCN 2017039146 (ebook) | ISBN 9789004281899 (E-book) | ISBN 9789004281882 (hardback : alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: African Americans--Ohio--Toledo--History--Sources. | African Americans--Ohio--Toledo--Social conditions--Sources. | Toledo (Ohio)--Race relations. | Toledo (Ohio)--History. Classification: LCC F499.T6 (ebook) | LCC F499.T6 B55 2018 (print) | DDC 305.896/073077113--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017037826

Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: “Brill”. See and download: brill.com/brill-typeface. issn 1573-4234 isbn 978-90-04-28188-2 (hardback) isbn 978-90-04-28189-9 (e-book) Copyright 2018 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill nv incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Hes & De Graaf, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Rodopi, Brill Sense and Hotei Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill nv provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, ma 01923, usa. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.

My dedication is to eight women of Black Toledo because their friendship served as a major motivational force for my work on this book: Odessa Lynch, Connie Howard, Deborah Hamilton, Renee’ Dunnavant, Pauline Kynard, Gwen Briggs, Judy Jones and Thelma Williams. Abdul Alkalimat

…

I dedicate this book to my lovely wife, Glenda, who passed away on ­October 8, 2017. When we boarded the Amtrak to Toledo in 1992, with only a few bags, we had no plans to remain there for more than twenty years. In Toledo, while I was starting a new career as an academic at the ­University of Toledo in the Sociology and Anthropology Department, Glenda secured a part-time position teaching several anthropology courses in the same Department. She did graduate work in medical and biological anthropology at Howard University and at Wayne State University. For over twenty years, collectively, she worked in the area of community health at Detroit’s Karmanos Cancer Institute and at the University of Michigan’s Medical School. A community-oriented person through and through, Glenda worked tirelessly to improve the health of members of black and under-resourced communities. For African American females from working-class backgrounds, a Glenda Sneed Fellowship in medical sociology will be established at Howard University and a Glenda Sneed Scholarship in health and environment will be established at her alma mater, Carter High School in Dallas. Our love for our professional work, which sought to make a difference in other people’s lives, was only eclipsed by our love for one another and our dedication to one another’s happiness. I miss my sweetie dearly. Rubin Patterson

∵

Contents Foreword XIII Nikki M. Taylor Acknowledgements XV List of Illustrations XVI 1 Introduction 1 Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson 1.1 Three Key Theoretical Issues 2 1.2 How This Book Is Organized 4 1.3 How This Book May Be Used 6 2 Origin (1787–1900) 7 Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson 2.1 Founding Documents (Documents 1–5) 7 2.1.1 The First Law: The Northwest Ordinance (1787) 10 2.1.2 The Second Law: Ohio Black Laws (1804) 11 2.1.3 13th Amendment to the u.s. Constitution (1865) 13 2.1.4 Reconstruction: Civil Rights Act (1875) 13 2.1.5 Supreme Court Overturns Civil Rights Act (1883) 14 2.2 Dialectics of Settlement (Documents 6–14) 15 2.2.1 Underground Railroad in Toledo 16 2.2.2 Taking Boats to Freedom in Canada 16 2.2.3 Elijah Anderson: General Superintendent of the Underground Railroad in Northwest Ohio 17 2.2.4 Lathrop House (1835–2005) 18 2.2.5 James Ashley’s Eyewitness Account of the Hanging of John Brown (1859) 19 2.2.6 The Toledo Riot of 1862 25 2.2.7 Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth Speak in Toledo (1864) 28 2.2.8 The Blade, the Black Man, and the Vote (1867) 29 2.2.9 Toledo School Desegregation (1871) 40

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2.3 Emergence of a Community Vanguard (Documents 15–18) 41 2.3.1 Founding of Warren ame Church (1864) 42 2.3.2 Prince Hall Freemasonry in Toledo (1864) 44 2.3.3 Moses Fleetwood Walker (1857–1919) 49 2.3.4 Stagecoach Mary (1832–1914) 52 3 Formation of Community Life (1900–1950) 55 Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson 3.1 Economics of Survival (Documents 19–27) 56 3.1.1 Toledo’s Black Labor Force (1890–1910) 57 3.1.2 Black Population Growth 1910–1930 60 3.1.3 Industrial Status of Employment 1936 63 3.1.4 Neighborhood Segregation 64 3.1.5 Black Access to Housing (1940–1950) 65 3.1.6 Toledo’s Black Middle Class (1926) 70 3.1.7 Toledo’s Black Middle Class (1936) 71 3.1.8 The Pinewood Avenue District (1929) 73 3.1.9 East Toledo 77 3.2 Cultural Capital (Documents 28–31) 78 3.2.1 Paul Laurence Dunbar Reads in Toledo (1900) 78 3.2.2 Art Tatum Performs in Toledo 81 3.2.3 The Depression 83 3.2.4 The Culture of Black Baseball 85 3.3 Organization and Leadership (Documents 32–42) 90 3.3.1 The Frederick Douglass Community Center 90 3.3.2 Interracial Activities in Toledo (1922) 95 3.3.3 Club Life in Toledo (1900–1920) 97 3.3.4 Henrietta Society (1883–present) 98 3.3.5 Fighting the Toledo Klu Klux Klan (1915–1944) 101 3.3.6 Housing and Racial Violence (1929) 102 3.3.7 Blacks in Toledo Schools (1927) 104 3.3.8 J.B. Simmons: Toledo’s First Black Councilman 105 3.3.9 James Slater Gibson: A Lawyer Who Pursued Social Justice 110 3.3.10 Cornelius Edwoods: Publisher of The Observer Newspaper (1920s) 115 3.3.11 Frances Alexander Belcher (1912–1963) 117 4 Community Development and Struggle (1950–2000) 119 Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson

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4.1 Community and Consciousness (Documents 43–48) 121 4.1.1 Dorr Street: Toledo’s Black Downtown 121 4.1.2 A Report on Black Life in Toledo (1950s) 124 4.1.3 When the Projects Were New: Brand Whitlock (1940s–1950s) 130 4.1.4 The Late 60s: Black Pain and Gain 135 4.1.5 House of Day Funeral Service 138 4.1.6 Henry’s Jeweler & Giftware 138 4.2 Culture and Education (Documents 49–69) 138 4.2.1 The Study Hour Club 140 4.2.2 Shops Promoted Afro-Culture (1968) 143 4.2.3 Rev. Al Reed Opens Negro History Book Store (1970) 144 4.2.4 Hines Farm Blues Club 145 4.2.5 Art Tatum and Toledo’s Popular Culture in the Twenties 149 4.2.6 Jon Hendricks First Begins Singing in Toledo 150 4.2.7 Murphy’s Place 151 4.2.8 wxts: Radio Jazz from High School 155 4.2.9 Tension at Scott after Negro Homecoming Queen Elected (1957) 156 4.2.10 The Declaration of the ut Black Student Union (1970) 158 4.2.11 Hiring Blacks at tu (1986) 159 4.2.12 Flute Rice: First Black Principal of Scott High School (1968) 160 4.2.13 Afro Ball Celebrates Heritage (1981-present) 161 4.2.14 Crystal Ellis Named First African American Superintendent of Toledo Schools 163 4.2.15 Wilbert “Skeeter” McClure 165 4.2.16 Chuck Ealey 168 4.2.17 Black Leadership: Sycophants and Taunters 169 4.2.18 Blacks at ut Protest “Injustice” 172 4.2.19 ut President Meets with Black Students (1994) 175 4.2.20 Jeff Johnson, Black Student Leader at ut (1994) 177 4.2.21 Abdul Alkalimat Appointed Head of Africana Studies at ut 178 4.3 Leadership and Vision (Documents 70–79) 180 4.3.1 Ardella Law Reed (1918–1989) 180 4.3.2 Ella P. Stewart (1893–1987) 183 4.3.3 Robert V. Franklin, Jr.: Leader in Law and Society 188 4.3.4 Civic Leader Cordelia Martin 189 4.3.5 Wayman Palmer 190 4.3.6 Black Panthers Patrol Dorr Street 192 4.3.7 Local Black Leaders Hail King Holiday (1983) 193

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4.3.8 Jimmy Jackson, Sports Hero and Businessman 194 4.3.9 Social Cyberpower in the Everyday Life of an African American Community (2004) 196 4.3.10 Powell’s Beauty & Barber Supplies 202 5 Survival during Deindustrialization (2000–2016) 203 Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson 5.1 Facing Poverty and Twenty-first-century Racism (Documents 80–83) 207 5.1.1 Population 208 5.1.2 Nazi March 214 5.1.3 Black Males 217 5.1.4 The Importance of Black Business 218 5.2 The Challenges of Black Leadership (Documents 84–90) 220 5.2.1 Jack Ford 220 5.2.2 Michael Bell 224 5.2.3 Paula Hicks-Hudson 226 5.2.4 Edna Brown 227 5.2.5 Coalition of Black Trade Unionists 228 5.2.6 Top Toledoans of 2009 229 5.2.7 Black Women Physicians and Dentists 242 5.3 Diverse Black Education Leaders and Activities (Documents 91–100) 245 5.3.1 Ella P. Stewart Academy 245 5.3.2 Romules Durant, School Superintendent 248 5.3.3 Helen Cooks and Toledo Excel 249 5.3.4 Simmie Blakney: First Black Department Chair at the University of Toledo 251 5.3.5 Pauline Kynard 252 5.3.6 Angela Siner 256 5.3.7 Green Column and Green Africana Studies 257 5.3.8 Edwina Kofi-Opata and Green Africana Studies 260 5.3.9 Improving African American Male Graduation Rates: Eliminating the Black–White Graduation Gap 262 5.3.10 Retention and Graduation Taskforce: Diversifying Student Retention and Academic Success 268 5.4 Revitalization of Community (Documents 101–110) 269 5.4.1 Restoring the Afro-Ball 270 5.4.2 Steppin in Toledo 272

Contents

5.4.3 Steel Guitar Sacred Music 273 5.4.4 Charles Welch 274 5.4.5 African American Festival 277 5.4.6 Toledo Horsemen Club 278 5.4.7 History of the African American Legacy Project 278 5.4.8 Black Lives Matter Resolution 279 5.4.9 Name Change at Scott High School 279 5.4.10 Art Tatum African American Resource Center 281 5.4.11 Fletcher Word 285 5.4.12 James Cooks 285 6 Black Toledo: The Historical Impulse toward Social Justice 286 Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson 6.1 Theoretical Reflection 286 6.2 Historical Periodization and Social Transformation 286 6.3 Dialectics of Urbanization and Proletarianization 288 6.4 Dialectics of Inequality and Democracy 289 6.5 Culture and Social Solidarity 290 6.6 Memory and Community Sustainability 291 6.7 Situating Black Toledo vis-à-vis Other Books on Urban Black Experiences 291 Available African American Materials 297 Donna Christian Bibliography 306 Index 312

xi

Foreword Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson have produced the book that I never had the courage to write—one about my hometown, Toledo, Ohio. Toledo— “Glass City,” “T-town,” “Frog town,” “Baby Detroit,” or more recently, “Mud City,” to natives—is a gritty, working-class small city in Northwestern Ohio. It was founded in the Great Black Swamp in an area originally controlled by the Odawa (Ottawa) peoples. Several groups of subsequent outsiders have made Toledo their home over the centuries, starting with white Americans, fugitive slaves, Irish and Polish immigrants, southern blacks, and more recently, Mexicans and other Latin Americans. Yet, despite the ancestral diversity of Toledo’s residents, its primary identity remains one of a white, working-class, industrial city. The intersection of whiteness and class that defines Toledo’s identity gave birth to a particularly intractable form of racism that proved and still proves to be immobilizing and inescapable to the vast majority of the city’s African Americans. These editors document this racism, as well as the resolve of black Toledoans to fortify their roots, organize, and resist. Although African Americans settled in the city from its earliest days, the Great Migration of the 20th century radically changed the black community and the larger Toledo population. As Alkalimat and Patterson indicate, Toledo resides at the nexus of the ghettoization and proletarianization of those southern migrants. My own ancestors, landowning farmers from Macon, Georgia who migrated to Toledo and Detroit in the 1920s and 1930s, were subject to the forces of both. Like other southern migrants, they secured low level factory jobs—often as janitors—in the smaller, subsidiary automobile factories. Eventually, they were allowed to work in the main plants and join unions, which provided job stability and better wages. Those African Americans fortunate enough to have factory jobs in Toledo—even low status ones—comprised the foundation of the city’s black middle-class. As a testament to how much of a working-class city Toledo was, several generations of African Americans aspired not to go to college, but to work at an automobile plant. Others with different aspirations found the city too stifling and white-collar opportunities too elusive, and migrated out. They number among the black “brain drain” that has disproportionately taken Toledo’s home-grown talent and commitment to other cities. Black Toledo’s greatest legacies are in the areas of music, art, literature, and sports. Musicians Art Tatum, Rance Allen, Stanley Cowell, Lyfe Jennings, Shirley Murdock, and Anita Baker; athletes Jim Jackson, Kelvin Ransey, DeShone Kizer, and Robert Easter Jr.; authors Mari Evans and Mildred Taylor, and

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Foreword

j­ournalist Zuri Hall are all Toledoans who rose to the tops of their respective fields. What they have in common is a gutsy spirit that was born in the heart of black neighborhoods on streets like Milburn, Indiana, Pinewood, Tecumseh, Collingwood, Dorr, and Maplewood and in churches like Warren A.M.E, Third Baptist Church, and First Church of God. They carried that undeniable Toledo grit into the larger universe. In recent decades, the economic opportunities that once abounded in Toledo for African Americans are no more. Boarded-up factories dot the landscape; potholes pit up the side streets; the downtown leaves no hints of the booming business center full of international headquarters it once was; the population is declining by the tens of thousands each decade. Toledo has become a Rust Town. Yet, what remains is the resilience of spirit of a people who refused to be silenced, excluded, discounted, or denied their due. Black Toledoans are, today, as hard-working, determined, gritty, and resourceful as they once were, illustrating that their factory jobs are only what they did, and not who they were. Black Toledo reminds us all that it is impossible to truly appreciate the black, urban, and industrial working-class experience without understanding the history of African Americans in a city like this one. Nikki M. Taylor, PhD Howard University Washington, dc July 2017

Acknowledgements This volume has been the result of the collective efforts of many people and their institutional homes. The four most important institutions have been the Local History Department of the Lucas County Main Library, the Archive of the University of Toledo Library, and the archive and library of the Toledo Blade and The Sojourner Truth newspapers. Articles in this volume from © Blade are reproduced with permission, as are the articles from The Sojourner Truth. These institutions have been the caretakers of the relevant historical documents used in reconstructing the historical experiences of Black Toledo. There have been many students whose research assignments on the local community also serve to provide useful information for this project. Some of them include Brian Zelip, Michelene McGreevy, Deborah Hamilton, Renee Dunnavant, Jarvia Walker, Rahul Thadani, Pauline Kynard, Sarah Hague, Rosalyn Adams-Smith, Ammar Muflah, and Nomathema Sibanda. There were also faculty colleagues at the University of Toledo whose work linked to this project and who contributed to our mutual interest in local history and telling stories of importance that have been ignored in mainstream narratives. In the History Department, we especially benefitted from the work of Peter Linebaugh and Tim Messer-Kruse. In the Sociology and Anthropology Department, we benefitted from ongoing social historical conversations with Seamus Metress, Patrick McGuire, Angela Siner, and Randy Stocker. And in English, we acknowledge Samir Abu-Absi. Diamond Crumby, Dana McCalla, and Cindia Fouda, students in the Department of Sociology and Criminology at Howard University, made helpful contributions for which we are grateful. We want to also give Angela Siner a special mention as she followed us as Director of the Africana Studies Program and provided essential support for this project. It is in her hands that this book will live as part of the curriculum.

List of Illustrations Figures 1 Social cohesion and social disruption 287 2 Overlapping race and class relationships 289

Tables 1 Black population of Toledo 4 2 Industrial employment, 1936 63

chapter 1

Introduction Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson The city of Toledo, Ohio, is in the heartland of the United States. Driving ­interstate highway 75 between north and south or 90 between east and west, travelers are likely to speed through Toledo, Ohio. Considering three popular ­destinations, especially for African Americans, Toledo is one hour south of ­Detroit, two hours west of Cleveland, and four hours east of Chicago. According to the United States Census Bureau, Toledo is a city of over 280,000 people and a metropolitan statistical area of over 600,000. The 2010 census figures based on racial categories indicate that the city was 27.2% African American and 7.4% Latino. In a more recent census population survey, figures show that the median household income in Toledo was $34,003, but $51,939 in the usa, which was 38% more than in Toledo, with a full 27% of the Toledo population living below the official government poverty level. M ­ etropolitan Toledo is home to several manufacturers, among them Dana (auto components), First Solar (solar panels), gm Powertrain (auto engines and more), Jeep (FiatChrysler’s two auto plants), Libbey Inc. (glassware), O ­ wens-Corning (insulation and roofing), Owens-Illinois (glass containers), and Pilkington (auto and other plate glass). In Toledo there are global capitalist and workers, but also poor people being left out of the emerging high-tech economy, many of whom are African Americans whose communities have continued to evolve over the many ­decades since the 1800s. The content of this book explores the experiences of black Toledoans during their struggle to build a sustainable, viable community. The structure of this book is inspired by the works of Carter G. Woodson and Herbert Aptheker. Both of these scholars collected and published anthologies of historical documents in order to reveal not only exceptions to the general narrative of ­American society, but more particularly the agency and collective process of African Americans constructing their own social reality. Woodson and Aptheker each assembled multiple collections of documents, with each document serving as a dot on the historical canvas, and by connecting them to each other enabled African Americans to reconstruct and remember their unique experiences. It is in this spirit that our collection of documents has been published for you the readers to connect the dots and reconstruct the African American experience in Toledo over a specific historical time and thus gain an ­understanding of the complicated black experience in Toledo. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi 10.1163/9789004281899_002

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This volume also relies on the earlier historical work of Leroy Williams and Edrene Cole. Dr. Williams titled his 1977 doctoral dissertation at the University of Toledo “Black Toledo: African Americans in Toledo, Ohio, 1890–1930”; it is a wonderful historical text that deserves to be published. Edrene Cole wrote her 1972 master’s thesis, “Black in Toledo: A Resource Unit for Elementary Teachers,” on the African American experience in Toledo. With her husband Eddie Cole, a local political leader, she developed many historical analyses covering such wide topics as the origin and history of the Toledo chapter of the naacp, the role of whites as Underground Railroad conductors in Toledo, and other ­aspects of the social organizational life of the African American community. Any research on the African American experience in Toledo has rich sources to draw from. These include the periodical Northwest Ohio History, the library of the Toledo Blade, the local-history section of the Lucas County Library, the Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections at the University of Toledo Library, The African American Legacy Project, Toledo’s Attic, and the Art Tatum African American Resource Center, located at the Kent Branch of the Toledo Lucas County Public Library. These sources have preserved original manuscripts that contain many more documents than those we have selected for this volume. This work could not have been completed without the help of the staff of these organizations. The construction of local history of the African American community is part of the mission of an African American Studies program. The key slogan of Africana Studies, based on the collective decision of the National Council for black Studies, is academic excellence and social responsibility. Each academic program, therefore, is required to have a relationship with its local community, both for community engagement projects and for scholarly research. 1.1

Three Key Theoretical Issues

We are concerned with general themes and issues around which we can discuss the meaning of the African American urban experience, particularly here in Toledo, Ohio. While we have included research material with a focus on general trends, we have also placed an emphasis on individuals, organizations, institutions, and events. The details of the black experience are often ignored and fall into silence. We want these events of black Toledo to be remembered. We have constructed this volume based on broad considerations of three key theoretical issues: periodization, perspective, and policy. With regard to periodization, we have selected research literature that contrasts ghettoization and proletarianization. It is clear that when African

Introduction

3

­Americans migrated from the rural agricultural South, they moved into the urban industrial North. In other words, both processes were at play: the aggregation of African Americans into racially segregated urban spaces was producing the urban inner city ghetto, while at the same time black labor leaving the cotton plantation was being transformed by the factory and the economic and social relations were being shaped by the factory system. Both ghettoization and proletarianization represent social forces that shaped and gave meaning to the African American experience. There is the ecology of residence, or the spatial parameters of racism and how these impact social and cultural life, while concurrently there are class relations of production that place workers in relationship to the entire global production process. Periodization from the rural to the urban and within the urban from the industrial to the high-tech economy is therefore one of our key points in Stage One of the development of Toledo’s black community. With regard to perspective, the main contradiction is between the leadership and the experience of the broad masses of people: in other words, elites and grassroots. It is important in any city to take note of key individuals who in some way represent their own individual characteristics, but at the same time embody a collective identity. The greatest forces of leadership define experience for the entire community, while simultaneously organizations and community-wide events help to anchor the historical experience as the shared collectivity of the entire community. Policy, our third focus, represents the positions taken on key issues ­describing solutions to problems. The more concrete and specific policy is ­political, versus the more general and abstract policy that is ideological. In every ­instance there are expressions of community identity related to very specific issues and at the same time there are manifestos and ­documents of vision from individuals and groups that are very much a part of the ­community-wide mix. These theoretical concerns guided the selection of documents. Toledo has been a working-class town for most African Americans (and everybody else, for that matter). There has always been the brutal institutionalized violence of racism, and the de facto patterns of segregation and discrimination. But Toledo has also been a town where black people have expressed greatness in the ­accomplishments of individuals as well as in our collective affirmations regarding the traditions of our music, our churches, our social styles, and our militant desire to be free. Black Toledo has the right to be proud. Nevertheless, all of this history is merely a prelude to the future. The lessons of the past are really u ­ seful only when they help us envision and fight for a better future—a future that every person in every community will find worth living.

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How This Book Is Organized

The historical development of the African American experience in Toledo can best be summed up in four stages: The four stages of the black presence in Toledo can be easily identified by these statistics. The first stage averages 1.5% black; the second stage, 4.3%; the third stage, 17.4%; and the fourth stage, 27.2%. The documents collected here express the social experience of these four different historical stages in the development of the black community in Toledo. This is a book of documents, and as such does not touch on every significant individual, organization, event, or present a general survey of the community. It should serve as a guide to further research. Of particular significance for this book is the coverage that the Toledo Blade newspaper has given the black community for over one hundred years. As Table 1 indicates, Stage One, covered in the first section of this book, focuses on the origins of the African American community over the period from 1787 to the 1890s. While this time frame is not marked by a large black Table 1

Black population of Toledo: 1880–2015

Stage

Year

African ­Americans percent of all Toledoans

Stage 1

1880 1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2015

1.9 1.3 1.3 1.1 2.3 4.6 5.2 8.3 12.7 13.8 17.4 19.7 23.5 27.2 27.2

Stage 2

Stage 3

Stage 4

Average percent African American 1.5 4.3

17.4

27.2

Introduction

5

­ opulation in Toledo, it does witness critical historical developments that p shaped the origin of the African American experience in Toledo. This period includes the founding political documents (e.g., the 1787 Northwest Ordinance and the 1803 black Codes of Ohio) that defined the legal environment for the initial settlement of black people in this area. These documents represent contradictory views regarding the acceptance of African Americans. Because these differences were so important, they required the most time during the debate over what the population of the new state of Ohio would be like. Essentially, the debates represented a struggle over what kind of country America was going to be. We continue to struggle over this question, considering new immigration policies evident in the twenty-first century. During the last part of the nineteenth century, however, a black community vanguard of leadership and key institutions of unity emerged. The second section of this book, focusing on Stage Two, covers development of the black Toledoan community from 1900 to 1950, which saw the formation of community life. It is during this period that key institutions developed representing service (e.g., the Frederick Douglass Center) as well as defense against racism (e.g., the naacp). The African American community began to develop an independent institutional base that expressed the strength and organizational culture of the working-class factory system. While the external racism was virulent and oppressive, inside the black community there was a vibrant social life with cultural traditions, rituals, and experimental innovations. Stage Three, as presented in the third section, extends from 1950 to 2000 and represents the maturation and decline of the African American experience in Toledo. On the one hand, it is in this period that the black middle class, as a result of the civil rights struggle, was able to attain leadership positions at the highest level in the public sector and representation at the executive level in the private sector as well. On the other hand, the quality of life conditions in the black community remained stagnant or in decline. There had never been a greater challenge for community leadership. The fourth section focuses on Stage Four, the relatively short period between 2000 and 2016. Of particular note are the contradictory problems of deepening poverty among the overwhelming majority of blacks in the midst of rising opportunities for the black elite, which have become more pronounced in the first two decades of the twenty-first century. This divergence is both an expression of the growing inequality occurring throughout the nation and the world, but it is also sui generis, given the complex historical interaction between the black community’s evolution in Toledo and the local manifestation of contemporary globalization and automation. The articles in this section capture how

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the community worked or works to carry out its affairs, consciously and unconsciously, in the context of this divergence. 1.3

How This Book May Be Used

This collection of documents is designed to ignite the imagination and enhance the knowledge of readers regarding their thoughts and perceptions, not only about the African American experience in Toledo, but also about the history of African American experiences in their own communities. Each of the articles contained in this collection can be used by individuals in ­academic, social, political, or other settings to reflect on and analyze broader social q­ uestions about black people. This book would be ideal for use in group ­discussions. There are many people in this book either as authors or as subjects who are still alive and who would be very willing to participate in local discussions of historical events of which they have knowledge, based on their personal experiences. This book is especially designed for academic study at the high school and college levels. On the one hand, it will be useful as a guide to those who are interested in a study of historical Toledo. Most of the other texts on the history of Toledo mention the black community only in passing, mainly as objects and not as subjects making history. On the other hand, this text provides the reader access to the voices of black people as they recount and reflect upon their experience in Toledo. The reader will find that this text tackles the historical process of revising the old exclusionary history of Toledo by including ­accounts, portraits, and contributions of African and American Toledoans, past and present.

chapter 2

Origin (1787–1900) Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson 2.1

Founding Documents (Documents 1–5)

These founding documents are about African Americans but not written by ­African Americans. They reflect the political conditions of the times as expressed by those white individuals who controlled state power. All of these documents impacted the Toledo African American experience, and some of them were created by politicians who were native Toledoans. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 (Document 1) was the first law of EuroAmerican colonization that covered Ohio. Such unfolding domestic acts of colonization were precursors to global American imperialism, one example of which was the arrival of Commodore Matthew Perry in 1853 in Japan to open up the country for exploitation. But with respect to the 1787 Northwest Ordinance, it hypocritically outlawed slavery but supported the return of escaped enslaved humans, as they were regarded as legally held property in enslaving states. This ordinance requiring the new Northwest jurisdiction to return ­Africans back to their enslavers foreshadowed the infamous Fugitive Slave Act, which the u.s. Congress would pass in 1850. This sort of contradiction, with Ohio not being an enslaving state but returning humans to be re-enslaved, is part of the American dilemma, asserting positive values yet compromising with practices that violate those values, often in search of economic gains. Another contradiction becomes evident through the comparison of two ­Toledoans: James Ashley and Morrison Waite. Ashley was a congressman from Toledo who wrote the first draft of the Thirteenth Amendment of the u.s. ­Constitution, which ended slavery in 1865. Morrison Waite, also based in ­Toledo, became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in 1874 and guided the court to ­overturn the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which was the last important ­civil rights legislation until the 1960s. Fortunately, the deplorable 1857 Supreme Court ruling on the Dred Scott case, which was overturned by the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, could not be undone by Morrison Waite. Yet Toledo has a high school named after Waite, but no public institution or ­infrastructure named ­after Ashley. There is still time to correct this lack of ­historical recognition. Bear in mind that the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 preceded the congressional election of George Washington as president in 1797. Native American extermination campaigns and the enslavement of blacks in many instances © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi 10.1163/9789004281899_003

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and their treatment as “third-class” citizens in others were obviously occurring in various regions of what is now the United States. In 1803, President Jefferson signed legislation making Ohio the seventeenth state of the expanding United States. The following year, Ohio’s black Codes emerged as a suite of racist policies that defined black people as illegal immigrants requiring special government documentation. These codes were formulated and implemented for much the same reason that other regions enacted tough ordinances and other rulings against progress for Africans. In 1791 Toussaint L’Ouverture successfully led the Haitian Revolution that involved the defeat of French colonialists—as well as Spanish and British troops—thereby ending slavery in Saint-Domingue. This revolution shook the foundation of slavery throughout the Americas, as enslavers had to always wonder if there was a Toussaint L’Ouverture in their midst. George Washington wrote, “How regrettable to see such a spirit of r­ evolt among the Negroes.” The Haitian Revolution was “regrettable,” according to slavers and governments supporting slavocracy throughout the emerging United States. And for good reason, considering that Haiti inspired the later revolts led by Denmark Vesey, Gabriel Prosser, Nat Turner, and many others. An interesting note is that, after the Nat Turner-led revolt in 1831 in Southampton County, Virginia, Alabama outlawed blacks from preaching. The Haitian Revolution was not just the most successful revolt in history by an enslaved people; it also dramatically affected the development of the United States. Without the Haitian Revolution, there would have been no Louisiana Purchase of 828,800 square acres, and the United States and global political geography would be completely different today (McClelland 2011). In light of the gravity of the rebelliousness and revolt enslaved and treated-as-third-class Africans were capable of unleashing, as evinced by the Haitian Revolution, a number of federal, state, regional, and city officials rushed to draft draconian statutes, ordinances, and court rulings to protect whites and their property from would-be revolting Africans. Hence, the black Codes of Ohio became ­especially relevant among whites and dangerous to blacks. During the first period of the black community in Toledo (1787–1900), ­major technological developments occurred to facilitate Western elite ­domination over people of color, white labor, and wealth accumulation in general. For instance, in 1812, the same year that the United States declared war on ­England, Luddite workers in England commenced to destroying new spinning and ­cloth-finishing machinery in factories all across industrial cities in quixotic ­efforts to prevent technological unemployment. The year 1812 was also e­ ventful for Ohio, since it was the year when Columbus was founded and designated the new capital. Other consequential technological advancements included steam-powered shipping in the 1820s, the telegraph connecting the west and

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east coasts of the United States in 1861, and the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869. Also, the 1861 invention of the Gatling gun altered political geography such as in South Africa, as it was instrumental in the British overpowering the Zulus in 1879. And in 1879, the electric light bulb was pioneered by Thomas Edison, an Ohioan. Six years later the European powers met in Berlin to divide up Africa among themselves for colonization. By 1900, the endpoint of the first period of black Toledo, the u.s. population of 75.8 million had 1.5 million telephones in use. In producing this book, Black Toledo, we have attempted to provide the context of world and u.s. affairs that were unfolding during the time period of 1787–1900, the first period of black community development in Toledo. Context is important because “local” historical events do not occur in a vacuum, but rather are partial products of broader national and global developments— expressly in some instances and subtly in others. When reading about black Toledoans in Black Toledo, one should bear in mind the international situation. The articles that follow include discussions about federal, state, and regional policies, the related events and movements, and their implications for whites in efforts to control blacks. White political and economic leaders of antebellum Toledo struggled to reconcile laudable abolitionist sentiments with ­widely-held bigoted ideas in a racist society. As Edrene Cole notes, by 1871 Toledo had the distinction as the only major city in the North (and therefore probably the only major city in the country) with integrated schools. Other parts of Ohio also had some early progressive traditions, such as Oberlin College, which was founded in 1832 and was the first coed college in the country—and by 1860, one-third of the students were black. The Toledo Blade, which was first printed in 1835, actually predating the incorporation of Toledo as a city by two years, prided itself on supporting the rights of individuals and the community. The newspaper was founded in the wake of the hostile war between Michigan and Ohio over who had jurisdiction over Toledo. The Blade was more or less a typical northern Republican newspaper, from the time of its founding through the Reconstruction period. The ­paper chronicled the grinding halt of Reconstruction and the reversal of ­African American fortunes. For instance, there were seven black members in the Forty-third Congress in 1873, eight in the Forty-fourth in 1875, but three years after the disputed 1876 presidential election involving Ohio Governor Hays, the Forty-sixth Congress had only one black member. By the Fiftieth Congress in 1887, there were no black members, as the Klan and other domestic terrorist organizations had effectively kept black voters from the polls. The Blade, at the time, was considered decidedly liberal among Democrats, though not vis-à-vis among Africans seeking full equality in America.

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A major question that shaped the political development of the u.s. was the status of African Americans, especially the question of slavery. The Northwest Ordinance (Document 1) established freedom of religion, habeas corpus and the general rule of law, and the freedom from slavery and involuntary servitude. However, in other territory, e.g., the u.s. South, a slave was a recognized legal category of property. So the Northwest Ordinance also required the territory to return freedom seekers back into slavery based on documents of ownership. Ohio passed its so-called black Laws in 1804 (Document 2). This act revised the terms set forth in the Northwest Ordinance. The act referred to black and Mulatto persons. It required registration with the state to distinguish residents from freedom seekers. It set a penalty for anyone helping a freedom seeker, and enabled a financial reward for any informer. The pendulum swung from 1865 to 1883. James Ashley, abolitionist congressman from Toledo, wrote the first draft of what became the Thirteenth Amendment (1865) to the u.s. Constitution (Document 3). This ended slavery. The freedom impulse continued with two more amendments, the Fourteenth (1868) and Fifteenth (1870), completing the task of granting African Americans citizenship and the right to vote. The 1875 Civil Rights Act (Document 4) advanced the freedom agenda even further. But eight years later Morrison Waite, as chief justice of the Supreme Court and a native son of Toledo, led the court to overturn the 1875 act, thereby allowing racist practices to continue. (Document 5). 2.1.1 The First Law: The Northwest Ordinance (1787)1 Art. 1. No person, demeaning himself in a peaceable and orderly manner, shall ever be molested on account of his mode of worship or religious sentiments, in the said territory. Art. 2. The Inhabitants of the said territory shall always be entitled to the benefits of the writ of habeas corpus, and of the trial by jury; of a proportionate representation of the people in the legislature; and of judicial proceedings according to the course of the common law. All persons shall be bailable, unless for capital offenses, where the proof shall be evident or the presumption great. All fines shall be moderate; and no cruel or unusual punishments shall be inflicted. No man shall be deprived of his liberty or property, but by the judgment of his peers or the law of the land; and, should the public exigencies make it necessary, for the common preservation, to take any person’s property, or to demand his particular services, full compensation shall be made for the 1 “The Northwest Ordinance.” (1787). July 19, 2000. Available: www.earlyamerica.com…lyamerica/milestones/ordinance/text.ht.

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same. And, in the just preservation of rights and property, it is understood and declared, that no law ought ever to be made, or have force in the said territory, that shall, in any manner whatever, interfere with or affect private contracts or engagements, bona fide, and without fraud, previously formed. Art. 3. Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged. The utmost good faith shall always be observed towards the Indians; their lands and property shall never be taken from them without their consent; and, in their property, rights, and liberty, they shall never be ­invaded or disturbed, unless in just and lawful wars authorized by congress; but laws founded in justice and humanity, shall from time to time be made for preventing wrongs being done to them, and for preserving peace and friendship with them…. Art. 6. There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted: Provided, always, that any person escaping into the same, from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed in any one of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid. 2.1.2 The Second Law: Ohio Black Laws (1804)2 Section  1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, that from and after the first day of June next, no black or mulatto person shall be permitted to settle or reside in this state, unless he or she shall first produce a fair certificate from some court within the United States, of his or her actual freedom, which certificate shall be attested by the clerk of said court, and the seal thereof annexed thereto, by said clerk. Section 2. And be it further enacted, that every black or mulatto person residing within this state, on or before the fifth day of June, one thousand eight hundred and four, shall enter his or her name, together with the name or names of his or her children, in the clerk’s office in the county in which he, she or they reside, which shall be entered on record by said clerk, and thereafter the clerk’s certificate of such record shall be sufficient evidence of his, her or their freedom; and for every entry and certificate, the person obtaining the same shall pay to the clerk twelve and a half cents. Provided nevertheless, that nothing in this act contained shall bar the lawful claim to any black or mulatto person.

2 African-American History Ohio Black Laws 1804. September 7, 2005. Available: http:// afroamhistory.about.com/library/blohio_blacklaws.htm.

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Section 3. And be it further enacted, that no person or persons residents of this state, shall be permitted to hire, or in any way employ any black or mulatto person, unless such black or mulatto person shall have one of the certificates as aforesaid, under pain of forfeiting and paying any sum not less than ten nor more than fifty dollars, at the discretion of the court, for every such offense, one-half thereof for the use of the informer and the other half for the use of the state; and shall moreover pay to the owner, if any there be, of such black or mulatto person, the sum of fifty cents for every day he, she or they shall in any wise employ, harbour or secret such black or mulatto person, which sum or sums shall be recoverable before any court having cognizance thereof. Section 4. And be it further enacted, that if any person or persons shall harbour or secret any black or mulatto person, the property of any person whatever, or shall in any wise hinder or prevent the lawful owner or owners from retaking and possessing his or her black or mulatto servant or servants, shall, upon conviction thereof, by indictment or information, be fined in any sum not less than ten nor more than fifty dollars, at the discretion of the court, one-half thereof for the use of the informer and the other half for the use of the state. Section 5. And be it further enacted, that every black or mulatto person who shall come to reside in this state with such certificate as is required in the first section of this act, shall, within two years, have the same recorded in the clerk’s office, in the county in which he or she means to reside, for which he or she shall pay to the clerk twelve and a half cents, and the clerk shall give him or her a certificate of such record. Section 6. And be it further enacted, that in case any person or persons, his or their agent or agents, claiming any black or mulatto person that now are or hereafter may be in this state, may apply, upon making satisfactory proof that such black or mulatto person or persons is the property of him or her who ­applies, to any associate judge or justice of the peace within this state, the associate judge or justice is hereby empowered and required, by his precept, to direct the sheriff or constable to arrest such black or mulatto person or persons and deliver the same in the county or township where such officers shall reside, to the claimant or claimants or his or their agent or agents, for which service the sheriff or constable shall receive such compensation as they are entitled to receive in other cases for similar services. Section  7. And be it further enacted, that any person or persons who shall ­attempt to remove, or shall remove from this state, or who shall aid and assist in removing, contrary to the provisions of this act, any black or mulatto person or persons, without first proving as hereinbefore directed, that he, she or they, is or are legally entitled so to do, shall, on conviction thereof before any

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court having cognizance of the same, forfeit and pay the sum of one thousand dollars, one-half to the use of the informer and the other half to the use of the state, to be recovered by action of debt, qui tam, or indictment, and shall moreover be liable to the action of the party injured. 2.1.3 13th Amendment to the u.s. Constitution (1865)3 Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. Section  2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. 2.1.4 Reconstruction: Civil Rights Act (1875)4 Whereas it is essential to just government we recognize the equality of all men before the law, and hold that it is the duty of government in its dealings with the people to mete out equal and exact justice to all, of whatever nativity, race, color, or persuasion, religious or political; and it being the appropriate object of legislation to enact great fundamental principles into law: Therefore, Be it enacted, That all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States shall be entitled to the full and equal enjoyment of the accommodations, advantages, facilities, and privileges of inns, public conveyances on land or water, theaters, and other places of public amusement; subject only to the conditions and limitations established by law, and applicable alike to citizens of every race and color, regardless of any previous condition of servitude. SEC. 2. That any person who shall violate the foregoing section by denying to any citizen, except for reasons by law applicable to citizens of every race and color, and regardless of any previous condition of servitude, the full enjoyment of any of the accommodations, advantages, facilities, or privileges in said section enumerated, or by aiding or inciting such denial, shall, for every such offense, forfeit and pay the sum of five hundred dollars to the person aggrieved thereby… and shall also, for every such offense, be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and, upon conviction thereof, shall be fined not less than five hundred nor more than one thousand dollars, or shall be imprisoned not less than thirty days nor more than one year….

3 13th Amendment to the u.s. Constitution. https://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/ 13thamendment.html Accessed November 6, 2016. 4 The Civil Rights Act of March 1, 1875. July 24, 2006. Available: http://chnm.gmu.edu/ courses/122/recon/civilrightsact.html.

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SEC. 3. That the district and circuit courts of the United States shall have exclusively of the courts of the several States, cognizance of all crimes and ­offenses against, and violations of, the provisions of this act…. SEC. 4. That no citizen possessing all other qualifications which are or may be prescribed by law shall be disqualified for service as grand or petit juror in any court of the United States, or of any State, on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude; and any officer or other person charged with any duty in the selection or summoning of jurors who shall exclude or fail to summon any citizen for the cause aforesaid shall, on conviction thereof, be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and be fined not more than five thousand dollars. 2.1.5 Supreme Court Overturns Civil Rights Act5 Argued: March 29, 1883 Decided: October 15, 1883 2.1.5.1 Facts of the Case The Civil Rights Act of 1875 affirmed the equality of all persons in the enjoyment of transportation facilities, in hotels and inns, and in theaters and places of public amusement. Though privately owned, these businesses were like public utilities, exercising public functions for the benefit of the public and, thus, subject to public regulation. In five separate cases, a black person was denied the same accommodations as a white person in violation of the 1875 Act. 2.1.5.2 Question Presented Does the Civil Rights Act of 1875 violate the 10th Amendment of the Constitution which reserves all powers not granted to the national government to the states or to the people? 2.1.5.3 Conclusion The Fourteenth Amendment restrains only state action. And the fifth section of the Amendment empowers Congress only to enforce the prohibition on state action. The amendment did not authorize national legislation on ­subjects which are within the domain of the state. Private acts of racial discrimination were simply private wrongs that the national government was powerless to correct.

5 The Civil Rights Cases. The Oyez Project at iit Chicago-Kent College of Law. 03 November 2015. .

Origin (1787–1900)

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Dialectics of Settlement (Documents 6–14)

The Underground Railroad The first stream of black people to arrive in Toledo mainly came from the Underground Railroad. They were people who literally stole themselves from ­enslavers and then ran north to freedom, often all the way to Canada. Toledo was one of the areas people either passed through on their way to Canada across Lake Erie (Documents 6 and 7), or stopped to make a home. This effort was contentious, as there were attempts to capture and return escaped erstwhile enslaved humans, and also the efforts of sympathizers to fight back and free the runaways. Many white people contributed to this process, for example Lucian Lathrop in the 1850s (Document 9), as well as many black people, for example Elijah Anderson (Document 8). Everyone in this process was breaking the law and risking their lives to protect the human rights of the enslaved Africans. They were true patriots fighting for freedom. Armed Struggle Slavery was legalized and protected by the military forces of the state. However, enslaving free people leads to resistance, and in the case of the enslaved Africans, such attempts always included armed struggle. Sometimes this was a low-intensity event, such as in 1847, when black people in Toledo rescued an alleged runaway from being taken back down south. Jessup Scott, after whom Scott High School is named, is an example of the way civic leaders were often confused about the law versus their moral duty to free enslaved humans. Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth spoke in Toledo to support fighting the Civil War through to the end (Document 12). James Ashley, an abolitionist congressman who had been a conductor on the Underground Railroad, witnessed the hanging of John Brown in 1859. In a Blade article Congressman ­Ashley warns Toledo of the dangers of keeping people enslaved (Document 10). Finally, the violence of repression was a constant threat, as demonstrated by the riot of 1862 (Document 11). Desegregation The emergence of the black community in Toledo during and after the fight to end slavery led to even more problems. The main general issue was the extent to which black people in Toledo would continue to live in segregated impoverished areas. The fight against segregation initially targeted public institutions, first the vote (Document 13) and then education (Document 14). In sum, this was a fight for first-class citizenship, a fight that would last more than a century and in many ways continues today. Every institution was in this battle,

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which was a major aspect of defining the quality of life in Toledo. On the objective side, one can date when black people legally entered mainstream institutions; on the other side, it is more difficult to grasp whether white people were changing their attitudes and whether black people were able to forgive the racist exclusion they had suffered. 2.2.1 Underground Railroad in Toledo6 Many of the fugitives were conducted to Erie and Buffalo; but every lake port in Ohio, from Conneaut to Toledo, was a port of departure for Canada. Sandusky and Cleveland were especially important, because, in the last ten years of underground work, they were the termini of railways running southward to the center of the state. In these later years, fugitives were put on board night trains, in the baggage cars, and thus taken swiftly to those cities, where they were put on steamers bound for Canadian ports, or taken across Lake Erie in sailboats. The steamers out of Toledo were frequently employed also. The list of Toledo operators of the Underground Railroad embraces the names of Richard Mott, a Quaker; Hon. James M. Ashley, former congressman; the late Mayor Bringham; James Conliak, an Irish-American; William H. ­Merritt, a Negro; and several others. As a youth of 17 in Kentucky, Mr. Ashley helped two groups of fugitives across the Ohio, one of seven persons, the other of five. He was active in the work for years in Toledo and took many risks— not the least of which was taking a party of fugitives in a sleigh, in midwinter, across Lake Erie on the ice from Toledo to Amherstburg. There was a station in Maumee, operated by A.C. Winslow, who operated a foundry. From there, if there was no close pursuit, fugitives were brought either to Toledo, or taken, via Detroit, to Monroe, Michigan, and thence across to Canada. If the pursuers were close, the Negroes were taken to the Sylvania station, kept by Daniel Harroun, Jr., and from there Hall Deland, the “night hawk,” took them to the French settlers along the Detroit River, who ferried them across that stream to Canada. 2.2.2 Taking Boats to Freedom in Canada7 Certain vessels were so extensively used by runaways that they became almost links in the underground system. In this connection, Professor Siebert makes particular mention of the steamer Arrow, plying between Sandusky and ­Detroit. The Arrow was a wooden side-wheel steamer of 373 tons, 185 feet long, built in 1848 at Trenton, Michigan. In 1850, when the passing of the Fugitive 6 S.S. Knabenshue. “The Underground Railroad.” Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, 14 (1905): 396–403. 7 Fred Landon. “Over Lake Erie to Freedom.” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 17 (1945): 132–138.

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Slave Bill brought panic to Negroes in the free states and resulted in the flight of hundreds to Canada, the Arrow was on the Detroit, Monroe, Toledo, and Sandusky route and at that time probably carried many Negroes across the lake. Two years later the Arrow was running between Cleveland and Buffalo, but was again on the former route by 1855, at which time her captain was J.W. Keith. Running fugitive slaves across the lake to freedom developed at times into something equivalent to our modern “boot-legging,” since it was a breach of the law and might be made profitable. The Firelands Pioneer recorded this incident: In the summer of 1853, four fugitives arrived at Sandusky.… Mr. John ­Irvine… had arranged for a “sharpee,” a small sailboat used by fishermen, with one George Sweigels, to sail the boat to Canada with this party, for which service Captain Sweigels was to receive thirty-five dollars. One man accompanied Captain Sweigels, and at eight o’clock in the evening this party in this small boat started to cross Lake Erie. The wind was favorable, and before morning Point au Pelee was reached, and the next day the four escaped fugitives were in Canada. William Wells Brown, himself a runaway, gave much time and effort to aiding his fellow refugees to freedom. He records that in the year 1842, between the first of May and the first of December, he conveyed 69 fugitives over Lake Erie to Canada. When he visited Amherstburg in 1843 he counted seventeen in the village who owed their freedom to his efforts. Elijah Anderson: General Superintendent of the Underground Railroad in Northwest Ohio8 Defending the oppressed cost white attorney Rush R. Sloane more than $4,000 in fines. Helping fugitives to freedom cost free black Elijah Anderson his life. Although a blacksmith by trade, Anderson was dubbed the “general superintendent” of the Underground Railroad in Northwestern Ohio, where such communities as Sandusky, Toledo, Maumee, Sylvania and Napoleon ran active lines. Sloane, a Sandusky attorney, abolitionist and Underground Railroad conductor, claimed that Anderson had led more than 1,000 fugitives to freedom. In 1856, Anderson was captured in Kentucky and charged with “enticing slaves.” He was sentenced to eight years in the Kentucky penitentiary. Anderson died in prison on March 4, 1861.

2.2.3

8 Ohio Historical Society. (n.d.). Ohio’s Underground Railroad Freedom Stations. [Pamphlet]. Ohio: Ohio Underground Railroad Museum. Retrieved from http://creativefolk.com/travel/ pdf/oh.ugrr.pdf.

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A few years earlier, Sloane, too, had been charged with breaking laws that protected slavery. In Sloane’s case, it was the federal Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which compelled citizens to assist slave catchers, not the slaves, and increased the penalty for assisting runaways. In 1852, Sloane intervened on behalf of seven runaways who were nabbed by Kentucky slave catchers claiming to be their owners. Sloane managed to have the slaves released, saying their captors lacked the legal evidence to detain them. One of the slave owners, angered at losing his “property,” sued Sloane, who was ordered to pay some $4,300 in fines, court costs and legal fees. Sloane’s home is now among 11 Ohio sites the National Park Service lists as its “Aboard the Underground Railroad: A National Register of Historic Places Travel Itinerary.” 2.2.4 Lathrop House (1835–2005)9 The oldest structure in Lucas County, Ohio is Lathrop House, which was built around 1835 by Elkanah Briggs in the village of Sylvania. Its grand wooden structure in a classic Greek Revival style is maintained until this day. What also ­remains are the two round ovens that were installed before the Civil War. One oven was used for cooking, but the other was used as a ruse to hide fugitive slaves in a secret area beyond the stove. This area led to the basement, and fugitive slaves could sleep and cook there while preparing to move to the next station. Beneath the Lathrop house was a ravine that connected it to the H ­ arroun Family Barn. Oral history tells of fugitive slaves traveling the ravine at night between these two safe havens. The barn is preserved and maintained by Flower Hospital, and Lathrop House is recognized by the Friends of Freedom Society as an Underground Railroad stop. These may very well be the only original stops of the Underground Railroad with an untouched path between the preserved stations. Various individuals and families have resided and maintained the historic Lathrop house, the first being Elkanah Briggs. He was a farmer and builder who commissioned this house, which was not yet named. Briggs was also one of Sylvania’s first school directors and served as a delegate to the Whig Party for Lucas County. After his death in February 1840, his wife Eliza Briggs owned the property for one month until she remarried in March 1840 to Jeremiah Green, which extinguished her right to her late husband’s estate. The court then appointed Lucian B. Lathrop as the administrator of Elkanah Briggs’ estate. As the administrator of the estate, he advised that Mrs. (Briggs) Green sell the house to pay off all of Elkanah’s debts. She obliged, and Lucian bought the house in 1847. 9 G. Gindy. The Underground Railroad and Sylvania’s historic Lathrop House: including an ­accounting of the owners and occupants of Sylvania’s historic Lathrop House since 1835 (Bloomington, in: AuthorHouse, 2008).

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Lucian Lathrop was a prominent man in helping develop the area. His occupation was listed as “Plank Road,” and he was a member of the Ohio Legislature as a Representative. Lucian served on the school board, organized the Sylvania Masonic Lodge, served as a delegate at the State Convention in 1841, served as a postmaster, and was a minister of the Universalist Church, among many other duties. He, along with his son Miles Lathrop, used the home as a station in the Underground Railroad. Lucian transferred ownership of the house to Miles in 1860. Miles was a fireman, engineer, and Captain of Company B 189th Ohio Voluntary Infantry. He later moved to Adrian, Michigan, and his father and stepmother, Lucian and Larissa, moved into the house until their deaths in 1873 and 1878, respectively. After Lucian died, however, Miles moved back, and he served on the village council and school board as well as Justice of the Peace in Sylvania. In 1887, Miles sold the home to George C. Wagonlander. Various sales of the house take place after 1887. The house was sold again in 1892 to Solomon J. Hershey, 1896 to John M. Hershey, 1897 to John W. Torrence, 1903 to John A. Crandall, and exchanged between John T. Grinage, Harry D. Fallis, James and Elizabeth Fallis, and Linton Fallis between the years of 1903 and 1954. It was during Linton’s ownership when a hidden space in the cellar with beds still in it was discovered (hidden for many decades under a cement slab back porch) in 1938. In 1954, Marie and Theodore Vogt purchased the Lathrop House. Marie is the founder and artistic director of the Toledo Ballet. Her husband rediscovered the covered ravine that traveled from Lathrop House to the Harroun Family Barn before his death in 1999. Marie owned the house until 2001 when St. Joseph Church became the caretakers of Lathrop House. In all, Lathrop House has served a great purpose in the development of Lucas County. The Underground Railroad conductors Lucian and Miles Lathrop used the grandeur of the house to help fugitive slaves escape to freedom. The preservation of this property is imperative to the overall history of Lucas County because it personifies struggle, promise, and hope to all of the residents, temporary and long-term. 2.2.5

James Ashley’s Eyewitness Account of the Hanging of John Brown (1859)10 As has already been announced, Hon. J.M. Ashley, member of Congress from this district, was one of the very few Northern men who were

10 “Ashley’s Account: The Execution—Interesting Particulars.” Daily Toledo Blade 09 ­December, 1859. Retrieved from http://www.toledoblade.com/Nation/2009/11/29/Ashley-s -Account-The-Execution-8212-Interesting-Particulars.html.

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­ ermitted to witness the hanging of John Brown; and his presence there p was entirely the result of his own persevering and inimitable will. The kind [remarks] which he was thus enabled to render to Mrs. Brown, were timely, and no doubt very grateful to her. In the midst of so much discouragement and gloom, a real friend was “a friend indeed.” Mr. Ashley furnished his family with a very full and graphic account of his experiences and observations in Virginia, from which we are permitted to make the following extracts. The narrator embraces many facts of interest not before published—especially in regard to Brown’s bearing and words and the treatment of Mrs. Brown. HARPERS FERRY, Dec. 2, 1859

I have not time to give you the details of all that transpired at the execution, (the first and last execution, I trust, I shall ever witness), and if I had, they will reach you in better shape by telegraph, as soon as the agents of the Associated Press can reach some point not controlled by martial law, with some Gen’l ­Taliafero as commander-in-chief. I wrote you a short, but very imperfect account of the difficulty and anyone I had to encounter in getting about the country, and p ­ assing the guards to get into Charlestown, which I did, ­notwithstanding the orders to the contrary. The whole thing appeared to me so like a farce, and was (with all) not free from danger of personal violence, that no one not on the ground would credit the statement of half the particulars. It is enough to say, that any Anti-Slavery man would have been safer from personal injury and insult in either Austria or Italy, countries whose language he could not speak, a stranger without a passport, during the prevalence of martial law, than in the town of Charlestown, in my own country, for the past few days. And why? For no other reason than that I was suspected of entertaining the opinion that one man may not of right enslave another. My arrival in town was heralded at once, and unfortunately for me, my crutch soon pointed me out as the “Black Republican Congressman from Ohio.” I was beset on all hands by over anxious gentlemen for my opinions, and one more excited than the rest came up to where I was in conversation in the room, and in a loud voice asked if I “was a Black Republican.” I answered, “I am, sir.”—From this time until I left, I was not only watched, but gazed at by everybody, as if I were a second JOHN BROWN. In going from here to Charlestown, I avoided the Railroad, as I learned that persons who got off the cars at that point were immediately arrested and placed in the Guard-house until after due examination by the distinguished Gen. Taliafero, and when the person or persons, thus detained were either

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d­ ischarged or escorted out of town to Harper’s Ferry, and seen safely on board the cars going east or west. Mr. Edgerton, a Republican member of Congress, from Ohio, and the district in which BROWN formerly resided, and in which many of his relatives and friends now are, was escorted from Charlestown with a strong body-guard to this place the day before I got here, and seen safely on board the cars for Washington City. For this kind attendance, I suppose the Democracy of the North think he ought to be thankful. MR. EDGERTON was charged with some message to BROWN from his friends, but was not permitted to see or communicate with him. The way I managed the matter was this: I got an old rickety horse and buggy, the best I could find, and with the son of the United States Marshall for the District, a worthy and gentlemanly young man, for a guide, went “by land,” as a waterman would say, and succeeded as I have before written you, in getting within the forbidden limits of Charlestown, without arrest or being brought before Gen. Taliafero. Marshal DONALDSON, of Kansas fame, was also behind in a buggy with a mule, and got by the sentinel by the aid of the Deputy u.s. Marshal as I did—I cannot do less than say that Mr. DONALDSON is a mild, gentlemanly man of about sixty, and has undoubtedly been greatly slandered. To him I am indebted for many acts of kindness, with which pleasure I acknowledge. He will go from here to Washington. Almost, if not quite, every Southern State had a representative on the ground to see the old Kansas hero hung, and it seemed to gratify them very much. On my way out to Charlestown, I had pointed out to me the place on the Maryland side where BROWN rented the farm which he made his headquarters. I also saw the plantations and dwellings of Col. WASHINGTON and other leading citizens who were made prisoners, and two or three of the premises where property has since been burned. Before I left for Charlestown yesterday, I had an interesting interview with Mrs. BROWN, two gentlemen and a lady who accompanied her here, and who expected to go with her to Charlestown on their arrival at the ­Ferry, ­notwithstanding they had letters from Gov. WISE granting the request of Mrs. BROWN to have an interview with her husband before his execution, and the privilege of taking the body and those of her sons home with her, with an order to the Sheriff to deliver the body to Mrs. BROWN or her agent at this point in “a plain substantial coffin, unmutilated,” besides letters from ­leading Southern men acquainted with the lady and gentleman accompanying her, commending them as the friends of Mrs. BROWN to the kind regards of all citizens. They thought best after their arrival here to consult Col. ­B ARBOUR, who is in command of the u.s. Arsenal, and who is one of the

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most gentlemanly of the very few gentlemen I met since I came here. After Col. BARBOUR and other gentlemen had seen and read Gov. WISE’S letters, they were assured that they could proceed without annoyance or molestation to their destination; but in  order to avoid the possibility of any unpleasant occurrences, at the ­suggestion of one of the gentlemen accompanying Mrs. B., General TALIAFERO was ­telegraphed, and he replied by telegraph, word for word as follows, as I know, for I obtained a copy of the dispatch. Read it, and then think of the chain set up by the “­chivalry,” to being the only gallant and polite people among us: Detain Mrs. BROWN at the Ferry, and the lady and gentlemen accompanying her, until further order. WATCH THEM. This is the work of “Chivalry.” No language can express their feelings, when this dispatch was read to them. A poor, broken-hearted woman, with two gentlemen and a Quaker lady friend, harmless and unarmed, after having the permission of the Governor to proceed to Charlestown on their errand of love and mercy, are “detained” by order of the commander-in-chief, until “further orders,” and instructions given to “watch them.” And this, too, when there were two or three hundred u.s. Soldiers stationed at the Arsenal—almost every citizen in the town armed, and at least three thousand persons under arms in the country. Gov. WISE was again telegraphed and late in the afternoon and some time after I had gained admission within the limits of Charlestown, a carriage and detachment of friends [followed]. What was my surprise, to find on the return of this grand cavalcade of “fuss and feathers,” that Mrs. BROWN came alone, and notwithstanding her earnest entreaties, the military hero in command would not even permit the Quaker lady to accompany Mrs. B., and she was absolutely compelled to sit in a closed carriage with some distinguished individual dressed in regimentals and thus go to Charlestown, or remain and not see her husband. Of course she chose the only alternative left to her, and went. I assure you that her entry into the town of Charlestown beggars all description. Before the arrival of Mrs. Brown, but two brass cannon were planted in front of the prison. As soon as her approach was announced, however, three other brass pieces, making five in all, were planted in the street in front of the jail, and from eight hundred to a thousand men, with glittering bayonets, pistols and swords, stood on all sides from four to six men deep, and formed a hollow square through which the carriage passed with Mrs. Brown. Through this file of bayonets the poor woman at last entered the jail, hoping at once to see her husband, as her stay was to be short, in compliance with orders. Here again she

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was doomed to disappointment, for the distinguished C ­ ommander-in-Chief took it into his military head, that Mrs. BROWN might possibly give her husband some poison, and he and the chivalry might be deprived of the extreme pleasure of choking the man to death. So he had Mrs. B. stripped and her clothing all subject to a rigid scrutiny. Nothing, however, was discovered on or about her person more formidable or dangerous than ladies usually wear, and she was permitted a moment alone, although the jail was guarded by at least a thousand soldiers and five brass cannon. The pretext that Mrs. B. might, notwithstanding the search, give him something with which to commit suicide, is simply preposterous. John Brown’s whole life and every act from the day of his arrest until that hour, was a guaranty against his committing self-murder. If they had feared that she might give him some terrible weapon, by which he would put to flight the gallant General and his immense body of troops, perhaps their conduct would be justifiable—certainly no other hypothesis can such a formidable military which surrounded the prison and the close inspection of Ms. B.’s clothing be accounted for. The whole conduct exhibited more fear on the part of those in charge of this manacled, unarmed old man, than ever the despots of Europe exhibited when NAPOLEON terrified the whole world with his feats of heroism and daring. During Mrs. B.’s stay with her husband, her conversation was principally upon business matters, which I have not time to give you. After about two hours, she was compelled to leave, although she desired to remain all night. As soon as the interview terminated, she was reconducted to the carriage and escorted by the same or a similar guard back to this place, to remain until the body of her husband should be delivered to her. It is due to Gov. WISE to say, that he undoubtedly intended the friends of Mrs. BROWN to accompany her, and had he been here, everybody concedes that no such outrage would have been thought of. For, whatever may be said of Gov. WISE, his letter to Mrs.  BROWN not only vindicates that his heart is right, but that he is in truth a high-toned gentleman. Thousands all over the country will ask, and be unable to answer the question, “Why has there been so much excitement and so much fear exhibited by the Southern people at this Harper’s Ferry affair?” I answer, it is inseparable from the system of slavery. A servile insurrection is always to be feared, because it is the most terrible of all the evils that can befall a people who claim to own their laborers. Men may talk as they will, but I tell you there is a smoldering volcano burning beneath the crust, ready to burst forth at any moment; and an enemy to the peace of almost every hearth-stone, is lurking in the heart of the apparently submissively lashed slave, and only those who have passed through an outbreak like this or the Southampton insurrection,

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can ­comprehend the danger and know for a certainty that it exists. Today, as the old chief was brought from the prison to be put into the wagon and taken to the place of execution, a slave woman, having perhaps heard me spoken of as an Abolitionist, said in my hearing, and I suppose so that I should hear it, just as the old man seated himself on his coffin, “God bless you, old man; if I could help you, I would; but I can’t.” The countenances of all the Slaves told too plainly of their sympathy. Although the military display may have been, as is claimed by many, too large, and has increased the excitement, a military force of some kind was not only necessary, but it was absolutely indispensable to keep the slave masters at hand, to watch their “property,” not from fear of the Northern “Abolitionist,” but simply from fear of the “property” itself. My interview with Mrs. BROWN and her friends who were anxiously awaiting my return to communicate the conclusion of the matter, was such as cannot be put upon paper. I was undoubtedly the only one, who, among all that throng, watched sympathizing every move and sought for every word, while beholding the horrid sight, that I might truthfully report to her, who was suffering anguish worse than death, every word and action that should comfort and bind up the bleeding wounds of a heart already too deeply bruised by sorrow. When I told her how like a man he acted—and how like a hero he died—and that to the question again asked him, if he “desired the services of a clergyman,” he replied, “No. I do not desire the prayers of any minister who approves of the enslavement of one of God’s children,” and added, “I want to go to the scaffold only in company with the necessary officers of the law, and if possible, some good old Slave Mother and her children, weeping and praying to the God of all to receive my soul.”—These words, with a detailed statement of every movement, and especially the words of the poor slave woman already quoted, “God bless you, old man, if I could help you, I would; but I can’t,” seemed to afford Mrs. B. great comfort and consolation, and she and her friends thanked me with much feeling for the interest I, stranger that I was to them, had taken in their behalf. Now, that the old man is gone, what will be said of him? Who shall reconcile the conflicting statements? What will be the verdict of history? All concede to him courage of the highest order, and many even here admit his honesty of purpose. That he had no desire for wealth, is evident from the fact that every dollar he could control was expended in getting Slaves to Canada. Simple in his manners, and with but few wants, he lived only to help the helpless. However much I condemn and lament, as I most sincerely do, his attack on this place, I cannot but admire his heroism, his straight-forward independence, and his undoubted courage.

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2.2.6 The Toledo Riot of 186211 During the morning hours of July 8, large numbers of striking white laborers gathered at the D.B. Smith and Company dock to halt the loading of the ship, New York, by Negro stevedores. Fearing possible hostilities, Samuel S. Read, agent for the New York and Erie Propeller Lines enlisted the aid of the local sheriff, marshal, and deputies to protect the Negro workers. As the boat was being loaded, the growing mob announced that the New York would be the last boat loaded by Negroes. Leaving Smith’s dock, the New York moved on to the Wabash Freight House. While loading the ship at this location, the Negro stevedores became subject to an assault of “stones, brick-bats, and similar missiles” thrown by the strikers. Amidst the barrage the Negroes rushed aboard the New York. One Negro, in an attempt to protect himself from the surrounding mob, drew a knife and stabbed one of the strikers, an Irishman named Fitzgerald. After attending to their fallen compatriot, the enraged mob moved downtown in pursuit of the Negro who stabbed their comrade. At Godard’s dock, the white strikers found the gangway closed and observed city officers aboard the New York protecting the Negro stevedores. Shouting to the men aboard the boat, the strikers promised to harm no one aboard the boat except the Negroes. With the hour approaching 11:30 a.m., a number of the strikers began to filter back to work at the old wages. Hearing of the disturbance on the docks, Rev. Francis Boff of St. Francis DeSales Catholic church approached the strikers in an effort to quiet them. Upon arrival, Father Boff asked the crowd “if anyone could identify the African.” The reply came back, “Yes, Father, the man who’s dead can identify him.” After talking to the assembled strikers, Father Boff left, having quelled the shouting mob for a few moments. At this point, Marshall Hanks ordered the crowd to disperse. However, one striker stated he would not leave, and was immediately arrested by the Marshall. While attempting to remove the arrested man, the individual broke loose and escaped through the dense crowd. Orders came from the boat to “cast off the lines” which was accomplished “amid a shower of clubs.” The New York swung out into the Maumee River and proceeded to the Cleveland and Toledo Railroad dock on the opposite side of the river. Returning to the docks, Father Boff tried once again to quiet and d­ isperse  the strikers. Boff’s efforts went for naught, as the strikers declared the “thing was not over” and one screamed “I’ll kill somebody before I sleep.” Leaving the dock area, the mob moved to the Negro residences of Toledo, demolishing one home

11

Frank R. Levstik. “The Toledo Riot of 1862: A Study of Midwest Negrophobia.” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 44 (Autumn 1972): 100–106.

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and damaging several others. A Negro, found on Monroe Street, was chased and subsequently beaten quite severely. Another Negro, discovered by the mob, took flight and found refuge in the home of E.P. Bassett, a local Toledo attorney. Surrounding the Bassett residence, the strikers demanded the Negro. Outside the Bassett home, D.E. Gardner, Deputy Collector of Customs at Toledo, attempted to “pacify” the unruly mob. Gardner’s utterances made him subject to a manhandling by the crowd. For the third time that day, Father Boff came to quell the strikers. While Boff addressed the crowd, the Negro was “spirited” away to the city jail for protection. Moving away from the Bassett home, the mob went to the house of a N ­ egro family, attacking it with clubs and stones. Continuing on the rampage, the crowd came to the house of “a quiet industrious negro woman” and tore it down. The woman’s two children left with a German family in the neighborhood became the next object of the rioters’ pursuit. The German, hearing of the rioters’ vows to kill the children, moved them to a safe place. The rioters proceeded to the Erie Street home of the Negro barbershop operator, William H. Merritt. Reappearing again, Father Boff succeeded in preventing the demolition of the Merritt residence. The Talbot home across the street had its windows broken and furniture damaged. The riot moved apace, as the mob moved uptown damaging every house occupied by a Negro family. At the corner of Lafayette and 11th Street, the mob seized another Negro, beating him into submission. Within a few minutes the rioters returned to the demolition of Negro homes. Near 4  p.m., July 8, approximately 100 special police gathered for duty against the rioters. A detachment of 40 police subsequently moved to the Godard dock to prevent the further outbreak of difficulties in that sector. As dusk approached, the ships New York, Marquette, and Orontes, with no Negroes aboard, moved out into midstream and anchored until the next morning. In an editorial on the riot, the Toledo Blade declared: “The attempt being made by men under excitement and passion, to prevent the employment of colored men on our shipping and docks must not be permitted to succeed.” The editorial further stated: “If any individuals are unwilling to work at the side of Negroes, it is their privilege to seek employment elsewhere.” By 11  a.m., July 9, twenty rioters had been arrested and before the search ended approximately thirty rioters were put to trial. For their participation in the riot, eight or nine were tried and charged “with promoting a disorderly assembly” and fined $50 each and sentenced to thirty days of hard labor. Meanwhile, the Democrats of the Midwest failed to relax their campaign against Negro emigration. The Fort Wayne Sentinel opined that the Toledo riot “is the fruit of bringing Negroes into free states to throw white men out of

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­employment.” Continuing to editorialize on the racial question, the Sentinel noticed “a determination in Toledo to degrade the white laborers to the level of the Negro by compelling them to work together.” In Columbus, the Negrophobic Crisis wrote with its customary vigor. Editor Samuel Medary claimed that Republican policy turning the war “into freeing of the slaves” left Ohio “open to be filled with blacks and the conflict between the races was inevitable, unless some law passed to anticipate the influx of these Negroes.” Disgusted by the failure of Negro emigration legislation, Medary saw its result in “many thousands of Negroes…sent into Ohio, and they are rapidly taking the place of white labor at reduced wages.” In Northwest Ohio, the Democratic Napoleon Northwest suggested that “when the Board gets through fighting for the Toledo niggers, the members proceed to South Carolina and be mustered into Gen. Hunter’s ‘Negro Brigade.’” Given the bogey of Negro inundation proclaimed by the Democratic journals, how did the actual situation in Toledo jibe with the Copperhead reports? First, as to the policy of employment of Negro stevedores on the Toledo docks, the Blade reported that there had “never been a time in history of our Lake commerce that negroes were not employed as sailors and stevedores on both steam and sail crafts.” In fact, the newspaper declared the “number of blacks now employed by the Propeller Lines is materially less than it was before war began.” By 1862, vessels that formerly employed Negroes resorted to the near exclusive hiring of white workers. Furthermore, how accurate were the assertions that Negroes were flocking into the Toledo area? The census of 1860 put Toledo’s white populations at 13,539 and the Negro total at 278. Of the 278 Negroes, thirty-six were under five years of age. Although the anti-Negro petitions failed, enough pressure was exerted on the Legislature to occasion a special enumeration of Negroes by the state of Ohio. Calling upon County Auditors to undertake a census of Negroes entering the state since March 1, 1861, the Lucas County figures prove to be especially revealing. Encompassing a space of two years, March 1, 1861– March 1, 1863, the enumeration revealed that the number of Negroes over five years of age totaled 127, a decline of 115 in the county. In percentage terms the ­Negro population in Toledo demonstrated a 47 percent decline. The Negro totals can be held in further perspective as population estimates for Toledo in 1862 approached 18,000. The argument that Negroes may have commuted from surrounding counties proves equally erroneous. In the six-county area around Toledo and Lucas County, new Negro additions to the population proved miniscule. The enumeration revealed the following totals of new Negroes: Seneca County, 4; Sandusky County, 6; Henry County, 0; Williams County, 3; Fulton County, 2; and Hancock County, 0. Thus, the purported inundation of

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e­ mancipated Negroes into Northwest Ohio proved entirely false. On the state level, Auditor of State Royal W. Taylor’s statistics indicated only 2,000 Negroes entered Ohio in the two-year span. Taylor’s report mentioned the above total included “many children.” 2.2.7 Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth Speak in Toledo (1864)12 This hall was filled to overflowing last evening to listen to an address from Mr. Fred. Douglass. Rev. Mr. Young introduced Mr. D. and took occasion to say that efforts had been made to secure White’s Hall for the occasion, and it was understood they were successful, but it proved otherwise, and hence a disappointment; he said, however, that Mr. Douglass would lecture at White’s Hall on Wednesday evening. Mr. D. then took the stand, saying that he was suffering from an attack of Intermittent fever, and unable to speak with that freedom that he could wish; he would give them a talk. He started out by remarking that the present condition of our country was illustrative of the instability and uncertainty of our institutions, and proceeded to speak of the change which has taken place in the views of the American people. He spoke of the “fathers” and their acts relating to American Slavery, of the acts of different religious denominations against the system of “property in man”; he then enumerated many of the important demands made by the slaveholders upon the people of the country prior to the breaking out of the Rebellion, and the manner in which they had been met; he spoke of the Emancipation Proclamation and regretted that the President had not pronounced against Slavery at the outset, and declared the negroes free in the territory reclaimed as our armies progressed, instead of waiting until he felt it to be a necessity to make war against the “Institution”—yet he expressed gratification that the President had seen the necessity and had acted with reference to it. He desired the re-election of Mr. Lincoln, and that the war should go on; the latter, because if it should end now, Slavery would not be wholly eradicated and he wanted no cessation of the struggle until all the people of the United States were free. He regretted that the negroes had not sooner been called into the service, but the whites are beginning to appreciate their services, and were very anxious to use them in meeting the demands of the government for men. He had recently seen remarkable energy exhibited to obtain recruits from the Slave States. [The speaker was here interrupted by a person in the audience saying—“and white men go to Canada.”] Mr. Douglas said he was suffering very much and under the necessity of closing his remarks, but hoped an aged ­female in the audience (the one who interrupted him) known to the readers of 12

“Frederick. Douglass at College Hall.” Toledo Blade 02 August, 1864.

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the Atlantic as Sojourner Truth, would interest them for a brief time, and took his seat. Sojourner Truth stepped upon the platform and made a few remarks, which were listened to with great satisfaction. Rev. Mr. Young announced that Mr. Douglass would lecture on “The War” at White’s Hall, on Wednesday evening, and the meeting closed. 2.2.8 The Blade, the Black Man, and the Vote (1867)13 After the election of 1866, which was, in essence, a referendum on the question of Reconstruction policy by the Radical Republicans, 1867 dawned with new vigor for the elimination of racial suffrage restrictions in the State of Ohio. One of the major issues of the 1866 election was to force the Southern states to enfranchise their blacks. The voters of Ohio went overwhelmingly for the measure. Thus, the first day of the new year was welcomed by the Toledo Blade with this exhortation: Ohio wiped out her black laws years ago; and has done her full share toward ridding the country of the blot of slavery. Let her follow up the work and enfranchise her Negroes. The word ‘white’ in the Constitution is a disgrace to the State, and should not stay there a moment longer than is necessary to expunge it. The Blade labeled such discrimination, “an offshoot of the curse of slavery.” The Blade was so vehement in its position that they ran the same column  again  the next day. It is clear that the cause of Negro suffrage in Ohio was of  prime ­concern to the editors of the Blade, headed by David R. Locke. Although they seemed unequivocal about this stand on the suffrage question, the editors revealed themselves to have some reservations on who should be trusted with the ballot. Yet the Blade did not hedge on the question of partisan politics that went along with the franchise issue. The Union party was to be the party of the freedmen, and nothing other than all-out support by the Republicans would be expected. The editors proclaimed several times that the Amendment (passed 9 April by the state legislature to remove the word “white” from suffrage requirements as well as disenfranchising deserters, draft dodgers and ex-rebels) would be endorsed by the people by an overwhelming majority and that the Republican party could and would accept the credit for

13

Ted Loewenberg. “The Blade and the Black Man: 1867.” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 44, no. 3 (1972).

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the victory of justice (as would the Blade, being a Republican mouthpiece in Northwest Ohio). To wit: The Union Party of Ohio with equality on its banner (would) march to certain victory. “The Union Party now bears the ‘odium’ of ‘nigger suffrage.’…We believe that the results will be anything but satisfactory to them (the Democrats).” “The verdict of Ohio, for equal rights, when it is given in October may be emphatic.” “That the ticket will be elected and the Amendment sustained we have no doubt.” “We can if we will, make the majority in favor of the Amendment as large, if not larger, than that given to our State ticket” (emphasis mine). To place the enthusiasm of the Blade in its proper perspective, one must dig deeper than these self-assurances that Mr. Locke gave himself and his readers. First, the editors, and the Union party had no desire to enfranchise blacks who were illiterate: …if she (Massachusetts) does away with this test (literacy), she will do a very foolish thing. The white man or Negro who cannot read his ballot is unfit to be trusted with it. The law, as it now stands (with literacy) in Massachusetts is perfection itself. In another instance, the Cincinnati Enquirer, a Democratic paper, pointed to Macon, Georgia, where 1,700 Negro voters were registered, but only five could read. In reply to the Enquirer, the Blade said: We agree with the Enquirer that the ignorance of the blacks is most lamentable, but who is responsible for it? Let us wonder that any possessed themselves of the accomplishment…. the white who cannot read, is certainly as unfit as the Negro equally ignorant. We are willing to join our Democratic brethren in an effort to establish the reading and writing test. In short, the Blade was little worried about the likely loss of new Negro voters that the Amendment would gain, in theory at least. While it is not known how many of Ohio’s blacks were illiterate there were a goodly number of Democrats who were illiterate, more so than Republican illiterate voters. Therefore, while the Union party stood to lose a few new voters and some old ones, their loss would be far less than the Democrat’s. The Copperheads, as an underdog in Ohio, paid little attention to the literacy of their voters. To them, the passage of the Amendment meant literacy requirements at the polls and the subsequent

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destruction of the state’s Democratic Party. Their stand therefore, not only opposed black suffrage, but also protected an already weak Democratic constituency. The Blade expressed this sentiment late in the campaign: “The least said about inferiority, the better … until … rights are made to depend upon capacity, we see no good ground for crowding out the African.” The Janus-ed attitudes of Ohio Republicans were further revealed ten days after the election of 8 October, when the Blade answered a Democratic paper with the following information that Ohio contained only 7,620 (recorded in the last census) male Negro adults, of whom at least one-half are more than half-white, and, consequently, legal voters. Two thirds of these legal colored voters live in Democratic counties, where they never attempted to exercise privileges clearly theirs … where the colored vote is too small to affect anything. Republicans knew full well that even if Negroes gained the franchise, the effect would be less than devastating in the North. The only effect it would have was to enhance the Republican vote. Senator John Sherman reflected this attitude in a speech in Toledo in mid-September: Everyone should be allowed to vote who had an interest in the government. There were only seven or eight thousand colored men in the state, and the great population of Ohio could not fear the result of giving them a share in the government of the country. What political damage could such a small number of new voters do in Ohio, when there were already about half a million white voters registered in the state? The possible damage was decreased more by the fact that those Negroes literate enough to vote would only add to the 42,000 vote plurality obtained in 1866 by the Union party. In short, the Republicans contended that Negro voters posed no threat to the Republican institutions of Ohio, as they would vote with the Republican Party, the protector (as the Civil War had proved) of those institutions. In the call for Negro voting equality, the Blade also advocated that former black soldiers from the State be allowed to vote. Their loyalty to the Union was the price factor qualifying them for the franchise. Every Unionist stumper in 1867 mentioned this reason for black suffrage. However, they never discussed the literacy of those soldiers in the same speech, nor did the Blade ever mention the two items together. The former black Union soldier with a ballot was a taunt at the South, just as he had been with a bayonet.

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The Blade, then advocated the blacks with the ballots be able to read, and so should the white man. Moreover, those whites who were not loyal to the Union should also be disenfranchised. The emphasis was clearly legal. The Blade did not appreciate the impact of the arguments of the Democracy on the suffrage question, calling these, “the outgrowth of the most detestable prejudice that warped the judgment of human beings.” The Democrats felt that to give the Negro the ballot was to make him not only the legal equal of the white man, but it would also make the former slave the social and economic equal of the Caucasian. One of the most effective appeals to prejudice which the Democracy make on the principle issue of the coming campaign is, that giving the Negro the ballot will place him on a social equality with the white race. “How would you like to have your sister marry a nigger?” Has been their most powerful argument…. The colored man…when he obtains the ballot…will force himself everywhere, and no spot can be found where his presence will not poison the air. So say the Democracy. In this pointing to the two extremes of the Democrat’s argument, and ignoring the vast distance between them, the Blade failed to take seriously the contention that legal equality implies social equality. This was chiefly due to the Blade not having had any misgivings about black suffrage. For example, Mr. Locke, as Petroleum V. Nasby, fictional Democrat, felt that the ballot does not automatically lead to political office, or social acceptance for that matter. …it never occurred to men that bein sent to Congress wuz the natural consekence uv voting. I hev voted for thirty years, at many elections four or five times, but I hev never bin to congris. Wher is the constituency wich wood elect me? Furthermore, the Blade laughed at the Democratic contention that Negro, or even part-Negro, voters would destroy the democratic institutions of the State (which were dominated by Whigs/Republicans since 1842, except from 1850–1855). … how deplorable it must have been for the past twenty-five years. For who does not know that a certain class of our colored citizens in Ohio have held the ballot, and used both it and all the social privileges coming from it since 1842.

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The tone turned sarcastic at this point: “… all these disgraceful things, this inter-marrying, this social mingling with the mulattoes of Ohio, have gone unnoticed for the last twenty-five years.” Returning to a more serious note, we, in the present state of things, would perhaps take a different view than some others might. Old Aunt Dinah, in Uncle Tom’s Cabin, incensed at the pleasantry of a quadroon, ejaculated, “Dey’s not white nor black. I likes to be one or tudder.” We endorse the sentiments of the Negress. To its conclusion, Mr. Locke’s sarcasm dominated the editorial: For the past twenty-five years, we have (been) submitted to disgraceful rule, that was neither white nor black. We like to be one or the other…. we would call on our Democratic friends to improve their condition by escaping from this hybrid, social equality and half-blood rule, which has oppressed the land—according to their arguments. In short, the Democrats had no reason for opposing Negro suffrage on the grounds that government, as well as social institutions would be undermined by black voters. By implying this, the more subtle suggestion came through. That is, white voters would have nothing to fear from black voters, just as they had feared nothing in the past. However, this brought to the fore, in even greater dimensions, the literacy issue and the loss of political power the Democrats could have expected if the Unionists continued to dominate the state in 1867. The Blade summed up their refusal to take seriously the Democratic argument when they confessed: “We cannot see, nor have we ever been able to determine, what earthly connection there is between the right to vote and matrimony.” However, the Democrats operated from a different set of assumptions in 1867. Not only would their defeat lead to their effective demise, but in order to secure their victory, they had to appeal to the racist element of 1867 Ohio voters. In essence, the Democratic argument said that to grant the Blackman of Ohio the vote was to give him a foot in the door. The natural result would have been that they could not deny that the former slave was then their social equal. Since this was contrary to what the Copperheads stood for, the Amendment served as their Pandora’s Box. To grant the Negro the ballot but to refuse, eventually, to marry him, was to display inconsistent racial prejudice. Consistency was the name of the game then, as it is today. The Democrats, too, wanted “to be one or tudder.” If the Democrats were racists, at least they were consistent racists! Their arguments need not be logical in our time; they need merely to have been effective in their time.

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Regardless of the partisan issues of gaining and losing voters, the Republicans (and therefore the Blade) assumed the opposite position. White society, they felt, could on the one hand enfranchise the Negro, and still hold him to be socially inferior on the other. They could give the black man the vote, but they would never let their sisters marry one. To be sure, the Blade went to great lengths to show that the black men were, “after all, only white men with black skins,” by showing various achievements of black people as typical of their potential. They brought forth the names of several Negroes such as Alexander Dumas, Toussaint “L’Ouverture,” Frederick Douglass and John M. Langston. They also reported a community of runaway slaves found in the Brazilian jungles living in harmony, and Negro mining operations in Colorado which was doing well. The Blade pleaded: Gentlemen of the Democratic Party! In view of this and other parallel instances, what becomes of your theory? Does the patience, the industry, the energy and the intelligence, exhibited in such works as these, show a lack of perception which is necessary to self government? (sic) Moreover, the Blade went on to accuse the Northern Democrats of a discrimination their Southern brethren did not exhibit. “Down South, where the Democracy is genuine, they do not shirk from nigger equality. In fact, they elevate the Negro to the closest companionship, and maintain with him the most intimate relationship.” If the Blade believed that “nigger equality” ruled the South, it gave its readers no evidence for such a conclusion. Through 1867, as in other years, the Blade carried frequent stories about the attacks on Negroes by white. Rape, murder and tar-and-feathering were the most common forms of “elevat(ing) the Negro to the closest companionship.” However, one fundamental question remains as to the Republican enthusiasm for the black man. If we accept their glib self-assurances about the political weight that Negroes as a bloc would possess, then why did Unionists insist upon “placing ourselves on the simple and broad platform of impartial manhood suffrage as embodied in the proposed Amendment…?” In other words, despite the damage that could be done to the Democrats, what other reasons may the Republicans have had for embracing the black pariah? The answer lies in the view that men had in the middle of the last century about the power of the ballot. Regrettably, in 1867, the ballot seemed to be a rather ineffective tool for political change. However, Americans from 1850 to the end of the century were witnesses to change through politics and the ballot box. In 1867, the victorious North had just witnessed the result of a political conflict turn into the military triumph of Northern bourgeois capitalism

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over the South. The political election of Abraham Lincoln, it appeared, sparked the long awaited conflict. In the ensuing years, the South was brought into the mainstream of American capitalism due to the political power of the Radicals in Congress. The Radicals, to secure the rights of freed slaves in the South, gave former slaves the ballot in preparation for the day that Northern troops would leave. Blacks and whites would have to elect their own Southern Republicans some day. The Negro became the tool with which the North was to whip the defeated South into line. The Northern Radicals applied this ballot power issue to their own states with the understanding that the black man was defenseless in Southern society without political power and less offensive in Northern society with political “power.” The ballot not only assured a voice in political affairs, but it also afforded the Negro a weapon with which to fight back at his white, Copperhead oppressor. Senator Benjamin Wade at Marietta put it this way: If you don’t clothe the week (sic) and the lowly with the power to protect themselves in a government, who will save them from the accursed dominion of this (Southern) Aristocracy?… with the ballot, they are colored men in this equal condition of slavery without any protection… General Washburne said in Toledo that even if the black man votes in the wrong way, “he’ll soon learn how to use the ballot for self-protection.” The Blade agreed when they pleaded, “What is freedom without the ballot? Without this weapon to protect them in their newly found rights, they are yet slaves.” In short, the ballot would give the black Ohioan the same respect that a common white man had in other areas of government, be they the courts, paying of taxes or running for political offices. It must be noted, however, that the Blade had no desire to see a mass migration to the promised lands of the North. The Negro, felt the Blade, would be happiest down South, where there was true democracy. The Negroes are altogether too shrewd to come North of the Ohio. Why should they? The climate of Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia suits them better, and they have more privileges (there) than will be given them here even if suffrage is extended to them. They are connected with Southern whites by ties of blood. The labor performed in the South suits them. To be sure, the question of Negro equality became painful to the Blade if pushed too far for their comfort. In response to the Cincinnati Enquirer, the Blade wondered in print: “How are they going to intermarry with us to the

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alarming amount represented in words paraphrased by the Blade: “Political equality was the act of law, but social equality was a matter that rested with the individual.” While the Blade espoused equality for the black man, it was clearly not consistent in the cause. The editors sang the praises of the black men and likewise denounced those Democrats who continued the oppression of those unfortunate, but equal Negroes. This was fine for front cover pages, where Mr. Locke could voice his opinions for all to read, along side the news. However, the local news and announcements on the back pages displayed an entirely different attitude. (An entire day’s edition consisted of only four pages, about 24" x 36", and perhaps about one third of this space was news and editorials.). The back pages of the Blade carried notices of runaway horses, city council meetings, etc., and most importantly, for our purposes, the daily transactions of the Police Court. It was a daily account of crime in 1867 Toledo. Blacks were seen there on occasion, but due to their small numbers in Toledo, not as often as their white counterparts. Negroes were there usually as a result of fights or assaults. Through this daily record of law and order, the readers of the Blade were able to conclude for themselves how the local blacks (and whites) behaved, and thus helped to form their opinions of Negroes as social beings. The Blade stacked the deck against Negro Toledoans. Blacks were singled out by the reporter covering the Police Court as being Afro-Americans who he never noted that while offenders were “white,” “Caucasian,” etc. The problem of the Blade’s righteousness comes into focus here because they spoke of Negroes in different terms on the third and fourth pages from the way they did on the first two pages. Negroes were turned into “darkies, cullud pussuns, and Ethiops.” Worse yet, they used these terms, or the fact that the offenders were black, to mock them by making puns of their color. “His honor engaged in the investigation of assault and battery case (sic), the parties being Ethiopians. It was a dark and ludicrous affair.” In one case, the story of the “Patriotic Darkey” was painted in a lengthy column about a drunk Negro staggering around (what is now downtown) Toledo with a musket, fighting the Civil War again in his inebriated mind. He was finally subdued by white citizens of Toledo and spent the rest of the night in jail. A few days later, “Andrew Jackson (colored) was arraigned (for) stealing a meat saw of the value of $1. The charge was sustained. In dismissing the darkey, the mayor remarked, ‘I guess he’s guilty.’” While there was an obvious difference in the use of terms, it is hard to define whether these statements are racist in origin or use, as they certainly would be considered so today. It would be perhaps premature to call the Blade racist for these terms as the frame of mind of what constituted a racist is certainly different. However, a fair conclusion is that these terms are used in different

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locations, and, I think, with a noticeably different tone. The editors speak in very noble and defensive terms of Negroes and colored persons on the front page. The implications of Darkeys and Cullud Pussuns on the third page are quite different. Cases where the blacks were the victims of felonies did not merit them better treatment. While a couple of these cases referred to the victims of “negroes (or) colored persons,” the more frequently used term was “of the colored persuasion.” Even a white man accused of stabbing “a black man” escaped a chain gang and was discovered “at a bar for blacks.” He had darkened his face to “resemble the sons and daughters of Ham with whom he was associating… to imitate a dilapidated darkey.” However, it must be noted that, as far as it is possible to determine, blacks did not fare any worse in court than their white counterparts. Fines were about equal, considering the variables and dismissals were about as frequent for both races. Yet, it is obvious from the above quotes that there was a double standard of equality in 1867 Toledo. On the other side, Negroes did act in ways intended to benefit the passage of the Amendment. State and national conventions of black men gathered to announce their support of anything that would further the civil liberation of the Negroes. Black men also wrote columns, and some even attempted to vote on Ohio’s Election Day. A meeting of “colored people and their friends” was held in Cincinnati in January of 1867, but no trace of the goings-on were to be found in the Toledo papers. On 10 January, blacks convened in Washington d.c. and John M. Langston of Ohio was elected president. They resolved to “petition Congress to educate public opinion to a point, giving them impartial suffrage in all the States…” A similar meeting followed closely on the heels of the State Republican convention in Columbus in the summer, and they adopted resolutions which would further that cause of the Amendment. They were of no great consequence, for what else could be expected from Ohio’s blacks at a time when their political future was at stake? More interestingly, though, the Blade recorded some of the division that occurred at the convention which helps bring to light at least what some Negroes thought about the issue of alliances: There was some discussion as some of the delegates doubted the power of Congress to interfere with the elective franchise in the States that had not forfeited their rights by rebelling against the government. Another debate occurred over the question of gratitude for bringing about the end of slavery at the hands of the Union. It was proposed that the convention

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thank the Republican Party for the great service it performed for black men. But some felt that it was not the Union party, but rather, John Brown, who was responsible for getting the issue of slavery into the forefront (ahead of territorial expansion of the slaveocracy). Added to that was the point that it was not John Brown at all, since he failed at this avowed task, but rather the black soldier who was responsible. He made the difference between the two armies that allowed the Northern armies to the job of manumitting slaves. The points were discussed at length, but no conclusion was reached by the convention. In mid-September, a “Colored Convention in Baltimore” met to decide a stance for blacks, nationally, on the issues confronting them (reconstruction and suffrage, especially). Among their resolutions, they wanted the federal government to guarantee a “republican form of government” in the States, and a similar guarantee of black suffrage within those republican governments. But that was not enough. The blacks proposed what an increasing number of civil libertarians saw as inevitable; an amendment to the u.s. Constitution to that end. The first mention the Blade made of such a proposition was in quoting the New York Times. An amendment engrafting equal suffrages on the National Constitution will encounter keen opposition in the North and West (emphasis mine). But it is indispensable as a measure of expediency. For once the Times is right …We can get it now…The people have progressed somewhat within the past ten years. Slavery is dead and they are perfectly willing to strangle its children. The response to the Times was only natural, but it indicates that the Blade had reservations about the chances for the success of the Ohio Amendment in the up-coming election. While constantly expressing enthusiasm for the passage of the Amendment, the doubts did show through. As early as late June 1867, the Blade confided: “We assure the Radicals of Ohio, that, as plain as the proposition is, they have a desperate struggle before them…” Black men in the State also, on rare occasions, had their view printed in the Blade on the suffrage question. Just before the campaign got under full swing in August, a Dayton Negro presented, “an argument in favor of impartial suffrage, written…for the Journal of that city. The subject is handled ably. The a­ rguments presented are unanswerable (even though they were counter to some of the opinions of the Blade).” The matters of intelligence, patriotism, equality and revolution were handled with alacrity. If Negroes were ignorant, they were only as ignorant as many

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whites were. “Besides, the privilege to exercise important rights is generally ­(emphasis mine) considered a sufficient stimulus to develop an u ­ nderstanding of the working of those rights.” Moreover, “something is wanted besides…­ knowledge…That want is pure patriotism and here is where we come in ­Number One!” He added this to the emotional appeal: “Shame, O Shame, upon the man or set of men who would restrict us and not others for ignorance, when our patriotism and devotion have been an essential means of the government’s success.” If the debt of gratitude felt in Baltimore by black men was owed to the Republicans, then certainly the Republicans owed a debt of gratitude to the black soldiers. The Dayton writer accurately picked up the main reason for the partisan alliance on the issue of suffrage. “And we think the chief difficulty with our opponents today is the certain knowledge that our votes cannot be appropriated to their political aggrandizement.” He recognized that black votes were only pawns in a game where the others players wielded more power. The most interesting part of his statement, however, concerned the threat of revolution. If the government would not give black men the right to vote, then they would (or could) be forced to seek it by themselves. It was more dangerous to disenfranchise the unintelligent than to trust them with the ballot. “Does not restriction foster a spirit of sedition, foreign alliances, hatred and revenge? Is not a proscribed class a dangerous class?” There is clearly a subtle threat of revolution implied in this question. Moreover, the writer put the conflict in terms of a class conflict rather than a race conflict; the latter would seem to have been more likely for the United States at that time. The black author concluded: Yes, we have always been afforded every facility for going down hill, and now that we want to come up with the other pilgrims, everything is said that a wicked heart could suggest. We have been receiving penalties in superabundance—extra penalties in the shape of black code, etc. and we insist upon trying some of its advantages. Lastly, there were instances where blacks attempted to cast ballots in 1867, and the results were hardly surprising. The day following the election, the Blade carried the following: The editor of the Bucyrus, Ohio, Journal (a paper that David Locke used to edit), radical, was mobbed at the polls in that town yesterday for presenting a Negro to exercise the right of suffrage. The extent of his injuries is not stated.

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The amendment was defeated on 8 October 1867 by 38,353 votes (255,340 to 216,987), a total reversal of the Blade’s expectations. While it is readily apparent that the Republicans did not comprehend the feelings of Ohioans in 1867 on the suffrage question, the Radicals, including the Blade, gave the citizens of the state little logical reason to accept the Negro as a full partner in the republic. The Radicals advocated increased civil liberties for Negroes while continuing to hold them in social slavery. This two-faced attitude was too difficult for Ohioans to handle, and the Democrats made political hay as a result. It was vastly easier to give no credence to arguments of black equality than to admit the Negro was a legal equal, entitled to vote with whites, but remained in all other respects, simply, “a darkey.” 2.2.9 Toledo School Desegregation (1871)14 During the 1800’s, blacks in Toledo suffered from the lack of franchise and the “Black Laws,” which forbade testimony in the courts where whites were involved. In 1829, the African American was excluded from any benefits of Public School Funds. Records indicate one Evangelical Abolitionist ran a school in Toledo. Possibly, a Negro may have attended Toledo’s schools if he were not recognized. Finally, in 1853, education for blacks was initiated legally in Ohio. Although public education was to be provided for blacks, it did not specify whether the education was to be integrated. Records are incomplete on black education. Probably, a school of some sort was in operation by the academic year 1852–53. In 1855, the local authorities turned over an “unclassified” school to be used by Negro patrons. It is noted, however, that classes of 35 to 55 were reported up to the time of the Civil War, and better than a hundred in each of the following years. Regardless of records, it is certain that there was a single school and a teacher until 1870. In 1871, two teachers and one school are mentioned. The building is recorded as being located in an alley next to Warren A.M.E. Church on Erie and a canal. It is described as a “low, one story frame building.” It was of cheap structure, dirty and without ventilation. It actually was a blacksmith shop. The first black teacher was Katie Maude Sped. The room was 20 x 35 feet and housed sixty pupils, ranging in age from six to thirty-two years. There were two phases in Toledo School integration. The first, beginning in 1869, was centered around the question, “Is the mixing of races legal?” Evidently, it was illegal, as the segregated education was continued. The second phase began in 1870. James Madison Bell, a black plasterer, held a mass ­meeting in 14

Edrene Cole. “A Project Entitled Blacks in Toledo: A Resource Unit for Elementary Teachers” (master’s thesis, University of Toledo, 1972), 2–4, 5–7, 16–18.

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Warren Church to achieve equal and integrated education for Toledo’s black youth. It ended in 1871 with positive action by the Board, preceding the handing down of a decision in regard to the case. The following is a brief account of the struggle: Mr. James Madison Bell had a strong ally in Clark Waggoner, the editor of a local paper, Commercial. He maintained city interest in the controversy through his paper. Mr. Hill, president of the Toledo Board of Education, answered public statements through a rival newspaper, the Blade. After a year of public agitation, a black taxpayer who claimed $10,000 in real estate, instituted legal action in 1871. Garland White claimed that his daughter, Louisa, was unable to walk over a mile to school. On May 21, 1869, she had been excluded from Clinton Park School and again on December 14, 1870, from Erie Street School; both were her neighborhood schools. Since she was physically unable to walk the distance to the Negro school, he hired a private teacher, while still paying taxes for public education. He was suing for $500 damages. The resolution of both matters came undramatically when the Board of Education agreed to integrate the schools. Mr. White was asked to drop his suit. A proposal was made by Mr. Hill, Board President, to remedy Toledo’s educational facilities and policies, as well as take steps to make clear whether or not the schools had to be integrated. Whatever the cause for Toledo’s educational desegregation in 1871, Toledo was the only major city in Northern Ohio with integrated schools. Please do note the parallel between the striking down of the Separate but Equal Clause of 1954 and the aforementioned Toledo account of 1871. 2.3

Emergence of a Community Vanguard (Documents 15–18)

Black people were not waiting to be accepted into the mainstream as equal members of the white community. Black people in Toledo had leadership who began to organize within their own segregated environment, although they often had assistance from abolitionist whites among the ruling elite. Again we note the contribution of Congressman James Ashley and Mayor Richard Mott. Two institutions that have stood out for almost one hundred fifty years of continuous service to the community are the Warren Church (Document 15) and the Prince Hall Masons (Document 16). They, along with some other institutions, have been the foundation for leadership development in all areas of community life in black Toledo. We also note the outstanding achievements of Moses Fleetwood Walker, the first black professional baseball player in the u.s. and a distinguished businessman and inventor (Document 17). Lastly, we

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note “Stagecoach Mary,” enslaved at birth in 1832, becoming a legendary and free black woman of the West, respected for her contribution to black life in Toledo (Document 18). 2.3.1 Founding of Warren ame Church (1864)15 The first reference of a church in Toledo was found in the Ohio Annual conference minutes of the a.m.e. Church for the year 1847, and there were eight members. The Toledo church was a part of the Sandusky Circuit. The Reverend G.H. Gillespie was the pastor in 1847; the Reverend Jeremiah Thomas in 1849–50; and the Reverend S.T. Willis was over the Sandusky Circuit in 1851. The membership increased more rapidly than other churches on the circuit, therefore, at the 1852 Annual Conference held in Cincinnati, it was resolved that “Toledo be made a mission.” The Reverend J.C. McLarren was appointed pastor. There were 22 members and a Sunday School consisting of one superintendent, three teachers, and 21 scholars. The church was not strong enough to support a minister and his family; and in 1853, Toledo was placed back on the circuit where it remained for nine years. There were less than 300 blacks in Toledo. The Civil War had great effect on our people, but a few faithful souls were determined to carry on. The most authentic record about the Toledo church is found in the History of Toledo and Lucas County Ohio by the historian Clark Waggoner on page 601: The first definite step taken in Toledo toward organization with reference to religious privileges for colored residents, consisted of a meeting of colored people held February 5, 1850, the immediate object being to raise funds for erecting a schoolhouse and a place of worship, they then having no place for either purpose. They organized as the ‘Toledo Colored School Association,’ with James E. Franklin as chairman and A. Richmond as Secretary… In 1862, a Sabbath School for colored scholars was organized in Toledo. It occupied the old frame building on Erie Street between Monroe and Washington streets, which is further distinguished as the first Courthouse of Lucas County. There had been for some years in existence but in feeble condition a Colored Church. The favorable influence of the rebellion was soon felt by that race in Toledo and elsewhere, although the heavy weight of caste prejudice was slow in its removal. 15

Alma Buchanan. “History of Warren ame Church, 1847–1977.” Warren ame Church. (n.d.).

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In the Toledo Blade dated March 11, 1858, the following appeared: The people of color who reside in this city and are connected with the African Methodist Episcopal Church are exceedingly desirous to erect a building in which to worship. We understand that an effort is soon to be made; and they ask the favorable attention of the public to the undertaking. Although these people had met from year to year to make plans to build a church for worshipping, it was not until 1862, when a black minister, the Reverend Henry Young came to Toledo through the underground railroad from Kentucky, and took an interest in these people that constructive developments were noticeable. The church still did not have a name, nor a place to worship. Reverend Young became friends with Richard Mott, for whom the Mott Library is named and Congressman James M. Ashley, the great grandfather of Congressman Ludlow Ashley. Congressman Ashley assisted Reverend Young in raising sufficient funds to rent a frame building at the southwest corner of Summit and Adams Streets. This was the first black institution in Toledo. A congregation of 23 worshipped there. The first school house was opened in 1862, in an old frame building on Erie Street between Monroe and Washington streets, which was originally the first courthouse of Lucas County, according to the historian, Clark Waggoner, in his book History of Toledo and Lucas County, Ohio. In 1874, the church sustained the loss by death of Reverend Henry Young, who rendered Herculean service for the church of his choice. He was a man of great aggressiveness and daring. While he was the pastor of Sullivan Street Church in New York City, he uncovered and forced the expulsion of a number of corrupt and dishonest trustees, a proceeding that gave him great prominence. He was an excellent pastor and an acceptable preacher. By September 1865, the members had laid the foundation and a year later the walls were announced as up on October 17, 1866. On December 29, 1866, it was announced that the church now had a roof and the congregation was worshipping in the basement under the ministry of Reverend J.W. Eades. Reverend Howard Lee and Reverend W.J. Johnson followed Reverend Eades. However, records do not show the exact period of their tenure. Reverend B.W. Arnett followed Reverend Johnson. He was the pastor of Warren from 1870 until 1873. Funds, contributed by members and solicited from whites friendly to the cause, finally made possible the completion of the church located at 17 North Erie Street. On January 9, 1871, Bishop Payne formally dedicated it to

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the worship of God. The Warren Chapel was named in honor of the Reverend Charles W. Warren. 2.3.2 Prince Hall Freemasonry in Toledo (1864)16 Carmen Williamson, 89, recalls the first time he visited the “best picture show house” in Toledo, the opulent, legendary Paramount Theater downtown. He was 13 and handed the cashier some change, expecting to get a ticket to join his friends who were waiting on the third floor, which was reserved for “people of color,” he said. Instead, the theater employee turned hostile and discouraged him from entering. “It was like that back then,” Mr. Williamson recalls. “There weren’t a lot of social opportunities for persons of color. For years all we had were the church and the Masons. There were some other places like the Cold Spot and the Elks clubs; those were places where you went to party and drink liquor. The Masons were a more stoic group.” In a 1958 photograph at Amazon Lodge are, from left, J. Frank Troy, Clarence Walker, Jr., and James W. Ellis. Second row, from left, are W.W. Ballard and Carmen Williamson, who, after more than 60 years, is senior member of the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Ohio, F&AM, in Toledo. Mr. Williamson says the lodge is the oldest chartered Masonic lodge, black or white, in Toledo. It is celebrating its 150th anniversary. After more than 60 years with Toledo’s Amazon Lodge, Mr. Williamson is now the senior member of the Toledo lodge of the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Ohio, Free and Accepted Masons. The black Masonic lodge, 638 N. University St. off Nebraska Avenue near Parkside Boulevard, is celebrating its 150th anniversary with public and private celebrations throughout the year. “It’s important to remember your history,” said Mr. Williamson, the group’s longtime, unofficial historian and photographer. “If you don’t pay respect to your elders, what happens? You lose that respect for your elders and your history.” The Toledo Prince Hall Masonic Lodge is the fourth oldest chartered black Masonic group in Ohio, Mr. Williamson said. The first three groups in Ohio were established in Cincinnati. The black Masonic lodge is the oldest chartered lodge—black or white—in Toledo, according to Mr. Williamson and confirmed by other local lodges.

16

Federico Martinez, “Local Prince Hall Masons mark 150 years of history, brotherhood,” Toledo Blade, February 16, 2014, http://www.toledoblade.com/Culture/2014/02/16/Local -Prince-Hall-Masons-mark-150-years-of-history-brotherhood.html.

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It is one of the oldest of the 21 Masonic lodges still in existence in Lucas, Ottawa, Wood, and Sandusky counties. There are about 8,000 registered Masons among the remaining groups, said Michael Shobe, executive secretary for the Valley of Toledo, Scottish Rite, based in Maumee. Claims of being the oldest Masonic lodge are complicated because many groups have folded or merged in recent years because of declining membership, said Mr. Shobe, a 33rd Degree Mason. For example, the Maumee-based Northern Light Lodge F&AM was chartered March 5, 1818, according to research by Bryon Stickles of Maumee, historian and past master of that lodge. Because of waning membership, it merged with Calumet Lodge in 1997 and Sanford L. Collins Lodge in 1995. Membership is slowly declining for the aging Scottish Rite Masons of Toledo, which covers 15 counties, Mr. Shobe said. Membership is not divided by counties, but the total membership is 2,350, he said. The Scottish Rite’s Masonic Temple was on Heatherdowns Boulevard from 1969 to 2007. But declining membership prompted the group to relocate to a smaller building at 1720 Indian Wood Circle in Maumee. The Zenobia Shrine also had a longtime presence in downtown Toledo, opening its lodge at Madison Avenue and 15th Street in 1949. The Masonic group also said good-bye to its longtime Toledo home and broke ground for a new headquarters in Perrysburg Township in 2009. The new lodge was built at 8048 Broadstone Blvd. in the Cedar Business Center. Prince Hall Masonic local membership has remained consistent—about 150 for more than a decade—although Mr. Williamson says the group is getting older and needs to develop a stronger recruiting plan. So who and what are Masons? The response is so rapid and forcefully stated that Grand Master James Willis, Sr., 63, gives the impression that he’s been waiting a lifetime to answer the question. “The Masons are not a religion or cult,” said Mr. Willis, pastor of Toledo’s St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church. “The Masons are a brotherhood. That’s what this is about. In a church, the job is to help the congregation develop a relationship with Jesus Christ. The Masons’ responsibility is to help members establish a relationship with other brothers, to become a brotherhood.” Black and white Masonic organizations share the same morals and principles, Pastor Willis and Mr. Shobe agreed. Masons are to be “composed of good men with a belief in the Almighty, dedicated to self-improvement and uplifting of the human spirit; through community service, charitable deeds, assisting our widows and orphans and guiding our youth,” according to a Master Mason Handbook.

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The Masons have three degrees of Masonry, with the 3rd Degree earning the member the title of Master Mason, Mr. Willis said. A Master Mason is someone who has, during the first two degrees, learned to subdue his passions and learned silence and obedience. A Master Mason also symbolically has mastered the intellectual and philosophical arts and sciences and crossed the threshold from the outer to the inner, from the material to the spiritual, according to the Master Mason Handbook. To proceed further, the Master Mason can pursue an honorary 33rd Degree level, which can be accomplished by service and merit, Mr. Willis said. The Scottish Rite operates a little differently than other lodges, putting more emphasis on philosophical and ethical teachings, Mr. Shobe said. Both groups occasionally join each other for ceremonies, mostly to promote brotherhood between black and white Masons, Mr. Shobe and Mr. Willis said. Both men said they would love to see the day when black and white Masonic groups merge and put an end to what has become mostly a self-imposed segregation. “I think it would work,” said Mr. Shobe, who points out that his organization has a couple of black members. “It doesn’t make sense to have separate groups for black Masons and white Masons.” Prince Hall has no white members, Pastor Willis said. Although he would like to see more interaction between black and white Masonic groups, he realizes it’s going to take time. It wasn’t until 1994 that Steven Reese, Sr., a black Prince Hall Mason from Cincinnati, and Carl Lindner, a white Mason with the Ancient & Accepted Scottish Rite, came together and in a symbolic gesture shook hands before 900 black and white Masons at a conference. “That was also the day they [the Scottish Rite] officially recognized the existence of Prince Hall Masons,” said Pastor Willis, whose voice trembles with emotion when he talks about it. Despite that monumental moment, Pastor Willis said he doesn’t believe there will be a day when black and white Masons truly stop segregating themselves. “You will always have those who have their beliefs,” he said. “You cannot change others’ beliefs. But you can pray that our brothers will someday change their beliefs.” The black Masons are the product of American segregation. According to Masonic history, the International Mason board, based in Britain, chartered the first Masonic group in the United States, which was based in Pennsylvania in 1731.

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Shortly before the Revolutionary War, British soldiers accepted 14 black Americans into their Masonic ranks. After the war, Prince Hall, a black abolitionist, and the other 13 black soldiers applied for and were denied membership to a white lodge in Boston. Undeterred, Mr. Hall petitioned England to charter a black Masonic organization. The request prompted a quick backlash by white Masons in the United States, who protested and lobbied that the request be denied, Mr. Williamson said. The King of England approved Mr. Hall’s charter request and the first black Mason Lodge 459 was established in 1775. Prince Hall served as the organization’s first Grand Master and would attain the rank of Worshipful Master before dying in 1807 at the age of 72. Most historians credit England for organizing the first Masonic group in 1717. Other historians argue that the English merely took a system created and already used in Egypt for hundreds of years and applied it to the Masons. The Masons’ origins can be traced to 12th century b.c. Egypt, said Jack Ford, former Toledo mayor and current councilman. Mr. Ford, who joined the Prince Hall Masons in 1994, has done considerable research on the group’s history. In an article titled “Freemasonry and Islam: What do They Share?” author Fahim A. Knight points out that black people in ancient Egypt and Africa had developed a sophisticated system of initiation called the Egyptian Mystery System during the 12th century b.c. It’s also believed that Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and Pythagoras—the philosophical fathers of masonry—were educated in astronomy, music, ­ ­geometry, arithmetic, logic, rhetoric, and grammar in Egypt by African wise men, Mr. Knight argues. The Masons are about developing relationships, Mr. Ford said. “They do a lot to contribute to the community,” he said, noting that the group funds youth enrichment programs and college scholarships and participates in many community service projects. Masons are taught the meaning of brotherhood and practice it, Pastor Willis said. Brotherhood includes helping a fellow Mason in need, whether it’s offering encouragement or help in finding a job. A lot of what the Masons do is “networking,” said Mr. Ford, who became a 33rd Degree Mason in 2003, during his second year as mayor. “They were men of high honor in the community who you went to if you needed a bank loan or legal assistance.”

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Historically, many of Toledo’s most prominent African-American men have been Masons, including James B. Simmons, a local attorney who was the first African-American elected to city council in 1935, Mr. Ford said. Among the early local black Masons are also a long list of local businessmen, clergy, physicians, and educators—pillars of the local black community. Current members include Pastor Willis, Mr. Ford, former Mayor Mike Bell, his father, Norman Bell, and the Rev. Otis Gordon, Jr., senior pastor of Warren ame Church on Collingwood Boulevard. Throughout its history, Toledo’s black Mason group has had several members serve as the state’s Most Worshipful Grand Master, or state leader for the Prince Hall Masons. Most recently, Pastor Willis served as Ohio’s Most Worshipful Grand ­Master from 2006 to 2009. William E. Clemens was elected state Grand ­Master 1902– 1909; Everett Gatliff, 1930–1934; Lloyd H. Kimbrough, 1947–1949, and Mr. Simmons, 1955–57, according to Prince Hall Masonic records. Harry Smith, a General Motors employee, was named an honorary state Grand Master in 1981. In 1980, Mr. Smith was the recipient of a rare honor—the No. 1 spot on the 25th Imperial Potentate of the Ancient Egyptian Arabic Order Nobles Mystic Shrine of North and South America and its Jurisdiction. Toledo’s Prince Hall Masons’ criteria for membership include being a male who is at least 18 years old, being an Ohio citizen, being of good moral character, having a personal belief in a supreme being, and agreeing to join of “your own free will and accord.” Nobody in the history of the local Masonic group was held in higher esteem than Clarence Walker, Jr., who died at age 87 in October. He started his career as a city tax officer but by 1966 was serving as director of the Ohio Civil Rights Commission. Three years later he took a job with the u.s. Justice Department, leading community relations efforts and helping Detroit Public Schools adhere to a court order to desegregate. Mr. Walker was a 33rd Degree Mason. He served on the Masonic United Supreme Council, which consisted of 24 members from throughout the world who make decisions that affect all Mason organizations. “He was such a big man in the Masons,” Mr. Ford said. “You would feel a sense of pride when you saw him in a parade or doing something in public.” Eric Walker discovered how beloved Mr. Walker, his father, was during the funeral. “Mr. Willis told me to expect about 200 Masons,” Eric Walker said. “More than 1,000 people turned out for the funeral.” “I was overwhelmed at the number of Masons who showed up.”

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As far back as Eric Walker can remember, his father would attend Masonic meetings every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. He said his grandfather and uncle were Masons too. The tradition appears to have ended with his father, admits Eric Walker, an only child, who acknowledges that he has no interest in joining the group. “I think for my father’s generation, the church and Masons were the only things available to them for socialization—at least until the 1960s and civil rights. Things are different for me. I have more options. “I think for my father, being in the Masons gave him the opportunity for a high degree of mentoring and of transferring his knowledge.” The issue of how to attract younger members is a major topic among Masonic leadership, Mr. Williamson said. Since at least 2000, membership has held at about 150 members, Mr. Williamson said. But the group has grown older; very few members in their 20s or 30s are joining, he said. The group’s leadership isn’t doing a very good job of appealing to younger people, he said. “No, they are not,” Mr. Williamson said. “They are not forward-looking. How do you entice them? “When they ask what we do, we say, we’ll tell you after you join. When they ask us what are the benefits of joining, we tell them they’ll find out after they join. That’s crazy. Young people have a lot more options now. They don’t have time for that.” 2.3.3 Moses Fleetwood Walker (1857–1919)17 Toledo, the best team in the Northwestern League and a frequent opponent, hosted the National League Chicago White Stockings on August 11, 1883, for an exhibition. The manager and star first baseman for Chicago was Cap Anson, one of baseball’s first Hall of Famers. A known racist, Anson at first refused to take the field if Walker played. Toledo manager Charles Morton responded that if Walker was not allowed to play, Anson’s team would lose its share of the gate receipts. Although Anson agreed to play the game (Chicago won 7–6 in ten innings), Walker would encounter Anson again, and the incidents of racism he and other black players faced would increase steadily in the new few years. In 1884 Walker became the first African American to play in the major leagues after Toledo joined the American Association, now in its third year and 17

Robert P. Chenier, “Moses Fleetwood Walker: Ohio’s Own ‘Jackie Robinson,’” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 65, no. 4/66, no. 1 (1993/ 1994): 34–49.

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the chief rival of the National League. One of the best players on the team in 1883, Walker was one of the few that Toledo decided to retain for the following season. Although he had originally planned to use his earnings from baseball to finish his education at the University of Michigan, Walker enjoyed baseball so much that he never went back to school. Reaction to Walker varied among spectators, players and writers. For the most part, Walker’s teammates showed little resentment towards him, except for some disparaging remarks star pitcher Tony Mullane made. Mullane, who could pitch with both hands and eventually won 285 games in the major leagues, admitted that Walker was “the best catcher I ever worked with, but I disliked a negro and whenever I had to pitch to him I used to pitch anything I wanted without looking at his signals.” As the only black major leaguer, Walker often became the target of opposing players’ cruelties, as white pitchers threw at his head and base runners tried to spike him. Spectators in Washington, d.c. reacted favorably to Walker, and in Baltimore more than three thousand fans went to watch him and applaud his good plays. People in the North and East seemed curious to see Walker play among all whites. It was a different story in the South and border states, however. In St. Louis, Walker was so shaken when spectators booed him that he was unable to play. Two more serious incidents followed, the first in Louisville. On May 1, 1884, Walker committed five errors in the game, which helped Louisville defeat Toledo 5-1. In the next game he was charged with four passed balls. The Toledo Blade blamed Walker’s poor game on the Louisville fans. He was “hissed and otherwise insulted…because he was colored.” The newspaper defended Walker by saying: “Walker…is one of the most reliable men on the club, but his poor playing in a city where the color line is closely drawn as it is in Louisville… should not be counted against him. Many a good player under less aggravating circumstances than this has become rattled and unable to play. It is not creditable to the Louisville management that it should permit such outrageous behavior to occur on the grounds.” The Sporting Life correspondent from Louisville saw the situation differently, reporting: “Time works wonders. Walker, the Negro catcher of the Toledo club, who was several years ago forbidden to play on Louisville grounds on ­account of his color, was frequently applauded in that city last week for his fine catching.” When Louisville went to play in Toledo a few weeks later, the Toledo fans, who were quite fond of Walker, got their revenge by booing and insulting the Louisville team. The Blade had to remind the Toledo patrons that it was the Louisville fans, not the players, who had instigated the feud over Walker.

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The second racial incident occurred in Richmond. The Virginians joined the American Association after the Washington franchise disbanded mid-season. Toledo was scheduled to play in Richmond, October 13–15. On September 5 Morton received a letter, allegedly on behalf of seventy-five men. The four men who signed the letter under assumed names warned of the consequences if Walker played: “We the undersigned do hereby warn you not to put up Walker, the Negro catcher, the evenings that you play in Richmond, as we could mention the names of 75 men who have sworn to mob Walker if he comes on the grounds in a suit. We hope you will listen to our words of warning, so that there will be no trouble; but if you do not there certainly will be. We only write this to prevent much bloodshed, as you alone can prevent.” Ironically, Walker was released from the team because of injuries, not race, and Toledo played in Richmond without further incident. Overall, 1884 was a difficult year for Toledo, which finished eighth out of twelve teams. This was mainly due to a slow 1–8 start, which led to a 17–35 record for the first half of the year. Toledo improved in the second half, going 29–23, to finish with an overall record of 46 wins and 58 losses. Unfortunately, financial problems forced the team to disband at the end of the season, and Chris Von der Ohe, the St. Louis owner, invited Morton and several of the Toledo players to join his team. Walker also had a difficult time in 1884. After suffering a broken rib in July, he played in less than half of the team’s games. Depending on the source, Walker batted either .251 in 46 games or .263 in 42 games, and had forty errors. Several other key players on the team also sustained injuries, causing Morton to become so desperate for replacements that he signed Moses’ brother Weldy to play five games in the outfield. The press was generally favorable towards Walker. The Blade sportswriter stressed his positive accomplishments, as well as his dedication and durability in catching barehanded. When Walker was released, the Blade described him as “a conscientious player [who] was very popular with Toledo audiences.” The Toledo correspondent for Sporting Life also spoke highly of Walker: “To his fine work last year much of the success of the Toledo club was due, as none will deny. This year, however, he has been extremely unfortunate, having met with several accidents which kept him disabled a large part of the time. During his connection with the Toledo club, by his fine, gentlemanly deportment, he made hosts of friends who will regret to learn that he is no longer a member of the club.” One of the sportswriters in New York wrote, “Walker, a colored player, caught for the Toledo’s and delighted the residents of Thompson Street by his clever work behind the plate.”

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In 1908, at the age of fifty-one, Walker wrote a booklet about racial tension in the u.s. entitled Our Home Colony: A Treatise on the Past, Present, and Future of the Negro Race in America. He divided the history of African Americans into three periods: the Dark Period, from the time the first blacks were sent to America as slaves in the early 1600’s up to emancipation; the Colonial Period, from the Emancipation Proclamation to the present; and the Destined, or Future Period. In the Dark Period, “the Negroes’ whole experience with the Anglo Saxon was one of outrage and persecution. Never were its own desires or interests considered by its masters.” On emancipation, Walker felt that the slaves were freed only to help strengthen the Northern army and that Southerners viewed emancipation as “wholesale robbery, and violation of the sacred right of contract.” In an Anglo-Saxon civilization, African Americans were “out of place,” and it was “impossible to have independent thought or action.” They could not experience national pride or have their own ideals in America because they realized they were always regarded “as a subordinate people.” With no hope for equality in America, Walker thought the best solution for blacks was to go back to Africa, where there were greater opportunities. Walker saw Liberia, the country founded for African Americans during the ­presidency of James Monroe, as “the only legitimate colony ever attempted by the u.s.” Walker thought that even forced emigration would be acceptable to both races.­ No further involvements in education, economics or religion could help, he believed, because the u.s. was a “white man’s country.” “The Negro should learn that he need never realize [his] full industrial, social, or political equality in this country, no more so than he is to have full social equality with the white man.” 2.3.4 Stagecoach Mary (1832–1914) One of the most respected and beloved pioneer women of the West was an integral part of the history and formation of Toledo’s Ursuline Convent. She was Mary Fields, known also as “Stagecoach Mary.” A colorful woman, Mary, with extraordinary height, stood six feet tall and weighed two hundred pounds. She wore a .38 Smith Wesson strapped under her apron and was said to be an expert markswoman. Although born a slave on the Field Plantation in Tennessee, on March 15, 1832 or 1833, Mary was adventuresome and a free spirit. She was able to surmount the system of human bondage imposed upon her. Mary was eventually sold to the Warner family of West Virginia. Supposedly, when Mr. Warner’s wife died, he sold all his slaves except one, Mary. After Mrs. Warner’s death, Mary cared for the five Warner children. One of the Warner children, Mary Warner, entered the Toledo Ursuline Convent and became known as Sister Annunciation.

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Mary accompanied Sister Annunciation to Toledo. A classmate from the Cleveland area, Sarah Theresa Dunne, known as Mother Amadeus, joined the convent around the same time. The two nuns formed a friendship and became in-laws when Josephine Warner married Edmund Dunne; thus, Mary Fields became a part of both Sister Annunciation’s and Sister Amadeus’ families. Mary Fields lived and worked on the grounds of the Ursuline Convent in Toledo on Cherry and Erie streets between 1870 and 1885. According to Sister Lelia Mahoney of the Ursuline Sisters of Toledo, “Mary was a lay helper who took care of the grounds.” Taking great pride and a sense of accomplishment in her grounds and lawn work, Mary prevented children, attending the convent, from playing on the lawn. In the Blade article, Sister Grace stated, “God help anyone who walked on the lawn after Mary had cut it.” Mary enjoyed Toledo politics. During an era when women, especially black women, not to mention slaves, were to be seen rather than heard, Mary could be found on election days, smoking a cigar while riding around town, campaigning for politicians. Mother Amadeus went to St. Peter’s Mission in Montana in 1884 to open a school for Blackfeet Indian girls. In April 1885, she became ill from pneumonia. Mary heard of Mother Amadeus’ illness and traveled from Toledo to Montana to be by her side. Following Mother Amadeus’ recovery, Mary remained in Montana to assist the nuns with the labor. Mary was instrumental in building the new convent at St. Peter’s Mission. She hauled materials from horse to wagon in order to complete the facilities. Mary’s quarrelsome nature and practice of dueling led Bishop Brondel to tell her to leave St. Peter’s Mission. Following Mary’s expulsion from the mission, Mother Amadeus established her in the restaurant business in Cascade, Montana, not too far from the mission. Mary’s restaurant business did not flourish even after being sponsored twice by Mother Amadeus. It seems Mary, who was kind and affectionate, had a practice of giving food away instead of selling it. After all else failed, Mother Amadeus secured for Mary a job as a stagecoach driver and mail carrier. Mary Fields became one of the first women in this country to deliver the u.s. mail. She received the name “Stagecoach Mary,” because of her outstanding stagecoach driving ability. The Adventures of the Negro Cowboy states, “Mary Fields was ‘perhaps the most remarkable’ of the Negro women in the West.” Stories illustrating Mary’s personality are plentiful. Sister Lelia reported, “Each evening on the train trip to Montana, Mary would wait until the nuns retired, then join the men for smoking and drinking.” Stories also suggest Mary could easily whip two men. Also, the Indians, either out of fear or respect for her, never attacked her stagecoach.

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Mary Fields died in 1914 at the age of 81 or 82 and is buried in Hillsdale Cemetery near the foothills where her stagecoach passed. Before she died, she won the hearts of many residents of Cascade, Montana. In 1912, when Mary’s laundry was destroyed by fire, the townspeople rebuilt the facilities and her home. So esteemed was Mary that she received all her meals free at the prominent New Cascade Hotel. In addition, she became mascot for the town’s baseball team. In honor of Mary, a portrait hangs in the Stockman’s Bank in Cascade. Mary Fields’ fame not only rests in her being one of the first women to drive a mail route. Her fame also rests in her accomplishments as a trail blazer. For Mary Fields was a strong, self-directed woman who would not shy away from a fight and always stood her ground. Not only a legend of the West, Mary Fields was a legend from Toledo.18

18

Ardenia M. Jones Terry, “Mary Fields, a.k.a. Stagecoach Mary,” In Search of Our Past: Women of Northwest Ohio 1 (1987): 21–22.

chapter 3

Formation of Community Life (1900–1950) Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson Toledo became an industrial city in the twentieth century. Strategic labor policies created neighborhoods in the form of ethnic enclaves. Racism created a caste-like system within which class consciousness and the possibility of class struggle were played out. Black people were working people, but faced the racism of both capital and labor. At the end of the Gilded Age and the start of the twentieth century, John D. Rockefeller was on his way to becoming America’s first billionaire after having gained control of over 95% of the u.s. oil-refining capacity, which might have been a prelude to the global inequality that exists today, with a mere 62 billionaires having more wealth than half of humanity, some 3.7 billion individuals. At the start of the twentieth century, with the u.s. economy officially surpassing that of Great Britain as the world’s largest, there was a sense in America of boundless economic possibilities. In 1903, the first message traveled around the world in less than ten minutes. Previously, it would take a few months at best to send a message, via ship, to the other side of the world and get a reply. In 1915, the first transcontinental telephone call was made. As a result of these technological developments, more seeds of globalization were planted, as the world was then on the cusp of swift forward advancement and local and global events would increasingly affect one another in ways never before experienced on the planet. The vile stereotype of black inferiority, indolence, and insobriety, was reinforced by the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist organizations. They sought to terrorize black communities from within the commercial cultural edifice of society, as exemplified by D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. The black population continued with its dignified demands for equality. Between 1901 and 1912, over one thousand blacks were lynched while the Birth of a Nation glorified the savage behavior of the white supremacist terrorist groups. Not to be deterred, however, black people and their liberal supporters continued with their campaigning and organization building, as illustrated by the founding of the naacp in 1909. Between the years 1914, when World War i began, and 1920, with the United States not entering the war until 1917, approximately half a million black people packed their bags and migrated to Chicago, New York, Detroit, and many other northern cities in search of new possibilities outside of the economically impoverishing, politically oppressive, and culturally © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi 10.1163/9789004281899_004

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stultifying South and, thus, its demonstrably inhumane treatment of blacks. Another  issue was the fact that as many as 370,000 black men were drafted during World War i—with some 200,000 shipped overseas and roughly 40,000 involved in combat—yet they experienced gross discrimination instead of honor as military men. The naacp and other organizations, therefore, pushed to end discrimination not only in society writ large, but also in the military, in the overall war effort, and for veterans. African Americans’ confidence and sense of unlimited possibilities e­ xploded with the black consciousness exhibited by the “New Negro” and the Harlem Renaissance. By the Harlem Renaissance’s peak period (1917–1928), blacks had traveled abroad and fought in hostile military theaters, had advanced in mammoth industrial facilities and in professional towers, and had the opportunity to build major churches as anchors in communities; as a result, in part, from such exposure, they were in little mood to brook the terror and poor treatment they had previously experienced with equanimity. They were simply determined to gain equitable treatment as human beings and their equitable share of the nation’s social rewards. From Henry Ford’s announcement of a forty-hour workweek to fdr’s launch of the New Deal, black people were determined to figure out strategies for inclusion in all aspects of human existence. Decades after the confident sensibilities of the “New Negro,” some blacks were counseled by leaders of the community to learn to fight as vigorously as the white corporate, foreign, and military establishment which, as witnessed, had dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This counsel, of course, was in no way advocating that blacks should drop atomic bombs on anyone, but instead the connection was drawn to educate blacks about the fierceness of their opponents, and that blacks would therefore have to gird themselves to become just as fierce if they were to overcome the formidable obstacles to their having full rights as citizens and dignity as human beings. In Stage Two of Toledo’s Black community development, readers will find twenty-four documents that focus on how African Americans, between 1900 and 1950, in various dignified and often contradictory ways organized themselves in Toledo and pushed for equality. It was never easy and always quite chaotic as blacks toiled for economic and political power in their overcrowded and impoverished Toledo neighborhoods. 3.1

Economics of Survival (Documents 19–27)

These documents focus on how racism and economic conditions impacted the social structure of life for African Americans in Toledo. The two most ­important

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social experiences of this have been where people worked and what they did for a job, and what kind of housing they lived in and what the neighborhood was like. This kind of analysis has a long history. Four important studies are the following: Friedrich Engels, The Conditions of the Working Class in England (Manchester, 1845); W.E.B. DuBois, The Philadelphia Negro (1899); St. Clair Drake and Horace Cayton, Black Metropolis (Chicago, 1945); and Ira Katznelson, City Trenches: Urban Politics and the Patterning of Class in the United States (New York, 1981). Roughly half a century separates each of these studies. The first half of the twentieth century in Toledo for African Americans was different from the legacy of slavery but was not without its own forms of racist oppression. The main demographic feature was expansion due to the Great Migration as the black population grew: 1,877 (1910), 5,691 (1920), 13,260 (1930). Black people were forced to work in menial, low-paying jobs. Women were limited mainly to domestic service work, laundry work, and other personalservice-type occupations (Documents 19–21). Men worked in similar jobs and as janitors, personal service, and general laborers. Consistent with this kind of work experience black people in Toledo were forced into the worst housing. Black people lived in segregated neighborhoods (Document 22) based on restrictive covenant principles enforced by the real estate industry and backed up by the state. By 1950 black people were making the transition from renting to buying houses (Document 23). This was facilitated by a rising black middle class (Documents 24 and 25). However, within its own neighborhoods, a vibrant black community did develop, such as in the Pinewood Avenue District and interesting race relations developed on Toledo’s East Side (Documents 26 and 27). 3.1.1 Toledo’s Black Labor Force (1890–1910)1 In an attempt to determine the relative place of blacks within the Toledo labor force, it is necessary to compare these workers with certain foreign born whites as well as the general category of white workers. In 1890, black males, ten years of age and over, comprised 1.5 percent of the total labor force. These workers were almost exclusively within the ranks of servants, waiters, and unspecified laborers. In the latter category, there were 4,600 black and white workers. Specifically, how did blacks compare with other unspecified laborers in terms of percentages employed, and the decennial progression upward from this category? In the last decade of the nineteenth century, German workers comprised the largest segment of both Toledo’s foreign-born population and foreign labor

1 LeRoy T. Williams, “Black Toledo: Afro-Americans in Toledo, Ohio, 1890–1930” (PhD diss., ­University of Toledo, 1977).

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force. These laborers constituted 21.3 percent of the city’s total workers. The Irish trailed the Germans with 4.7 percent of their numbers in the total labor force. Black males accounted for 1.54 percent of the unspecified laborers, a figure almost exactly in line with their proportion of the total labor force. German and Irish male workers constituted 35.8 percent and 8.3 percent respectively of the city’s unspecified laborers. When these groups are compared, there is a similar over-representation in the category of unspecified laborer in 1890. For example, while blacks comprised 1.5 percent of the total Toledo labor force and 1.54 percent of the unspecified laborer category, more than 18 percent of all black working males were unclassified laborers in 1890. Similarly, 30 percent and 31.5 percent of all the employed foreign-born German and Irish workers respectively were in this same category of employment. There appears to be, at least for the opening year of the 1890’s, a similar concentration of ­unspecified laborers—blacks, the foreign-born Germans and Irish—in the ­Toledo labor force. In general, the corresponding positions of all three groups may have represented the beginning years and, to a degree, the relative skills held by these workers upon entering the city’s rapidly expanding industrial order. On the other hand, in the broad category of white workers (both native and ­foreign-born), a ­different picture is presented of the unspecified laborer category. White workers, as a group, constituted 98.5 percent of the total Toledo labor force in 1890. Only 17.8 percent, however, were classed as ­unspecified laborers. This compares to 18.3 percent for all black employed males in the same year. Here, there is a more graphic view of the Afro-American’s “over-­ representation” within the unspecified laborer category. In 1900, black males held 1.59 percent of the city’s 41,041 total jobs and occupations. Comparatively, the foreign-born Germans constituted 30.06 percent of the total labor force while the Irish, Polish, and Austro-Hungarian workers accounted for 8.5 percent, 5.8 percent, and 1.3 percent respectively. In the unspecified laborer category, black males constituted 3.1 percent of these workers. This represented a doubling of Afro-American workers in the category over that of 1890. At the same time, the Germans comprised 30.6 percent of the city’s unspecified laborers. The Irish, Polish, and Austro-Hungarians trailed the Germans with 8.3 percent, 21 percent, and 2.8 percent of Toledo’s unclassified workers. When these groups are surveyed according to the percentage of total members employed, there are decreases in unspecified laborers for two groups. Among all employed German workers, the percentage of these laborers decreased from their 30 percent in 1890 to 15.9 percent in 1900. A similar decline occurred within the ranks of Irish workers. Here, Irish males witnessed a decrease from their 31.5 percent in 1890 to 15.3 percent in 1900. It is uncertain

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what percentages of the unspecified laborer category were held by the Polish and the Austro-Hungarians in 1890. The decrease of unspecified laborers among the German and Irish workers suggest a certain mobility upward to other and perhaps more skilled forms of employment during the decade of the 1890’s. The possibility of this upward movement is underscored by the decided margin in homeownerships among the Germans and Irish in 1900, a topic previously discussed. On the other hand, the percentage of all black employed males in the unskilled category increased during the 1890’s. Blacks increased from 18.3 percent of their total employed members as unspecified laborers in 1890 to more than 30 percent a decade later. It should be noted that the Toledo and black populations increased by 61.9 percent and 58.7 percent respectively during the depression decade of the 1890’s. This growth reflected the expanding and increasing complexity of Toledo and other urban communities as well as the national economic dislocation. Despite the economic uncertainties or perhaps due to them, both the black and white sectors of Toledo’s population increased. As blacks grew in numbers, so did the percentage of their workers who were employed as unspecified laborers. For the German and Irish populations, there were significant decreases in the percentage of concentration in the unskilled category of labor. In fact, the percentage of all white workers in this classification declined from 17.8 percent in 1890 to 15.3 percent by 1900. The decade of 1900 to 1910 further illustrates the place of black workers within the most heavily populated category being unspecified laborer. Again, the population growth in the period is revealing. During the decade, black Toledoans recorded their lowest rate of growth—9.8 percent. The city’s total population increased by 27.8 percent in this same period. And yet, white workers, as a group, declined in the percentage of their members who were employed as unspecified laborers from 15.3 percent in 1900 to only 9.05 percent by 1910. This suggests that increasing numbers of white workers entered the Toledo general economy in wider fields of employment and even jobs above those of the unskilled. In the main, such occurrences constituted upward group movement. Black workers who were employed as unspecified laborers declined from 30.3 percent in 1900 to 18.05 percent in 1910. This percentage almost equaled that of all black males employed in the category in 1890. More than any upward movement by this group of workers, the 18.05 percentage of all employed blacks as unspecified laborers reflected the relative black population increase between 1900 and 1910 (9.8 percent) and the diffusion of black male workers into such categories as janitors, sextons, and waiters (See: Tables xi–xiii). The expanded or inflated 30.3 percent of all black employed males in the category of unspecified laborer in 1900 denoted, in part, the 58.7 percent growth

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in the black ­population during the 1890’s and a concentration of these workers in the unskilled category. Unlike the increase in white laborers, incoming blacks entered primarily one classification of labor, the unskilled. At the same time, blacks also declined in their share of the city’s barbers between 1890 and 1900. In 1890, there were twenty-three black males among Toledo’s 199 barbers and hairdressers. Ten years later, only twenty-nine blacks found employment among more than 350 barbers and hairdressers in the city. In part, the relatively small increase in black barbers denoted the expansion of whites into this occupational category at the exclusion of blacks during the depression decade of the 1890’s. 3.1.2 Black Population Growth 1910–19302 Between 1910 and 1930, the number of black residents in Toledo rose from 1,877 to 13,260, an increase of more than 336 percent. During this same period, the total population of the city grew by only 64 percent, from 168,497 to 290,718. These percentages represent the net decennial growth of the black and white communities; they do not show the number of residents who moved in or out of the city on a monthly or yearly basis. Despite the lack of such data, it can be stated that within the space of a single decade, 1910–1920, the Afro-American population soared from 1,877 to 5,691 and represented 2.3 percent of the city’s 243,164 residents. During the next decade, this figure increased to 13,260 or 4.6 percent of Toledo’s total population of 290,718.… The net black population increases between 1910 and 1930 departed sharply from those of earlier years. The growth of black Toledo brought significant changes in the composition of its population. In 1900, almost 45 percent of the city’s 1,710 black residents were native Ohioans. Twenty years later, only one-fourth of the Afro-American population of 5,691 were born in Ohio and by 1930 this percentage had decreased to roughly 22 percent. Moreover, the intervening years between 1900 and 1930 witnessed important shifts in the origins of migrants to the city. For example, in 1900 13.3 percent of Toledo’s black residents born outside Ohio were natives of the Midwestern states of Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. By 1930, less than one-tenth of the Afro-American population were natives of these same Midwestern states. Similarly, the 1900 black population received only 12.3 percent of its 1,710 members from the states of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi, and about this same percentage from the Virginias, Carolinas, and Georgia. By 1930, this was no longer true. While one-fourth of all the blacks in Toledo were natives of the Virginias, Carolinas, 2 Lee Williams, “Newcomers to the City: A Study of Black Population Growth in Toledo, Ohio, 1910–1930,” Ohio History 89 (1980), pages 5–24.

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Georgia, and Florida, more than 45 percent (almost one-half of the total population of 13,260) were born in the four states of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi. The greatest number of these Afro-Americans, 35 percent, were native Tennesseans. In all, the generation from 1900 to 1930 witnessed a decided shift in the origins of black newcomers to Toledo from the Midwest to greater numbers from the southwest and the “deep south.” Despite their southern nativity, an indeterminate number of Afro-­Americans entered Toledo via other northern industrial communities. Indications are that these southern-born migrants underwent a “falling back” process as they left such cities as Detroit and Chicago to settle in Toledo. In part, these newcomers considered Toledo’s relatively small Negro population as one which offered a greater degree of “elbow room” from the overcrowding that plagued larger communities. In short, it was a place that “promised expanded opportunities” and yet was small enough for one to “put down roots and raise a family.” ­Beyond the selection of Toledo as a second or perhaps even third destination for migrants, the community shared in the World War i northward drive of southern black Americans. How, then, did black Toledoans fare in terms of the jobs or occupations that they held in 1920 and 1930? In 1920, the community’s black female workers constituted 3.3 percent of the total female labor force in the city. These Negroes, like their counterparts in the decades 1890–1910, were most heavily ­concentrated in the domestic and personal services category of labor. Forty-four percent of all employed black females were servants in 1920 and they comprised fifteen ­percent of all the servants in the city. By contrast, only ten percent of all employed white females were servants in the same year. While information on the ethnic backgrounds of these whites is unavailable, it is possible that sizeable numbers continued to be those of “newer immigrant groups” such as the Austro-Hungarians and the Russians. In the category of laundress, more than 31 percent of all the employed black females held jobs while only 1.7 percent of the employed white females were laundresses. In the broad and dubious category of mechanical trades, 5.6 percent of the employed black females held jobs. For the most part, this percentage represented the opening of greater opportunities in industry for Negro females. When compared to their white counterparts, however, blacks trailed by more than 20 percent in the mechanical trades. In the second decade of the twentieth century, Afro-American males evidenced slight improvement in the jobs they held. These advances came as a result of increased industrial development in the city. In 1910, less than onehalf of one percent of the employed black males were iron molders, founders, and casters. With the economic growth produced by the First World War,

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Negro males comprised slightly more than one percent of all the city’s workers in these same jobs in 1920. Moreover, approximately 11.0 percent of all the employed black males in 1920 were iron molders, founders, and casters. In the city’s automobile factories, Afro-Americans comprised 7.0 percent of the unspecified laborers. Even as laborers, blacks were negligible in the automobile industry in 1910. A decade later, 2.5 percent of the city’s mechanics were Negroes. As semi-skilled and skilled operatives within the automobile factories, the Afro-American’s share of the total jobs stood at slightly more than one percent. Black males were conspicuously absent from the ranks of machinists and there were few Negro apprentices in any of the semi-skilled and skilled categories of labor between 1910 and 1930. This combined with a general exclusion of blacks from organized labor to pose a double hardship in access to higher paying jobs. Afro-American males continued a long-standing concentration in primarily three job classifications. They comprised 48 percent of Toledo’s “street, railroad, and store laborers,” 27 percent of all the jobs as janitors, and two-thirds of the non-store porters in 1920. Comparatively, white males as a group, did not evidence such concentration in any of these categories. By 1930, Negro males had increased their slightly less than three percent of the total labor force in 1920 to more than five percent. Yet, blacks, other than laborers, janitors, porters, servants, and waiters, witnessed little movement into the semi-skilled occupations. Indeed, there was a greater concentration in the unskilled categories as blacks now comprised 82 percent of the city’s porters and 31 percent of its janitors. In the category of iron molder, founder, and caster, employed black males decreased from 11 percent in 1920 to less than 5 percent by 1930. In that same year, Negro females came to dominate the category of servant. These workers comprised 61 percent of the entire servant class, with more than one-fourth (27 percent) of all employed black females listed as servants. Similarly, Afro-American females continued their concentration as laundresses and non-factory laundry operatives. They also came to dominate the category of “elevator operator” by holding 62 percent of Toledo’s total jobs of this classification. At the same time, Negro females declined from 5.6 percent of the mechanical trades to one percent in 1930. Among white males and females, such concentration in certain categories and under-representation in others did not exist, at least for the opening year of the century’s third decade. Between 1920 and 1930, the economic conditions among black residents in Toledo evidenced change or improvement in some areas and greater concentration in the more traditional areas of Afro-American employment. The growing industrialization in the city brought limited opportunities for many ­Negroes, especially as classified laborers. Undoubtedly, some newcomers saw

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this as a move upward from their previous economic conditions in the south. For others, the circle only tightened as the socioeconomic walls of a new and often strange world closed in upon them. In the clerical and professional c­ lasses of work, approximately one percent of the black Toledo population held jobs in 1920 and 1930. These represented the limits of the white collar occupations within the black community. Comparatively the total statewide percentage of blacks in these two jobs classifications stood a little above two percent in 1920. The decline in industrial-related jobs for blacks in 1930 reflected the opening years of the Great Depression. As jobs decreased among all workers, they took a sharp downward turn in the Negro community. Some workers had just begun to inch their way into the “time clock” routine of the industrial order as semiskilled operatives when the bottom fell out of the economy. With this economic crisis at the close of the century’s third decade, blacks could do little more than increase their already disproportionate share of the lowest-paying and most menial jobs. In time, even these forms of labor would be at a premium. 3.1.3 Table 2

Industrial Status of Employment 19363 African Americans employed in industrial firms in Toledo in 1936

Company Chevrolet Motor Ohio Co. Libbey-Owens-Ford Glass Ohio Bell Telephone Spicer Manufacturing Willys Overland Electric Auto Lite Champion Spark Plug De Vilbiss Co. Dolhler Die ­Casting Co. Diera Co. Inter-lake Iron Corp. Mather Spring Co. Moto Meter Gauge Co.

Total employees 1,200 1,400 700 1,600 2,000 3,500 1,000 796 1,000 400 650 350 590

Negro

Negro position

40 12 0 10 4 0 15 0 0 1 200 0 1

Janitor Janitor Labor Janitor Janitor

Janitor Labor Matron

3 John S. Rinehart, “The Negro in a congested Toledo area” (Master’s thesis, Bowling Green State University, 1940).

64 Table 2

Alkalimat and Patterson African Americans employed in industrial firms in Toledo in 1936 (cont.)

Company

Total employees

Negro

Negro position

Standard Oil (Sales Dept.) Standard Oil (Refinery) Toledo Machine and Tool Toledo Scale Co. Total

220 322 990 272 16,990

2 22 28 5 340

Janitor Labor Janitor

3.1.4 Neighborhood Segregation4 Throughout the period 1890 to 1930, black residents continued to be disproportionately represented in various city wards. For example, along with the single black enumerated within the Ninth Ward in 1890, three additional wards (in the city’s total of nine) contained less than one percent black residents. Despite the changes in ward boundaries and the annexation of newer areas to the city, many wards contained a minimal number of Afro-Americans. In 1900, there were seventeen blacks in the Fifth Ward population of more than 8,700 residents and only four Negroes in the Fourteenth Ward among 8,802 residents. Ten years later and after significant growth in both population and physical size, Toledo’s Thirteenth Ward held only fifteen blacks. Another, the Fourth Ward, counted twenty-three Afro-American residents. By 1920 the city’s Eighth Ward (in a total of sixteen) contained only eleven blacks. A dec­ ade later, four of the city’s twenty wards—the Second, Eleventh, Twelfth, and Fourteenth—held a combined black population of less than fifty residents while the Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth Wards contained over two-thirds of the city’s Afro-American population. These figures illustrate the degree of residential ward concentration in Toledo during the period. They do not explain the movements of blacks within these wards and the growing number of ­Afro-Americans in neighborhoods. Nonetheless, there were areas in the city—vast tracts of certain wards—that were either under- or over-populated with black Toledoans. If most Afro-Americans were primarily concentrated in four wards in 1890, it was the same in 1930. In short, the distribution and ­concentration of the black population in 1930 departed little from the patterns evident in 1890 and 1900. 4 Williams, “Black Toledo.”

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Since the mid-nineteenth century, most black Toledoans lived in so-called Negro or Colored houses in the city. This appears to be the case despite the existence of black residents on the fringes of white neighborhoods and even along certain city streets. Moreover, regardless of the size of the black population in relation to that of the city’s total (1.3 percent in both 1890 and 1900 and declining to 1.1 percent by 1910), a general race prejudice continued to separate the Afro-American community from the larger society. The causes of this segregation can be found in the long-standing white attitudes toward the AfroAmerican. A hardening of neighborhood lines (especially after 1915) occurred as the black community grew in the twentieth century, in other words, but this development was not independent of the traditional white attitudes toward the Afro-American. The limited economic opportunities available to blacks also figure in the patterns of segregated housing. Between 1890 and 1916, blacks were disproportionately represented in the job categories of unspecified laborers, servants, and waiters, for example, and they did not parallel the general white population in movement upward from the more menial categories of labor. Still, it is apparent that the issue of race played a stronger role than economics in maintaining older patterns of street and later neighborhood segregation of blacks in Toledo. 3.1.5 Black Access to Housing (1940–1950)5 The relation between race and population growth in Toledo in recent years has been typical of other northern urban centers, namely, the Negro population has grown more rapidly than has the white. The Negro population increased by 72 percent from 1940 to 1950, from just under 15,000 to just over 25,000. This increase produced a decline in the proportion of the community’s housing available to Negroes. In 1940, the 5.2 percent of Negroes in the city occupied 4.9 percent of the housing; in 1950 Negroes were 8.3 percent of the population and occupied 6.2 percent of available housing. The more intensive occupancy by Negroes of available housing suggested by these data is documented by other data: from 1940 to 1950, the proportion of persons per occupied dwelling unit for whites decreased from 3.5 to 3.2; for Negroes, it increased from 3.9 to 4.9. In addition, Negroes have never had a proportionate share of ­standard housing. Of the substandard housing in Toledo, 88 percent is white-­ occupied; this is 13 percent of all white-occupied housing. Negroes, in turn, 5 J. McKee, “Changing Patterns of Race and Housing: A Toledo Study,” Social Forces 41, no. 3 (1963): 253–260.

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occupy only 12 percent substandard housing in Toledo; but this is 26 percent of all available non-white housing. Thus, one Negro-occupied dwelling unit in four is substandard, in contrast to about one in eight for whites. These background data support the familiar sociological image of Negroes concentrated in the older residential area of the city and crowded into substandard housing. The research undertaken, however, was motivated by recognition among intergroup relations, housing, city planning, and health officials that these did not exhaust the relevant data. Other known facts, whether firmly documented or more tentative and impressionistic, offered an opportunity to explore changes in the relation of the Negro to the community’s housing market, both actual and potential. Of these, perhaps the most important was knowledge of a spreading pattern of Negro home ownership. This paper reports the data from the sample survey relevant to this issue. From our knowledge of housing use patterns in the city, and from professional knowledge of this area, we expected to find a high degree of home ownership. Our data bore this out. Almost three-fourths of the sample of 167 ­respondents reported they were buying their homes: Buying 124 (74 percent) Renting 43 (26 percent) This is a substantially higher rate of homeownership than in the city as a whole, and for Negroes especially this represents, in the postwar years, a significant change in their housing patterns. In 1940, only 18 percent of Toledo’s Negroes were homeowners; in 1950, there was 46 percent home ownership. The difference between our sample figure of 74 percent home ownership in the Negro area in 1955, and 46 percent Negro home ownership in the city in 1950 can be explained by three factors: (1) the very high proportion of single family residences in our sample area; (2) the difference of five years reflecting the increasing trend toward more home ownership among Negroes; and (3) the voluntary withdrawal of whites from both occupancy and ownership of property in the decaying core of the city. From our sample data, it is apparent that Negro home ownership has occurred largely since World War ii. If we use 1940 as a dividing line, we find that a large majority of home purchases were made since that time. Before 1940 17 (15 percent) After 1940 96 (85 percent)

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If we break down the data into decades, using as the key decade the post-war years, 1945–54, the following is revealed: Before 1935 7 (6 percent) 1935–1944 40 (35 percent) 1945–1954 66 (58 percent) We would expect, of course, that a majority of home purchases had been made within 10 or 15 years in any area; only a minority of homebuyers could have been expected to have purchased their homes before 1935 in any area of the city. Nevertheless, some comparative data available to us from the survey does provide support for our thesis that there has been a trend to home buying among Negroes. For example, while 85 percent of home purchases by Negroes had occurred since 1940, the comparable figure for the white residents in the remaining hard-core area was 57 percent. In contrast, 31 percent of the white residents of the hard-core had purchased their homes before 1930, compared to only 6 percent of the Negroes. The limitations on home-buying by Negroes have always been related to the problem of financing. Negroes have usually found it difficult to get financial backing in the form of mortgages, and thus, when buying, have had to make use of the land contract more than have white home-buyers. [A land contract is essentially a mortgage agreement between buyer and seller rather between buyer and bank.—eds.] When we note how Negroes in our sample have ­financed the purchase of their home … we note an extensive use of the land contract. About four in ten of home purchases in our sample were by land contract. Nevertheless, slightly more than half of our sample was able to procure financing, either by conventional or government-supported mortgages. Cash purchase or inheritance accounted for only a small percentage of the cases. The data … however, cover all cases in the sample, regardless of when the home was purchased…. If we relate the data on types of financing to the periods when Negroes purchased housing … then we find significant clues to the change in the Negro’s relation to the housing market. The few cases of home buying by Negroes before 1935 relied almost entirely on the land contract…. In the decade 1935–44, one out of two Negroes still relied on land contract, though by now better than four out of ten were able to obtain some form of financing, divided between conventional and fha mortgages. In the ­post-war decade, however, we note that the land contract provides the method of ­financing in only about three out of ten cases, and that gi, fha, and conventional mortgages account for 65 percent of home purchasing.

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The decline in the land contract as a mode of financing is only partly e­ vident…. If we divide the decade, 1945–54, into two periods, we can see the continued decline of the land contract, as other means of financing home purchases opens up to Negroes. Of the 19 cases of land contract financing reported in Table 2 for the decade, 12 cases occurred in the years 1945–49. In the years 1950–54, only 7 cases of land contract are found out of 33; this is only 21 percent of the cases. In similar fashion, 23 out of 33 home purchases in this five-year period were financed by conventional, gi, and fha mortgages. This means that Negroes in the oldest residential area of Toledo had by 1950 reached a point where only about one in five resorted to a land contract to purchase housing, and that seven out of ten were able to secure a mortgage. Of the seven, about five obtained either gi or fha mortgages. In short, after 1950 government programs for the support of home purchasing were being used by half the Negro home buyers. While these data suggest an important “breakthrough” on the previous barriers to home purchasing by Negroes, other data suggest that the Negro may be paying a high price (literally) for his gain. The housing in the Negro area is some of the oldest residential housing in Toledo; and by several somewhat crude measures available to us, we were able to determine that it was of lesser quality than that of the surrounding white area. During the interview, a qualitative judgment was recorded by each pair of interviewers, based on observation of the exterior and interior of the houses by a set of criteria provided them in the orientation session. Since this was a crude, qualitative judgment, it can only be offered most tentatively. In Table 3 we have compared the Negro area to the immediately adjoining Polish area and then to the rest of the white housing…. The differences recorded are in an expected direction: the much higher rating for the Polish area accords with the traditionally high level of home maintenance and upkeep characteristic of the Polish in Toledo. The lower rating for the Negro housing is consistent with the high proportion of substandard homes occupied by Negroes. While these are crude measurements, they are consistent with other data and with professional expectations and judgments. Further evidence of differences in housing quality from our research data is that more than one fourth (27 ­percent) of the Negro housing units lacked central heating, compared to only 6 percent in the Polish area and 12 percent in the other white housing. In addition, we must note that 26 percent of Negro housing in Toledo is substandard, compared to 13 percent of white housing. Also, while Negroes are getting the lowest quality housing in the oldest residential area of Toledo, and thus the poorest housing in the city, they are

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paying more for it than are whites in the adjoining old residential areas. The median purchase price for Negroes was $4700, compared to $4600 for whites in the  ­Polish area, and $4250 for the other whites. Here we must note that ­Negroes have entered the housing market relatively late. They were not able to buy ­housing before the War to any great extent, when that same housing, newer and frequently in better condition, sold for substantially less. Thus, it would seem reasonable to assume that Negroes have had to pay somewhat more for  housing which is older, of poorer quality, and more of which is substandard. This inference seems borne out by an inspection of the data. Since 1950, housing in the Negro area has sold at median category of $8,000–9,000. This same house averaged $3,000 less in 1945–49 and cost only between $2,000–  3,000 from 1935–44. But the majority of Negroes as we have seen have been able to purchase housing only in more recent years. While white housing has similarly experienced an inflationary increase, more white housing in our sample had been purchased earlier before the price went up. The median price category of $8,000–9,000 that Negroes have been paying since 1950 for the area’s poorest housing is more than whites have been paying for somewhat better housing in the rest of the hard-core area. Houses in the previously mentioned Polish area, which contains the best-kept housing in the area, were also selling in the median price category of $8,000–9,000 but the remainder of white housing in the area was selling in the median category, $6,000–7,000. To this point, then, our data suggest that the Negro has been able to change from a traditional renter to home-buyer, and since 1950 has been able to enter the home-buying and home-financing market in substantially greater numbers than ever before. To some degree he has broken through the restrictions which prevented more than four out of five Negroes from entering the housing market prior to World War ii. Important as this gain has been for the Negro, such a development must be tempered with a recognition that he has only been able to purchase the oldest and poorest quality housing in the city’s oldest area and at the highest prices for such housing. Such a change could not have occurred unless Negroes were able to afford the going price for housing, and particularly, to qualify for mortgages. This means that their economic status since World War ii constitutes relevant data for the analysis of such a change. At the time of our interviewing (March and April, 1955), 17 percent of the primary wage-earners among the Negroes in our sample were unemployed, contrasted to 8 percent of the whites. Only 4 percent of secondary Negro ­wage-earners were unemployed, however, and 31 percent of the Negro families

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reported two or more workers in the family. Data such as these, document the commonly held idea that Negroes still experience greater unemployment than do whites, and rely upon multiple employment in the family to maintain the family income. An analysis of the range of occupations held by Negroes indicates that they had not as yet won equal access to positions on the job market, and discrimination in employment still operated. Table 4 provides evidence that 50 ­percent of the sample of Negroes hold jobs in Toledo’s industrial economy paying average wages or better…. This compares, however, to the 87 percent of the white workers in the sample whose occupations rank from semi-skilled on up. According to the data in Table 4, secondary workers in the Negro family, 62 percent of whom are the wives of the primary worker, are also about evenly divided among the higher and lower occupation. However, the greater proportion of white-collar workers among the secondary workers probably reflects the greater education of the younger generation, as well as the somewhat greater education of wives over husbands, both of which our data reveal. In turn, however, more than four out of ten of the secondary workers are ­service workers and domestic servants, underscoring the fact that Negro women still constitute a significant part of this section of the community’s labor force. These data would suggest that Negro earning power was still less than that of whites. The median weekly wages of Negroes in our sample were $71 compared to $78 for whites in the sample…. In both cases this is below the average w ­ ages for the city, which for 1955 was reported as having an average ­weekly  wage of $87–$76…. There was no significant difference in the average weekly wage of Negro and white secondary workers. If we measure family income, rather than individual income, we find that Negroes here, too, average less than do whites in the area. However, it may be particularly useful to note that 28 percent of Negro primary wage-earners reported earning over $80 a week, and that 22 percent of the Negro families reported a family income ranging from $100 to $200 a week. 3.1.6 Toledo’s Black Middle Class (1926)6 In our city they are forging their way into the business world and are now making a creditable showing in many various business undertakings. There are at present ten (10) tailor shops, six (6) ice and coal dealers, four (4) pool rooms, three (3) real estate offices, two (2) sign painters, three (3) soft drink 6 E.L. Wheaton, “The Social Status of the Negro in Toledo, Ohio,” (master’s thesis, University of Toledo, 1927).

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parlors, three (3) trucking houses, seven (7) grocery stores, three (3) hotels, six (6) ­insurance offices, nine (9) barber shops, four (4) auto repair shops, two (2) carpenters, and contractors, two (2) taxi service stations, two (2) undertaker ­establishments, two (2) shoe repair shops, one (1) newspaper establishment, one (1) cement contractor, one (1) landscape gardener, one (1) milliner and flower maker, one (1) photographer, two (2) plumbers, one (1) printer, one (1) electrician, one (1) window shade manufacturer, one (1) lamp shade manufacturer, one (1) bricabrac manufacturer, two (2) painters and decorators, one (1) drug store and one (1) fish market. There are in the professional group two (2) pharmacists, seven (7) physicians, three (3) dentists, one (1) chiropodist, five (5) lawyers and seventeen (17) ministers. In 1926, the author organized a local Negro Business League to promote the financial and commercial development of the negro of this community. This organization became a chartered member of the National Negro Business League which was founded by the late Booker T. Washington and is similar in function to the National Chamber of Commerce. The membership of the local Negro Business League is composed of business and professional men. Considering the Negro’s lack of apprenticeship and training in the various business fields, his poverty and lack of capital, the severity of the competition which all must face who enter commercial and industrial enterprises, our ­sober judgment is that he is making progress. From the standpoint of the professions the Negro makes a far better showing. This no doubt may be attributed to the specialized training required and the weeding out process that he is subjected to before he can even enter into the pursuit of his chosen calling. The professional people of the group are generally regarded as men of high integrity whose economic status is secure. 3.1.7 Toledo’s Black Middle Class (1936)7 During Race Relations week, which has recently closed, much was published in newspaper and elsewhere about the colored population of Toledo and the increasing activities, industrial and cultural, of the race. It should not be amiss to call attention to a few specific instances of the many cases in which colored men and women in this city have achieved and are achieving outstanding success in the business and economic life of our city. Economically, the colored man suffers most of all the minority groups, whether here or in any other large city. Hence his advancement in business is particularly commendable. 7 From a 1936 article in the Toledo Blade.

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The John Harter Coal and Ice Co. is the largest colored business enterprise native to Toledo. This company has a high credit rating. Today it can sell coal from wheelbarrow amounts to carloads. Ezra Price does the trucking, with modern trucks owned by him, and the business employs at least 16 persons. 3.1.7.1 Registered Pharmacists William and Ella Stewart, both registered pharmacists, operate the Stewart Pharmacy, a modern drug store. Mrs. Stewart is the only colored woman pharmacist of the group and one of the few women pharmacists in the city. A few years ago Silas Harris opened another drug store. This store, like the Stewarts,’ is modern in every detail. Barbee Durham, graduate of Ohio State University, is the pharmacist. Toledo has at least four large grocery stores owned by colored people. The colored insurance companies are represented in the Supreme Liberty Life, the Mammoth, the Domestic, the Fireside Mutual and the Dunbar Mutual, with E.G. Wade, H.F. Jones, James B. Simmons, Jr., T.J. Woods and F.B. Bell, district managers, respectively. The field of beauty culture has a number of large shops, with modern equipment and trained operators. Solomon White operates a Standard Oil filling ­station and Henry Darling operates a Mobil Oil station. Among undertakers, there are the Wanzo, Easely, Stevens and Tandy funeral homes. The Colored Working Girls’ Home has for a number of years housed unemployed girls and assisted in obtaining employment for them. It is one of the agencies of the community chest. 3.1.7.2 First in Field Miss Irene Ambers is the first colored teacher in modern pedagogy. Dr. F.S. Randolph is a colored chiropodist. Frederick Allen, artist, has a wide reputation. Lloyd Kimbrough holds a responsible position with the Toledo Retail Merchants’ association. Mrs. Ida Mae Fox is Toledo’s only legally trained probation officer. The Rev. W. Payne Stanley, running for the board of education some time ago, polled nearly 10,000 votes. This was the largest vote obtained by any colored man in Toledo, running under independent auspices. No story of the colored race in Toledo could be even casually written without mentioning the labors, social and religious, of the Rev. Dr. B.F. McWilliams, pastor of Third Baptist church. He was the first chairman of the race relations department of the Council of Churches. There are many other prominent colored people and other worthwhile achievements not recorded here but even a brief story of the colored race in Toledo could not afford to ignore personalities and progress mentioned here.

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3.1.8 The Pinewood Avenue District (1929)8 About a year ago, it was felt, by several social agencies in the city of Toledo, that some study should be made of the families in the city’s major Negro district. This was necessary in order to have some basis upon which to deal intelligently with the Negro families of the entire city. Accordingly, the district which is noted on the accompanying map as the Pinewood Avenue District, was designated as the district to be studied. 3.1.8.1 Population The district studied in the survey, known as the Pinewood Avenue District, is bounded by the following streets: Washington, Erie, Dorr, Ewing and Creek. Out of a total of 548 families studied, it was found that 461 were whole families, and 87, or 16 percent, were broken. This percentage is high, as compared with the average population of the city. In the same families, we find a total of 741 children, or 1.3 percent child per family. This is low for the general population. In order to verify more thoroughly these figures, we have turned first to the survey made in October 1923 by Mr. Forrester B. Washington, and we find in his figures for the same district that the average Negro family had two children. From the Board of Education, we find that there are approximately 1700 Negro students in the public schools. We have endeavored to ascertain the ­actual population by the comparison of figures, and by estimates given by the Chamber of Commerce, the Toledo Public Library, the Social Service Federation and the Frederick Douglass Community Association, which was founded by the late Albertus Brown, who himself came to Toledo to practice law, and who sensed the necessity for adequate facilities for the social and recreational needs of the people. Comparing all the figures submitted, we feel safe in ­assuming that there are approximately 14,000 Negroes in the city of Toledo, an increase of 40 percent over the figures of 1923. Using the estimate of 305,000 as the entire population of Toledo, we find the Negro comprises about 4.5 percent of the population. Upon investigation of the different churches and various industrial concerns, we find that 40 percent of the total Negro population are single men, and 20 percent children, with about 8 percent single women. This would mean about 5600 single Negro men to 1120 single Negro women in the city of Toledo. This may help to answer many of the problems which are present in this district.

8 Everett Johnson, “A Study of the Negro Families in the Pinewood Avenue District of Toledo, Ohio,” Opportunity: Journal of Negro Life, 7 (1929).

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3.1.8.2 Migration Figures show that the length of time spent in the city of Toledo by the average Negro is about nine years. This figure includes the native born, as well as the recent migrant. It is interesting to note that 84 percent of the Negroes of Toledo are migrants, and of this number, 33.4 percent were from so-called East South Central States—Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi; the second largest group, or 26.3 percent were born in the East North Central States— Ohio, Michigan, Illinois and Indiana; the third largest group, or 16.6 percent were born in the South Atlantic States—Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida; the fourth largest group or 9.2 percent were born in the West South Central States—Arkansas, Louisiana, Texas and Oklahoma. The other states of the United States and Canada furnished the remainder, or about 14.5 percent. Since the survey of 1923, one finds that the largest increase has come from the second group—Ohio, Michigan, Illinois and Indiana. This only corroborates the well-known opinion that Toledo has not received the direct migration, but has been the indirect place of residence. Toledo has not been a lure in the same sense as the other larger northern cities, and many of the migrants, who have gone to the other cities first, have ultimately come to Toledo to stay. It has been found that southern Ohio, that part of Ohio south of Columbus, has been the direct stopping place of most of the migrants, with Michigan next, and Indiana, third. This fact should be considered as a matter of utmost ­importance to the employers of Toledo, because it means a more contented and stabilized Negro laborer, and a Negro citizenry who will have greater civic interest, because they have come to Toledo to make their homes. 3.1.8.3 Housing It is a significant fact that the average number of rooms per Negro family is four. Most of the families, about 80 percent, live in the cottage type, or, what we have called, the single residence. We note a decided movement in certain districts of Toledo toward the building of the tenement house. Another source of interest to the city of Toledo would be to know that 30 percent of the Negro families own, or are buying, their homes. This is a much larger proportion of homeowners than is found in Detroit or Chicago. 3.1.8.4 Condition of Property Regarding the matter of lighting, we find that most of the homes occupied by the Negro are lighted by electricity. We find, however, that there are a number lighted by gas, and a surprisingly large number that are still in a primitive, back-wood stage, of using lamplight.

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3.1.8.5 Sanitary Conditions We find in the houses that are lighted by the lamps, that there are not t­oilet facilities at all, except outside. These conditions exist in one block in the district studied, and it would be a very easy matter for both situations, light and toilet, to be remedied. In the same locality, there is not decent walking space, and though this pathway could not be dignified by being called a street, ­nevertheless, we find a real estate firm is now building a tenement house thereon, which rather than improving the neighborhood, will only serve to detract from it. 3.1.8.6 The Negro, Himself About 8 percent of the adult Negroes studied in the survey were reported as college graduates, and we find that the average Negro in this district has completed the seventh grade. This is about the average for the country, and is certainly a sign of progress along educational lines. 3.1.8.7 Religious Life Within the district studied there are four Baptist churches: three churches not connected with the regular denominations, and one each of the following denominations: Methodist Episcopal, Colored Methodist Episcopal, A ­ frican Methodist Episcopal Zion, Presbyterian and Episcopalian. Of the twelve church buildings, four are of brick construction, and the others are small, inadequate frame buildings, including two of the store-front type. The valuation of these building is about $175,000. To this should be added about $25,000 as the value of the parsonages owned by the five larger churches in the district, bringing the total valuation to $200,000 or more. This is a commendable showing, when it is remembered that most of these buildings have been acquired within the last ten years. Five of the pastors of these churches are college men, and three are graduates of reputable Theological Seminaries. One of the findings of the Washington survey was that over 66 percent of the Negro population were not members of any church. The percentage of membership is about the same today. Concurrent with this apparent failure on the part of the churches to increase substantially their membership in the past five years is the rapid increase of those commercial institutions which serve as breeding places for vice and crime. While the district is not now over churched, we find that the danger of over churching is imminent, and should be strongly discouraged. Instead of establishing more churches, the larger and stronger churches should inaugurate programs of extension work in the districts of the newcomers. A more intensive type of work also could be done, including home visitation, social and

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recreational activities among the young, evening classes in singing, auxiliary elementary education, public speaking, etc. Other than the churches, the Pinewood Avenue District is almost wholly devoid of helpful social and welfare agencies. The growth of the city, the rapid multiplicity of unwholesome agencies and the increasing of the leisure time of the Negro youth make it imperative that there should be new and additional social and religious agencies. It should be noted that an expansion campaign of the y.m.c.a. is just now getting under way, and that the plans call for a branch of the “Y” in the Pinewood Avenue District. A similar institution for girls and women, either by establishing a y.w.c.a., or by greatly expanding the program of the Colored Working Girls Home, is also a vital necessity. 3.1.8.8 Leisure Time There were 11 pool and billiard rooms studied, all of which were licensed, all charging the same fee of 5 cents per game, and all running from 7:00 a.m. to 12:00 midnight. In most of these, we find they are not by their appearance any too attractive, and their standards are certainly not what they should be. Gambling appeared to be one of the recreational activities of nearly all of these pool rooms. Although in only about one-third of them do we find liquor served openly, yet in all, with the exception of one, there is always the pocket bootlegger, who is ready to furnish and deliver liquor to those who wish it. In all except two the presence of minors was noted: Boys decidedly under the age of eighteen, which is contrary to a City Ordinance. In one, it was found that women frequent the place and play cards. 3.1.8.9 Industrial Status Today there are about 6,000 Negroes gainfully employed in the business establishments of this city. The larger groups are found in the automobile factories, foundries and construction companies. There has been a steady increase since his initial entry into the industries in the number that have come into the skilled class. There are now of the employed Negro males about 20 percent in the skilled class, and about the same percentage in the semi-skilled. This percentage on a whole is not as large as the percentage which is found in a number of the other northern industrial centers. We find a few unusual positions occupied by Negroes, such as Master Electrician with a department store, and Superintendent of a building. In the last few years, Toledo has seen a great increase in the employment of women in industry, and unfortunately, the Negro woman faces a stronger barrier of prejudice in the factories than the man, and we find as a result that the majority of women employed are either domestic servants, or maids, stock girls

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and ­elevator girls in the department stores. In the last year, Toledo suffered a distinct loss in the closing of one of its leading factories which has been employing a very larger percentage of Negro laborers, but those who were in the skilled trades were readily located in other factories, and scarcity of employment at the present day exists for Negroes only in the unskilled class. 3.1.9 East Toledo9 Black residents were not new to East Toledo. Even in the nineteenth century, there had been a small settlement in the general area. In 1890, Afro-Americans tended to cluster along certain streets in this and other parts of the city. With the arrival of increasing numbers of blacks, especially railroad laborers in the period of the First World War, the traditional areas of black residences threatened to overflow their borders. Unlike the street or block segregation prior to 1910, whites now attempted, in 1919, to prohibit black settlement from entire areas of the community. This was the explicit aim of the 146 white covenant signers as they called for the exclusion of blacks from “Vinal, Albert, and adjacent Streets” in East Toledo. While black newcomers may have prompted the actions of these East Toledoans, they did not cause such attitudes toward race. The influx of migrants only served to intensify the existing prejudice and segregation in the city. In the period to 1930, it is uncertain to what extent white residents entered into restrictive covenants to bar Afro-Americans from certain neighborhoods or along certain streets. It is clear, however, that such agreements and their close kindred, the “Neighborhood Improvement Association,” served to further depress the housing available to blacks. Neighborhood associations operated under a variety of generic names that produced the same general results—­ racial segregation. Unlike the more explicitly restrictive covenants, these associations did not bear the outward appearance of exclusion. When East ­Toledoans launched their “Citizens’ Realty Plan,” they simply reported that it was “a holding and developing company aimed at the development of the right kind of property.” There were no references to race, only to the development of “the right kind of property.” Exclusion, however, is implied and sufficient to foster and maintain residential segregation. Whether associated “for improvement” or explicitly to exclude “undesirable elements,” property owners had to have the cooperation of other parties. Perhaps the most important second party to a restrictive covenant was the local real estate agents or boards. While there is little to directly link the city’s real estate board with the covenant and Citizens’ Realty Plan of East Toledo, for 9 Williams, “Black Toledo.”

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example, it is unlikely that local realtors were unaware of the actions of community residents to restrict certain individuals and groups. This is given greater meaning when one considers that prior to 1950, the “Code of Ethics of the National Association of Real Estate Boards” included the following provisions: A realtor should never be instrumental in introducing into neighborhoods … members of any race or nationality … whose presence will be clearly detrimental to property values in that neighborhood. In the main, the reduction of property values hinged more on the reactions of whites than blacks. If, for example, whites fled the presence of blacks, the cry of property value loss by realtors served to enhance their profits and increase racial hostility. In all, Toledo realtors could ill-afford to engender the wrath of irate white property owners. 3.2

Cultural Capital (Documents 28–31)

Cultural capital is genius systematized into the cultural traditions and rituals of a community. It brings the identity and ego strength of people to live their lives with meaning and a vision of a good life that includes them. Toledo was an exciting town for poetry, and especially for music and baseball. The first half of the twentieth century, in significant ways, was a golden time for the Black Toledo community, which became a hub of activity for local black talent as well as a part of a national circuit for the top entertainment acts of the day. Especially important was the early life of jazz musician Art Tatum. 3.2.1 Paul Laurence Dunbar Reads in Toledo (1900)10 Perhaps the most important black to visit the city and the Afro-American community around the turn of the twentieth century was Paul Laurence Dunbar. There are no indications that the community’s black churchmen and leading citizens were responsible for Dunbar’s trips to the city. It appears the young poet spent much of his time in the company of Brand Whitlock. “I came to know [him] personally,” stated Whitlock, “and the hours we spent together were delightful to me.” In a revealing note on the racial climate of the era, Whitlock remarked that “Dunbar” was “the only Negro” he ever “met who did not remind” him “that he was one.” “And I have,” admitted Whitlock, “more than the common share of the conventional prejudice against them…” ­Whitlock’s 10

Williams, “Black Toledo.”

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statement reflects the general sentiment of a small yet significant group of whites who bore witness to “the peculiar genius of special Negroes.” “Dunbar,” said Whitlock, was “a rare and delicate soul in the blackest skin—but the soul” was “all white.” For Whitlock, the genius and blackness of a personality such as Dunbar represented its own “love-hate” relationship. In an attempt to reconcile this dichotomy between “the repulsiveness of blackness and the acknowledgement of its own creativity,” Whitlock and his literary friends extended a modicum of indulgence to the special Negro. In February, 1900, Paul Dunbar presented a selection of his poetry to interested citizens and members of the fast-growing white Collingwood Avenue Presbyterian Church. It is uncertain if blacks were in the audience. In the main, when such recitals were staged outside black communities they were sponsored and attended by whites. Beyond the make-up of the audience, Dunbar’s “renditions were particularly effective.” “The Negro dialect numbers,” stated the Blade, “were given in a manner never before heard from a northern rostrum.” The audience insisted on an encore. There are some critical points to be made concerning Dunbar’s recital. First, like many Midwestern and northern cities, Toledo had a minstrel heritage. Across the stages of both Stickney and White’s Halls, Toledoans laughed and cried to the plaintive songs and the light-hearted jigs of ain’t got nothin’—don’t need nothin’ type of Negro race. In his “Negro Dialect” selections, Dunbar simply reinforced the unflattering antics of black-faced minstrels and abetted certain white-held racial stereotypes of the Afro-American. Second, the popularity of minstrel shows suggests that southern blacks and “their problems” were of particular interest to white Toledoans. Minstrel-showgoers found portrayals of southern black life interesting because it was largely distant. It belonged to the south. Whites could agonize and sometimes rejoice at a peculiarly southern form of life that included the soul-shaking spiritual, “mammy’s lullaby,” and “the songs of work-ridden slaves.” This, in part, may explain the Toledo audience’s request for an encore of Dunbar’s poem, “The Party.” Whites watched attentively as the poet mimicked the “popularized” language of the slave with the opening lines: “Dey had a gread big pahty down to Tom’s de othah night…” Or, perhaps it was Dunbar’s “Antebellum Sermon” that stirred the audience. “We is gathered hyeah, my brothahs,” stated the poet, “in dis howlin’ wildaness, fu’ to speak some words of comfo’t to each othah in distress…” Renditions such as these thoroughly pleased many white audiences and critics. They did so because most whites saw an entire race in terms of unflattering stereotypes. There is reason to believe that Paul Dunbar suffered, as did whites in the larger view, from the tone and style of such works as “The Party” and “Antebellum Sermon.” In Newport, Rhode Island, Dunbar came face to face with

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the social implications of his “dialect poetry.” As the Newport audience stood in applause, “a staid and imperiously aristocratic white lady” interrupted the ­applause and remarked to Dunbar that no longer would she “wax impatiently and cross at the childish antics” of her servants, “members of [his] race.” “­Tonight,” she continued, “you have made me understand and love them.” The audience once again roared in applause. To this, Dunbar raced from the stage “to an anteroom where his wife waited.” He “dropped to his knees before her, buried his head in her lap, and wept convulsively.” Old Paul Dunbar simply gave whites what they wanted to hear? Perhaps he did. It is also possible that the poet found himself entrapped in the blurred recesses of that same “mask” he poetically described as a shroud to protect the Afro-American’s true feelings and desires. At the same time, Dunbar’s ­select audiences in Toledo and across the nation did their part to keep before the public an “acceptable Negro art form.” Many whites thought “it ludicrous for a black poet to express in pure English the nice sentiments, the laudable ­attitudes, and the higher passions that blacks were assumed not to think, feel, and experience.” The significance of Paul Dunbar to Toledo rests in the fact that he was its most noteworthy and publicized black visitor at the turn of the twentieth century. As a poet of growing fame, many of his sponsors and companions were literary figures such as Brand Whitlock. It is doubtful, however, that Whitlock changed, to any appreciable degree, his racial view of blacks. This view, claimed Whitlock, was “the inheritance of a southern ancestry.” On the other hand, there are indications that he came to respect the special genius of the black poet. At Dunbar’s death in 1906, Whitlock, as mayor of the city and a literary friend, likened the poet to such writers as Robert Burns, Percy B. S­ helley, John Keats, George Gordon Byron, and Alexander Pushkin. From within the black community, there is no indication of the response to Dunbar either before or after 1906. Beyond any insensitivity to the poet, the community reflected the less publicized segment of the city’s life. Just as there is a lack of public statements about Paul Dunbar, so there are no indications that the community’s leading black residents expressed their opinions concerning two major events of the early twentieth century: the Brownsville Affair and the victory of Jefferson Jack Johnson. In Cincinnati, Ohio, for example, the Allen a.m.e. Church, the largest in that city, passed a resolution denouncing President Theodore Roosevelt’s dismissal of the more than one hundred black soldiers of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Battalion of the United States Army. The President’s action stemmed from the so-called “Brownsville Raid” of August, 1906, in which black soldiers allegedly “shot-up the town of Brownsville, Texas.” Unlike Cincinnati’s blacks, Afro-Americans in Toledo, at

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least publicly, did not offer their comments on the dishonorable discharge of the men of the Twenty-Fifth. 3.2.2 Art Tatum Performs in Toledo11 Toledo in the 1920s had no shortage of local talent, and it was also on the circuit for touring musicians. Art almost certainly took in all the touring musical acts, since age was no barrier to going into a theater. He was apparently looking for chances to play in clubs at as early an age as they would let him in. At first he simply asked for permission to sit in during intermissions, and one can easily imagine him wanting to measure himself against the professionals. Exactly when and where he played his earliest paid appearances has not been documented. He was probably being booked by club owners as early as fifteen or sixteen (1924–25), but he was certainly being paid for playing at social functions even before that, including appearances at prominent local sites such as the Toledo Club and the Rotary Club. Harold Payne, another acquaintance of Art’s in the 1920s and a banjo player at that time (the guitar had not yet become popular with jazz musicians), ­remembers playing a variety of jobs around Toledo with him, including a dance at the University of Toledo. He and Tatum played, he recalled, “anywhere there was a piano, bootleg liquor, and a chance for tips, places like La Tabernella, Chateau La France, Chicken Charlie’s, Darfey’s… Dorothy Royal’s Blue Lantern, and spots long forgotten” (Rothman, “Toledo Years”). Payne also recalls one time when Art had agreed to provide music for a dance but completely forgot to hire the musicians. At the last minute he had to hire two “terrible” horn players (“the worst in Toledo,” Harold told me). At the dance Art was asked to “give the horns a rest,” so Harold and Art played for a while together (Tatum and banjo—it boggles the mind!) and then the crowd demanded Art Tatum solos for the rest of the evening. As he began to realize the possibilities, at some point Art got together a sixpiece band to work professionally. The group included several musicians who went on to play with nationally known groups: Milton Senior (alto and clarinet) joined McKinney’s Cotton Pickers, one of the finest of the Midwestern bands, in 1928; and Harold Fox (violin) eventually worked with Wilbur de Paris. The rest of the members of the group were Bill Moore (bass), Lester Smith (guitar), and Fats Mason (drums) (Spencer, “Appreciation”). Two of the then well-known Toledo night spots where the group played were the Chateau La France (a converted mansion) and La Tabernella. Both were popular, whites-only restaurants, 11

Lester, J., Too marvelous for words: the life and genius of Art Tatum (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994).

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and they were also famous during those years, which were Prohibition years, as rum-runner hangouts. Rex Stewart, the trumpet player who eventually became so well known playing with Duke Ellington’s orchestra, has described vividly hearing Tatum in 1926 or ’27, when Tatum would have been seventeen or eighteen. Stewart was in Toledo with the Fletcher Henderson band, where he had recently replaced Louis Armstrong, when Milt Senior, already known and respected by the Henderson musicians, persuaded Henderson and some of his players to go to hear the teenage Tatum, playing in a club in an alley in the middle of Toledo’s Bohemian district. They were somewhat reluctant, since almost everywhere the Henderson band went there was someone trying to bring a local musician to their attention, and few of these tips produced a real musical experience. However, this one did: “To a man, we were astonished, gassed, and just couldn’t believe our eyes and ears. How could this nearly blind young fellow extract so much beauty out of an old beat-up upright piano that looked like a relic from the Civil War?” (Stewart, “Genius in Retrospect”). Coleman Hawkins was an unknown sideman of Henderson’s on that night in Toledo. Stewart maintains that Hawkins was so taken by Tatum’s playing that he immediately dropped his slap-tongue style and began creating a different style based on what he’d heard Tatum doing. What Hawkins did with that new style eventually led to his being judged one of the giants of the tenor saxophone, as well as to a line of disciples who made the saxophone the dominant instrument in jazz. This is just one example of the kind of indirect influence Art Tatum has had on the development of jazz. Stewart himself said that ­Tatum’s playing led him to consider seriously giving up the trumpet and ­returning to school. And Henderson, like so many after him, refused to play after Tatum. Stewart quotes Henderson as saying, “I am pretty sure that we are in the presence of one of the greatest talents that you or I will ever hear.” The young Count Basie, traveling with the Benny Moten band in the late 1920s, never forgot his first encounter on a Toledo stop-over: We stopped off there and went into a bar where you could get sandwiches and cigarettes and candy and things like that, and they had a good piano in there. That’s the part I will never forget, because I made the mistake of sitting down at that piano, and that’s when I got my personal introduction to a keyboard monster by the name of Art Tatum. I don’t know why I sat down at that piano. We were all in there to get a little taste and a little snack, and the piano was there. But it was just sitting there. It wasn’t bothering anybody. I just don’t know what made me do what I went and did. I went over there and started bothering that

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piano. That was just asking for trouble, and that’s just exactly what I got. Because somebody went out and found Art. That was his hangout. He was just off somewhere waiting for somebody to come in there and start messing with that piano. Someone dumb enough to do something like that, somebody like Basie in there showing off because there were a couple of good-looking girls in the place or something like that. Oh, boy. They brought him in there, and I can still see him and that way he had of walking on his toes with his head kind of tilted. I’m pretty sure I had already heard a lot of tales about old Art. But when I went over there and hopped on that innocent-looking piano, I didn’t have any idea I was on his stomping ground. “I could have told you,” one of the girls at the bar said. “Why didn’t you, baby? Why didn’t you?” Crow, Jazz Anecdotes

3.2.3 The Depression12 The year was 1929, the dawn of the Great Depression. It was the time of the stock market crash, bank failures, and unemployment. The economic downturn hit Toledo’s black community hard. But people weren’t talking about just their pocketbooks. In black circles around town, folks were still discussing black philosopher Alain Locke’s book, “The New Negro: An Interpretation,” which was published four years earlier. They were marveling at the paintings of Henry O. Tanner and cheering for baseball great Josh Gibson as he dazzled fans as a catcher and hitter with the Homestead Grays. Actress Ethel Waters, musician Duke Ellington and black labor union organizer A. Phillip Randolph were household names. While many blacks felt the hardships of the 1920s and the 1930s, memories of 1929 and the Depression years are often positive for Toledo blacks. At least that’s what Georgianna Taylor and Nina Hunt say. Nestled comfortably in their neat Woodland Avenue home, Ms. Taylor, at the age of 86, and her niece, Ms. Hunt, 75, recall the segregated years of the late 1920s and early 1930s, not with resignation but rather with great pride. Ms. Taylor was 26 years old and what many may call your atypical “colored” girl at that time. 12

Rhonda Sewell, “Depression Memories Not All Bad,” Toledo Blade, February 10, 1989.

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When she was just 6 months old, she moved to Toledo with her parents, who had been black miners in Madison, N.C., along with five older brothers and sisters. They came at the request of her white grandfather, a Civil War veteran who lived in a house on Ottawa Drive. She and her family were the only “Negroes” in the all-white neighborhood. “It wasn’t a lot of colored people in Toledo at that time,” she said. “We lived in a white neighborhood most of my life. I never had any trouble any place. In fact, when I was just 9 years old, I went to an all-white church and they never said anything about it. I went there and I was even in their church groups.” The silver-haired Ms. Taylor laughed loudly as she recalled the “good ol’ days” of her childhood, teens, and 20s. “My uncle, John Harter, was the first Negro to have a coal yard in Toledo. It was on Hoag Street. I’ll never forget when my daddy whipped me one time when I called it Hog Street,” she said chuckling. “[Ms. Taylor’s uncle] had four men who worked for him and they sold ice to people. People would put signs in their front yards that read ‘25’ or ‘50’ pounds, and they would come around to the homes. Because, you know, everybody had iceboxes back then.” Ms. Hunt was 15 years old in 1929. Like her aunt, she recalled the late 1920s as good times. Ms. Hunt later became one of the first black police officers in Toledo in 1946 and was one of the first to be uniformed. Asked about segregation, she said, “Of course there was segregation, but people just ignored it most of the time.” “I remember when I went to school in the new Woodward High School and there was a white girl named Lina Hunt and the teacher called her name and asked if we were sisters and up stands this white girl. We laughed and I was friends with her ever since.” Ms. Taylor agreed: “It depended on the person, but most people just ignored it.” Some aspects of segregation could not be ignored, however. “We would go to the motion picture shows like the Valentine, on Adams, the Rivoli Theatre and the Paramount [Theatre], but we couldn’t sit where the whites did. Negroes used to sit in the balcony—we used to call it ‘peanut heaven’ up there,” Ms. Hunt said. “I remember I had a white girlfriend and the [usher] made the mistake of telling her that I couldn’t sit downstairs with her, and, boy, she ate him out after that!” Ms. Taylor recalled when her first husband moved an usher out of their way when he told the couple they could not sit with the whites. “But we went anyplace and we could shop anyplace, like LaSalle’s—they weren’t that prejudiced. They did have colored elevator girls there because I was one of them,” Ms. Hunt recalled.

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The Blade published an article in 1929 about a survey done by Everett J­ohnson called, “A Study of the Negro Families in the Pinewood Avenue District of Toledo, O.” The article reported that the district, which was bounded by Washington, Erie, Dorr, and Ewing streets and Swan Creek, was said to be the “primary residential colored district of [Toledo].” Ms. Hunt and Ms. Taylor agreed. “Most blacks lived in the Detroit-Dorr-Ewing street areas. We called it the gold coast,” they said in a serious yet playful manner. As far as entertainment for blacks in Toledo, the two women asserted that blacks had “good clean fun” and most of the time black people would visit each other’s homes because of a lack of cars. The “black Y on Indiana Avenue,” as Mrs. Taylor called the ymca, was built in 1930 and became the place for dances and spaghetti dinners after the boys played basketball. For a little excitement and maybe even some risqué fun, blacks could be seen at places such as Johnny Crockett’s bar; the old gambling place on Erie; the 400 Pool Hall at Indiana and Division Street, and even the former Trianon Ballroom, at 1415 Madison Ave., where on certain nights “colored dances” were the place to be. What about men? Ms. Hunt, has been married four times—despite her theory that at three strikes you’re out—and Ms. Taylor, who has been married twice, both blushed as they reminisced on their courting days. Neither had children, and both said they were glad of that because times are rough for black youths today. Despite the fond memories, however, they would not go back. “Blacks just don’t know how good they have it now,” the women said in unison. 3.2.4 The Culture of Black Baseball13 For the past year we have been piecing together the story of Hines’ Farm, a legendary blues club in rural Swanton Township near the Toledo airport. In the 1950s and ‘60s Hines’ Farm had been a major music scene and gathering place for African-Americans. One day we were going through a chest of old photos and promotional ads with Henry Griffin, the current owner of the Hines’ property. Among the flyers for John Lee Hooker, Count Basie, Otis Redding, B.B. King, and other such super-stars of the era, was one that read, EXHIBITION BASEBALL: THE CRYSTAL STARS BASEBALL CLUB OF DETROIT VS. THE HINES ALL-STARS. 13

Thomas Barden and Matthew Donahue, “Those Were the Days,” Toledo Blade, March 21, 1993.

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“You know, I wouldn’t have remembered that,” Mr. Griffin said, “but they did play ball out here.” As we looked the poster over closely, Mr. Griffin pointed at a line of small print. “It says, manager, K.V. James; I think he’s dead. Now, wait, I know that fellow, Porter King; it has him listed as pitcher. Maybe Porter could tell you something about the baseball out here.” As it turned out, Porter King did know about the baseball scene at Hines’ Farm, as did another ball player from those days named Morris Esmond. Mr. Griffin made the contacts and got us in touch with both men. By talking with them we got our story about baseball at Hines’ Farm, and a lot more. As we interviewed these veteran athletes of the 1940s and ‘50s, the whole scene of black semi-pro baseball in Toledo, pre-Jackie Robinson, unfolded vividly ­before us. We dropped in on Morris Esmond first. He greeted us on a cold, sunny afternoon in front of his home on Angola Road, and led us to a rec room lined with sports trophies and civic citations. We sat down to talk at a card table covered with photos and a baseball encyclopedia. It soon became clear how much he enjoyed talking about those glory days. “Well, this was before my time really,” Mr. Esmond said, “but I can tell you in the 1920s the two main black teams were the 400 acs and the Eureka Giants. They were sponsored by pool parlors down on Division Street—Division and Indiana, one of them, and Division and Vance the other one, I believe, that area anyway. It was mixed; they played in the city federation against white teams like the grocery store’s Roller Coats, and the Olds Motors team that was sponsored by the Oldsmobile car dealer.” He unrolled a poster that declared in large type, BASKETBALL— CIRALSKY MEATS—STATE COLORED CHAMPS—TOLEDO CHAMPS. “See this,” he said, “this fellow Hank Rigney was a big promoter in the 1930s. He managed these guys. Rigney got sponsors for a lot of the teams, to get them uniforms and promote their games. Most of the Ciralsky Meats players played baseball and football too. They were just good athletes no matter what they were playing.” He named the various players as he pointed to them—“Link Stevens, Jim McCoglin, Al Williams, Shine Taylor. Ciralsky meats sponsored a softball team for a number of years and all these same fellows played on it.” Hank Rigney had organized an all-black league in the mid-‘30s. They played in South Toledo on Saturdays at a park called Sterling Field. Some of the clubs Mr. Rigney helped start played in this league. “This fellow here was named Henry ‘Banks’ Simon. He played on the Casey Jones Red Socks; they were a traveling semi-pro team, but they played those Saturday games at Sterling Field too.” Casey Jones was a trucking company in Monroe, Mich. Most Toledo areas fielded at least one team in the Sterling Field federation. The Douglas Center Pets, the Airline-Junction All Stars, a Rossford team, a team

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from the East Side, and the South Side acs—these were some of the teams Mr. Esmond remembered. The team he played for was called the Hill’s Hatters, and was sponsored by a dry cleaning business on Hill Avenue. “The regular Toledo federation was still going on,” he said. “This was just a different league. The Toledo Blade had a league for about four years in the mid-‘30s, too. At the end of the season they had play-offs at Swayne Field for all city teams, all the federations. It was a tournament, starting about 9 a.m. on Saturday and playing eliminations all weekend for about 20 city teams. And blacks and whites played each other in that. See, Toledo never had much of a race problem. The black teams played white teams all through this time.” But all-black league play proliferated in this period, probably spurred by the growing nationwide interest in the Negro Leagues. This was the heyday of the Negro American and National Leagues, they were fielding such greats as the pitcher Satchel Paige, the legendary third baseman William “Judy” ­Johnson, “Cool Papa” Bell, who pitched but could play any position, and Josh Gibson, probably the greatest grand-slam slugger of all time. Toledo’s professional ballpark would host Negro League games when the Mud Hens, the all-white team, was playing away. (This was the same arrangement most American cities followed in those segregated days.) Crowds packed Swayne Field, at the corner of Monroe Street and Detroit Avenue, to see such Negro League clubs as the New York Black Yankees, the New York Cubans, the Washington Black Senators, the Homestead Grays, the Memphis Red Socks, the Detroit Stars, and—the most famous of all—the Kansas City Monarchs. How did local athletes get to play at this rarified level? “They’d come out to Toledo with just seven or eight players, the Philadelphia Stars, or the Newark Eagles, or some club like that, and they’d pick up local guys to fill their bench,” Mr. Esmond explained. “There were enough semi-pro ballplayers around town that they could get a good deep team together that way. I played with ‘em. You could make a pretty good amount of money at it, compared to what people made at that time, you know. I would make about $35 a game, and if you played two games a week, that wasn’t too bad.” By the early 1940s Toledo’s black baseball was in its golden age. Hank Rigney had organized a pro team called the Toledo Crawfords (after the famous Pittsburgh Crawfords, which had folded). The University of Toledo had a summer collegiate baseball team with such talented African-American players as Bob Nash, Dick Craig, and Jimmy Day. And the Negro League games continued to draw on local talent when they came to town. “This is closer to my time now,” said Mr. Esmond. He placed a glossy black and white team photo on the table. “The Unitcast Team was the first all-black team to win the Toledo City Championship. That was in 1949. Some of these

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fellows got hired by Unitcast so they could play on the team. Some of them didn’t want the job, you know, ‘cause they could make more as ball players than they could working, but they wanted to be on that team!” He looked over the photograph. “That’s me there. That’s Fred Fleming.” He told us about the players—who played what positions, how good they were individually, and how the team worked together. “That’s Porter King there; didn’t you mention him?” Bingo! This was the Porter King named as Hines’ pitcher on the poster that got us into all this in the first place. Could he have played for Hines’ too? Esmond was quick to reply. “You see, we all played for a lot of different teams. I played for the Cincinnati Clowns while I was playing for Unitcast, and we all would play any exhibition game we could get. Porter King would’ve played out at Hines’ Farms, sure.” Porter King welcomed us in and we sat down to talk in his living room. Just as we were getting started he stopped his teen-age grandson, who was walking out of the front door with a basketball covered with signature: “Wait a minute, put that back! That ball’s a souvenir, don’t play with that one.” Behind his chair were wall plaques noting his induction into the Scott High School Hall of Fame (1981) and the City of Toledo Athletic Hall of Fame (1989). When we showed him the Unitcast photo, he remembered all but one name. His story echoed Morris Esmond’s. Mr. King had played for the Negro League teams, too. “I guess the Cuban Stars were the best team I ever played for. A lot of local guys played for those teams. They’d advertise that a New York team, or a Baltimore team was playing, but then you’d look out there and there’d be guys from Port Clinton and Toledo and Monroe, and you knew they weren’t from New York.” “That Unitcast team in the picture, they’d play under all kinds of different names, but it was basically the same bunch. They were Unitcast, the Bombers, and when they played shadow ball and did tricks, they were the New York Komedy Kings. Their managers were Sandy McCray and Bill West, and when the team played exhibition, they’d give ‘em whatever name the sponsor wanted.” Mr. King knew the team we’d been searching for, too—Hines’ All Stars. “Their manager was named K.V. James. He was a painter, and some of the guys on the team would work for him painting while he found a game for them to play.” We showed him the poster and he seemed pleased with his memory when he saw “K.V. James, manager.” He told us the Detroit Crystal Stars were ­really the major-league Detroit Stars, but they wouldn’t use their franchise name in ­exhibition games. “That’s the way it worked,” he said. “The names didn’t matter. They barnstormed and everybody used all kinds of team names.” Did he remember Hines’ Farm? “Oh, yeah, it was an out-of-the-way place ­everybody went to have a ball.” Mr. James, their manager, would get the dates

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and times set up and they would come out to play, usually in the early afternoon. People would come from around the rural area but also all the way from inner-city Toledo. “They’d have the barbecue going in the little shack off from the field by the time we got on the field. And the people would get some barbecue and some beers and watch the game.” Game time was 2:30. “Hines’ had stands set up,” Mr. King said. “Nothing much, just three or four risers. And a lot of the people would sit on the hoods of their cars back in the shade, ‘cause along in July and August it got hot out there.” “See, the way Hines worked it, the game’d be ending and he’d have a band ready to go and that’d start up the music. He’d get the crowd out and they’d just stay on. What do you call it?—drawing the crowd. They had to pay 35 cents for the game and then they’d pay again for the music. He had it all worked out, and they made some money, I tell you.” “But Sonny Hines was a hell of a nice guy. He always did right by us. One time we played an exhibition for him and stayed over at Hines’ Farm. We’d made him a lot of money that game. We thought we were going to miss a game in Louisville because of playing for him, and you know Sonny gave us $50 apiece! He said he appreciated us staying to play. Fifty dollars a piece! And we made it to Louisville anyway, two hours before the game.” “Berkey, Swanton, Wauseon—all the little towns did exhibition games like that, but Hines’ Farm was great; they really got the crowds. And the players made good money—the winners got 60 percent of the draw and the losers got 40. You could make money at it, but it was fun too.” “There were some women on those teams too. I remember one time I was pitching against the New Orleans Creoles and they had two women, the shortstop and second base! I kind of eased up on one of ‘em when she was at bat, and she cut loose on me.” When we asked what happened to these local teams, Mr. King hesitated. “Well, when teams were on the way down they’d play places like Hines’ Farm. Not that there was anything wrong with exhibition games like that, but it wasn’t the big time. It wasn’t like playing at Swayne Field.” The demise of these teams seemed to parallel that of the major-league ­Negro teams. Television might have been part of it, and the integration of white m ­ ajor-league baseball might have been an influence, but for whatever reasons, teams like these didn’t make it past the 1950s. Porter King went to Cuba in pre-Castro days (1950 and again in 1953) to play in their winter season leagues. He even traveled as far south as Argentina playing ball. And he and other Toledo players could still find paying exhibition games throughout Ohio and the ­Midwest. If they were willing to travel.

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But the era of African-American professional and semi-pro baseball was coming to an end all over the country. By 1960, the Negro American League was down to four teams, and by 1968 the Indianapolis Clowns were the only Negro League team in existence, serving as a dim reminder of a sports world that used to be. If those black teams, from the major-league clubs down to the municipal federations, had not existed, such great athletes as Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, and Willie Mays would not have been there to step in when segregation in professional baseball finally collapsed. Although whole generations of baseball greats suffered neglect and exclusion just because of the color of their skin, it is never too late to tell their story, honor their skill, and get their names and statistics in the record books. 3.3

Organization and Leadership (Documents 32–42)

The Black Toledo community during the first half of the twentieth century was organized and led by outstanding men and women. During this period, the Douglass Center was one of the organizations established by leaders who began to command mainstream recognition. The first generation of Toledo’s black professionals had national stature and brought great honor to their city. 3.3.1 The Frederick Douglass Community Center14 On the banks of the Maumee River, close to Lake Erie, lies the city of Toledo, Ohio. Fourteen main-line railroads have tracks running into Toledo and 2000 factories are making goods which are used the world over. There are 250,000 inhabitants and some 9000 of these are men and women of the Negro race. Toledo has grown rapidly in the past decade and with its growth have come problems that must be met and solved. Some four years ago [1916] a group of colored men and women of Toledo began to talk of establishing some place where colored boys might have facilities for recreation under proper auspices. The leader in this movement was Mr. Albertus Brown, a prominent Negro attorney, who, in daily contact in his criminal practice with the seamy side of life, saw that unless something was done to interest the young people of his race in higher things, there were many pitfalls awaiting them. The y.m.c.a. and the y.w.c.a. barred them from their magnificent buildings and there were no similar places for the colored boy and 14

From the Toledo Blade.

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girl. Mr. Brown called into conference the leading colored men and women of the city and they decided to solicit funds for a recreation center for boys. In February of 1920 there was incorporated the Frederick Douglass Recreation Center whose purpose was “to establish a recreation center for colored boys and young men, and to provide a place for the moral, mental, and physical development of colored youth.” Meantime, through the courtesy of the colored Elk Lodge several meetings had been held with the boys of the community at the Elk Hall. On March 1, 1920, the Recreation Center rented a large, upstairs room on Monroe Street. Here, a desk, a pool table, two punching bags, several sets of boxing gloves, and a few books constituted the entire equipment. Two or three times each week this room was opened, and interested men came in and kept an eye on the thirty or forty youngsters who would show up and amuse themselves as best they could. Aside from a Scout Troop under Mr. Louis Miller no organized work was attempted. But even this little was so much better than nothing that the attendance steadily increased and the amount of time and work necessary to really do something for these boys who came to the “Rec.” as they appropriately called the place, became too great for volunteers alone. The backers of the movement then began to cast about for a trained worker who could devote his full time to the work of the organizations. Through the National Urban League, R. Maurice Moss, of New York City, a graduate of Columbia University, was secured. Mr. Moss had had a year’s training in boys’ work at the New York School of Social Work as a fellow of the Urban League. He had been employed by the y.m.c.a. in its county work on Long Island as Secretary for Colored Work and in the athletic department of the Brooklyn (n.y.) branch. Mr. Moss went to Toledo in November of 1920 and is still the executive head of the institution. With the coming of a paid worker the interest in this infant project increased and a real program was introduced. Classes and teams were formed, a boys’ brass band was organized, and tournaments and games were featured which began to attract the public to the efforts that the colored people were ­making toward creating a better environment for their boys. Very early it ­became evident that the work being done for boys was solving only part of the problem for Negro Toledo. It was felt that those interested would no sooner ­initiate this movement than the same group would undoubtedly have to b­ egin all over again and establish something similar for girls and young women. Therefore, it was decided to build at one and the same time for both sexes. So in April 1921 the constitution and articles of incorporation were changed and the activities enlarged so as to include work with girls and women. The name was also changed to the Frederick Douglass Community Center.

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Other changes were also taking place at this time. The quarters in Monroe Street, never wholly suited to the work, had become altogether inadequate. After some difficulties, the building at 15 North 11th Street was rented and is the present home of the Center. This building with its auditorium has a seating capacity of 550. Pool tables, shower baths, basketball and gymnastic equipment, a fully equipped office, club rooms and library were thus provided, making the “Center,” as it is now called by the members, one of the show places of colored Toledo. Although the change in the scope of the work occurred in April of 1920 nothing was actually done for girls and women until November of that year when, through the courtesy of Miss Mary Howard, then secretary of the y.w.c.a., a group of trained workers came each week to the Center and instructed the colored girls in basketry, flower making, sewing, and dramatic arts. A gymnasium class and a basketball team among girls were also organized. But these young white women who came once a week for an hour or so each could not visit the girls’ homes, consult with and advise individuals, nor do any one of the other things so necessary for the successful carrying on of such a work. It soon became evident that someone must be employed to devote her entire time to the girls. Again, it was through the National Urban League that Miss Louise S. Love of Montclair, N.J., was secured. Miss Love is a graduate of Cornell University and has had experience in handling girls’ clubs. She began her duties as Girls’ Work Secretary in October 1922. A little later a need was felt for someone who could take charge of the boys’ classes, train the basketball teams, institute gymnastic classes for boys and men, and relieve Mr. Moss of the physical side of the work so that the executive’s entire time could be given to the direction of the program as a whole. With this in mind Mr. E. Bruce Highwarden, of Delaware, Ohio, an ex-student of Ohio Wesleyan College and a star athlete, was employed part time as physical director. Mr. Highwarden began work in December of 1922. At the outset, some $1200 was raised among the colored citizens to initiate the work of the Center. Toledo’s philanthropies are combined in the Toledo Community chest, which raises funds in a central drive once each year and which aims to pay the actual running expenses of the thirty-six agencies that it recognizes. In April 1920, the Chest investigated the Frederick Douglass Recreation center and allotted $2400 for its year’s work. In 1921, the Center received $3000 as its share. In 1922, convinced that the organization was putting over a worthwhile program, the officials of the Chest raised the allotment to $7000, and this sum has been received during the past fiscal year. The Community Chest pays only running expenses. Yearly membership dues, donations, and benefits have made possible the additional $1100 which has been spent for

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equipment. This does not include the cost of instruments for the boys’ band for which $1400, donated or raised by benefits, has been expended. A Board of Governors numbering fifteen and the seven elected officers compose the controlling body of the organization. There is also an Advisory Committee composed of leading white people of the community who have been invited to serve in this capacity. There are at present thirty-nine members of the Advisory Board. This traces in brief the story of the Frederick Douglass Community Center since its inception in 1919. An attempt will now be made to outline some of its accomplishments. The most widely advertised activity has been basketball. Six teams—two of them composed of girls—have been formed and these teams have carried the name of Douglass Center far beyond the confines of Toledo. The same has been true of the baseball team. The Colored Boys’ Brass Band of thirty-three pieces has already made its appearance in public events in Toledo. The Dramatic Arts Class has done serious study and has presented several plays. The Girls’ Reserve Corps is the largest in the city, and the Boy Scout Troop is ranked as one of the best. The chief out-of-door feature has been tennis. Two lots were secured which the Center proceeded to get in shape for this game. Some three-score joined the tennis club and three tournaments were held. For two seasons the Center has held a “Style Show” giving to colored dressmakers and milliners a chance to display their creations. These shows have also encouraged the girls to learn to sew and make their own clothes. In October 1922, a Negro Business Exposition was sponsored by the Center with thirty-one firms taking part. Looking toward the day when Toledo shall have a Negro Choral Society the Center has organized a Glee Club under the direction of Madame French. This Glee Club of thirty-eight has already rendered three cantatas. There were found to be twenty-eight colored boys in high schools in the city and an organization with literary and social aims has been formed for these youngsters with twenty-five members. Now the Junior High boys are ­being organized. A day’s outing for crippled colored children was arranged last July and on Christmas Eve all of the aged shut-ins were called for by those who own ­automobiles and were brought to the Center to hear the Glee Club’s “carol sing.” Each Sunday afternoon at the twilight hour a program is arranged and the best speakers, white and colored, and fine musical programs are presented to the audience. The Center also serves as an information bureau and an employment agency for colored people, and a meeting place for clubs and committees of various groups. Work with delinquents is also featured and the schools which have a large Negro enrollment refer their serious cases to the Center.

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The Frederick Douglass Community Center in its three years of actual work has accomplished something. It has given the boys and girls a place for ­supervised play and organized work with groups and individuals; and it has developed a community consciousness among men and women of color. This institution is seeking to pave the way for a new type of social work among colored groups. Toledo has no branch y.m.c.a. or y.w.c.a. for these people, and they are barred from the buildings of the white institutions. The backers of this movement feel that they should start their own organization rather than ask the existing white agencies to set aside separate buildings for colored people. They believe, further, that when the whites see the Negro doing something for himself they will be willing to help with their greater means to further the work. Moreover, this organization is being watched with interest because it is ­attempting to build for both sexes at the same time and is thus setting an example for those communities where there is no organized social work for colored people and where the population is not sufficiently large to justify two separate organizations. That these two ideas are being “sold” to the community was evidenced when Mr. Grove Patterson, editor of the Toledo Blade, the leading daily, said recently in his personal column: “White people spent a lot of time worrying about the ‘Negro problem.’ They don’t know what to do about it. They seem to think that the Negro is in a bad way and that he can’t get any better unless the white folks do something about it. The writer wonders if most white people know that the colored people are doing a great deal for themselves. They are doing more every year and getting further all the time. Here in Toledo the Frederick Douglass Community House is the center of a finely organized and actively carried on work for old and young members of the Negro race—­especially the young people. This community social center, which is a combination y.m.c.a. and y.w.c.a., is under the excellent management of an executive secretary and his assistants and it is supported and led by colored men in the city who are recognized leaders of their race. It is a great work they are doing over on Eleventh Street, and it is growing more important and more successful all the time.” Already the Center has outgrown its present quarters and is planning to ask the citizens of Toledo in the near future to give it the means with which to build a fully equipped community center building. What a magnificent p ­ rospect— looking toward the day when the stranger in Toledo may have pointed out to him a commodious community center building, which he will be told is the accomplishment of the Negro citizenry of Toledo, wherein black boys and girls are being built into upright manhood and womanhood!

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3.3.2 Interracial Activities in Toledo (1922)15 In the summer of 1922 the writer was called into a conference with Dr. C. McLeod Smith, executive secretary of the Toledo Council of Churches. The conference resulted in a decision to create a committee in the Social Service Department of the Council to be known as the Interracial Committee of the Social Service Department, composed of twelve persons—six white and six colored. After several personal interviews and subsequent conferences the committee was finally made up as follows: colored, three ministers, two lawyers, one real-estate man, and a hotel proprietress: white, four ministers, one newspaper editor, one insurance man, and one business woman. The committee was organized by choosing a Negro for chairman, a white preacher for vicechairman, and the executive secretary of the Council for secretary. At the second meeting of the committee held in mid-summer of 1923 it was unanimously agreed that no worthwhile, constructive work could be done without a scientific, comprehensive study of the entire situation in Toledo as it pertains to Negro life and conditions. This decision was readily endorsed by the Executive Board of the Council and upon the recommendation of Dr. George E. Haynes the committee secured the services of Mr. Forester B. Washington, director of the Research Bureau of the Associated Charities of Detroit, to make the study. Mr. Washington, assisted by several Negro civic and welfare organizations and by the efficient and well-organized office force of the Toledo C ­ ouncil of Churches, gave six or eight weeks to this intensive study. At its conclusion, an all-day interracial conference was held in the Ashland Avenue Baptist Church, one of the largest and most influential white churches in the city. At this conference, Mr. Washington made his final report which included a very thorough and helpful study of every aspect of Negro life and conditions in the city, such as population, housing, industry, health, recreation, thrift, crime and delinquency, religion, and race relations. The report was freely discussed by both the white and colored workers present. Drs. William W. Alexander and George E. Haynes, national secretaries of the commission in the Church and  Race Relations of the Federal council of churches, were present and delivered inspiring and thought-provoking addresses at the evening session. A committee on findings reported later to the Interracial Committee and it was agreed to publish a resume of the entire report in pamphlet form. The entire cost of this publication was borne by the Negro churches of Toledo and the pamphlet is being widely distributed through the office of the Toledo Council of Churches. Following the recommendations made by the survey, the Negro ministers came together early in the winter of 1923 and organized a Christian Workers’ 15

From the Toledo Blade.

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Conference. This is an organization representing all religious denominations among Negroes and is composed of the pastors and official laymen of their respective churches. Its object is to unify the religious forces of the city and to discourage the multiplicity of Negro churches in neighborhoods already well- or over-churched. This new body has become the recognized agency with which the Toledo Council of Churches co-operates. The Christian Workers’ Conference is itself a direct outgrowth of interracial co-operation. One of the findings from our survey was that 66 percent of the 10,000 Negroes in Toledo were not members of any church in the city. Previous study and personal visitation by the ministers had revealed the fact that fully 80 percent of the Negro population had lived in Toledo less than ten years and that the large majority of these new-comers had been members of churches before leaving their homes in the South. For some cause many of these migrants seemed timid and afraid, in some cases even suspicious, of the established churches which they found in Toledo. It was very apparent that unless something was done quickly and effectively the unchurched new-comer would seek to colonize and thereby perpetuate the habits and customs of life in the communities whence he came. This would have meant an inevitable rift in the Negro population and an increasing antipathy which would have spelled disaster. Here was a bold challenge to our Christian Workers’ Conference and our Interracial Committee. The matter was fully considered from every possible angle and the final conclusion was that we should launch an open-air campaign in the very heart of the most densely populated Negro district. The aim of this campaign was to convince our newly arrived brethren that we were not uninterested in them and that we were sincere in our desire to have them become one with us in our civic, social, and religious life. The program as finally worked out included the securing of a tent seating one thousand people; finding and engaging a strong gospel preacher who understands and believes in the social as well as the spiritual gospel; using a large chorus choir composed of new arrivals as well as old settlers. It was further understood that this choir was to sing many of the oldtime Negro spirituals. The whole program, covering a period of four weeks, was worked out in detail, first by the Christian Workers’ Conference, then by the Interracial Committee, and was finally laid before the Executive Board of the Toledo Council of Churches. It was unanimously approved by the Board and $500 was appropriated to meet one-half of the expense, the Negroes promising to raise the other half. The meetings were held during the month of August. Rev. Dr. W.H. Mosses of New York City was secured as the social evangelist. Dr. Wiseman of Detroit, Michigan, a splendid soloist who has been very successful in conducting and directing chorus choirs, was engaged for the musical program. Singers were

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selected from all of the colored churches and from those who belonged to no church at all. The attendance was far beyond the seating capacity of the tent and on several occasions there were more people standing on the outside of the tent “listening in” than there were seated inside. There were three outstanding results of this open-air effort. First, it effectively united the Negro ministers and religious workers of all denominations; second, it completely contradicted the thought cherished by so many of our new-comers that they were not wanted among the old settlers, even in the Christian churches; third, it encouraged and stimulated the white people and made it far easier to introduce our interracial program to many who hitherto had been but lukewarm. At the close of the open-air meetings the executive secretary of the Toledo Council of Churches made the suggestion that the Interracial Committee be made a regular department of the Toledo Council of Churches. This recommendation seemed to be in recognition of the fact that the committee had made good and deserved a little larger place in the sun. The recommendation was approved by the Executive Board and the name was changed to the Church and Race Relations Department of the Toledo Council of Churches. Instead of reporting to the Social Service Department as formerly, it now reports directly to the Executive Board. Race Relations Day was first observed in Toledo in 1922. Prior to that day last year one of the members of our department, a leading newspaper editor, sent out a letter to each of the white pastors suggesting an exchange of pulpits between colored and white pastors. He expressed the hope that such an exchange might be the means of creating a better understanding and a fervent goodwill between the races in Toledo. As a result of that letter the writer has spoken in eight of the best white churches in the city. He has also exchanged pulpits with the pastor of perhaps the most prominent Protestant church in Toledo. 3.3.3 Club Life in Toledo (1900–1920)16 In the period to 1916, the community’s refined and respectable black residents centered their social and organizational life around several clubs. There were “Willing Workers,” “Henrietta Societies,” and “Lookout Circles.” For the more secular yet distantly related, there were “Pleasure Seekers” clubs, Grand Masons, and a “Golden Rule Circle” as a lasting memorial to Mayor Samuel Jones. At times, the refined and respectable elements demonstrated their relative social positions within the black community with elaborate social affairs. In early February, 1902, Mrs. J.R. Moore entertained about fifty guests of the Golden Rule Circle Club. In the Moore home, club members dined amid “rare 16

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potted plants that filled every available corner” of the dwelling. The affair was “the social event of the week.” A committee of leading black citizens assisted Mrs. Moore in coordinating the affair. The wives of former policeman Edward Ashby and restaurateur Archie Allen were two of the more notable committee members. Beyond the purely social nature of the gathering, Golden Rule members met to discuss at least one issue confronting the black community. At the ­February meeting in the Moore residence, these members considered “the  construction of a home for the Colored aged.” It is not clear that plans were made to raise funds for this endeavor or if blacks succeeded in establishing a home for the elderly and infirm members of the community. More than a decade after Golden Rulers first raised the issue, there were few homes and agencies that admitted black elderly residents and dependent children. In 1918, the city’s Catholic and Lutheran Churches operated three establishments that admitted Afro-Americans. On Starr Avenue, the Little Sisters of the Poor opened their doors to blacks. Along Lagrange Street, the Sisters of the Good Shepherd maintained a home for  “erring women” and the indigent. On Seaman Street, the Lutherans operated an “orphan and old folks home.” It is uncertain how many blacks were in these facilities. Beyond the existence of such homes for blacks, it is important to note that historically the black family structure has been ­required, more often than not, to provide for its indigent and elderly ­members. While this practice is not unique to blacks and must be considered within the context of family ­incomes and household structures, ­Afro-­Americans have faced a more extreme and  systematic exclusion from community and ­publicly-operated ­facilities. Thus, the black family traditionally has accommodated those m ­ embers who require professional care. The fact that the ­Golden Rule Circle club raised the issue in 1902 is testimony of the larger social ­questions facing blacks. 3.3.4 Henrietta Society (1883–present)17 Sometimes history comes in bold speeches and dramatic protests. And sometimes it sneaks up on us softly, one small gesture of kindness at a time. And so this is history, too, as 95-year-old Hazel Marshall greets her fellow members of the Henrietta Society at the front door of her spacious central city home.

17

“Toledo’s Henrietta Society: Still Meeting after 100 Plus Years,” Toledo Blade, February 22, 1998.

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“Come on in, girls!” she says, fresh as a flower in a navy pant suit with pearl earrings. “You don’t have to ring the bell, just bring it on in!” she says, chuckling as she reaches for the coats. “Maid’s out today, so I’ll be the maid.” The Henriettas don’t host famous speakers or spark political debate. Their business is friendship, good food, and charity of the old-fashioned neighborshelping-neighbors variety. But they’ve been meeting for more than 100 years now, longer than the naacp, or the Study Hour Club, or Alpha Kappa Alpha. They’ve been meeting since 1881, according to members and a 1943 club constitution, and that makes them one of the oldest surviving black organizations in town. Like most formulas for longevity, theirs is fairly simple. “I guess it’s just our members,” says assistant treasurer Lillian Kyser, 74, a third-generation Henrietta. “When we get in there, we’re more or less like sisters. To me, they’re family. We’re just like a big family. That’s the way I feel about them.” Dues are still only $5, and charity projects tend to be low-profile. A $200 college scholarship here. Blankets for a homeless shelter there. “We just do things on a small order,” says club president Mary White, 75, a retired nurse’s aide. Often beneficiaries are known to club members: a friend of a friend, a relative of a minister. Ten years ago when the Henrietta’s read a newspaper article about a local child with brain cancer, they made a donation, but their interest didn’t stop there. At least one member kept an eye on the recipient. “Oh, she’s ok,” the member says during an informal gathering scheduled around a Blade interview. “Beautiful girl. She goes to Church of Christ.” Sometimes charity begins even closer to home. When club treasurer Grace Edwards, 73, a real estate broker, adopted a ­15-year old from Ethiopia, she became the proud mother of a hard-working young man who would one day go on to become an electrical engineer. When it was time for him to go to college, the Henriettas became part of the plan. Their $200 scholarship wasn’t enough to pay for college and graduate school for Melese Teklu, now an employee of Texas Instruments in Dallas. But in Ms. Edwards’s eyes, it was an important contribution. “Every bit helps,” she says. The Henriettas began to meet in September 1881, according to club records. Black and white people often socialized separately in those days, and the Henrietta’s were all African-American.

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The plan was a simple one, just to give the women, mostly homemakers, something to do. “A group of ladies just got together at a friend’s house to form the club,” says Mrs. Marshall, the club historian, recalling a defining moment in Henrietta history. “While they were talking there to find out what they would name it, a hen walked across the fence and that’s how they got to name it the Henrietta club.” The Henriettas began at a time when black men had had the vote for less than 20 years. Women still had 30 years to wait. Life moved at a different pace. Toledoans got around by foot, by train, or by horse and buggy. Large sections of the city were still rural. “I was a child when they were building my house,” recalls Mrs. Marshall. “It was all vacant lots and the Polish people used to bring their goats and nail down a stake and let them graze in the vacant lots here.” African-Americans were still a small percentage of Toledo’s population; it wasn’t until World War ii that black Southerners began arriving here in large numbers. By the early 1940s, the northern migration was in full swing, with the promise of wartime factory jobs drawing African-Americans north by the thousands. Toledo’s brand-new Brand Whitlock housing project was a whirlwind of hope and ambition, home to a Who’s Who of up-and-coming black Toledoans, including a future vice mayor, J.B. Simmons, Jr. For the Henriettas, it was business as usual, a 1943 club constitution indicates. The meetings were devoted to “literary, social, and moral uplift.” Unexcused absences prompted a 25-cent fine. The 1943 watchword, “Mum,” has fallen out of fashion, as has the 55-year age limit for new members. It had to, one member jokes, or there wouldn’t be any Henriettas left. Indeed, many of the Henriettas are in their 70s. The youngster of the group, Jettie Sansbury, Lucas County human services director of staff development, is in her 50s. “We need young people,” club members told her when they were trying to get her to join. “Yes,” said Ms. Sansbury, who does not consider herself particularly young. “You do need young people, but not me.” The seniority of many members is a frequent source of merriment for the group, which generally meets monthly at members’ homes. “We give money now because we’re old and we have it,” chuckles Ms. ­Edwards, the club treasurer and one of 15 active Henrietta Society members.

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“You might have it,” another Henrietta replies, causing a second ripple of laughter. But all jokes aside, many of the Henriettas remain remarkably lively. At 95, Mrs. Marshall still goes to church every Sunday and does her own housekeeping. With the Henriettas gathering for a newspaper interview, another member, Marie Ford, 74—an interpretive dancer and retired sheriff’s department dispatcher—comes through the door gaily recounting her latest adventure. She picked up a stranger on the way, she says, a man who requested a ride when she stopped to ask for directions. Was she scared? Not at all, says Ms. Ford. “I didn’t think that he might so-and-so and you see, I’m here. And I’m going to be here a lot more years.” The Henriettas do see a need to recruit younger members, but true to form, they’re approaching this latest challenge with a practical can-do attitude. Asked if the Henriettas will last another 100 years, Mrs. Marshall, the oldest active member, answers without hesitation. “If we continue to get our daughters to join, I think we will.” 3.3.5 Fighting the Toledo Klu Klux Klan (1915–1944)18 Toledo, not unlike numerous other cities across the nation, had its klan movement in the period 1915 to 1944. It did not have, however, the large membership that characterized klan activities in such cities as Akron, the Cincinnati-­Covington area, and Columbus, Ohio. While the acknowledged membership rolls in these cities numbered well above 10,000, the Toledo klan had ­approximately 1,500 members while Cleveland recorded a membership of approximately 2,500 klansmen in the same period. It is possible that larger klan memberships in certain central and southern Ohio cities reflected a decided in-migration of both southern whites and blacks. It is to be said, however, that southern whites had never held a monopoly on racial hostility toward blacks. On the state level, the “Mighty Ohio Klan” ranked second only to Indiana with a membership of 195,000 between 1915 and 1944. The Toledo Klan appears to have been most active during the 1920’s. The public variety of this activity took the form of parades through the city’s streets and public speeches. In 1924, local n.a.a.c.p. members Charles Cottrill, Albertus Brown, and Jessie Heslip secured the aid of former Jewish Mayor Cornell Schreiber and “lodged a formal protest with Mayor Bernard Brough against 18

Williams, “Black Toledo.”

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klan parade” in the city. The n.a.a.c.p. did not receive, however, a commitment from the mayor to use his office in efforts to bring an end to klan demonstrations. It is unlikely that he could as long as klansmen were openly peaceful. When the organization ended its parades in the decade of the 1920’s, it did so voluntarily. It is possible that such displays failed to draw the desired crowds. On the other hand, the klan may have felt that the city’s residents understood its presence and therefore parades were unnecessary. For whatever reasons, the Toledo klan ceased to parade the city’s streets. It is difficult to gauge either the extent of the klan’s influence in Toledo or the opposition of the n.a.a.c.p. to the organization. According to Newsbee Editor, Negley D. Cochran, the city’s Merchants and Manufacturers’ Association supplied “the brains and the financial support for the local branch of the klan.” Cochran also charged that organizations and fraternal orders such as the Rotary, Kiwanis, Masons, and Knights of Pythias supported the klan. The full extent of this support is unknown. On the other hand, the Blade editorialized against “Ku Kluxism” as an organization that “black-mailed its neighbors into law obedience and claimed immunity from punishment for its own crimes.” In the main, the klan openly expressed the deep-seated desires and fears of those whites who suspected only the worst from blacks and many new and undesirable immigrants. Accordingly, the organization advocated a permanent separation of so-called superior and inferior racial stocks within the society. When the local n.a.a.c.p. agitated for, and later received the city’s removal of “white only signs” in 1918, it did so primarily against officials and businessmen who may or may not have been under the influence of local klansmen. Similarly, the n.a.a.c.p.’s challenge to the city’s press, and particularly the Blade, to capitalize the word negro and to end its use of the offensive term “negress,” grew out of a long-standing practice of the printed press. These, as well as the segregation that permeated public facilities, despite public accommodation laws to the contrary, were problems for the city. “The only place a Negro could go for an ice cream soda,” stated Mrs. Jessie Heslip of the n.a.a.c.p., “was to the old bus station at Superior and Jefferson Streets, no place else.” Whatever influence exercised by the klan among civic officials only intensified existing conditions of racial segregation and complimented, for the most part, the city’s historical view of race. 3.3.6 Housing and Racial Violence (1929)19 In 1929, an incident occurred in the city that dramatized the human limits of the narrowly defined race relations program. On August 12th, an unidentified 19

Williams, “Black Toledo.”

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black male acquired a house in the 300 block of Willard Street in East ­Toledo. That night, a crowd of white residents gathered in the area and smashed ­every window in the wood frame house. One brick struck the black’s sister as she attempted to protect her child from flying debris. Shortly after this first a­ ttack, whites returned to the battered dwelling and set it on fire. In response to this incident, the Race Relations Department issued a statement condemning “the lawlessness.” According to the department, there were reports that several Toledo policemen were present during the attack upon the house and its occupants and “made no effort to disperse the crowd.” Beyond the actions of enraged whites, the inaction of those sworn to uphold the law only sanctioned mob violence. “We call upon” Mayor William Jackson, stated the race department, “to make an official investigation of this incident and to take such steps as will be necessary to discipline the officers if it is found that they did not attempt to enforce the law.” It is uncertain whether or not Mayor Jackson initiated an investigation or if those involved in mob violence were brought to justice. It can be said, however, that the possibility of police involvement or inaction constituted “the ultimate weapon in keeping the Negro in his place.” The significance of the August 1929 incident is that it points to the limits of racial contacts between a smaller number of black and white church leaders. And yet, it cannot be denied that efforts toward more amicable race ­relations had to start somewhere. Of all the institutions of society, the church, more than any other, had an unfulfilled yet standing mission to promote racial justice. It could not, however, accomplish this task alone. There is at least one other point of significance concerning the August incident. This has to do with that area of the city known as East Toledo. Were the incidents of overt or antiblack sentiment and mob violence, especially in housing, solely an East Toledo phenomenon? If the public record is any reliable indicator, there were more racially motivated actions against blacks to the east of the Maumee River. This does not mean, however, that residential segregation existed only in this part of the city. The catalyst in East Toledo’s racial outbreaks appears to have been the existence of highly concentrated and lasting enclaves of certain ethnic groups and nationalities. On two separate occasions, for example, there were reported incidences of violence or its potential on the part of some East ­Toledo Hungarian and Bulgarian immigrants toward blacks. At the same time, such ethnic enclaves did not undergo the rapid and even moderate change that took place in other parts of the city. This was due to a variety of reasons ranging from nativist sentiment against newer immigrants to a desire on the part of some foreign-born residents to share mutually-held cultural amenities. Importantly, certain geographical features (a smaller land area and the Maumee River) also placed limits upon expansion in East Toledo. In other parts of the

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city and especially the southwest, blacks acquired older and wider residences as whites moved further west to more attractive neighborhoods. Moreover, by 1929, the majority of Afro-American residents were well entrenched in the Pinewood (southwest) area of Toledo. In the smaller land area of East Toledo, many whites met the ­expansion of black residences with more overt forms of resistance because they still maintained homes in the general area in which blacks attempted to enter. Beyond these points, it can be stated that the majority of Toledoans, both east and west, were not affected by the efforts of the Toledo council of Churches to improve race relations. 3.3.7 Blacks in Toledo Schools (1927)20 At least between 1870 and 1880 the question of separate and segregated schools for Negroes in Toledo, Ohio was brought to the front and thrashed out. The forces of ignorance, injustice, oppression and prejudice were arrayed against the influences of intelligence, justice, equality of opportunity and fair play. The spirits of Sumner, Phillips, Garrison, Seward, Stanton, Lincoln and that grand old war horse of Ohio, Salmon P. Chase, fought on the side of those who contended for full and equal rights for all who breathe under the benign aegis of the Stars and Stripes so lately purified and redeemed by the sacramental blood of her black and white citizens alike and concentrated anew to the doctrine set forth in the preamble of the Constitution. Confronted with such an invincible host the defenders and promoters of discrimination and separate schools lost. The Colored children were admitted to the Jefferson Street School along with the white children. At this time the center of the Colored population was around Canton Street. As the Colored population spread, the Colored children entered various public schools of the city. They gradually entered the high school and Alonzo Locke, who was the first Colored high school graduate, ­afterwards studied law and became Toledo’s first Colored practicing ­attorney. Charles Cottrell was the second Colored high school graduate and had the eminent distinction of being the president of his class. He entered the Revenue Service on July 15, 1881. From 1888 to 1893 he served in the office of the Secretary of State of Ohio, and was afterwards appointed Collector of Internal Revenue at the Port of Honolulu at a salary of $6,000 per year. He achieved a national reputation as a political statesman and as an organizer. His demise in 1925 was regarded as a distinct loss to the constructive forces and influences of this City and State. 20

Wheaton, “Social Status of the Negro.”

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According to the report of March 7, 1927, received from Superintendent Charles S. Meek of the Public Schools of Toledo, Ohio, there are now enrolled 147 Negroes in the high schools and 1,574 in the grade schools of this city. The Registrar of the University of Toledo reports the present enrollment of Negro students to be 21. 3.3.8 J.B. Simmons: Toledo’s First Black Councilman21 Before Jesse Jackson, before Malcolm X, before Martin Luther King, Jr., there was J.B. Simmons, Jr. In the early 1940s, when black Toledoans couldn’t drive buses, eat in many restaurants, or live in white neighborhoods, Mr. Simmons helped start the protests and pickets that gave the city its first black bus driver. At its height, his short-lived but mighty Mass League Movement drew 1,500 people to a protest and opened the doors to black cabbies, nurse trainees, and department store clerks. And Mr. Simmons didn’t stop there. In 1945, the iron-willed, impeccably dressed insurance salesman from Georgia became Toledo’s first black councilman. Fourteen years later, he was the city’s first black vice mayor. A study in contradictions—forceful but funny, blunt but caring—Mr. Simmons helped define his city during a political career that spanned three ­decades. He pressed for better housing and jobs for blacks, took a risky proincome tax stand at a time when his core constituency could least afford to pay, and faced down a McCarthy-era smear campaign. He won white votes as well as black and built a record of fighting not only for his own community but for the city as a whole. His independence frustrated his fellow Democrats, key political allies, and the editors of this newspaper, and his rise to vice mayor was controversial. But when all was said and done, and Mr. Simmons was voted out of office in 1961, barriers had crumbled and a reputation for sometimes startling honesty had been forged. “His ethics were without question, and … when he said or saw something, he stayed with it. He didn’t compromise,” says Ohio House Minority Leader Jack Ford (D., Toledo). “And that’s one of the reasons why I think people get turned off with some politicians these days. They compromise, or play to the powers, or are scared 21

Nara Schoenberg, “Activist a Black Pioneer: J.B. Simmons Jr. Led Push for Rights,” Toledo Blade, December 28, 1999.

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of The Blade, or scared of the unions, or scared of the party powers. He wasn’t that type of guy.” The grandson of slaves, James Blanton Simmons, Jr., was born in 1898 and grew up near Atlanta in East Point, ga. His father was a carpenter whose status as a respected tradesman spared his eight children the worst of the Jim Crow South. “I never saw a lynching, but they happened around me,” Mr. Simmons told the Blade in 1989. “I saw evidence of it…. They happened around a mile from our house.” Working to help pay his way, he earned degrees from the Tuskegee Institute and Lincoln University, a historic black college in Pennsylvania, where he graduated in 1925. He worked as an insurance salesman in Cleveland and then Toledo, arriving here in 1935 with his wife, Isabelle, and their son, J.B. iii. The city that greeted him had about 15,000 blacks crowded into a few central city neighborhoods. Housing conditions were (unreadable)… the streets promoting Mr. Simmons, children passed out literature on the street corners. Black ministers kept two collections boxes—one for the church, one for the Simmons campaign. Mr. Simmons, who appealed to blacks and liberal whites, not only won a seat, but squeezed…ire of Democrats, Republicans, and his own core constituency. Among the best-known examples: One of his first acts as a councilman was to announce his support of a controversial 1 percent payroll income tax. The high point of Mr. Simmons’s political career occurred not long before its end. Mr. Simmons was a strong advocate of the city manager form of government, which lost him the support of the Democratic organization in his 1959 re-election race. He won, however, with the support of the powerful City Manager League. Then, he surprised his city manager allies by backing an opponent of city manager government, Democratic councilman Mike Damas, for mayor. At the time, the mayor and vice mayor were elected by council. Mr. Damas became mayor and the Damas coalition backed Mr. Simmons for vice mayor, making him one of the few black politicians to achieve such a high position in an American city. But the road from victory was rocky. Mr. Simmons was ejected from the City Manager League and the Democratic county executive committee. “Toledo was still a Jim Crow town,” Mr. Simmons would later recall. “In some ways, I think it was as bad as the South.”

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But then World War ii began, and black leaders saw the potential for change. On the national level, A. Phillip Randolph, founder of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, called for greater opportunities for blacks who wanted to do their part for the war effort. Mr. Simmons and allies in the black community such as mortician E.B. Wanzo took up that battle cry on the local front, forming the Mass Movement League to fight for industrial jobs. A picket line in 1942 drew 50 baton-wielding police officers and, according to Mr. Simmons, a pregnant woman was hurt. The league responded with a pamphlet saying, “How long will black men stand by and see their pregnant women beat up with the nightsticks of these police officers?” In response, more than 1,500 people gathered for a rally at the Frederick Douglass Community Center. The Mass Movement League was on its way. Over the next few years, a campaign to make Community Traction Co. hire blacks as bus drivers and streetcar motormen yielded the city’s first black bus driver. The league forced cab companies to hire black cabbies, convinced hospitals to hire black nurse’s aides and nurse trainees, and persuaded department stores to allow blacks to work not just as janitors and elevator operators but as clerks. The league even convinced industrial companies such as Champion Spark Plug Co. and Willys-Overland to give black workers a shot at good jobs. By 1945, local black leaders had their eyes on a new prize: They wanted a black city councilman. A meeting of 150 community activists at the Douglass Center produced a decision and a telegram to Mr. Simmons, who was in New York on business. “You are the candidate,” the telegram read. Sound trucks rode through the streets promoting Mr. Simmons. Children passed out literature on the street corners. Black ministers kept two collection boxes—one for the church, one for the Simmons campaign. Mr. Simmons, who appealed to blacks and liberal whites, not only won a seat, but squeezed out several better-known candidates, including councilman Ira Bame. When the votes from the precinct with the Brand Whitlock housing project came in, Mr. Simmons’s lead was so commanding that Mr. Bame was heard to utter a profanity and exclaim, “There must be a little black Jesus down there.” During his six terms on council, Mr. Simmons led fights against employment discrimination. He was in the forefront of the battles for fair housing, a community relations board, and city jobs for black citizens.

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The man behind the accomplishments was strong-willed and supportive of his community. As a councilman, a Mason, and a lawyer—he earned his degree in 1949—he helped start the careers of promising African-Americans, among them Robert Penn, now a retired Toledo Municipal Court judge. “I shall be eternally grateful to him for his giving me an opportunity to get started in the practice of law,” says Judge Penn. “I knew practically no one in town, and his permitting me to associate with him was a blessing.” But if the councilman was generous, he was seldom described as gentle. “He was not sweet and gentle,“ says Clarence J. Walker, Jr., 74, a former regional director of the Ohio Civil Rights Commission who considered Mr. Simmons a friend and mentor. “He was very forceful. He was very opinionated, and if you had a different opinion than J.B., he was going to drive his opinion home.” Mr. Simmons’s bluntness could be balanced by humor. His son, J.B. iii, a retired lawyer who lives in Toledo, recalls once introducing his father at a Masons’ function. “My dad in his whole life only broke one promise to me. He promised me a baby sister,” J.B. iii told the crowd. His father, who was about 90 at the time, got up behind him. “No, I didn’t break any promise. We’re still working on it,” J.B. Jr. said. J.B. Jr.’s strong personality could work as an asset in the political arena, where he risked the ire of Democrats, Republicans, and his own core constituency. Among the best known examples: One of his first acts as a councilman was to announce his support of a controversial 1 percent payroll income tax. “We as a people are less able to pay the 1 per cent levy. But I feel if we intend to share the principles of government, find employment in civil service jobs, we certainly must be willing to pay our share in Toledo,” he said. A Blade editorial called the speech “the most unusual, and in some ways the best, political address made in Toledo since double talk became the vogue.” During a February, 1945, controversy that pitted returning veterans in need of housing against irate citizens, Mr. Simmons stood apart from the politicians squirming to please both factions. Siding squarely with the veterans, he said, “This is an emergency. We’ve got to get these boys in out of the snow.” The Blade praised him again as a politician “who has absolutely no vested interests to protect and only has to consider what is right.” Mr. Simmons took a strong stand in the early 1950s, when the council was considering a proposal honoring William Cummings, a self-described undercover fbi agent who was testifying against alleged communists on investigative panels across the nation.

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Mr. Simmons blocked the resolution, saying, “A stooge is a stooge no matter what side he is on.” Shortly after that, Mr. Cummings appeared before an Ohio legislative committee and identified Mr. Simmons as one of 50 Toledoans who were “duespaying Communists or fellow travelers.” Front-page headlines blared, “Simmons Accused of Red Fund Gift” but Mr.   Simmons didn’t back down. He asked to testify before the committee, where he denied making contributions to a Communist Party defense fund and explained an appearance at the dedication of Lucas County Communist Party headquarters, saying he did not know the nature of the meeting. But he didn’t stop there. Criticizing the committee’s tactics, he said: “I am fearful of this trend, this method we’re using these days—attacking honest citizens who are not given a proper trial.” The committee cleared him, with its counsel, Sidney Isaacs,… Simmons for vice mayor, making him one of the few black politicians to achieve such a high position in an American city. But the road from victory was rocky. Mr. Simmons was ejected from the City Manager League and the Democratic county executive committee. City Manager League president Lloyd Roulette accused Mr. Simmons of deceit: “I…blame Simmons,” he said of the vote for mayor. “He did it under cover. He said he did it because his people wanted him to be vice mayor. He went along with Damas [in exchange] for the vice mayor’s office.” Mr. Simmons defended himself, saying that he had warned the league he might shift his support to Mr. Damas. In any case, the trouble continued. Mr. Simmons offended the Blade with strong words for those who opposed a controversial fair housing ordinance. The Democrats eventually decided to back him in his 1961 race, but a strong anti-incumbent mood worked against him. He was defeated, and at the age of 63, decided to leave politics and devote more time to his wife and law practice. He and his wife, Isabelle, were by many accounts a close couple. She had a master’s degree in chemistry from the University of Toledo and often worked alongside her husband in his insurance and law businesses. Later, when she was ill with Alzheimer’s—and he was in his late 80s and early 90s—he cared for her himself, refusing to institutionalize his partner of more than 60 years. “He was devoted to his wife to such an extent that it was a real model of partnership to the whole community,” says Mr. Ford. For decades he had been denied the honors Toledo had bestowed on less ­accomplished men and women, but at the end of his life recognition poured in. A proclamation was issued on Mr. Simmons’s 91st birthday. A community

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center was named for him. A testimonial dinner in his honor, featuring the mayor and city manager, filled SeaGate Centre. Still, there were jobs to be done, dreams to be dreamed. A few years before his death in 1991 at age 93, J.B. Simmons, Jr., leaned forward in his chair and told a Blade reporter, “Listen closely to me now. Toledo will have a black mayor. I won’t be around to see it, but I know it will happen. I know this city can change.” 3.3.9 James Slater Gibson: A Lawyer Who Pursued Social Justice22 He is an enigma, a puzzle with a thousand pieces. Being black, growing up in the South at the turn of the century, coming to Toledo as a strike-breaker, going to law school at night while working and raising a family, entering the practice of law at the start of the Depression—all were opportunities for failure. He survived. But calling him a survivor does not describe him fully. He personifies the concept of the self-made man. He also is a self-made, self-described loner. The man is James Slater Gibson, known as “Slater.” Still active in the practice of law at the age of 81, he has been honored by his colleagues in the legal profession and is feared and respected by his adversaries. He argued many of the landmark cases of the last 50 years for the City of Toledo, yet his name is hardly a household word. He prefers privacy. In the courtroom, he commands attention. Even the casual spectator is drawn by his powerful, resonant voice. He stands straight, like a schoolboy reciting his lessons, eyes fixed on judge or jury. His words flow in crisp sentences. His features seem harsh, as if chiseled in granite. In his office, he also commands attention. His voice is lower, softer. Granite features smooth into a sculpted look. His words flow smoothly, sprinkled with contagious laughter. Two fingers protect his bony, arthritic hand while he shakes hands firmly. His office conveys an image of simplicity and hard work—a setting for serious conversation. The walls are decorated sparingly. A few personal plaques, two landscape paintings, and two old, dark English prints easily fade into the background. If one inspects the plaques closely, they reveal honors. The Ohio State Bar Association paid tribute to his 50 years of active law practice. The Toledo Board of Education and the Toledo Association of ptas gave hand-scrolled mementos for his success as counsel for the school board from 1958 to 1971. The F­ raternal 22

Tom Willging, “James Slater Gibson: In Pursuit of Justice,” Toledo Blade, December 12, 1982.

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Order of Police honored him with a plaque for services which he dismisses as “routine.” He served as secretary of the board of trustees of the Medical College of Ohio from 1965 to 1976; he was a member of the original board appointed by Gov. James Rhodes in 1964. The University of Toledo selected him as the Distinguished Lawyer of the Year in 1981, but no memorial of that tribute appears in his office. On that occasion, Judge Robert Franklin of the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas said: Mr. Gibson has been for more than 50 years … the highest and best example in all areas, of what a lawyer should be. In this now-quiet office setting, he talks freely. Personally, he has not felt “handicapped” by any of the racial barriers he faced as a black man entering the practice of law in 1931. He says he does not expect to be judged on the basis of race. He takes the initiative without pausing to anticipate discrimination. “I’ve experienced segregation. I managed to survive. Every once in a while I’d get to throw something back on someone,” he says. An example of “throwing something back” occurred when he was rebuffed in his attempt to buy a house in the then white-only block of Dorr-WoodlandIndiana-Pinewood. When his offer was rejected, he went to Columbus to try to convince a federal loan board official to order the sale. When that failed, he submitted a much lower offer through a straw party. He even used a different real estate agent so that his adversary would not get the commission. The owner sold to the straw party because “they were so glad to get away from that troublemaker Gibson,” he recalls with a hearty laugh. He lived in the house for 30 years. That experience and others, including contact with blockbusting and restrictive covenants barring the sale of property to blacks, sparked an abiding anger. In his words, “the realtors’ associations have been as much an enemy of the Negro as the Ku Klux Klan.” In the legal arena, he feels that race has not been a barrier. “It’s like trying a lawsuit,” he says. “I always start out to try the case like a gentleman. But, if the other attorney wants to fight dirty, I’ll give it back and he won’t forget it.” While he doesn’t believe he ever was a victim of discrimination, he also cannot recall that anyone was a major aid to his legal career. He accepts responsibility for his own success. He got no more than he deserved and he’s “obligated to none.” Saying that “it’s a helluva way to live,” he reveals that he’s developed few close friends over the years. Hard work, reading, yard work, and visits to

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Fox Lake (near Angola, in) occupied his time. With a whisper of regret in his voice, he says “it’s nobody’s fault but my own.” As counsel for the city and the Fraternal Order of Police, he developed strong opinions about racial preferences. Stating that his views “don’t jibe with others” on this subject, he delivers a smooth essay, without prompting, like a well-written speech delivered from memory. “If an exam is job-related and non-discriminatory, then there should be no place for color in the selection. If three people apply, choose the best one.” “Don’t do me any favors. If I measure up, then I accept the job. If not, so be it. Preferences based on color are a badge of inferiority. They afford no opportunity to measure up to standards.” “Race pride is a fallacy…an opiate. I want to be judged by something I’ve done, not by appearances. Race is an accident of birth which we cannot change. I want to be judged not for being but for doing. Pride for being is stagnation, an opiate.” How did he come to be a lawyer in Toledo? Like a lawyer giving a low keyed summation to the jury, he talks easily and chronologically of his round-about journey from Alabama in 1901. He attended high school at the Tuskegee Institute and graduated as valedictorian of the class of 1918. He dabbled in accounting, pharmacy, medicine, and engineering before he moved to Toledo in the early 1920s to work as a printer. The Toledo job was open because of a “tough” strike in the print shop. On his way home from work one day, he remembers clearly seeing a “funny looking car.” As he looked back, a blow glanced off his ear. He escaped with a torn coat and a black eye. He borrowed money and bought a .38 which he carried in a shoulder holster as insurance against a repeat performance. The source of his ambition to practice law is unclear. His namesake, Uncle James, a lawyer in Lexington, Kentucky, had litigated the issue of segregated facilities in railroad cars. This was in the era when the u.s. Supreme Court allowed so-called “separate but equal” facilities long before Rosa Parks made her famous challenge. Uncle James, however, dropped out of law practice after finding religion with the Seventh Day Adventists—hardly a good role model for an aspiring lawyer. Uncle James may account for Mr. Gibson’s skill at preaching. Mr. Gibson also had shown talent as a debater at Tuskegee, recalling with a mix of nostalgia and humor that people did such things before radio and television. In the self-contained world of Tuskegee, he had no personal contact with the law, yet he recalls always having a sense of the important role of law in our society.

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Whatever the inspiration, he entered law school. During the day he worked as a linotype operator for Superior Typesetting, still located at 1 Erie St. At night he studied at the University of Toledo College of Law under the tutelage of ­local judges and lawyers. On Saturdays, Gibson would frequent the courthouse, watching the “docket call” at which lawyers would argue motions and other pretrial issues. In his senior year, he won a book-prize for skill in legal research. He graduated and passed the bar examination on his first attempt in 1930. In the face of the Depression, he opened an office in the Nichols Building (now the National Bank Building) at Madison and Huron. Mr. Gibson measures his own career by a “public interest” standard. Despite his many successes in private practice, including appeals of landmark cases, his list of important cases does not include any private ones because he says they benefited only one person, his client. He has represented the “dregs of humanity” as well as the “top,” including many well-known Toledo “names.” Discreet and professional, he mentions no client’s name. Judge Franklin confirms the range of Gibson’s practice. He says that Mr. Gibson is “one who strives for perfection in all his work, whether his client be a government subdivision, a corporation, a pauper, or a millionaire. He is an innovator in the field of law and a pioneer in developing new approaches to difficult legal problems.” During his years as assistant city law director, from 1934 to 1949, he achieved many of the professional successes which he includes in his biographical sketch as “cases involving the public interest.” They touch dry subjects such as taxes, liquor control, development of the Anthony Wayne Trail (a test case for “limited access” highways), and regulation of parking meters—hardly the stuff of Perry Mason scripts. Yet, they did usher Toledo into the modern era. Mr. Gibson’s career as the “workhorse” (Judge Franklin’s word) of the city law department ended abruptly in 1948. Mr. Gibson had served in the department since 1934, appointed by Solon Klotz, the new Socialist mayor, for whom he had campaigned. In those days, Mr. Gibson explains, “socialist” meant supporting programs like insurance for bank deposits. Mr. Gibson remained in the law department under Democratic and Republican administrations. In 1948, however, the new city manager, Arnold V. Finch, chose to appoint John J. McCarthy as law director, bypassing Mr. Gibson, the first assistant and logical choice. Mr. Gibson resigned in a rare public display of rage, tightly controlled and formalized in his letter of resignation to Mr. McCarthy. The letter, quoted ­extensively in an article appearing in the Blade on Jan. 3, 1949, decried the

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“monstrous change” from nonpartisanship to partisanship in the selection of a Democrat for the position. He referred to three “sub rosa qualifications” (which were political, ethnic, and religious, not professional), that the city manager had imposed for the position. He said that he possessed none of the three, but only a record that would entitle him to the appointment. “In connection with your appointment,” Mr. Gibson wrote to Mr. McCarthy, “Mr. Finch has, according to the newspapers, made certain statements with respect to consideration of your record and capabilities and mine. With him I have no quarrel, for one has a right to his own opinions, although the soundness of his judgment may certainly be questioned.” He now says that Mr.  ­McCarthy turned out to be a good law director. In 1922, he married the former Inez M. Cage, now deceased, a former school teacher from New Orleans. They had one child, Marietta A. Leverette, wife of Emery Leverette, retired assistant superintendent of the Toledo board of education, who last year was appointed director of service delivery at the Lucas County Children Services Board. Mr. Gibson now is married to Berylee F.  ­Taylor, a retired social work supervisor. During our conversations, he speaks little of his family, but he does provide a glimpse of his pride at being a father, as well as his sense of humor, when he says, “My daughter used to think I let her beat me at chess.” He talks about cases a lot. In 1953, he shared office space with a young lawyer who was president of the Toledo Chapter of the naacp, Robert Franklin, now Lucas County Court of Common Pleas judge. They teamed up in a precedentsetting challenge to segregation in the public housing units of the Toledo Metropolitan Housing Authority (tmha), the integration of which was opposed by Toledo City Council. They filed a class-action suit in federal court in Toledo. The late Judge Frank Kloeb ruled, in the year before the United States Supreme Court decided Brown vs. Board of Education, that the tmha must implement its desegregation policy and that the City of Toledo had no right, under the u.s. Constitution, to block that policy. Separate but equal facilities (that is, equal in quality, if not quantity) did not satisfy the constitution. Mr. Gibson’s views on the “fallacy” of racial pride do not mean that he does not feel an obligation to help black people. Judge Franklin remembers that Slater Gibson was in demand by civil rights leaders during the early days of the civil rights movement. He frequently consulted with Mr. Gibson on civil rights and knows that Mr. Gibson never applied for fees from the naacp litigation fund. He taught young lawyers like Robert Franklin to have “high standards” for the practice of law. By example of all-night preparation of cases, forgoing lunch, and steady hard work, he projected a model of the professional a­ dvocate. Even

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now, he advises aspiring lawyers to “look at the substance of matters, not the superficialities” and “don’t assume that the law is a particular way; look it up.” By all accounts, he has practiced what he preaches. And he still recalls the day that a judge sentenced a person to the penitentiary and quoted Oscar Wilde: I know not whether Laws be right; Or whether laws be wrong; All that we know who lie in gaol; Is that the wall is strong; And that each day is like a year, A year whose days are long. From “The Ballad of Reading Gaol”

Contrary to Oscar Wilde, J. Slater Gibson knows whether the law is right or wrong. He seems to have known from the day he entered law school 55 years ago. 3.3.10 Cornelius Edwoods: Publisher of The Observer Newspaper (1920s)23 In the early 1920s, Cornelius Edwoods became an early African American pioneer in the history of Toledo, Ohio. He was founder and publisher of an early newspaper, The Observer. The Observer existed for over twelve years. Mr. ­Edwoods was in his sixties, well beyond his prime when he started the newspaper. Mr. Edwoods was a printer by trade. He had worked at The Bay City Tribune… Mr. Edwoods wanted [The Observer] to publish news about various activities in Toledo and vicinity without bias. He wanted news that was fit to read. There was opposition to some of his feature stories. Some members of the community were dissatisfied that the printed news in their opinion, was not newsworthy. He expressed that it would be unfair to refrain The Observer from printing things that were indeed of news value. Any African American, who had information of human value, Mr. Edwoods wanted it in The Observer, especially in its infancy. Mr. Edwoods used his home as the headquarters for The Observer. The 351 Woodland Avenue site was eventually torn down to make room for the Interstate 75 road expansion. Just about everything was done there, from newsgathering to the layout of the paper. Printing was done by an outside printer in the downtown area. Mr. Edwoods never had to pick the paper up from the printer. The printer always delivered the paper to the headquarters. 23

Darryl Q. Tucker, “Pioneer Journalist Cornelius Edwoods Provided the Voice for Toledo’s African-American Community in 1920s,” The Toledo Journal, March 22, 1989, 11–23.

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Elizabeth Vines, granddaughter of Mr. Edwoods and the daughter of Ethel and D.F. Washington, describes 351 Woodland as a three bedroom duplex. She said along with the bedrooms there was a hall, kitchen, and a living room. The living room was used as the office for The Observer. Mrs. Vines remembers the office having a book case and a piano. She became a housewife and raised ten children, lived at the address until she was four years old. Mrs. Vines noted that, while The Observer ran, it was the most beautiful time of her life. The lifestyle was laid back. She says that you did not even have to lock your doors of your house when you went away. The circulation of The Observer was several hundred papers weekly. It came out every Saturday and sold for five cents a copy. The Observer was well written by today’s standards. There were modern techniques used as well as a modern format. Feature stories, editorials, current events, sporting events, society columns, church events, and pictures comprised the paper. Sadie Hackley, who sold the Observer while in grade school, contributed stories, a gossip column, and wrote on school happenings while a student at Libbey High School. Mrs. Hackley became an educator and a social worker by profession. The Observer was an alternative to radio as a form of entertainment. She says, “You did not want to have The Observer to print anything about you in an uncomplimentary way.” Mrs. Hackley said she got a big kick out of selling the paper as a kid. She and other kids would sell the paper as a kid. She and other kids would sell the paper and Mr. Edwoods would give them money so they could go to the movies. Mrs. Hackley who received a Bachelors Degree in education from the University of Toledo, earned a Masters Degree in social work from Columbia ­University. She also has the distinction of becoming the first African American to be employed by the Ohio Mental Health Center in Toledo. She also taught the sixth grade at Washington Elementary School. The staff of The Observer was small. There was usually around five or six employees. Faye Dinwiddie worked for the paper writing society columns. She would later publish poems in other publications and became active in social and opportunity clubs. Hazel Marshall said The Observer was the only African American newspaper at the time. “I really enjoyed the paper between 1926–1930.” Currently, Mrs.  Marshall has the distinction of being the oldest member in the All Saints’ Episcopal Church, 563 Pinewood in Toledo. She is a former housewife and raised three children all of whom graduated from college. Mrs. Marshall also confesses, her family is the oldest African American family to ­continuously live in Toledo.

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She is also the sister of a local dentist, Dr. Franklyn Duffy. Mrs.  ­Marshall says she always waited for The Observer to come out to see who was doing what, and who was going with who. She says the paper used initials to protect the identity of individuals. She also read the paper to stay informed on church activities. 3.3.11 Frances Alexander Belcher (1912–1963)24 Accomplishing several “firsts” came naturally to Frances Alexander, who became the first Afro American person to be employed in the Division of Water of the City of Toledo. During World War ii, she enlisted as a private in the Women’s Army Corps, and rose to the rank of captain. Under the name of “Lady B,” she became one of Toledo’s first to have a radio program from 1950–1961 on station wtod, and she and her husband founded The Bronze Raven. Frances was born on February 12, 1912, in Acheson, Kansas. She and her mother moved to Toledo in 1920. A warm, friendly, and spirited youth, at an early age she displayed unusual talents and abilities. She attended Toledo Public Schools and furthered her education at the University of Toledo and Eastern Michigan College, Ypsilanti, Michigan. She received a degree in physical education, and after graduation accepted the position of director of physical education at the Community Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, though she later returned to Toledo. Before going into the service, while employed in the division of Water for the City of Toledo, she was co-editor of Toledo’s only Negro weekly, The Toledo Observer and later The Toledo Voice. This was where she displayed outstanding ability in journalism and public relations. It was after her military duties that she met and married Richard Belcher in December, 1947. Her interest returned to that of providing a Negro weekly newspaper for the Toledo community. Consequently, she and her husband founded The Bronze Raven on September 18, 1948, where she served as editor and publisher. Civic and social organizations Frances was affiliated with included a ­charter membership in Iota Phi Lambda Sorority, Alpha Iota Chapter; the Ella P. ­Stewart Junior Federated Club, and the Frederick Douglass Community Association. She was a member of the Educational Club of the ymca and a charter member of the Junior National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (naacp). Frances was active in the Democratic Party on both local and state levels. In several instances Frances received special citations for her p ­ erformances. It was noted in the Raven that she received a Special 24

Joyce Brown, In Search of Our Past: Women of Northwest Ohio Volume iv (Toledo, oh: Women’s History Committee of the Women Alive! Coalition, 1994).

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­Recognition Plaque at the ymca’s 32nd Annual Meeting for “her interest and concern for the youth of this community.” Another major activity was that of the Toledo Cotillion, which she orig­ inated in the fifties, and directed for several years, which was keyed toward uplifting the ideals of young girls by securing funds for scholarships. For several years Frances was a swimming instructor at the Indiana Avenue ymca. She spent tremendous energy with young girls, not only to shape their minds, but also to increase their awareness of being physically fit. According to her stepdaughter, Frances was an avid bowler, and was acquainted with many in the bowling leagues around the country. Frances and her husband, Dick, were outstanding promoters. For many years they were responsible for bringing great musicians to the Toledo community. It was noted by some of the old timers what good times they had when the big Jazz and Blues performers came to town. Frances loved life! She thoroughly enjoyed surprise parties for her friends. They found her to be a delightful person, full of fun at all times. These were the moments when friends gathered in the Belcher home for an enjoyable evening of music and games. On other occasions, weekends in Michigan were the order of the day. When “Lady B” sponsored a Cabaret party at the Silver Blue Ballroom, patrons thought they were attending a style show, from the appearance of the young people there. Someone noted, “they believe in wearing the latest in fashion.” Frances was endowed with a great richness of the love of God. Since early childhood, she was a member of Warren ame church and during the early years taught Sunday School classes. There were times when life sometimes dealt Frances harsh blows, frustrations, heartaches and disappointments. But, in any event, not once did she ­falter in her love of life and people. After suffering a long period of illness, Frances Belcher died in November, 1963, at the age of 51. Her husband noted that the death of his wife had left a void in the newspaper operation, but that the staff would continue to do everything possible to make the paper what his wife would want it to be and what the readers deserved. Frances Belcher devoted much of her life, energy, and talent toward humanitarian efforts to increase greater opportunities for her people. Due to her very popular radio program, where she was a disc jockey for more than a decade, she will be remembered fondly, as “Lady B.”

chapter 4

Community Development and Struggle (1950–2000) Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson The black community came of age during the last half of the 20th century, but this great success was followed by a crash. At one time the entire community lived together, but one of the unanticipated consequences of the Civil Rights Movement was the flight of the black middle class to suburban areas. The inner city became black and poor and a concentration of all the social problems of the day. Especially devastating was the scourge of crack. The third quarter of the twentieth century has been dubbed the Golden Age of American capitalism, denoting the postwar economic boom and the strengthening of democratic institutions. In the wake of the infrastructure destruction in industrialized capitalist nations in Western Europe and Japan, the United States had an outsized share of global markets. During this period, world trade quadrupled in size, and the United States experienced the largest gains. By 1950 the United States had 60% of the total output of the seven largest capitalist nations. Fewer than five hundred companies were responsible for approximately a quarter of the industrial output of the world outside the Soviet bloc. In this booming production environment with effective job color bars, white workers, white males in particular, felt empowered to push for consistently higher wages and better working conditions. To put a check on this labor push, some five million African Americans were effectively recruited from the South to the Midwest, West, and Northeast to work in industrial jobs they had been previously denied. The integration of ­African Americans into jobs that were previously reserved for whites—even the threat of such integration helped to serve as an anchor on white wages. The efforts of a downward push on wages by companies were met with a strong countervailing force, as over a third of workers were employed union members. In that moment, under those conditions, the United States achieved its highest level of income equality. At that time, Toledo was an industrial juggernaut. During the 1950s, Toledo was the home of seven Fortune 500 companies, mostly located in a bustling downtown area within blocks of one another. There were as many as 40,000 employees working downtown, whereas by 2000 the number was under 20,000. Haughton Elevator Company, the Toledo Scale Company, and Doehler Jarvis were three of many industrial companies based in Toledo. Doehler Jarvis was once the world’s largest manufacturer of die-cast metal. The foundry p ­ roduced © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi 10.1163/9789004281899_005

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metal products such as engine bearings and hood ornaments for many automobile manufacturers. Previously, Toledo was the headquarters of Willy’s Overland Motors, formerly the nation’s second largest automobile producer after Ford Motor Company. Willy’s was best known for its production of military jeeps. In addition to growing economic opportunities, there were also stronger democratic practices slowly developing as a result of trenchant political and movement struggles taking place in this country and in Africa and other developing regions. For instance, in 1960 the apartheid state of South Africa massacred 69 blacks in response to their demands for ending Pass laws, and in 1963 terrorists bombed the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Alabama in response to blacks’ push for civil rights, including the successful Brown V. Board Supreme Court decision. By 1964, the Civil Rights Act was signed into law and several African nations had gained their independence, with the understanding that the full continent would be free of colonialism in the foreseeable future. The urban riots that spread in this country during the mid-to-late 1960s, starting with Watts in 1965 and reaching Detroit in 1967 with some of the most volatile protests in the nation, never reached Toledo on that scale. Nevertheless, buildings were set ablaze in Toledo’s Dorr Street and Detroit Avenue areas. Additionally, once the Black Panther Party was established in 1966, a chapter was soon established in Toledo, and local members had their share of shootouts with the police over the practices that these law enforcers used in patrolling and controlling the black neighborhoods. At the end of the 20th century, African Americans in Toledo continued making uneven strides while the wider world was convulsed and transformed, from the Rwandan genocide that resulted in 800,000 Tutsis being slaughtered by Hutus, to the urban explosion in response to the acquittal of white Los Angeles police officers, whose shocking, merciless billy clubbing of Rodney King was viewed around the world, to the release from prison and ascendency of Nelson Mandela to the South African presidency, to the breakup of the Soviet Union, and to the debut of the Internet. Progress was occurring and some gains were being consolidated, but this period in the development of Toledo’s Black community, not unlike the final period between 2000 and 2016, witnessed progress exemplifying the dictum of two steps forward, one step backward. As Stage Three illustrates, Toledo had its share of professionals and leaders in the second half of the twentieth century, including many who came from Brand Whitlock, a public housing complex in the inner city. Leaders included the likes of Ella P. Stewart, the first black female licensed and practicing pharmacist in the country; J.B. Simmons, first black City Council member and first black vice mayor; Wayman Palmer, who served as the director of Self-Help Development and Technical Assistance of

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the National Consumer Cooperative Bank in the Carter administration; councilwoman June Boyd; Judge Robert Franklin; and others. As this third stage will show, the lives of these individuals who built and administered institutions in Toledo’s Black community helped other blacks gain a positive sense of self and gave meaning and purpose to life in the community. 4.1

Community and Consciousness (Documents 43–48)

The black community developed its businesses and institutions in its neighborhoods, but at its epicenter was its black downtown on Dorr Street. It was the place to go, to see and be seen (Document 43). De facto segregation put the majority of African Americans in the same schools, both as students, teachers, and administrators. But progress was measured by individuals rising in public and private positions (Document 44). By the 1950s African Americans were based in the Brand Whitlock Homes, the first public housing project in Toledo (Document 45). It was a base for upward mobility for many. Document 46 illustrates the pain and gain or regress and progress experienced in the late 1960s. Businesses were opening, including funeral parlors (Documents 47) as well as a unique jewelry store (Document 48). 4.1.1 Dorr Street: Toledo’s Black Downtown1 During the 1950s and 60s, the Dorr Street area was where a majority of ­Toledo’s African American community resided. It is now regarded as the central city. This area consisted of hundreds of residential homes—single and multi-­family structures, as well as businesses owned by both blacks and whites. It was an area where people young and old would put on their Sunday-go-tomeetin’s, get into their cars and cruise down the streets on Friday and Saturday nights. It was a place where the families would crowd into their automobiles to go shopping, go to the movies, go bowling, and attend church. This street was lined with all types of stores and shops, such as beauty/ barber, hardware, restaurants, clubs, etc. And black physicians and attorneys provided services as well it being a place where hundreds of individuals were employed. People about 30 years of age, may have some recollection of Dorr Street, as a booming area before it was destroyed as urban blight.

1 Darryl Tucker and Marcella McCoy, “Reopening the Door to Dorr Street,” The Toledo Journal, February 3, 1992.

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Today, certain neighborhoods and commercial downtown areas are considered historic and are given city funds for economic and structural revitalization. Had the same treatment been afforded Dorr Street, it would be alive today. People under 25 probably will only remember what is there now: a few businesses, several apartment complexes, a couple of gas stations, a fire station, a library, two or three restaurants, and vast vacant land, not generating any taxes for local government use. Believe it or not, this particular area in the central city of Toledo was Dorr St., from Washington near the Interstate 75 highway to Route 24, commonly known as Detroit Ave. Dating back to the 1930s to the mid 1970s when urban renewal arose to relocate displaced businesses for the sake of widening the two-lane popular street to a five-lane thoroughfare, Dorr St. began to prosper. [Sentence fragment corrected] Dorr Street was named after the city of Toledo’s 10th mayor, Charles Dorr. Mr. Dorr was a member of the Whig Party, the same party that elected William Henry Harrison, of Ohio, and Zachary Taylor of Louisiana, as presidents of the United States. He died in 1870 at the age of 55 and is buried in Forest Cemetery. This area was considered a residential community area with housing dating back to the early 20th century. Most of the homes were single-family, woodframed structures, while the businesses were mostly two-story brick buildings. Residential living was usually the norm in the second story rooms above the businesses on Dorr St. As a tribute to Black History Month, The Journal will publish two editions dedicated to Dorr Street.: “Re-Opening the Door to Dorr Street—Community Progress in the 1960s and Now.” Several individuals who were administrators of urban renewal and Model Cities programs, owners of businesses, or people that frequently visited Dorr St., whether for entertainment or to patronize the black businesses, were recently interviewed and gave their reflections on Dorr St. Two blocks that Toledoans remember most were the 1200 and 1300 blocks of Dorr St. where many of the businesses African Americans patronized were, although blacks shopped at many of the stores along Dorr St. At 1215 Dorr was the Original Black Panthers Carry-Out operated by James Mitchell, a formal professional wrestler. The building was owned by the Toledo Paper Box Company until 1982 when the city purchased the land for $23,500. Mr. Mitchell was paid $6,845 because he leased the property.

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A few doors down at the corner of Dorr and Heston was the Theater Bar. The owners of the business were Samuel and Leatrice Griffin of Dallas, Texas. The Texas couple sold the two-story structure to the city in 1982 for $17,590. The city had an extensive file on Septa Enterprises at 1229–35 Dorr St. Theodore Gerz, a local attorney, was receiver of the property and received $20,000 in 1979 from the city. The large structure was divided into two store rooms: one for the Dorr Luncheonette and the other for storage. The late Charles Corley, a community activist and long time president of People’s Tribunal, operated the facility during the ‘60s and ‘70s. Jimmy’s Carry-Out, 1241–43 Dorr St., was owned by Archie Smith and Jim Billups. The tow men had been operating the neighborhood business for seven years before they were bought out by the city. Mr. Billups also owned an appliance store on Dorr St. This site was formerly the black Giant supermarket, owned by Lucille Anderson until 1974. Another property owned by Mr. Smith was at 1249–51 Dorr St. At one time the local naacp (national Association for the Advancement of colored People) was housed there, from 1967–70. The civil rights group purchased the property for one dollar. Mr. Smith acquired the property in 1970. Miller’s Hardware, 1245–49 owned by Virgil Miller, was a longtime fixture in the black business district. Residents did not have to venture too far for their hardware needs. Roland’s Credit and Jewelry had been located at 1253–55 Dorr St. since the late 1940s until the city purchased the property in 1982 for $54,000. At 1259–61, Curtis Goode and Clarence Spearman owned and operated the Lincoln Motel. The two-story brick concrete frame was also accompanied by a one story brick motel and restaurant. At one time, the motel with its 33 rooms was a popular attraction. By 1972, only five of the 33 rooms were occupied. By 1974, the restaurant had closed and the living units had dwindled to 27. There were also nine permanent tenants paying from $60 to $94 in monthly rent. One of the factories located on Dorr St. was the Seaport Mold and Casting facility. The property was owned by B & K Realty. The city paid them $34, 789 for the three-story building and land. One of the hottest attractions on the strip was The Spot, 1344 Dorr St. The owners were Gilbert and Mayme Turner who lived in Port Clinton, Ohio. Their son, Nelson, managed the restaurant and bar.

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This was one of the properties that the city was only willing to pay a portion of what the owners wanted. In this case, the city offered the Turners $39,000. After going to court, the city was ordered to pay the Turners $49,000. Thomas Temple Church of God in Christ, founded by the late Bishop C.E. Thomas, was formerly located at 1244–46–48 Dorr St. The building was owned by the Ohio Asphalt Roofing Company and Bishop Thomas acquired the property on a land contract and paid it off in 1973. The church is now located at Bancroft and Ashland avenues and is pastored by Bishop Frank Richard. One of the most well-known establishments on Dorr St. was the M & L Rendevouz Bar, 1301–03, owned by Merriweather J. Harding, who purchased it in 1962. In 1973, Lucas County Common Pleas Court Judge Reno Riley ordered the business padlocked for one year after he found it to be a public nuisance. The Sixth District Court of Appeals upheld the lower court’s decision, and the owner was ordered to pay a $300 fine. This event was chronicled in the (Toledo) Blade newspaper in March of 1974. The city paid Mr. Harding $26,500 for the property. When people walked past Dorr and Ewing, the aroma of fresh baked goods would seep through windows. Walton’s Baker, 802 Dorr St., was a long-time fixture until it went out of business. The three-story brick building later became Star Equipment and Supply, Inc. The facility was basically used for retail and warehouse purposes as well as railroad salvage supplies and paint. By the way, average cost of a gallon of paint was $1.95. Among some of the other businesses in the 1300 block of Dorr St. was the Jesus Only, Church of Deliverance at 1305, pastured by Emma Foster; Dorr Cleaners and Laundry, 1307, owned by Harry Goodleman, of LaMesa, California; Moore’s Barbershop, owned by Owen Moore; Clark’s One Stop Record Shop, 1315, which featured free delivery and was owned by Fred and Ednah Page; the Be Square Club, 1327, owned by Cleveland Richardson, Lucinda Robertson, George Hackney, and James Harris. Although there were many more businesses along Dorr St., there are too many to mention. As the Lone Ranger would say, “Let’s go back to yesteryear.” 4.1.2 A Report on Black Life in Toledo (1950s)2 All across the country, I was constantly told that this city or that was unique in black-white relationships, or was in a unique position to solve its problems. Call it pride or vanity or affliction, there is a tendency to look at your own situation through rose-colored glasses. 2 William Brower, “Low Profile Held by Toledo on Race Issues,” Toledo Blade, March 22, 1972.

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I’ve lived in Toledo nearly 25 years, or almost half my lifetime. I call it “my hometown” now. I, too, have civic loyalty. I know that Toledo has plus features, and I know that it has minus features. After all, this city is but a microcosm of the rest of the nation. However, compared to many other places, larger and smaller, Toledo has had a low profile on racial controversies. I have spent the last several days talking with Toledoans about their city. From blacks, I get different versions of what has occurred, for better or worse, in the past two decades. One highly placed person told me that he considered Toledo backward in racial progress, saying that it is just reaching the stage long ago attained in other cities. But then, a former Toledo resident said that blacks here are far ahead, in many respects, of their counterparts in her present city. There is ample evidence to support both points of view. Some of the symptoms of racial discrimination that faced blacks when I came to Toledo have disappeared, have even been erased from memory, but basic problems—jobs, education, employment, and housing—still persist. 4.1.2.1 Population In the meantime, Toledo has been going forward on several fronts, and some of this advancement cannot be turned back. These changes have been affected by the growth of the black population in Toledo and Lucas County in the past two decades. In 1951, there were about 25,000 blacks in the Toledo area, principally within the city boundaries. This represented about one-twelfth of the 306,616 residents in Toledo. Census figures show Toledo with a population of 383,818, and blacks accounting for 52,915, or almost 14 per cent. (Lucas County has a population of 484,370, with blacks totaling 54,694, or about 12 per cent.) 4.1.2.2 Housing The impact on the housing market by the bulging black population in the inner city, where most are concentrated, has caused a pinch. This has been compounded by the fact that more than 5,000 units have been lost to the bulldozers and wreckers for urban renewal and expressway projects. Little replacement housing to meet the needs of displaced black families has been built. Housing patterns remain essentially segregated. In a report issued earlier this year, the Planning Commission noted that black households in Toledo rose

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from 1,000 to 15,500 in the decade between 1960 and 1970, but the infiltration of black families into all-white areas was small. This density of housing has created all sorts of problems for its occupants. As soon as an area becomes overcrowded, the housing is quickly transformed into slum conditions and numerous health and building codes are violated. The neighborhoods soon develop into high-crime areas. 4.1.2.3 Shift in Racial Makeup Blacks, over the past 20 years, have penetrated several previously all-white ­areas, but most such areas have turned black, or predominantly black. There remain some areas that have representative integration, but whites are under unrelenting pressure from some real estate interests to sell their homes and move. Some real estate men will not show white families homes in these areas unless specifically asked to do so. In 1952, I wrote that there had been fewer than 50 new dwellings built for blacks in the previous 30 years. The record in the last 20 years is better, and a scattered few black families have been able to purchase homes in such suburbs as Ottawa Hills and Sylvania Township. 4.1.2.4 Tie-In to Problems Emerson Cole, regional director of the Ohio Civil Rights Commission, said there is some difficulty encountered by blacks seeking rental accommodations. Interracial couples are in deeper trouble when they apply. “You can tie housing into every major problem we have,” Dr. Samantha ­Adams, president of the Toledo chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said. “You break the housing pattern, you break the educational pattern.” Mrs. Adams observed that it affects employment because many Toledo firms, following a national trend, are moving to the suburbs, making it difficult for blacks to follow their jobs because of transportation obstacles. 4.1.2.5 Education Toledo’s public school system has a non-segregated policy, but housing patterns have resulted in 10,000 of its 13,000 black elementary pupils and 3,100 of 4,500 high school students to be enrolled in inner-city district schools. Another 750 pupils are bussed out of crowded ghetto schools to building in other sections of the city. The school administration’s policy of bussing children to distant schools to relieve congested schools has met objections from parents, particularly in the Fulton-Glenwood areas, and has been curtailed somewhat.

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The increased ratio of black pupils in the Toledo schools has been accompanied by an increase in the number of black teachers. In 1952, I reported that there were 42 black teachers in the system, all in elementary schools. 4.1.2.6 300 Elementary Teachers A recent report showed there were 300 regular black elementary teachers out of 1,464, or about 20 per cent. There are 85 full-time black high school teachers, a little more than 10 per cent of the total of 789. The period between 1952 and 1972 has seen gains in administrative positions. In 1955, E.L. Leverette, then an assistant principal, was named principal at Gunckel. Mr. Leverette is now assistant superintendent. There are nine black principals of elementary schools and one black high school principal (Flute Rice at Scott). There are five black assistant high school principals (four at Scott and one at Libbey), and eight black assistant elementary principals. 4.1.2.7 Singular Administrator The only administrator assigned to a predominantly white school is Mrs. Louise Brower, named an assistant at Gunckel in 1955. She is principal at McTigue, where 128 blacks are enrolled in a student body of 1,385, and there are 3 black members on a faculty of 50. Twelve black supervisors, directors, coordinators, and specialists are assigned to the central administration and two to district high schools. (The figures do not include Spencer-Sharples School, which runs from kindergarten through the 12th grade. It is a part of the school district, but it is outside of the city. It has a predominantly black teaching staff and enrollment). 4.1.2.8 Employment In 1952, I wrote: “Even with a college background, your best chances (if you were black) for employment would be at Rossford Ordnance Depot, an army installation. If you were hired in private industries, your chances for promotion would not be too good.” At that time, of 5,500 employees at Rossford, 2,400 were black. Rossford was phased out about 10 years ago and that left a gaping hole in the black economy in Toledo. Today, an appreciable number of blacks are still dependent on Federal Government-oriented employment—Model Cities, the poverty program, and urban renewal. The city of Toledo agency with the highest number of blacks (74 out of 179) regularly employed is the urban renewal agency, funded in part by federal

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money. The pay range for this personnel is from $7,389 to $18,450. Arthur D. Lanier is the deputy director. 4.1.2.9 Model Cities The Model Cities agency, headed by Charles Penn, is another federally supported operation with mostly black employees. Only a few of the 28 staff members are white. The Economic Opportunity Planning Association of Toledo, under Wayman Palmer, executive director, has about 400 professional, paraprofessional, and clerical employees. Of this number, 65 per cent are black. The board of community relations, headed by Nelson Grace, also black, reported that 487 out of 3,256 full-time municipal jobs are held by blacks. Among them is Dr. Joseph Fenwick, head of dental services of the health department, but by far most of these jobs are in the low paying categories. Black policemen number 41 out of 689, a big jump over the 10 or so on the force in 1952. The 10 black firemen (out of 527) represent little, if any, numerical gain in the 20 year span. In fact, in recent years blacks have lost ground in the fire division because of the retirements of Capts. Robert Herron and Alfred Stuart. Detective Capt. Roy Shelton, the ranking black police officer, also retired this year, leaving one black command officer, Sgt. Irving B. Swan. 4.1.2.10 Control of Civil Service Toledo is one of the few major cities where blacks are in control of a civil service commission. Harry Smith, a shipping supervisor for the Champion Spark Plug Co., and Robert Penn, an attorney, are two of the three-member commission. Private employment remains a critical problem for blacks, although they are employed in much greater force now than 20 years ago. Mr. Cole said there is a multitude of hiring blacks by such corporations as Champion, Chrysler, Chevrolet, and Jeep Corp., but many are still restricted to the lower paying jobs as laborers and machine operators. Few make it to the skilled jobs, he contends. Blacks, on the other hand, find a welcome in the foundries, Mr. Cole said. Chevrolet has 422 black employees out of 4,100, and Jeep, 344 out of 3,170, each running about 10 per cent. Chrysler says that 24 per cent of its 3,100 ­employees at its Toledo Machining Plant are black. This includes 400 salaried employees, 14 per cent black, and 240 managerial employees, 10 per cent. 4.1.2.11 Executive Breakthrough There has been a breakthrough in Toledo in recent years on management levels in Toledo-based corporations.

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One of the highest-ranking black corporation executives in the country is John Chadwell, director of human resources for Owens-Illinois, Inc. Archie Finch is manager of job orientation and planning at Chrysler in ­Perrysburg. Councilman Harold Garner is assistant personnel manager at ­General Mills. Job opportunities are awaiting blacks in the once-hard-to-crack trucking industry, Herman Miller, equal opportunity representative of the Ohio Bureau of Employment Services, told me. “Truck firms are looking for over-the-road drivers, and they (the drivers) are not easy to find,” Mr. Miller said. 4.1.2.12 Hiring in Stores Most Toledo area department stores and discount and variety stores now hire blacks, including on managerial levels—something I didn’t find on any noticeable scale in 1952. The most significant development in Toledo in Black capitalism appears to be the Christian Brothers Development Corp., headed by the Rev. Robert Culp, former president of the Toledo naacp. The corporation’s operations now include a supermarket, a McDonald’s Restaurant franchise later owned by Mr. James Cooks, the Good ’n Plenty Restaurant in the Franklin Park Mall (one of two black businesses there), and the Christian Bros. Industries, a small manufacturing operation at 1225 Indiana Ave. Started three years ago, the corporation now has 100 workers regularly on its payroll. Expansion of the corporation has been handicapped somewhat, Mr. Culp told me, because it is under the scrutiny (for statutory reasons) of the division of securities of the Ohio Department of Commerce. It can only make nonvoting stock available and presently has 100 stockholders. 4.1.2.13 Black Vice Mayor Before it became politically fashionable for blacks to be elected vice mayors and city council presidents pro tem in big cities in the South and North, Toledo had a black vice mayor. J.B. Simmons, Jr., was in his seventh term in City Council when he made a deal with Michael Damas. Mr. Damas received Mr. Simmons’ vote for mayor, while Mr. Simmons got the votes of Mr. Damas’ other supporters for vice mayor. This may or may not have led to the end of Mr. Simmons’ long service in council. At any rate, in 1961 both he and Mr. Damas were defeated for reelection. Since then two other blacks have been elected councilmen. Clayton Umbles, the former University of Toledo football captain, served one term (1967–69), and Mr. Garner is now serving his second.

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At one time, Toledo had two black judges. One still serves. Former Gov. ­ ichael V. DiSalle named Robert V. Franklin to a Municipal Court vacancy in M 1961. Judge Franklin was elected to complete an expired term in that fall, and he won a full six year term in 1963. In 1968, he moved up to his first term on the Common Pleas bench. The other judge was Clarence G. Smith, appointed by former Governor Rhodes in 1965, but Mr. Smith was defeated in the next election to complete the unexpired term. Two black men have served after Dr. Martin Luther King was killed in April, 1968, but cool heads held the disturbances down. Out of this incident came Harambee, Inc., a black-controlled organization established to make long-range plans for motivation and improvement in the black community. Now nearing the end of its fourth year, Harambee considers its chief achievement, according Robert Sciplin, executive director, its housing program and a planned manufacturing operation in Oak Openings industrial center. The housing plans call for a $3.7 million, 200-unit development along Dorr Street in the Roosevelt urban renewal area. 4.1.2.14 Criticism of Leadership One of the things that I heard in recent conversations on race relations in Toledo is that the black community suffers from live-wire leadership. Some complained that the chief accomplishment of the naacp is to give two money-raising dinners each year. Dr. Adams defends the naacp’s leadership record, and cites that the Toledo chapter has the second highest number of members in Ohio, with 2,300 to Cleveland’s 4,000. Whether this feeling has anything to do with this sentiment, several “ad hoc” community and neighborhood groups have sprung up in the last few years. These include welfare rights and tenants’ organizations, the People’s Tribunal, Model Neighborhood Residents Association, Urban Concerns, and Black Pride, Inc., all asking to speak their peace on civil rights and related issues. 4.1.3 When the Projects Were New: Brand Whitlock (1940s–1950s)3 As a child, June Boyd slept with the doors unlocked, wore frilly dresses sewn by her mother, and so charmed a little boy named Richard Reed that he graciously agreed to sample her cooking. 3 Nara Schoenberg, “Brand Whitlock’s Glory Days,” Toledo Blade, February 11, 1996.

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“Now this is going to taste real good,” June, 4, told Richard as she stirred up a batch of dirt and patted her mud pies into shape. “Now, you’re going to eat this.” Dazzled, Richard did. Fortunately, Richard’s chivalry did him no harm, and June went on to a s­ eries of new adventures. In the winter, there was ice-skating on nearby streets; in the summer she and her friends cooled off at a real old-fashioned drug store soda fountain, complete with marble floors and burnished chrome seats. That such childhoods existed in the starry-eyed America of the 1940’s hardly comes as a surprise. But many Toledoans would be startled to discover that Councilwoman June Boyd, 60, spent much of her charmed childhood in what is now one of Toledo’s most notorious housing projects: the Brand Whitlock Homes. For thousands of black southerners who moved to Toledo in the 1940’s— the first decade of a historic wave of migration to the industrial north—Brand Whitlock was a local landmark. For the many who couldn’t afford the airy apartments with new refrigerators, gas stoves, and steam heat, the project served as a symbol of what hardworking people might someday achieve. For those lucky enough to join the many longtime Toledoans who lived in the modern red-brick buildings, Brand Whitlock was an opportunity to cherish. The windows were kept squeaky clean, the stoops well-swept, the gardens immaculate. Youngsters watched in awe as some of the biggest heroes of the black community criss-crossed the smooth, green lawns. Toledo’s future vice-mayor, J.B. Simmons, Jr., lived at Brand Whitlock. Jack Dale, who would one day own one of the city’s major funeral parlors, could be seen rushing back and forth from embalming jobs well into the night. “Everybody in Toledo who ended up doing anything lived in the Brand Whitlock Homes,” says former resident Edgar DuBois, 72, a retired post office manager. “They all lived there.” That’s an exaggeration, but not an outrageous one; the list of former ­residents does indeed read like a Who’s Who of black Toledo. Toledo’s first ­African-American fire captain, Robert “rd.” Herron, lived at Brand Whitlock, and Brand Whitlock was where his wife, Gladys, launched herself on a career path that would lead to the founding of Toledo’s first black beauty school. Emerson Ross, 54, manager of corporate community relations at the Toledo based Fortune 500 company, Owens Corning, got his start at Brand Whitlock, showing early initiative when, as a mere toddler, he somehow managed to climb a waist-high backyard fence and wander off into the neighborhood.

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The entrepreneur Stanley R. Cowell, who owned what some say was Toledo’s first motel, stayed at Brand Whitlock for a brief period, as did his son, Stanley A. Cowell, now 54 and an internationally recognized jazz pianist and composer. The heyday didn’t last long, by some estimates from the late 1930’s to the early 1950’s, but today its memory continues to influence many leading Toledoans. “We had happy childhoods, and that’s so important,” says Ms. Boyd. “I think that’s why I put so much emphasis on youth, and I have for 39 years.” In the beginning, there were slums. Brand Whitlock replaced ramshackle homes with rotting porches, garbage strewn lots, and shacks that had grown up pell-mell in the backs of alleys. Certainly, there were highly respectable black addresses in the rigidly ­segregated Toledo of the late 1930’s—most notable along Indian Avenue, where black professionals often lived. But by 1930, slumlords, racially restricted housing, and the economic hardships of the Great Depression had conspired to produce truly wretched housing conditions in the central city. One survey of the era found that, of 713 households in the Belmont-Division area, 118 had neither a toilet nor a bathtub. Between 1935 and 1938, Toledo responded by leveling roughly 200 homes in the area and erecting one of the first public housing projects in the nation. Named for Brand Whitlock, a reform minded turn-of-the-century Toledo mayor who went on to an illustrious diplomatic career, the 264-unit complex was to be a showplace for Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal. A.R. Clas, director of the housing division of the federal Public Works Administration, gave a ringing speech at the 1936 groundbreaking ceremony. “Brand Whitlock Homes will rise from the ashes of sordidness, vice, and crime … shaping a neighborhood design for eventual rehabilitation of the entire district,” he told an audience of several hundred. Brand Whitlock didn’t actually open its doors to displaced slum dwellers. Instead, a rigid screening process and relatively high rents ensured that residents were, at the very least, working class. “I’m sure they bent the federal rules quite a bit, because it sure as heck didn’t ante up to what it is now, or what it probably was intended to be,” Mr. Dubois says with a chuckle. “It was more like a clique to get in there.” In 1938, a toddler born in the tiny town of Belville, Ga., joined the ranks of the Brand Whitlock elect together with her mother, Clyde Jones-Bond, a ­divorced domestic worker, and her aunt, Mamie Richmond. Some of the happiest days of June Boyd’s life were about to begin. The local newspapers made much of the Brand Whitlock’s spanking-new appliances and airy interiors, but the home June Boyd and her contemporaries remember was much more than up-to-date amenities.

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It was people like Brand Whitlock’s heating engineer John Marshall, a generous, fatherly man with no children of his own. In his free time, he would take children on tours of the much-vaunted central heating plant with coal-fueled steam boilers and 150-foot smokestack. Mr. Marshall also kept an eye out for newspaper announcements of upcoming circuses and fairs. “You’ll have to be good,” he’d tell an eager bunch of children. “You’ll have to have good grades in school.” Then, when the big day arrived, Mr. Marshall would pile the well-behaved into his car and drive off to the fairgrounds. “Everybody loved him, he was so sweet,” recalls Beatrice Huntley-Turner, 65, a retired teachers’ assistant who grew up in Brand Whitlock. Certainly, Mr. Marshall distinguished himself in the children’s eyes, but he was hardly the only adult who made it his or her business to touch young lives. At the nearby Gunckel School, Emery Leverette, Toledo’s first black school administrator, was a role model and a friend, the kind of old-time assistant principal who wouldn’t hesitate to paddle a child who didn’t respond to a scolding—or hug the youngster when the paddling was done. Mr. Leverette, 80, who retired in 1980 as an assistant superintendent, smiles sadly when he notes that, today, the hugging would get him in more trouble than the paddling. Closer to home, many a child at Brand Whitlock shied away from misbehavior, knowing that when parents were gone, neighbors were watching. Not that the parents left much to chance. June Boyd recalls that once, when she was about 7, she went to a friend’s house after school without telling her mother. When she came home, her frantic mother was waiting for her at the trolley stop. “Where were you?” her mother cried as she wrapped her arms around June. “Where were you?” Then there was June’s step-father, mechanic Otho Bond, who married her mother in 1940. He impressed his stepdaughter with small but heartfelt gestures like the way he cut the crusts off the sandwiches when preparing her school lunches. “He took so much love and pride, just in packing a lunch. Those are things that stay with you. See? I’m 60 years old and I’m still remembering him packing those lunches.” Although she was an only child until age 11, June never wanted for friends. She and her neighbors at Brand Whitlock played jacks, jumped rope, competed at hopscotch. When winter came, kindly adults flooded nearby streets so the children could ice skate.

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Crafts and organized activities such as nature walks were offered at Brand Whitlock’s playgrounds and recreation rooms, and church was a major event on Sundays. Little boys dressed in caps and suits with short pants and stockings; girls wore hats and dresses. There were no tv’s of course, but there were radio shows, “The Shadow,” “The Hermit’s Cave.” The children would turn off the lights, the better to ­appreciate the spooky laughter and eerie howls. That was about as much fear as June Boyd and her friends had to contend with in those days, unless you count the creepy image of a monster face imbedded in ice in the movie “Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man.” “We left!” Ms. Boyd recalls. “We couldn’t stand it!” The glory days didn’t last long. By the mid-1950’s, Brand Whitlock income ­requirements had changed and the complex was more like a conventional housing project than a middle-class enclave. In many ways, that was a good thing. Behind the pretty words that u ­ shered in Brand Whitlock’s first decade were some ugly realities. Toledo, once a moderately integrated city, had become more racist by leaps and bounds as ­African-­Americans from the South began migrating north in the early part of the 20th century. By the 1940’s housing segregation was the rule, not the exception. Mr. Leverette, the retired assistant superintendent, recalls what happened when Minnie Perkins, an African-American whose family had owned a s­ izable farm in Rossford, tried to purchase a home on a traditionally white street. Her new neighbors didn’t merely object. They took up a collection, raising enough money to buy Ms. Perkins out and send her back to the black neighborhood. Brand Whitlock itself was intended and run as all-black housing in the early years. Housing discrimination continued for decades. By 1950 black Toledoans had reached the Detroit Avenue border of the central city, and middle-class families were finding decent accommodations outside of Brand Whitlock. Today, African-Americans live as far west as the upscale Old Orchard neighborhood and the tony suburbs of Sylvania and Ottawa Hills. The Brand Whitlock area underwent changes, too, many of them negative. Housing conditions in the central city actually worsened in the 1940’s, according to one report. By 1960 white Toledoans were moving to the suburbs in ­significant numbers; white flight had begun. Soon, the central city was losing middle-class blacks as well, a trend some say was accelerated by controversial urban renewal efforts that wiped out blight but also destroyed many black-owned businesses.

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By the 1980’s crack had arrived at Brand Whitlock, and with it gang violence. The violence peaked around 1993, the year Michael Moore, 25, and his 19-yearold brother, Kevin, were gunned down in a Brand Whitlock parking lot. “The situation seems much better: no more killings, less drugs,” says Pam Smith, president of resident council for Brand Whitlock, and two nearby housing projects, Albertus Brown and McClinton Nunn. “It’s OK. Nothing is perfect but it’s better, much better, and our law enforcement is doing a beautiful job.” On a recent visit to her childhood home, Councilwoman June Boyd points proudly to recent Brand Whitlock renovations and praises the housing authority for enforcing a tough new policy of “Zero tolerance” for tenants who deal drugs. It’s true that the project looks better than it has in recent years, although Ms. Boyd does have to kick a bottle of Colt 45 malt liquor to the side when she poses for a picture near her old home. “No!” she says, playful but determined as she removes the bottle from sight. “No! No! No!” Looking at that bottle, it’s easy to understand the pessimism of June Boyd’s girlhood friend, retired schoolteacher Betty Grant. “It will never be the same,” Mrs. Grant says, her voice sad but resolute. Her generation of Brand Whitlock tenants had a goal, she says: “We wanted to do better than what we were doing, and we were going to try to go forward. Some of the people that live there now, they don’t care.” But on this ice-cold day in February, June Boyd stresses the positive: renovations and plans for new parenting classes and expanded employment service. Her winter coat a bright blaze of color—yellow, orange, green, and purple— against the dull red-black brick of the housing project, she greets a tenant with a warm smile, laughs as she recalls a childhood adventure. True, she makes no promises; a lot depends on the tenants themselves, she says. But, as June Boyd looks out over the snow covered lawns of her childhood home, she sees something more than bare trees and worn brick. “Let’s call it a new beginning.” 4.1.4 The Late 60s: Black Pain and Gain4 The late 1960s was a time when interracial conflict, black power and pride, angry riots, nonviolent marches, and bloody assassinations blended together in a kaleidoscope of events and emotions. The black experience during that period included both mourning over the murder of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and celebrating at the news of Thurgood Marshall’s appointment to the United States Supreme Court. 4 Rhonda B. Sewell, “The Late 60s: Black Pain and Gain,” Toledo Blade February 25, 1989.

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Many yelled “Right on!” when, during the Star Spangled Banner in the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, track and field stars Tommie Smith and John Carlos bowed their heads and raised black-gloved fists as a symbol of protest against a nation they said treated them as second-class citizens. But what was the view in Toledo? • A white supremacist, anti-integration group called the United Council of America had established a chapter in the city. • A local branch of the controversial and armed Black Panther Party established its headquarters at 1334 Dorr St. Shots were traded between the Panthers and police for over an hour after a police officer was shot to death while sitting in a patrol wagon. • Black children from Fulton School were being bused to all-white schools, such as DeVeaux. A Toledo resident for more than 20 years, Charles Corley, now 70, recalls a divided black community during the late 60s. “When I came here to live in the early 60s, the Rev. Robert Culp was president of the [National Association for the Advancement of Colored People]. He was quite outspoken and well-known, and I was used to that, having belonged to the chapter in Los Angles and Springfield, Ohio. But this town was not ready for that.” “It was during this time the Black Panthers came here, and they were very much misunderstood—not only by the whites but by the blacks, too. But I was very much for them.” Sepia Enterprises, an organization that supported black entrepreneurship, was headed by Mr. Corley, who said the group befriended the Black Panthers despite community opposition. “Sepia bought a building on Dorr and renovated it so the Black Panthers would have a headquarters where they could meet. We moved them in, and many of them lived there. It got a bad reaction, which of course didn’t bother us—it was our money. We did this, and there was no secret about it.” “Many blacks resented their being here because it caused ripples. One Sunday they appeared at several of the black churches and it upset [the parishioners]. Of course, they were there to do no harm to the church but to let the church know that there were those out there that would do what was necessary to be done in the black community.” Mr. Corley said there were many vestiges of discrimination in Toledo in the late 60s. “You were treated differently. There were no jobs you still couldn’t get. In all fairness there were some good whites here, but their voice was stilled by

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the radical whites. And they didn’t feel inclined to speak out against what was wrong.” Divisions within the black community made progress difficult, he recalled. “During all this time blacks here were not together,” Mr. Corley said. “I was understood to be an activist, which I was. It’s not a name that I’m ashamed of. I was proud of the fact that I spoke out against what I felt was wrong and I felt that blacks were standing in their own way because they wouldn’t unite behind anybody.” “If a [black] group was doing something … many times they were acting alone and not with the support of the masses.” During that period, the Model Neighborhood Residents Association (mnra) came into existence, Mr. Corley recalled. mnra, part of the federal Model Cities program, was a 128-member association which represented more than 45,000 residents in a 3½ square-mile area of the inner city. The program sought to empower poor blacks, which was something Mr. Corley said was particularly important. “The poor blacks were the ones I was mainly concerned with. Now our professional blacks—they did not support us, groups like the Black Panthers and Sepia. They acted like they had it made.” Dr. Samantha P. Adams, the city’s first black chiropractor, the first woman to head the Toledo chapter of the naacp in the early 70s, and a former Toledo school board member, said she felt that, although there were differences, radical and moderate groups came to work together peacefully. “The naacp at that time was concerned with the legal rights of the Panthers being protected as individuals. We didn’t want their rights violated. One of the concerns of the Panthers was what whites were permitted to do in black neighborhoods. They were trying to assert themselves.” “Older blacks were in the mindset that whites and lighter Negroes had some sort of status. But being black and doing the Afro and all of that announced to them that our hair and our coloring was all right. The younger groups were saying we’re all black and kinky hair was just as good as straight hair. It made whites uncomfortable …. To be young, beautiful, and black was up and coming. You didn’t have to be a mulatto or half-white to be beautiful. It did a lot for the older people.” What did local people want during the turbulent 60s? “I think they wanted to be their own person,” Dr. Adams said. “If you were black you wanted to like your music and eat your food and wear your hair in an Afro or cornrows. The black movement spread to the liberation of white women.” But, she said, barriers remained.

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“I think the white leadership felt superior and in control and wanted to show the new struggling black leadership. [Blacks] were trying to build homes on Dorr Street, build black theaters and the money started to be curtailed. They cut it off. It was like they were saying, ‘I’ll show you.’” Still, she says, she remembers the activist spirit of the era fondly. “It wasn’t just a movement of the young people … it was a time when all people said, ‘I’ve had enough.’ Every age group was saying, ‘I don’t want to be denied anymore.’ That was the mood in Toledo and around the country. 4.1.5 House of Day Funeral Service5 Established in 1964 by James and Dorothy Day as Day Mortuary, 1325 Nebraska Avenue, near Junction Street. At that time, it was the beginning of the African American migration into, what was then, the Polish community. James and Dorothy’s two children, Michael and Cassandra, grew up in the business and later joined their parents, after going to college to become funeral directors and embalmers. Today, they are the second generation of what now is three generations, with the addition of Julius M. Moore, licensed funeral director and embalmer, Michael Jr. now as a licensed funeral director and Brian Day, Sr. as an assistant director. In 1975, Day Mortuary became known as The House of Day Funeral S­ ervice. Fifteen years later, in 1990, construction was completed on our new 10,000 square foot facility located at 2550 Nebraska Avenue, in the heart of the University of ­Toledo corridor. With the new building we have been able to offer a beautiful facility, beautiful landscaping, more parking spaces, and on-site casket selection room. 4.1.6 Henry’s Jeweler & Giftware Henry’s Jeweler & Giftware is owned by Henry Tripplet; it is the only jewelry store in Toledo owned by an African American. Henry first opened his jewelry store on Monroe and Auburn Street on November 17, 1977 for about 5½ years; he then moved to Bancroft and Franklin in 1984 for 18 years. Henry’s has been in its present location at 4909 Dorr Street since 2001. 4.2

Culture and Education (Documents 49–69)

The cultural and educational experiences of the black community changed dramatically during the last half of the twentieth century. A good example of 5 House of Day Funeral Service, “Our History,” http://www.houseofday.com/our-story.html. Accessed October 27, 2016.

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this is the civic organization known as “The Study Hour Club” (Document 49). Black consciousness in Toledo flowered in the 1960s in step with national trends. Several shops were opened to provide information and artifacts of the black cultural renaissance (Documents 50 and 51). At the foundation of culture for black people is music, and Toledo has always been a major scene for the best. The Hines Farm Blues Club was the spot that showcased both national and local talent (Document 52). As Toledo was in the middle of the country it became a crossroads of all major jazz and blues musicians, from Louis Armstrong to Duke Ellington to B.B. King. It is the hometown for such greats as Art Tatum (Document 53) and Jon Hendricks (Document 54). The jazz traditions had two major institutions that provided the music. Murphy’s Place was a club anchored by the team of Claude Black (piano) and Clifford Murphy (bass), and ably run by Clifford’s wife Joan Russell (Document  55). They had live jazz for at least six nights a week, where you could hear great music and get a nice meal. An absolutely unique jazz radio program ran every weekday, all day, out of the nearly all-black Scott High School. This was a ­special link with the youth as they were being trained as jazz djs (Document 56). In the area of public school education there have been struggles and advances. In 1957 an African American student was elected homecoming queen at Scott High School, but afterwards the school had to face racist resentment (Document 57). And as for the University of Toledo, it has never been the source of equal opportunity employment for African Americans (Document 58 and 59). By 1968 Flute Rice was named the first black principal of Scott High School (Document 60). As relative forms of de facto segregationist practices hindered black students, a special Afro Ball was formed as a citywide event for black students (Document 61). In 1990 Crystal Ellis was named the first black school superintendent for the entire system (Document 62). Of course, another important area has been sports. There were two outstanding athletes during this period with major accomplishments. In 1960 “Skeeter” McClure won the Olympic gold medal as a boxer (Document 63). From 1965 to 1971 Chuck Ealey, a black quarterback, played every game at Bowser High School and at the University of Toledo with a record of sixtyfive consecutive victories. The racism against black quarterbacks at that time kept Ealey from being named an All-American, going to the nfl, or b­ eing inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. His record is unbroken! (Document 64). Black students have maintained a tradition of militant protest (Documents 65–68. Student protest led to the establishment of a black Studies program

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in 1996. This is significant because it became the first such program in the ­country based on information technology and later the first to be based on environmental justice (Document 69). 4.2.1 The Study Hour Club6 It was not uncommon in the 1930s, ‘40s, and ‘50s for great African American figures such as writer Langston Hughes, poet Countee Cullen, boxer Joe Louis and novelist Arna Bontemps to visit their Toledo friends and associates. One black women’s organization, whose goal was to enrich the community, often sponsored public meetings featuring these prominent figures of the 20th century. The group was called the Study Hour Club, started in the early ‘30s by former Toledoan Bessie Marsh. She moved to Toledo shortly after her marriage to Leo B. Marsh. The couple met while they were in college in Norfolk, Va. They moved here when Mr. Marsh was offered a position as executive secretary of the old Indiana Avenue ymca—known then as the “colored ymca.” Study Hour, still a viable group today and considered the oldest black women’s cultural organization in Toledo, this year celebrates its 61st birthday. The group officially formed on Oct. 2, 1933, with 16 women at the home of the late Elizabeth English. She had moved to Toledo in 1917 with her husband Dr. Leo V. English, a physician who graduated from Northwestern University’s medical school. Mrs. English, who worked as her late husband’s office manager, died in 1983 at the age of 95. Mrs. Marsh, the only survivor of the 16 charter members, now resides in Montclair, n.j. In a telephone interview, Mrs. Marsh, who celebrated her 87th birthday last week, reflected on the history and beginnings of The Study Hour Club and its role in broadening Toledo’s cultural development. “The idea of forming the group came at a time when there wasn’t so much of a bad feeling between the races. Everybody worked together,” she recalled. Although blacks and whites lived and often worked together in peace, she said, social activities and some facilities, such as the distinctly black ymca, were segregated. “I just had a feeling that we as black women in the community needed to know each other better as women. We needed to understand how much of a contribution we made as black women to the establishment of Toledo, Ohio,” 6 Rhonda B. Sewell, “Celebrating the Work of Women,” Toledo Blade, July 10, 1994, 1–2.

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said Mrs. Marsh, who described herself back then as a “young and sassy” woman who had a mission, along with others, to better her community. The original purpose of The Study Hour club was to read, study, review and discuss books, current events and topics of interest that would enhance the ­cultural and mental development of both the group and the community at large. Its members were and still are known as women with professional and social influence locally and nationally. The original 16 members, in addition to Mrs. Marsh and the late Mrs. English, include Della Fields, Edwena Furgerson, Inez Gibson, Reba Harris, Constance Heslip, Katherine Highwarden, Irene Hill, Edna Hobbs, Georgine Johnson, ­Jeanette Price, Ollie Randolph, Anna Singleton, Ella Stewart, and Elizabeth Wanzo. The Study Hour Club also sponsored public meetings and tried to encourage young people by presenting talented individuals as speakers and performers. Mrs. Marsh said it was not uncommon for prominent figures of the Harlem Renaissance, famous musicians and literary figures, and even athletes to come to Toledo. “I can remember when Joe Louis came to town on a Saturday. He lived in Detroit and he came when we put in the brand new gym at the ymca on Indiana Ave.… and then Langston Hughes came on another occasion for a Sunday afternoon program that we sponsored. He even autographed a book for me and he read some of this poetry for the community—I still have that book,” Mrs. Marsh said. Hughes (1902–1967), known as one of the major American writers of the 20th century, was a poet, novelist, playwright, and journalist. He was born in Missouri and raised in Cleveland. Louis (1914–1981), was a famous boxer nicknamed “The Brown Bomber” who turned pro in 1934 and held the heavyweight championship for more than 11 years. “What we were trying to do at that time was bring the masterpieces of our own race to the community. That was very important,” says Mrs. Marsh. “We wanted to prove to the community that you could do anything you wanted to do.” Mrs. Marsh and members today agree that the Toledo community often looked to The Study Hour Club for such cultural outlets and leadership. Today, the Study Hour has more than 30 members. One of them, Faye Fenwick, says that, on reflection, she believes that the original members made history by introducing prominent national figures to Toledo.

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“It was so important at that time, especially because these were black artists and people of note, and many times our community was not able to appreciate these types of figures,” Mrs. Fenwick said. “Also, the meetings were often held in the homes, because the hotels and various halls weren’t available to blacks during that period, so those l­ adies were truly making history.” Dorothy Smith, Study Hour’s new president, agreed: “These people were leaders of the Harlem Renaissance and people who had contacts here in Toledo,” says Mrs. Smith. “Study Hour members sponsored [public meetings] with these role models because so often we are not aware of our culture and our contributions.” While programs have broadened since the Study Hour’s inception in the ‘30s to include debates and forums by political candidates during election years and special projects, the organization’s members continue to discuss their own pursuits and those that might interest other Toledoans. Marianne Payne, another member, maintains that Study Hour still enlightens: It has changed since the beginning, but it still reflects current events and things that are of interest to the members and to the general public…. [W]e are enriching ourselves. More recently, she said, the Study Hour has sponsored local youth in talent shows, performing vocal and musical artists, and a Black History Quiz bowl between Scott and Rogers high schools. Louise Parks, Study Hour’s keeper of records and a member for about 10 years, sums up her affiliation with the organization this way: “It’s a feeling of esteem because you’re with women who really believe in the community,” she said. “I knew the group as a child, through my teenage life, and as a young adult. These women were always very sophisticated, and to be among them meant that you were moving in the right direction. They were and are always trying to solve meaningful problems to enrich the community.” Back in New Jersey, Mrs. Marsh, for her part, hopes that one day, The Study Hour Club will turn over its records documenting the group’s rich contribution to Toledo to the public library’s archives. A Study Hour Club committee is already looking into that possibility.

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4.2.2 Shops Promoted Afro-Culture (1968)7 The new wave of interest among some Negroes in the culture and dress of ­Africa has led to the opening of at least three shops in Toledo dealing exclusively in items that portray the Afro-American heritage. Everything from hand-carved tiki gods to Afro mini-dresses can be bought at two shops, Black Breed Garments at 535 Indiana Ave., and the Afro-­American Unity Shop on Bancroft Street near Vermont Avenue. A third shop, Brown’s Book Store at 414 Indiana, specialized in pictures, books, and pamphlets covering such subjects as African culture and race relations in America. 4.2.2.1 Promoting Culture The shop owners all say they are as interested in promoting Negro culture as they are in making money. In fact, Jesse Russell, who opened the Bancroft Street store about two months ago, said he actually is losing money. He added, however, that the so-called Afro garments which his wife sews for sale in the shop are not a fad and that he expects business to boom shortly. If it does, Mr. Russell said, he plans to open a factory in which sewing machine operators would turn out the bold-print clothes in volume. S. Clifford Brown, who owns the book store, said he has hopes of expanding his shop into a cultural center, complete with educational materials. Probably the best-selling item at Black Breed Garments and the unity shop is  the Dashiki, a one-piece shirt with a hole in the top, worn loosely on the shoulders. 4.2.2.2 Shipments From n.y. Black Breed co-owner Felton Chatman said that the Dashiki and similar garments are nearly impossible to keep in stock. Shipments arrive from New York’s Harlem and Detroit, where culture shops are considerably more popular. Mr. Chatman and the shop’s other owners, David Wooley and Charles ­Cavanaugh, also stock assorted jewelry, African native statuettes carved in ­Kenya, posters, and pictures of Malcolm x, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the assassinated Kennedy brothers. A necklace made in Taiwan with real boar’s teeth sells for $5. Among the most unusual items on sale at Mr. Russell’s store, in addition to the pamphlets, jewelry, and “unity beads,” or necklaces, are women’s natural Afro wigs, which sell for about $30 each. 7 Tom Gearhart, “Negro History Available at Toledo Store,” Toledo Blade, September 15, 1968.

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As many curiosity-seekers as customers drop by the shops. The young, especially, are interested in the strange new places of business in their neighborhoods. “Is this a black power shop?” is a common question asked by groups of youngsters sticking their heads into the shop, Mr. Russell said. 4.2.2.3 White Patrons White students from the University of Toledo drop into the Black Breed shop to buy necklaces or statuettes, Mr. Chatman said. Mr. Russell estimates that almost as many white persons as Negroes visit his store. “We couldn’t live off the income from the shop,” Mr. Chatman commented. “But it’s interesting work, and we want to educate people and shed a little light on the Negro’s past.” Mr. Russell is a Muslim, and the sign above the door perhaps best explains his interest in opening the Bancroft Street shop: “May Allah watch over the small shop which is owned by one of his children to awaken and unite the Afro-American.” “I love my people,” Mr. Russell said. “I would like to make a little money from the shop, but what I really care about is promoting the culture of the Afro-American.” 4.2.3 Rev. Al Reed Opens Negro History Book Store (1970)8 If Negro history is what interests you, one of the places to look is Freedom House of Culture, on Lawrence Avenue. The store, between Lincoln and Oakwood avenues, was opened in December by the Rev. Albert Reed. Located in what used to be a grocery store, the Freedom House is well stocked with books, paintings, sculpture, records, clothing, magazines, jewelry, and more, all related to Negro history and culture. 4.2.3.1 Poster Available If you want a brightly colored dashiki, a copy of Eldridge Cleaver’s “Soul on Ice,” a poster of Marcus Garvey in full uniform, or even an incense burner, they’ve got it and much more. Mr. Reed said that he sees the purpose of the store as “serving as a clearing house for black people in the sense that we hope to provide resources that will assist in the liberation of the Afro-American mind.” He said he is now redirecting his interests “toward the educating of the black mind for dignity and understanding.” 8 Toledo Blade, “Negro History Available at Toledo Store,” May 31, 1970.

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4.2.3.2 New Image Sought “We want to provide black people with images, in the form of art, posters, and literature, that will help them gain a new image of themselves as being beautiful,” he said. He said, however, that although the Freedom House’s primary emphasis is on “assisting blacks to become liberated,” he is also interested in “helping white people in their understanding of blacks.” “We hope to be a house of resources for all people, black and white, seeking freedom from lack of understanding.” Mr. Reed said that in making plans for the establishment of the Freedom House, he visited a number of similar stores in New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Detroit, and Dayton. 4.2.4 Hines Farm Blues Club9 The whole thing started in Frank and Sarah Hines’ basement. By the time they built the club itself in 1957, Hines’ Farm was already in full swing as a blues center. They had gotten a state liquor license in the late ‘40s when they were still operating out of the basement; in fact, they were the first African Americans in northwest Ohio to have one. Blind Bobby Smith, a Toledo blues guitarist who did session work in the ‘60s for Stax Records, used to play in their basement in those days. He remembers how the party would start outside, but “after they’d close down outdoors we’d all pile in the basement. In the wintertime he [Frank Hines] just ran it out of the house. It was, you know, everybody talkin’ at the same time … passing the bottle around, and Hines wishin’ everybody’d get out of there so he could go to bed.” The first real club spot once they moved out of the basement was a shack in the woods at the back of the Hines’ property. They built this in 1950. A neighbor who lived across the road said, “Man, it was good to go back there in the woods. See, I never took my car. I’d just walk back there and have me a cold beer and watch ‘em dance. See, that place back there, they used to dance. Chicks would come out of Toledo. Some of them ol’ gals was good lookin’. I’d sit there and drink beer and watch ‘em from mid-afternoon. Hell, I wouldn’t leave ‘til dark … watchin’ them chicks shake it up.” Ordinarily, Frank Hines was the bouncer and keeper of the peace. Henry Griffin, the current owner of the property, was a kid in the’50s, when the shack was the center of the Hines’ Farm scene. He remembers that Hines would check everybody out for knives and guns and just take them. He would give them back when they left. But he wouldn’t let any trouble start. And neither 9 Thomas E. Barden and Matthew Donahue, “Hines Farm Blues Club,” Living Blues (May/June 1992).

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would his wife Sarah. One time Sarah broke a beer over a guy’s head. He got out there and played like he was drunk and was sayin’ a lot of filthy talk in front of the women, and she tried to get him to hush, you know, and he wouldn’t do it. So she went to him a couple of times. The third time, he started all kinds of that filthy talk, and she just took a beer bottle and went up there and hit that son-of-a-bitch on top of his head. That damned bottle shattered all to pieces, man, and that guy said, ‘She killed me. I’m gonna tell Sonny.’ That’s what everybody called Frank Hines. She said, ‘I don’t give a damn if you tell Sonny—just get the hell out of here.’ And it was peaceful the rest of the night. The shack was full-service. It had electricity for amplifiers and lights, a kitchen with a barbecue pit that could handle two full hogs; they served catfish and chicken, too. There was a beer bar and a stage and lights strung off into the woods. They even built a home-made, nine-hole miniature golf course in the woods beside the shack. Altogether, it could accommodate over a hundred customers and keep them entertained night and day. But the shack alone wasn’t enough to handle the crowds the Hines were attracting. And it became clear by the mid-‘50s that they needed a bigger place. Frank’s brother George Hines, who had run a night club in St. Louis, helped him with the planning and construction of the main club building that, according to Henry Griffin, was built in a year and was finished and ready for business by the summer of 1958. Sarah ran the bar and restaurant and booked the bands. According to Big Jack Reynolds, one of the regular performers in the club’s early days, “she worked herself to death.” Reynolds recalls that the main bar area “could fit 500 people. She had seven waitresses runnin’, two cooks runnin’, you could go out there to get breakfast. We [Reynolds’ band] were from Detroit, we could eat breakfast and if you got sleepy you could go upstairs.” There were rooms with bunks above the bar for out-of-town musicians. John Lee Hooker, also one of the Hines’ Farm regulars in those days, would come down from Detroit and stay in one of the upstairs rooms. In fact, Hooker actually lived at the Hines’ Farm club for two summers. John Lee Hooker is not the only famous blues artist that played Hines’ Farm in the ‘50s. “All the big timers were there,” says Roman Griswold, a Toledo bluesman who, with his brother Art Griswold, opened for many of the bigname acts. “They had B.B. King, Freddy King, Jimmy McCracklin, Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland, Little Esther Phillips, Jimmy Ricks.” These name musicians made a big impression on the Griswold Brothers. Art recalls the night John Lee Hooker came from Detroit and sat in with B.B. King—“and that was a knockout.” He says, “One thing about playing at Hines’, though, you had to be a pretty damn good musician ‘cause he wanted the best.” Roman remembers one night when Freddy King played. “Hines told the drummer, ‘When you go back up, tell Freddy King to turn that music down. ‘It’s too

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loud,’ he said, ‘they can hear you way out on Airport Highway.’ And he [Freddy King] got on the microphone and said, ‘Sonny Hines, they can all hear me on Airport Highway now and I’m gonna turn it up and they’re gonna hear me in Toledo now.’” Even after they had the indoor club and stage, they still played outside in the summer months. Some nights, in good weather, the shack would go on ­concurrently with the indoor acts, and the musicians playing back there could really turn up the volume. Henry Griffin recalls that “they was out in those woods, and they’d say, ‘We’re gonna open up the woods tonight.’ And it was like that Mississippi stuff, when they go in the woods, that’s when they gonna party in the woods.” He adds that the music could be heard across the swamp and that’s how people would know Hines’ Farm was starting up. “You wouldn’t even have to advertise, you could hear the music everywhere the blacks stayed.” Whether they need to or not, Frank and Sarah Hines did advertise. They placed posters and flyers, put ads in the local black newspapers, and even drove around the black neighborhoods of Toledo with a sound car. Art Griswold describes it this way: “Sarah Hines had a car with a speaker on top of it. She would drive through town and say what was going on.” And what was going on was amazing. The ads in The Bronze Raven, a black arts and entertainment sheet that published from 1951 to 1973, show that Hines’ Farm hosted a virtual who’s who of African-American performing artists, from the big-name people and national level acts like the Falcons and the Bill Doggett Band to such second-level acts as Big Blues Carson; Eddie Kirkland; Little Walter, Jr.; Betty Lovett; Johnny Mae Mathews; and Chiquita, the Girl Drummer. While most of the performers were blues or rhythm and blues musicians, some jazz greats also played Hines’ Farm. Local jazzmen like Eddie Abrams were joined by such famous jazz artists as Louis Jordan and Count Basie. Basie and his full orchestra were booked for the grand opening of an outdoor pavilion that was built in 1961 adjacent to the club building. The pavilion, which doubled as a roller rink and dance floor, could handle 1,500 people. Hines constructed the stage at the far end of the pavilion so performances could go on there while another group was playing inside. “Outside was great, music under the stars they called it,” says Roman Griswold. “All you had to do was kill a few mosquitoes and keep doing what you was doing.” Big Jack Reynolds remembers the outside stage very well, too. “Well, I had all my people there, my brother and everything from Detroit, and I got up on the stage and the whiskey told me that I could turn a flip like them other guys. [Reynolds weighed well over 250 pounds at the time]. Now, I’d never turned a flip in my life. But I jumped and said ‘I’m gonna blow this sucker [his harmonica].’ I was blowin’ and they was all pullin’ for me and I says, ‘Shit, I can do it,’ to myself. Man, I jumped up and flipped over and come right down on my

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neck. Goddurn, I’m layin’ down there kickin’ and they say ‘Look at that sucker blow that harmonica.’” Music was the main thing at Hines’ Farm, but it wasn’t the only thing. One reason why Henry Griffin bought Hines’ Farm after the Hines’ death was his memories of all that went on there when he was a boy in the early ‘50s. He remembers getting hayrides around the property while his parents were ­dancing back at the shack. There was also roller skating, amusement park rides, exhibition baseball games, horse races, hobo car races, squirrel hunts, and the one event everybody remembers about Hines’ Farm motorcycle races. Griffin recalls that the motorcycle races were really impressive. “Hines would send out a flyer that he was havin’ a motorcycle race and he would have people come from Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and they’d get on their motorcycles and ride right up there. And there’d be thousands of ‘em.” There was entertainment besides the music inside, too. There were comedy acts (such as the Boll Weevil), female impersonators, and numerous shakedancers. In was a black club, but it wasn’t segregated in any sense of the word. Big Jack Reynolds says that Mexicans and whites were welcome, too—“there was no discrimination there.” And Griffin recalls that the migrant tomato pickers would come in the late summer when they were workin’ northern Ohio, “and they’d be welcome too.” Also, some groups of gypsies that passed through northwest Ohio had a deal with Hines. He would let them stay on the property, and he even provided them with an old school bus at the edge of a field to store their belongings in out of the rain when they set up camp. In exchange they worked for him on the farm. When they were unable to maintain the club, they leased it out to managers. And it went through several of these manager arrangements in the early ‘70s. Their own children weren’t interested in taking it over and, eventually, by the fall of 1976, Hines’ Farm shut down. Roman Griswold went to see Sarah Hines at the Farm in 1978 just before she died. “I remember what she said then. She said, ‘You know, I tried to do the best I could for this place. I tried to get the best entertainment I could find. And I liked it. And I don’t regret a day.” Frank Hines died three years later in 1981. Hines Farm was the undisputed center of the blues scene in northwest Ohio. It thrived for 20 years on the outskirts of Toledo in the predominantly black rural area called Spencer-Sharples near the little town of Swanton, Ohio. Frank and Sarah Hines imagined it, created it, and maintained it all that time as one of the major stops on the chittlin circuit. In doing so they provided one area of the Midwest with some of its very best blues and all around good times.

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4.2.5 Art Tatum and Toledo’s Popular Culture in the Twenties10 According to Blade reporter Seymour Rothman, during his Toledo years Art stayed very close to the black community. While white musicians came to the Waiters and Bellman’s Club, an after-hours club on Indiana Avenue, to jam until dawn, there wasn’t much mixing of the races outside. Clubs and after-hours made up one aspect of both social and cultural trends of the Jazz Age, and were accountable to Prohibition. Prohibition set the stage for an atmosphere which produced places such as Waiters and Bellmans and the Blue Lantern, where whites and blacks mixed socially. Harold Payne, also one of the local musicians, performed with the young Tatum. According to Rothman, “Tatum and Payne were in demand, playing anywhere there was a piano, bootleg liquor, and a chance for tips, in places like La Tabernilla, Chateau La France, Chicken Charlie’s, Darfey’s, the Blue Lantern, and spots long forgotten.” Another of Tatum’s companions, Harry Gregory, recalled that even as a child Tatum was famous for his piano playing and played in all kinds of places and he played in at least one of them out of fear. Gregory recalled that: We were walking down 22nd Street and a guy came out and told us to come in and play the piano. It was a white boot joint. He [Art] really didn’t want to play. The piano was way out of tune, but we were led to believe that the spot was run by Licavoli gangsters, so Art kept his mouth shut and played. Musically, Tatum’s fame had already been established. How and why this occurred can be attributed to the times and also to Tatum’s style. Arnold Laubich and Ray Spencer wrote, “Tatum is the most articulate representative of the tradition formed from the merging of ragtime, Dixieland and blues piano into stride and from there into and through the piano developments of the swing era.” The times that permitted the flourishing of the after-hours clubs also were the formative years for Tatum. It was during these times that Tatum grew to become a man and mature into the musician who later would receive worldwide acclaim. Toledo offered many of the opportunities that Harlem did. Certainly the popular movies of the day came to Toledo and there were the “respectable [Black] night spots” like the Chateau de France and La Tabernilla listed in the 10

Imelda Hunt, “An Oral History of Art Tatum during His Years in Toledo, Ohio, 1909–1932” (PhD diss., Bowling Green State University, 1995).

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Toledo Topics. The fashions, the large entertainment establishments, the underworld, and the availability of new media technology suggest that the name “Little New York” was an appropriate nickname for Toledo. Toledo also had Art Tatum. Felicity Howlett remarks that: Word gradually spread among musicians that there was a young talent emerging, worthy of the best challenges and all-night competitions. By that time the musicians were seeking out Tatum at Val’s, one of his favorite Cleveland spots, or making special trips to the Toledo area to hear him play. 4.2.6 Jon Hendricks First Begins Singing in Toledo11 Jon Hendricks noticed he had a way with words when he was young. “I was helping my father who was a minister in the African-Methodist-Episcopal Church; he was a pastor at the Warren ame Church in Toledo. I was 8 and he asked me to help him with his sermons ‘cause I always was very good with words.” Hendricks was born in Newark, Ohio, in 1921. His family, which would eventually include more than a dozen siblings, moved to Toledo when he was 4 years old. They lived on the same street as Toledo’s other jazz legend, Art Tatum. “He lived five houses from us on City Park Avenue,” Jon says. “We called him ‘Arthur.’” At age 14, Jon started performing with Tatum at the Waiters and Bellmen’s Club on Indiana Avenue in Toledo. “I met a lot of people at 14—Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Lucky Millinder, Andy Kirk, and Don Redman. I met just about anybody that there was because everybody came to hear Art Tatum.” While attending Scott High School, Jon wrote, produced and starred in a musical called “Scotts-A-Poppin.” At age 16, he started singing with the Swing Buddies on a local radio show. After high school, Hendricks continued singing in Detroit and in the Glass City—until he was drafted into the army in 1942. After serving his country, Hendricks returned to Toledo. He enrolled at The University of Toledo in 1946, where he studied literature and law. Some of his poetry was published in The Collegian, ut’s student newspaper. All the while he worked as a singer and drummer at night. Hendricks even sat in with Charlie “Bird” Parker when he played the Civic Auditorium in Toledo in 1950. The saxophonist was impressed. “He told me I should come to New York and I told him I didn’t know anybody there, and he said, ‘Well, you know me,’” Hendricks 11

Nowak, Cynthia. The University of Toledo: Alumni who have changed the world. Toledo: The University of Toledo, 2004. Pages 23–24.

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recalls. “And I said, ‘Where will I find you?’ He said, ‘Ask anybody.’ So I went there and made a phone call at the bus station and found out where he was.” With $27 in his pocket, Hendricks went to the Big Apple in 1952 and found Parker playing at the Apollo Bar. “[Parker] had already told everybody about me, so I had an instant entry into the jazz world. I had sung with Dizzy ­[Gillespie], so I knew Dizzy and he had talked about me, too. So everybody knew about me.” 4.2.7 Murphy’s Place12 Night in and night out, Clifford Murphy sidles up to his beloved stand-up bass, leans it against his shoulder, and begins laying out a perfect foundation for jazz. Big, rich notes resonate from his fingertips, keeping a steady rhythm and a firm direction as his musical colleagues skitter and slide and bank off the walls of the melody. Murphy holds everything together, moving the music forward with tact and intelligence, his big hands plucking and pressing the metal strings, his brown eyes narrowed to dreamy slits behind his oversized aviators. Every night but Sunday, Murphy takes his place on the stage of the cozy, wood-lined jazz club that bears his name, Murphy’s Place. It’s the way he makes a living, but it’s not really “work” for the Toledo jazz icon who turns 75 on Feb. 5. He said he’s never tempted to skip out or cut down on his performance schedule. “Not really, because I enjoy playing so much,” Murphy said. “And if I miss a night, it would be, oh, no …. That would be so hard on me!” The low-key bassist said his 75th birthday was no big deal to him, but it was to Joan Russell, the club’s co-owner and his companioin of 35 years. “I never even noticed [it was my 75th] until Joan sent a card out to everybody in Toledo,” he said with a wry laugh. 4.2.7.1 Bullets to Bebop Sitting on the stage with arms wrapped around that 140-year-old Andreas Morelli bass, it doesn’t matter if three people or 103 are listening, Murphy always gives the music his complete attention. A graduate of Scott High School, he said he liked jazz as a child but his father was a minister in the Church of God in Christ and frowned on secular music. “When I was in high school, I used to paint a moustache over my mouth and sneak into the clubs to hear Jon Hendricks sing,” Murphy said. “I knew him before he knew me,” he said of the 85-year-old, five-time Grammy Award-winning vocalist from Toledo. 12

David Yonke, “Toledo’s Ambassador of Jazz; Clifford Murphy Turns 75 Doing What He Always Does—Playing Great Music,” Toledo Blade, arts section, January 28, 2007.

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At 18, Murphy was drafted into the Army infantry and before he knew it he was crawling under barbed wire as bullets flew overhead in Pusan, Korea. He survived a harrowing initiation to combat but was wounded twice in later battles with the Koreans. After his Army discharge, Murphy bought a stand-up bass at a downtown music store, slapping $300 on the counter, and had to carry it home, walking several miles through neighborhoods and smiling at all the gawkers. “Man, I was so proud,” he recalled. Soon Murphy was a regular on the Toledo nightclub scene, playing with such local luminaries as Stanley Cowell, Arv Garrison, and Candy Johnson. One of the jazz artists he met back in the 1950s was Claude Black, a ­lightning-quick bebop pianist from Detroit. Black, now 74, moved to Toledo and has been a friend and colleague of Murphy for 50 years, give or take the few times when they went separate ways. “Clifford has been like a brother to me,” Black said. “You know how close that is. He’s as close as can be. If you’re playing with your brother, you don’t have to say nothing. You just play.” They can play all night with boundless enthusiasm, and even after 50 years of collaboration, Black said Murphy is still coming up with new ideas. “He surprised me just last night!” Black said in a recent interview. “He whipped out the bow and started playing something and I thought, ‘My God, boy, what are you doing?’” 4.2.7.2 “A Big Sound” Black said he and Murphy know more than 3,000 songs, but their official repertoire is about 700. Putting such numbers in print is misleading, however, because the two musicians can play virtually any tune—and when they do, it’s never played the same way twice. “Always different. Never the same,” Black said. “No no no no no no no no no NO! We play some of the same songs, but we always play them different.” Tim Mycek, a drummer from Detroit, recently played with the Murphys Trio for a weekend at the Toledo club. “You’d never believe Clifford was 75,” Mycek said. “Most people, when they’re 75 years old, they’re slowing down. I hope I’m still as energetic as he is when I’m 65, never mind 75.” Mycek said that playing at Murphy’s Place is like “being in your living room,” compared to some of the stuffy clubs he plays in Detroit. “It’s amazing how quickly the night goes when I play here. I look at my watch and it’s 2 a.m. and I almost wish it wasn’t over yet,” he said. He said he feels honored to play with Murphy.

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“Clifford has great tone, he is a great foundation, and he’s also a great soloist. His ideas are always fresh,” Mycek said. Jimmy Cook, a trumpeter and one of Toledo’s top jazz artists for decades, called Murphy a musical master. “He’s played with everybody,” Cook said. “The bass, which accompanies the rest of the orchestra, well he knows it completely and he does it completely. He’s one of the best bass players you’ll ever hear.” Black said Murphy’s musical talents are a reflection of his personality. “He’s got a big sound, because he has big stature as a person,” Black said. “And he’s got a temperament like myself. He’s very flexible, which of course we’ve had to be to play with all the people we’ve played with over the years.” Some of Murphy’s musical highlights did not even take place on stage, Black said. In the 1960s, for example, a group of jazz stars including drummers Elvin Jones and Grady Tate stopped in Toledo, knocked on black’s door, and jammed with him and Murphy all day long before packing up and heading for New York. 4.2.7.3 Keeper of the Flame In the 1970s and ‘80s, Murphy was on the road with his band, traveling from city to city, playing jazz clubs and hotel lounges. “When we were traveling, all we did was wake up the next day and rehearse and play that night and go to the next site, next state,” Murphy said. “Same ol’, same ol’. You really didn’t have much time to yourself as you do when you’re not traveling.” Murphy and Russell decided to get off the road and take a chance running their own club. The first Murphy’s Place opened on Madison Avenue downtown in 1991, and five years later they moved several blocks east into the former Digby’s Pub, a basement-level bar and restaurant that fronts the Maumee River. For awhile, Toledo was one of the few mid-sized American cities that ­boasted two full-time jazz clubs—Murphy’s Place and Rusty’s, until Rusty’s changed owners in 2003. Murphy had some health problems in the 1990s, first undergoing heart surgery and later dealing with a lingering leg ailment, but he’s back in full stride now. When he has free time, he said he relaxes by collecting ho scale trains and toy cars. “Joan says I’m a pack rat. We’re trying to find a bigger house to put all this stuff,” he said with a laugh. At his jazz club, the guests are usually a mix of jazz devotees and people who just like the comfortable setting. On a recent weekend night, among the first-time visitors were Brogan Hill and Jordan Cappola, two 13-year-old boys from Cincinnati visiting Toledo for a wrestling tournament.

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They came with Brogan’s father, Robert Hill, a jazz aficionado. Brogan plays drums and Jordan plays trombone, and when the band started playing the boys hurried down to the front row and listened intently. “They’re better than I am,” Brogan said of the Murphys. “I think they’re awesome.” Mr. Hill said he and the boys were staying at a downtown hotel when they saw the neon “jazz” sign in the club’s window and decided to stop in. “I think these guys are unbelievable!” Mr. Hill said. “I never heard of them before, but I am pleasantly surprised.” Winding up a song, Murphy leaned into the microphone to announce that the tune was “How Deep Is the Ocean,” and then he started playing and singing the lyrics to “Hit the Road Jack,” swinging through the tune in a smooth baritone. Jamie Valo, 25, of Columbus, grew up in Sylvania and has been coming to Murphy’s Place since she was in high school, she said, because her parents are jazz fans. “I’ve been listening to Clifford and Claude since I was a kid. And [drummer] Sean Dobbins gave my brother his drumsticks one time. I always try to come to Murphy’s Place when I’m in town. I like the atmosphere.” Jon Richardson, president of the Toledo Jazz Society, said Murphy is not only a talented musician but an ambassador for jazz. Murphy’s Place regularly brings in some of the top artists in the genre, and saxophonist David “Fathead” Newman recorded a live album at the club in 2005. “Clifford is a local icon and a keeper of the flame,” Richardson said. “He and Joan have brought in some of the most extraordinary national talents so that we here in Toledo can listen live to the kinds of music you would have to go to New York for under most circumstances.” “Everyone knows and respects his musical chops, but it’s also his devotion to the music and his determination to make that music accessible to us here in Toledo that really sets him apart. He’s also a very funny guy. He’s a hoot. We’re lucky to have him and I hope we have him for another 75 years,” Richardson said. Celebrations of Clifford Murphy’s 75th birthday will be held Thursday and Friday starting at 6 p.m. at Murphy’s Place, 151 Water St. Free hors d’oeuvres with no cover charge Thursday. No cover charge for musicians Thursday or Friday night. Information and reservations: 419-241-7732. 4.2.7.4 A Discography Here is a list of recordings on which Clifford Murphy has performed: “Cookin’ at Murphy’s,” (Sophia Records, 2005), with David “Fathead” Newman, Claude Black, and Winard Harper

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“Live at the Peristyle: The Nature of Jazz,” by Claude Black (2000) “The Detroit Jazz Connection,” by Claude Black (Sophia, 2006) “Reunion,” by The Murphys Trio (Sophia, 2006) “Downtown,” by The Murphy’s Trio (Sophia, 1985) “Second Time Around,” by Jerry Sawicki (1989) “After Hours,” by The Murphys (Sophia, 1984) 4.2.8 wxts: Radio Jazz from High School13 The music is smooth, the station manager cool, and the disc jockeys the youngest in town. Other stations change their format seemingly yearly, but not wxts-fm. The station, on the fourth floor of Scott High School, turns 25 next year. All but five have been devoted to jazz. Unlike most other radio stations in business to put on a show and earn a buck, wxts has a different agenda. “Our No. 1 goal is to train students. If we can entertain at the same time, whoopee!” said John Kuschell, senior instructor of Scott’s radio broadcast program. Started in 1975 with state and Toledo Public Schools funding, the station featured a mixed format its first five years. Then Mr. Kuschell, who lives in Adrian, was hired. He had started his career as a disc jockey and, tiring of that, became a radio news director. At Scott, the first thing he did was hone in on a format. Mr. Kuschell chose jazz largely because the majority of his students were African-American. “Students came up to me and asked ‘Who is this Count Basie guy?’ I thought it was important for them to know about their heritage, especially when it involved music. It’s important for them to be exposed to it.” One of the ironies is that Mr. Kuschell, a bearded, self-proclaimed ex-hippie, cares little for jazz. Most of his students, who prefer rap, feel the same way. “I tell them a couple of years later they will have a different opinion,” he said. Scott’s broadcast program covers two years. The first year class, for juniors, is taught by instructor Bob Bailey in a classroom adjacent to the studio. Mr. ­Kuschell, 53, handles the seniors, who are djs. The station airs from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Friday on 88.3 fm, a signal it shares with the University of Toledo’s wxut, which offers college alternative format. wxts shuts down for the summer. When Mr. Kuschell came on board, wxts was a 25-watt station. He got the wattage boosted to 110, which expanded its listening area to about 10 miles. That’s still small compared with other stations. 13

George Tanber, “wxts-FM Entering Its 25th Year of Cool Music,” Toledo Blade, December 23, 1999.

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The students, figuring few people are tuning in, usually are surprised when they get phone calls from curious listeners. “When the calls come in, they get real excited. They just think they’re playing to no one,” Mr. Kuschell says. James Dickerson, a 17-year-old senior, is the station’s 2 p.m. dj. Unlike some of his classmates, James considers himself a jazz lover, though he admits it’s not at the top of his list. He recalled that as a youngster he got caught playing with his father’s record collection, which included jazz and rhythm and blues. James said he might consider a career as a dj, although he also has an interest in fashion. “At first when I was on the air, I was nervous. I also couldn’t talk in front of people. But I overcame that fear,” he said. He said he gets calls from inter­ested listeners, including former Scott broadcast students. “I never knew people were listening,” he said. Several alums are professionals. Among them, Jonathon Turner, who hosted the station’s evening show for many years, now hosts a jazz show in Columbus. Jackie Newsome has worked with film producer Spike Lee, Mr. Kuschell said. Brenda Davis, who graduated from the program in the mid-1980s, hosts the station’s evening slot—a paid position—from 4 to 8 p.m. For the station’s 25th anniversary year, Mr. Kuschell hopes former wxts djs will return for guest appearances—or record best wishes announcements. Mr. Kuschell is having so much fun, he hopes to continue running the station until retirement. “I love it,” he said. “I love the kids, and I like to teach.” 4.2.9 Tension at Scott after Negro Homecoming Queen Elected (1957)14 Tension which rose among Scott High School students this week following election of the school’s first Negro football queen had “all quieted down” today, according to Richard Langstaff, principal. Janet Quinn, 17, of 549 Norwood Ave., was elected Monday as the choice of the senior class as its queen for the traditional Scott-Waite football game and dance on Thanksgiving Day. She was chosen over two white girls, Cherry Wright, 626 Sylvania Ave., and Carol Kledis, 2371 Fulton St., who will be her attendants. The election followed the customary practice at Scott, with three candidates being chosen first and then competing for election as queen.

14

Toledo Blade, “Tension at Scott Disappears After Negro Queen Incident,” November 15, 1957.

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For several years, a Negro girl has been among the candidates, which means that Scott has had a Negro attendant for the queen on a number of occasions, Mr. Langstaff explained. However, the election of Miss Quinn caused “shock” among some of the students, the principal declared. 4.2.9.1 Special Assembly Called Rumors flew about the school of alleged fights and impending fights between Negro and white students. Sometime Tuesday night, an effigy of the Negro queen was hanged on a tree in front of the school on Collingwood Blvd. It was removed before school opened on Wednesday morning, Mr. Langstaff said. Wednesday afternoon, the principal called a special assembly of the junior and senior classes at which the students spoke their opinions on the situation. Dozens of white and Negro students rose to tell the assemblage of about 600 that they had no hard feelings or bitterness toward one another. Miss Kledis, speaking for both the runners-up in the election, said she would be glad to serve as attendant to Miss Quinn. The Negro girl, weeping with emotion, told the gathering that she harbored no resentment toward anyone. 4.2.9.2 Negro Minister Speaks The assembly closed with a Negro minister, the Rev. Elliott J. Mason of Third Baptist Church, pointing out that the whole incident should be viewed as part of the advance at Scott and in Toledo toward better race relations. Mr. Mason spoke by invitation from Mr. Langstaff. Detective Sergt. Edward Sobczak made an investigation at Scott on Wednesday morning after word of the effigy incident was relayed to police by the Blade. He said that he had learned the identities of the students responsible for placing the effigy on the tree, and found that all of them regretted the act. The students, a group of white senior boys told the detective they now were convinced that the election of Miss Quinn had been completely fair. They said they had let their first prejudicial emotions “get the better of them,” the detective reported. Sergeant Sobczak said he found no evidence of any fights between white and Negro students. The rumors of violence apparently had been manufactured, and then magnified, by students and parents alike, he said. The detective emphasized to students responsible for the effigy that such a deed could have been the spark which set off a serious racial disturbance. But, he pointed out, by talking things over among themselves in democratic fashion, with no outside interference, the student body had solved the problem.

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Mr. Langstaff told the Blade today that no word of any fighting at the school had reached his office. He described the behavior of the students at the assembly as “just wonderful” and said that as a result of it the school had “quieted right down.” 4.2.9.3 Elected by Plurality About 40 percent of the senior class is Negro, while the entire student body is about half Negro and half white, Mr. Langstaff said. Miss Quinn was elected by a plurality rather than a clear majority, but that is what usually happens in the 3-way election, he added. The football queen told the Blade today that she felt her election was “a great honor.” She herself knew of no fighting over it, and said no white students had aimed any unpleasant remarks at her. Miss Wright said today that she felt no resentment at having lost the election to a Negro girl. “It’s their school as much as it is ours,” she observed. Miss Quinn will be “crowned” in a student ceremony in the State Theater on Nov. 27 at 1:30 p.m. The next morning she will be honored at the Scott-Waite game. 4.2.10 The Declaration of the ut Black Student Union (1970)15 Because of the University of Toledo’s indifference to the deaths of the two black students at Jackson State College, we the Black Student Union declare the university closed for a three-day moratorium. Following the deaths of four white students at Kent State University on May 4, the university expressed its shock and concern by observing (1) a three day ­moratorium, (2) normal classroom activity was suspended, (3) workshops and seminars were held, (4) students and faculty wore black armbands and (5) the flag was flown at half mast. Last Thursday, May 14, two Jackson State College students were killed under the same circumstances; four days have passed and the university has done nothing. This indicates to us that the university administration feels that only white deaths are to be mourned, while black deaths are insignificant and go ignored. Therefore, it would appear to us that the value of black lives in America is not to be equated with that of white lives. We believe that the Jackson State students deserve respect and that their deaths are as significant as the deaths of the Kent State University students. 15

Declaration of the ut Black Student Union, May 18, 1970, Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, University of Toledo Library.

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We have been appalled and disgusted by the university’s display of apathy and indifference. However, we are fully aware that this repugnant display of apathy on the university’s behalf is the verification of its past and present attitude towards blacks. The university has a heritage of systematically excluding black people— systematically excluding them in admissions—systematically excluding them in devising standards of admission—and systematically excluding them in devising standards of evaluations that have nothing to do with the styles of life and the indigenous culture of the black community. And, moreover, when the admissions policy was slightly changed, blacks have been exposed to a body of knowledge which in effect excludes them— not only excludes them, but defines them as being evil, illiterate and not capable of taking over in this white society. To remedy this situation when the university reopens, we, the b.s.u., seek immediate negotiation on the following proposals: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

$200,000 for a black Studies Program, manned and directed by Blacks. The hiring of a full-time coordinator of black Studies. First priority placed on the hiring of black professors’ in each department. By the Fall of 1970, a black student enrollment which is commensurate with the population of blacks in the city of Toledo. A minimum of three (3) black graduate students in every department.

We expect the university officials to negotiate with us on these proposals with an attitude of sincerity, honesty, and respect for black people, unprecedented in the annals of Black-White relations in Toledo. In conclusion, we request complete amnesty for the students participating in the moratorium. 4.2.11 Hiring Blacks at tu (1986)16 Many Toledoans may consider that the state of Mississippi has little to emulate when it comes to state or local public policies. They would be wrong. University of Toledo President James McComas, whose last academic position was head of Mississippi State University, last week took a long overdue step at tu. He announced that the university will aggressively pursue the hiring of more black faculty members and that he himself will be personally involved in the effort. 16

Toledo Blade, “Hiring Blacks at tu,” January 13, 1986, 8.

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Proof of his intentions will be in the performance, of course, but until Dr. McComas came to Toledo there had been no discernible pressure to increase the number of blacks on the faculty. There are just 13 in a university which employs the equivalent of 850 full-time faculty members. That is disgracefully low for a large urban university in a city with a 17.4 percent black minority. No blacks currently teach in engineering and only two in the college of business. Priority will be given to these areas, although one can expect there will be competition for first-rate academic specialists. That suggests salaries will have to be highly competitive. Dr. McComas is correct in assigning a high priority to an affirmative action program of this sort. It is only fair to point out that had such a low rate of minority employment existed at a southern university, federal civil rights enforcers probably would have descended on it en masse. The new university president is exactly on target. It is to be hoped that his effort will pay off in the classroom in the very near future. The university and the community can only gain from such a demonstration of fairness and equity in hiring practices. 4.2.12 Flute Rice: First Black Principal of Scott High School (1968)17 In May, 1968, about 350 Scott students held a brief sit-in at the school, where they protested against the physical condition of the school and the course offerings. A grievance committee elected by the student body demanded 10 changes and prominent among them was the appointment of an AfricanAmerican principal, course offerings in African-American history and culture, and more qualified teachers. It was then that Mr. Rice, who had been the head of the Spencer-Sharples schools in western Lucas County, was named the first African-American principal at Scott. It was not the first time he was the first African-American teacher or administrator in the Toledo schools. Mr. Rice began teaching science and mathematics at the then-Walbridge Junior School in 1957. In 1962, he became the first African-American teacher at Start High School, where he taught biology and general science until 1965. “My father, a committed community educator, believed in giving his best for the cause of education, especially education for poor students,” his son, a Scott alumnus, said. He added that his father presided over a significant revamping of the curriculum at Scott, which saw the initiation of the first skill 17

Toledo Blade, “Scott High’s 1st African-American Principal Took Helm after ‘60’s Riots,” August 14, 2006, 4.

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center in the Toledo schools system. The center offered classes in communications and the performing arts and boasted of one of the few high school radio ­stations in the country at the time. The younger Rice said that his father went about transforming Scott “by instilling pride in the students.” In addition to building a solid marching band, and athletics program in both football and basketball, Mr. Rice oversaw a topnotch student-run radio and television station skills program, a debate team, and also instituted one of the first Ebonics classes in the state and the country. “Others may have my company, but Scott High School will always have my concern and my heart,” Mr. Rice said in 1975, when the school’s skill center was officially named the Flute Rice SkillCenter. In 1996, he ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat against Republican Lynn Olman for a seat in the Ohio House of Representatives. He married the former Esterine Shields in 1953 and the couple settled in Toledo. His wife died in 1988. The grandson of one of the first African-American state legislators in Alabama during Reconstruction, Mr. Rice was the last born in a family of 14 children in Huntsville, Ala. His sister Nell Rice Anthony said that Mr. Rice, like all his siblings, grew up with a stern sense of the importance of education. “We all learned at a very young age that we had to excel in school. It was expected of us,” Mrs. Anthony recalled. All 14 children earned college degrees. Mr. Rice graduated from Council Training High School in Normal, Ala., and attended one year at Fisk University in Tennessee before completing his bachelor’s degree in pre-med from Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical University. He later received his master’s degree in education from the University of Toledo and pursued advanced studies at Ohio State University. 4.2.13 Afro Ball Celebrates Heritage (1981-present)18 What started as a sweetheart dance has bloomed into a gala celebration of African American culture and heritage. Toledo young men and women will step out tomorrow in their best finery for the fifteenth annual Afro Ball. The affair is being held at the Sea Gate Centre and is open to the public. The theme is “A Sea of Blackness, What a Beautiful Sight.” It refers not only to the night’s festivities, but to the recent Million Man March in Washington, d.c. “This is a ball that is representative of and celebrates black history for our kids,” said Ernest Jones, a Scott High School art teacher and coordinator of the 18

Maisha T. Maurant, “Afro Ball Celebrates Heritage,” Toledo Blade February 29, 1996, 1–2.

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event. “It is the black affair for our youngsters. It’s something to be proud of … a beautiful thing. It is a symbol of our unity and the unity we strive for as far as blacks coming together. If you look, you’ll have black youngsters from all walks of life.” Mr. Jones, who has been with Toledo Public Schools 30 years, was instrumental in starting the ball’s tradition. Fifteen years ago, Afro clubs were conducting their separate sweetheart dances during February. He said the Afro Ball was born when Bowsher, Scott, and Devilbiss High Schools decided to combine their efforts. Since then, the ball has exploded into a major social occasion. Two thousand students, parents, and teachers attended last year’s ball and they expect at least that many this year. Almost 15 public, private, and Catholic schools are participating. “It’s huge,” said Dryel Williams, adviser to Springfield’s African American Club. “It’s almost like prom for a lot of them. Some kids may not go to a prom of a predominately white school, to be honest with you.” Mr. Jones said the students in the Afro clubs make the ball possible for their peers. Each club contributes $300 to fund the event. They have 100 tickets each to sell. Money from the sales benefits the club’s treasury. Tickets sell for $10 per person or $18 a couple. Music is provided by radio personality Terry Guy. The attire is semiformal, with no exceptions. “We are sticklers,” said Mr. Jones. “You can not come through the door if you don’t have on a tie and [are wearing] regular shoes.” Strict guidelines and security have allowed them to have fifteen years of enjoyable, trouble-free balls. “In fifteen years we have not had any fights or anything.” Mr. Jones said. “The kids respect the mere fact that this is their ball.” Each club was given the opportunity to select their own king, queen, and court for the ball. A maximum of twelve students can sit on the court. Every school has at least a queen. The courts are announced to the crowd. Some schools already know the identity of their queen while others will be unveiled for the first time at the ball. Springfield High School is among those schools that will have to wait until the ball to hail their queen. Four college scholarships valued at $500 each will also be awarded at the ball. Two scholarships are funded from the ball’s profits, and two are being donated by Allen Smith of am Renaissance Photography. Mr. Jones said the Afro clubs’ funding of scholarships demonstrates “kids giving to kids.” Mr. Jones said Afro clubs originated out of the need to provide a supplement to what students were or were not learning in the classroom. Any student is invited to become a member.

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“This is knowledge we all should know and we should know it all year long, not just in Black History Month,” he said. The 30 members of Springfield’s club focuses on African American life and history. Community service is one of their responsibilities. Members get the opportunity to take educational trips. 4.2.14 Crystal Ellis Named First African American Superintendent of Toledo Schools19 Just two days after being appointed acting superintendent, Crystal Ellis has been given the top administrative post in the Toledo public schools. Mr. Ellis, 57, was unanimously named superintendent yesterday by the Toledo board of education following a 10-minute executive session. He will be the district’s first black superintendent. Mr. Ellis replaces Ruth Scott, who resigned last week after five years in that position. His appointment was made without a national search for a replacement, a process used by many school districts, and without a chance for citizens to let the board know what they want in a superintendent. Before the board went into executive session, board member Thomas Lopez stated that the five-member panel should not act hastily in naming a new superintendent. “Probably the single most important responsibility an elected school board has is the selection of a school superintendent,” Dr. Lopez said. “I believe that we should take our time and think about what kind of a superintendent we need and what kind of a superintendent we want for this district.” Dr. Lopez recommended that the board first consult with “our neighbors, our friends in labor and business, political leadership, teachers, administrators, and other employees, students, civic groups, and the like.” He called the school superintendent’s post the most important job in the city. “This is a golden opportunity to win friends for our district at a time when our city schools need help very badly,” Dr. Lopez said, adding that the board should make certain that the new superintendent has broad support in the community. “We are in a strategic position to raise the level of community consciousness about education, and to build support for the schools of this district,” Dr. Lopez said. Despite his desire to wait, Dr. Lopez went along with his four fellow board members in voting to hire Mr. Ellis. 19

Ralph Kisiel, “Ellis Named Head of City Schools; 1st Black to Win Post,” Toledo Blade, December 8, 1990.

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After the meeting, Dr. Lopez said that he would have preferred that a search be conducted for Mrs. Scott’s successor, but only to build support for the schools by getting the community more involved in the process. “I’m convinced he would have fared well in any search,” Dr. Lopez said. “I could well have led the way for him.” Mr. Ellis will continue as acting superintendent until Jan. 7, 1991. His new contract will extend through July 31, 1993, and he will earn an annual salary of $77,700. A salary adjustment may be made after Aug. 1, 1991. Mr. Ellis joined the school district in 1969 and has served in a variety of teaching and administrative positions including principal at Rogers High School, 1981–84; Leverette Junior High School, 1979–81, and the former Hamilton Elementary School, 1975–79. He was named administrative assistant to former Superintendent Hugh Caumartin in 1984, and became deputy superintendent in 1985. Ken Perry, board president, said that it’s not unusual to fill the superintendent’s post without naming a search committee. Mr. Caumartin and Mrs. Scott both were hired without a search, he said. The quick appointment will ensure continuity, he said. “I’m extremely pleased with your selection,” David McClellan, president of the Toledo Association of Administrative Personnel, told the board. “It’s critical for this district to unite behind a leader.” The district “will turn around quickly” under Mr. Ellis’ direction, Mr. McClellan said. “I’m overwhelmed,” Mr. Ellis said. When he entered the school district as a teacher in 1969, Mr. Ellis said that his only goal was to be a good teacher. “Never in my wildest dreams did I envision being superintendent of the Toledo public schools,” he said. Mr. Ellis said that he is not taking over a crippled school district. “It’s strong because our people make it strong,” he said. Voters were not saying “no” to new school funding when they defeated a 9.9-mill levy in November, he said. “They were saying just take a good look at what you’re doing first,” he said. The levy would have generated $22 million a year. But its defeat has the district considering cutting more than $17 million in expenses to balance the budget by the end of the 1993 fiscal year. Mr. Ellis said that he hopes any budget cuts are done in areas that won’t affect the classroom—“the heart of this school district.” Specific cuts will be recommended to the board within a month, he said. “There will be some tough things to decide,” Mr. Ellis said.

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Prior to joining the school district, Mr. Ellis held a variety of administrative posts for 12 years with the Toledo ymca. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Bowling Green State University in 1957, and master’s degree at the same institution in 1975. In 1988, he was honored by bgsu as an alumnus of the year by the college of education and allied professions. 4.2.15 Wilbert “Skeeter” McClure20 They would hit him to the point of literally pummeling him. He would go back into the deep recesses of the dingy locker room in the makeshift East Toledo boxing gym and cry, frustration more than pain fueling his misery. They could hit him, but he couldn’t figure out how to hit them back. It wasn’t fair, but experience has a way of being very biased when it comes to boxing. Wilbert “Skeeter” McClure, then just 13, would later learn that if you hit them first, and fast, an opponent’s superior power is neutralized along with the opponent himself. “If I get my hands to you before you get your hands to me, that’s the secret,” McClure, now 61, said earlier this week from his home in Newton, Mass. “It’s a game of strategy and physics. I don’t care how much power an opponent has, speed will always overcome power unless someone throws a lucky punch. Boxing is a game of high speed chess.” Those were the words the Toledo native lived by in winning a gold medal in the 1960 Olympics in Rome. He went on to an eight-year professional boxing career that ended in 1968 after he had climbed as high as No. 3 in the world in the light-middleweight (156-pound) division. Those were also the words taught to McClure by Buddy Carr, a retired Toledo police officer and the boxing coach for the Police Athletic League boxing gym for more than 30 years. “Half of my gold medal is his. I’ve told him that a thousand times,” McClure added. “You can only do what you’re taught. No more. No less. He prepared me until I was sick and angry. He was a taskmaster. Drill. Drill. Drill. But if I would not have done that I wouldn’t have gotten what I did.” That statement might also include, to some extent, what McClure got once he left the ring. After McClure graduated from the University of Toledo in 1961 with a degree in education, his family, which included two younger brothers and a ­younger

20

Dave Woolford, “Wilbert ‘Skeeter’ McClure: 1960 Olympic Gold Medalist Was Toledo Native Original Fight Doctor?” Toledo Blade, sec. C, December 19, 1999, 2.

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sister, moved to Detroit to open a sewing machine sales and repair store. ­McClure also trained in Detroit, another reason for the move. He compiled a 139–10 record as an amateur. He went undefeated from ­1958–63, a period that included his first 14 professional fights. He got married in 1962 and fathered a daughter, Karen, who lives in Detroit. He was divorced in 1974. At the end of his boxing career, McClure enrolled at Wayne State University in Detroit and received a master’s degree in counseling. He earned his PhD from Wayne State and became an associate professor of psychology at Northeastern University in Boston. He was one of a very few professional boxers to earn a doctorate. His doctoral thesis resides in Carr’s home in Toledo, along with a lot of other memorabilia, including pictures and scrapbooks that Carr cherishes. McClure was appointed to the Massachusetts State Boxing Commission in 1994 and became the organization’s chairman the following year. He resigned in 1998. He’s currently self-employed and runs a consulting business, giving motivational speeches in such areas as communication skills, stress and conflict. “You don’t get ’em any better than that kid,” Carr said of McClure, judging him not only as a pugilist but also as a person. “He didn’t have a devastating knockout punch but if you keep knocking bricks out of the building, eventually the building is going to fall.” “Boxing is an art. The better artist you are the better boxer you’re going to be. Skeeter was a terrific artist and he had a lot of desire to win. He outsmarted his opponents.” Carr coached 23 nation aau champions, but once they turned professional he would no longer train them. “When Skeeter told me he was going to turn professional he told me he was sorry,” Carr added. “I didn’t want to see him do it. I was worried he would get his brain rattled up.” After learning the ropes at Larry (Moreland) and Al’s (Perales) Boxing Gym while waiting for his moustache to grow so it would be easier for him to lie about his age, McClure approached Carr. Skeeter was a Scott High School student at the time, and Carr was working at the game in a police officer capacity. He had seen McClure fight but didn’t know him. “He told me he wasn’t learning enough,” Carr recalled. “He was very shy. He wasn’t a tough-talking kid, but an easy-going, nice kid, not the type you would associate with being a fighter. He always had his school books with him at the gym.”

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“I often thought a kid with his brains had no business getting his brains knocked out in the ring. The middleweight division is the toughest. He wasn’t street-smart. You’ve got to have a certain amount of that in you to be successful.” But the best fighter Carr ever trained had the hand speed, intelligence and desire to overcome the pitfalls of not being a headstrong, hard-bitten, streetwise bully. “I was probably shy in the ring, too,” McClure explained. “But I guess I had a little exhibitionist in me. Many actors are shy at social events, but on the set they have to do what they have to do.” “It took me three years to get acclimated to the feel of being in the ring with all the lights and people. Then you don’t have time to go into a shy mode.” McClure participated in plays at ut and also wrote, directed and performed in church plays. “I’ve always been competitive. I despise losing,” he added. “I fought hard not to lose. That was just me in there with my ego and myself on the line. Maybe if I was more secure I would have taken losing easier, but I didn’t want to take it easier. Sometimes what is housed on the quiet exterior isn’t what is housed on the interior.” Toledo’s greatest amateur boxer and only gold medal winner is also the only boxer to win every major national and international boxing championship back-to-back in a three year period. He was the first American to win a gold medal in the light-middleweight division in the Olympics. One of McClure’s teammates on the 1960 u.s. Olympic Boxing team was a tall, gangly boxer named Cassius Clay, who had captured a national aau championship in Toledo the previous year. “He (Clay) was a spunky, little kid who idolized Skeeter,” said Carr, who traveled with the u.s. Boxing team to Rome. “He’d say of Skeeter, ‘Man, he’s good.’” Clay, of course, later became Muhammad Ali and one of the greatest boxers ever. He was recently named Athlete of the Century by one popular sports publication. “I remember at the Olympics, Ali agitated the Russian (Boris LaGutin) he was supposed to fight in the semifinals, telling him he was going to beat his butt,” Carr recalled. “The Russian didn’t know what he was saying, but the ­Russian’s interpreter did. When the fight started, the Russian rushed across the ring and hit Ali so hard in the shoulder it knocked Ali out of the ring.” “Ali climbed back into the ring, did one of those scissor-steps, and proceeded to beat the heck out of the Russian. The fight should have been stopped in the second.” McClure first met Ali in 1959 at the national Golden Gloves tournament in Chicago.

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“He was a tall, skinny guy who wore high-water pants and a short jacket,” McClure recalls. “He was pleasant, nice. He wasn’t like he was when he turned professional. He was a sweet, hard working kid before he turned pro.” “He had a high regard for me. I got him his first honorary doctorate degree at Mount Ida College in Newton (Mass.). He has always been a good man. I’ve yet to hear him say one bad word about anyone. We stay in close touch and I call him every three or four months and visit him on occasion at his home in Michigan. I’m proud of knowing him.” After winning the gold medal, McClure returned to Toledo to a hero’s welcome, complete with a parade. “As the plane was taxiing to a stop at the Toledo airport, I saw all of those people and I thought there must be someone really important on the flight,” McClure recalled. “When I saw my name on the signs the people were waving I was more nervous than before any of my fights.” So nervous that when he got off the airplane he realized he had picked up the stewardess’s purse by mistake instead of his bag. “I love Toledo. I have nothing but good memories of that city,” McClure said. “When I grew up there that was the best of times. I’d go back in a heartbeat.” McClure’s pro career started successfully, but he said he was thrown into the ring too quickly against the best light-middleweights in the world. “I was in over my head all the time. It was due to my own stupidity,” he said, referring to his choice of a trainer, whose name he would not divulge. “Some of the top promoters in the boxing business later told me no one could have been more mismanaged than I was.” “But I have no regrets. It should have been different, but it wasn’t for a reason. I’m convinced that I was supposed to stop boxing at the gold medal. As a professor for the last 25 years, I touched thousands of people’s lives, helping them to get better.” “I think that’s what I’m here for. I think that is what I was meant to do. I’m comfortable with what I did as a boxer.” 4.2.16 Chuck Ealey21 Chuck Ealey did not lose a football game from 1965 through 1971, a span of 65 games at Notre Dame High School and the University of Toledo. Even with this record of success, Ealey was hardly recruited outside of Northwest Ohio (only

21

Toledo’s Attic, “African Americans in Toledo Sports.” https://www.toledosattic.org/114 -newmedia/slideshows/236-afroamintoledosports.

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University of Toledo and Miami University) and lightly recruited by the nfl as a running back (which steered away from black quarterbacks). Not desiring to move from the position that he excelled at, Ealey chose to ply his trade in the Canadian Football League. Ealey was drafted by the Hamilton RoughRiders, and quickly was part of something that he hadn’t been a part of since before high school, a loss. But this did not deter Ealey and he picked up where he left off at Toledo, leading the RoughRiders to 11 straight wins, and 11–3 record, and a Grey Cup championship. Ealey would never match the numbers that he put up in that first season, but would continue to play in the cfl for six more seasons, concluding his career in 1978 after suffering a collapsed lung while playing for Toronto. Ealey would retire having never been able to fulfill his dream of playing in the nfl. In 2006, a movement at the University of Toledo began to get Ealey into the College Football Hall of Fame. The reason for his exclusion was not due to race or oversight, but because of the rules for election that called for the player to either be a First or Second Team All American by one of the major voting bodies while playing college football. The “Induct Chuck” movement, through the Chuck Ealey Foundation, is currently working to get the rules for admission changed so players such as Chuck Ealey are able to gain admission into the Hall of Fame. Chuck Ealey is currently a motivational speaker based out of Mississauga, Ontario, a suburb of Toronto. 4.2.17 Black Leadership: Sycophants and Taunters22 Dr. Khallid Abdul Muhammad’s appearance on campus May 15 to keynote the Black Student Union’s inaugural banquet has touched off much constructive dialogue and debate. The most salient part of this dialogue and debate to me is black students’ evaluation of black faculty and staff. As it turns out, the reevaluation of black leadership is a concern of national proportion. Like many African Americans in the mid-1990s, ut’s black student leadership is somewhat fixated on the haunting issue of the absence of black leadership. Although I am encouraged to see black students reflecting and agonizing over this crucial topic, I am compelled to offer a caveat. ut’s black student leadership complaint of black leadership (or its absence) is a part of a national chorus of complaint, each level of complaint is both meritorious and potentially ineffective. 22

Rubin Patterson, “Black Leadership: Sycophants and Taunters,” The Collegian FORUM, May 23, 1996, 3.

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The meritorious nature of this complaint is indisputable. We have a new, exceedingly complex world racing forward, which is both running past and running over millions of African Americans. Is there leadership nationally and locally with track records of successfully building black communities economically, socially, politically and spiritually in the wake of this rapid change? Although some may answer in the affirmative, we should not have to scratch our head, conduct research or ask around to identify such leadership. The ­inability to reach out and touch this leadership is partially responsible for ­millions of blacks in the bewildering lurch. The potentially ineffective outcome of criticism of blacks in leadership ­positions is connected with the inherent heuristic difficulty associated with “social bipolarity,” namely, focusing on polar opposites can cause us to overlook the prized holy grail: the rudiments of successful black leadership. All too often many blacks throw their support behind taunters because he or she “tells it like it is.” When other blacks disagree, they tend to all be lumped together as bootlicking, weak-kneed, spineless sycophants to the white establishment. Ofttimes, little if any, effort is made to distinguish those who do not subscribe to the particular nature of the ideology or program of the speaker from scornful sycophants. These critiques rail against anyone who fosters any kind of progressive black political agenda that attacks racial discrimination and the increasingly lifethreatening ill-distribution of resources. Some of those who do not fit neatly into either pole (i.e. taunter or sycophant) are simply concrete, aggressive practitioners of progressive politics. They would argue that they have evolved beyond pie-in-the-sky talk and ­personality politics. The issues of relevance to them are achievable and ­imagination-capturing visions that challenge and stimulate millions into productive activities. More specifically, the progressive practitioners are those who critique political figures and organizations on the basis of three key questions: • What is the victory they envision and articulate (i.e. what constitutes victory for them?) • What is the overall theory of victory? • What are the strategies leading to that victory? The tragedy of this ill-fated bipolarity black leadership heuristics problem is the fact that the taunters on the one hand and the sycophants on the other

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blind us from taking note of the courageous, selfless, far-sighted program builders deep down in the trenches. The institution builders in the trenches neither give unqualified support to taunters, nor do they execute the establishment’s bidding with wild condemnations. In other words, they would support and help protect students as they bring to campus anyone from Muhammad to Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Institution builders simply attempt to wring out all practical benefits of who comes to campus. An example of an institutional-building activity is to rally around is Africana Studies. A successful department on campus can help attract dedicated black faculty and staff, increase black student retention and prepare numerous students to aggressively challenge life-threatening inequality and deadly racism in the 21st century. The u.s. has a long history of nurturing the successful development of intelligent, articulate and charismatic black sycophants. The black community also has a well-documented history of supporting blacks who speak out harshly and valiantly against racial oppression (including taunters). Equally long-tenured in history, though deliberately undocumented and promoted by the establishment and unheralded by the black community, are the in-the-trenches institution builders. In-the-trenches institution builders must eclipse the allure of sycophants and taunters on the quick. The must is driven by our recognition of the rising threats to blacks: One, the emerging “winner take all” economy where the have-nots swell in size and suffering (most blacks are in this category), and two, the ever-nimble racists who are presently growing more powerful in the militia and patriot movements, organized groups actively working toward their Day of the Rope. The Day of the Rope is the phrase used by these people to describe the period of ascendance and the mass execution of blacks and other “undesirable” groups. (See “Turner Diaries” and other literature connected with Tim McVeigh’s and other supremacist militia.) The new towering threats preluding the 21st century demand repositioning both sycophancy and demagoguery. They can be supplanted with institution building, which prepares African Americans with discipline, dedication and a determination to reposition themselves within the world’s socio-political hierarchy. Hence, a productive evaluative technique is to identify leaders by their practical deeds. After all, real leaders lead by example. Dr. Rubin Patterson is the president of the Association of Black Faculty and Staff and a ut assistant professor of sociology.

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4.2.18 Blacks at ut Protest “Injustice”23 Echoing the sentiments of blacks nationwide, African-American students at the University of Toledo gathered in a 1960s-style sit-in to call attention to what they called pervasive injustice. “I think that, people in Toledo—and especially the African-American community—are complacent and dormant when it comes to this issue,” said Erica Caldwell, one of the organizers of the campus demonstration. By 11 a.m. yesterday, about 30 students, some brandishing signs, had joined the sit-in near the ut student union. Ms. Caldwell and Steven Fullwood, another organizer, said the acquittal of four white police officers for the beating of Los Angeles motorist Rodney King was simply the catalyst for the demonstration and not its prime focus. “We deliberately waited until much of the violence from the King decision had calmed down,” Mr. Fullwood said. “This is intended just to begin raising awareness of the plight of African-Americans and other minorities.” Ms. Caldwell said the organizers, who called themselves the Black Monday Movement, believe that discrimination and injustice is systemic in America, and that it is as pronounced in Toledo as elsewhere in the country. Their demonstration was staged without the approval of the university, but they were asked by the administration to compose a statement of purpose so that it could be allowed on the campus. For many of the demonstrators, the protest process was a new one, and one that they wished to continue. “We are a generation that grew up without the leadership and vision of a [Dr. Martin Luther] King,” Ms. Caldwell said. “We were never around to participate in the demonstrations years ago, but the legacy of injustice affects us just as much as the previous generations.” The group hoped to raise consciousness about discrimination on campus and in the community, and to enlist the help of sympathizers in starting a ­letter-writing campaign to government officials outlining their views. “We’d like to explore other ideas,” said Carla Robinson, another demonstrator. “What has been created is a system in which everyone loses, and where injustice happens because people are complacent enough to let it happen.” Besides the letter-writing campaign, Ms. Caldwell said the group wants to continue bringing social issues to the campus, and might embark on a program to send members to local elementary schools to talk to children about being black and in college. 23

Tom Ford, “Blacks at ut Protest ‘Injustice,’” Toledo Blade, May 5, 1992.

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“That is something we could do,” Ms. Caldwell said. “Just our being there would demonstrate to the kids that problems can be overcome.” They called a plan by university officials in 1970 to lift black enrollment to 10 percent a failure, and protested current recruiting and retention policies. University of Michigan President Harold Shapiro on March 23 agreed to 6 of 22 ucar and bam iii demands to alleviate racial tension and assure diversity after students held an 18-hour sit-in at the administration building. The agreement calls for: • A permanent and autonomous budget for the black student union set at a minimum level of 35,000 a year. • Budgetary incentives to attract and retain black faculty and administrators. It would include a post-doctoral program to attract minorities and a fund to improve research and teaching capabilities. • An annual review of each dean and department head for performance on affirmative-action goals. • Establishing a presidential advisory commission composed of appointees and representatives of the black faculty organization, black student organizations, the black administrators’ association, and members of the community. • The appointment of a black senior administrator in the office of affirmative action. Lannis Hall, minority affairs chairman and member of ucar’s steering committee, said the affirmative-action director has not been responsive to charges of racism. She criticized the office for reacting passively to the flier incident. Virginia Nordby, the director, who is white, said black students are upset because a black is not heading the office. She said her staff did not investigate the matter because no complaint had been filed with her office, that it was handled by the housing division. Miss Hall said, “If someone does not know the rules and regulations, the office of affirmative action should make them familiar with them. Her sitting idly by and saying no one filed a complaint tells us that she is not concerned and should be removed.” Mr. Wallace disputed the university’s claim that it has trouble finding and recruiting black faculty members. He said the school should be able to attract top black professors because of its academic standing. “It’s ridiculous,” he said. “I will admit there’s a scarcity of black professors out there, but this is a major institution. I could understand if it was a junior college saying that. This university should have methods to track people down and entice them to come here.”

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In Toledo, Martino Harmon, president of the Black Student Union at the University of Toledo, said that, although no overtly racial acts have occurred, he is concerned about attitudes. “The biggest strain on race relations is that there is a real strong insensitivity by white students toward some of the problems and the way of life of black students,” he said. “They’re either not sensitive, not in touch, or don’t care.” Mr. Harmon said he believes University President James McComas is trying to develop programs to dismantle racial stereotypes, but is not being sup­ported by other school officials. He said the university’s office of minority affairs and its retention program help some students but fail to reach others. Maribeth Elias-Sanz, director of retention services, admitted that the programs do not reach all black and minority students. However, she said students have responded well to many programs. The university has to “take the first step” in addressing retention of minority students, she said. “We’re finding that we’re very much on target with other schools, but until now, we didn’t know. We would like to do better, not only at attracting, but retaining, black and minority students.” At Bowling Green State University, about 475 blacks were among the 17,200 students this academic year. Students decried the low number and formed a group called africa (Americans Fighting Racial Injustice through Concern and Action) and a chapter of the naacp. africa issued recommendations to President Paul Olscamp, calling for more minority faculty, staff, and administrators, enrolling more blacks and other minorities, establishing a retention program, and creating more cultural diversity. Last month, Vernice Cain, director of bgsu’s University Writing Center, allegedly was the target of racial threats after a shanty erected on campus to protest investments in South African was burned down. The board of directors of the bgsu Foundation last week decided to divest holdings in South Africa-related firms not making progress toward the elimination of apartheid. University of Toledo trustees have approved a resolution calling for a withdrawal of South Africa-related investments within a two-year period. Errol Lam, the advisor to the bgsu Black Student Union, said university officials did not harshly condemn the threats, although President Olscamp has said he would not tolerate racism. “It seems to me that if you’re not going to tolerate racism on campus, you would come out with a strong statement immediately,” Mr. Lam said. “This is racist behavior on the campus. It’s happened, and nothing has come out officially from the university. What has to happen before something is done?”

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President Olscamp admitted that there have been racial name-calling incidents, physical altercations, and attitude problems. He said the university has various events and organizations for black students, but pointed out that there are few social outlets for blacks outside the campus. Bowling Green tries to recruit black students and faculty members, the president said. “This university can prove to anyone’s satisfaction that we have exerted great efforts above and beyond the call of duty to recruit black faculty members and retain them once we get them. It is hard to find qualified faculty members, especially in the areas of physics and accounting. The competition for them is very stiff, indeed.” 4.2.19 ut President Meets with Black Students (1994)24 A Black Studies Department probably figures in the University of Toledo’s future, President Frank Horton says. At an assembly yesterday on the front steps of the student union, Dr. Horton said he will push for creation of a Black Studies Department. That was the chief request in a list of demands that the Black Student Union presented to Dr. Horton last week. He stopped short of guaranteeing that ut would have a Black Studies Department, and he wouldn’t set a date for creation of the department. Those things, he said, were up to the Ohio Board of Regents to decide. “This is unacceptable,” said Jeffrey Johnson, president of the Black Student Union. “If they cannot give us an implementation date of fall of the 1995–96 school year for creation of a Pan-African studies department, we have nothing to say,” Mr. Johnson told the group of about 250 students. Between half and two-thirds of the students were black. Last week, Mr. Johnson led about 200 students in a march from campus to Dr. Horton’s house, where they presented a list of demands, including: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Creation of a Black Studies Department Steps to cut down on the drop-out rate of black students Extension of shuttle bus routes to black neighborhoods Hiring more black administrators and advisers

Foremost among the demands was the creation of a Black Studies Department. Mr. Johnson said he and other members of his organization want Black 24

Holden Lewis, “ut President Meets With Black Students,” Toledo Blade, May 19, 1994.

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Studies to be a full academic department, with a chairman and a bachelor’s degree sequence. Dr. Horton responded yesterday with a letter to Mr. Johnson, which he read to the assembly. He said: • He will ask academic vice president Judy Hample to appoint a committee by June 10 to develop a proposal for a Black Studies Program. • He has created a minority student retention subcommittee and will ask the Black Student Union to appoint two members. • He has added two stops along the Bancroft Street shuttle bus route, beginning in the fall quarter. • He has established a transit advisory committee that meets for the first time today, and the Black Student Union will be asked to appoint two members to the committee. • He will ask the Black Student Union to send a representative to sit on all future search committees for administrators. • He will appoint a task force June 2 to monitor the progress of the above projects. Dr. Horton invited the Black Student Union’s executive committee to meet with him for lunch tomorrow at this house, where they are to discuss the makeup of the task force. Black students who attended the rally said they were disappointed that Dr. Horton didn’t promise that ut would have a Black Studies Department by fall, 1995. Dr. Horton said he wants a committee to submit a proposal by next spring. Sandra Meeks, a Toledo senior who is director of external affairs for the Black Student Union, said, “These are half steps. It’s not hard to give a proposed date. He doesn’t have to say, ‘Tomorrow, we’ll have your Pan-African Studies Department.’ And until he gives us a proposed date, we don’t have an agreement.” Black students said they weren’t impressed with Dr. Horton’s proposal to add two stops along the shuttle bus route—one at Bancroft and Torrey Hill Drive and another at Bancroft and Perth Street. Both those intersections are near Ottawa Park. “That’s inadequate, too, because the people who stay in the Old West End and inner city don’t just live along Bancroft,” Ms. Meeks said. “Why not go Nebraska-Dorr-Bancroft-Monroe?” From 1972 to 1984, ut had a Black Studies program in University College, a now-defunct arm of the university that allowed students to put together their own custom bachelor’s degrees. Dr. Horton wasn’t at ut when the program was disbanded, but he said he understands it fizzled for lack of students or administrative support.

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4.2.20 Jeff Johnson, Black Student Leader at ut (1994)25 Don’t expect Jeffrey Johnson to retire quietly to his studies anytime soon. Mr. Johnson, president of the University of Toledo’s Black Student Union, wants the organization to have an impact not only on campus, but citywide and even nationally. In Mr. Johnson’s first year as president, the Black Student Union has sponsored last month’s rally by controversial Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, demanded that ut organize a black studies department, and begun a national alliance of black student organizations. The 21-year-old junior from Cleveland Heights has been the Black Student Union’s most outspoken and visible president in years. Still, Mr. Johnson believes many people don’t know what the student group is all about. “I think many black organizations are misunderstood as separatist or racist or anti-something else, when they’re concerned with the problems of black students,” he said. “Our goal is to improve things for black students on this campus without taking anything away from anyone, and to expose people of various cultures to the black experience.” He said he welcomed Mr. Farrakhan to Toledo because the Nation of Islam leader brought a different viewpoint. He said he pushes for a black studies department at ut because American and world history are incomplete without information from all ethnic groups. A couple of weeks ago, Mr. Johnson led a student march from campus to the home of ut President Frank Horton, where he presented a list of demands: creation of a black studies department, expansion of shuttle bus service to the inner city, reduction of the dropout rate among black students, and the hiring of more black administrators and advisers. Dr. Horton responded last week at a rally in front of the Student Union. He promised to appoint various committees to consider the demands. He said he supports the creation of a black studies department, but would not promise whether it will happen. Then Mr. Johnson took the lectern. “Are you, the students, satisfied?” he said defiantly. “No!” responded members of the crowd of about 250. Mr. Johnson can be a fiery public speaker, and the letters he delivers to The Collegian (signed simply “The Black Student Union”) are caustic. In person, he relaxes the rhetoric, but keeps the business-like demeanor. Mr. Johnson is tall, well-dressed, and walks with the lanky self-confidence of an athlete. No surprise there: He originally came to ut on a track scholarship. 25

Holden Lewis, “Black Leader at ut Pushes the Envelope,” Toledo Blade, May 23, 1994.

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His specialties were the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes, the long jump, and the triple jump. But he wasn’t satisfied with his grades in his freshman year, so he dropped track. He carries a neatly organized day planner. Hanging on the walls of his office in the Student Union are three bulletin boards, a calendar, a map of Africa, photographs of Africans, and posters featuring Malcolm x, John Coltrane, and the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. Mr. Johnson is majoring in marketing. He plans to attend graduate school, where he wants to earn dual master of business administration and law degrees. He would like to go to graduate school at Howard University, one of the nation’s elite, historically black colleges. He said he feels especially proud that the Black Student Union this year founded an organization called the National Alliance for Pan-African Students. It has chapters at 13 universities. Mr. Johnson sees it as a national support group for black organizations at mostly white colleges. And the organization might soon go international. Students at a university in Ghana have expressed interest. He said he’s confident he’ll never lose his commitment, even if he goes into corporate law. “I have a strong conviction toward helping my people,” he said. “If that means not being rich, then that’s the way it’s going to be. I think people mislead themselves when they believe they can separate themselves from their people because they’ve reached a particular socioeconomic group.” 4.2.21 Abdul Alkalimat Appointed Head of Africana Studies at ut26 “We will initiate a curriculum based in cyberspace.” That is how Dr. Abdul Alkalimat, ut professor of sociology and director of the new Africana studies program, envisions this discipline at The University of Toledo. It is one of the first programs in the country established on 21st century technology, with curriculum tied to the use of computers and the Internet, according to the professor. Alkalimat, who assumed his position in August, believes computers offer universities opportunities to “serve our public education function” in new ways, offering occasions to build bridges among races.

26

Christine Alexander, “Computer-based Africana Studies Curriculum Established; Alkalimat Is Appointed Director,” ut Times 12, no. 2 (September 30, 1996): 1–2.

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“No longer do we, sitting in Ohio, have to wait for things to trickle down to us. The new technology offers everyone the same chance. We’re on the verge of a new egalitarianism. A person in a rural farming community and one in innercity Cleveland can engage in a discussion through a list-serve. There are new possibilities for overcoming racial tensions. This is 21st century innovation.” “The technological revolution’s impact on society is the greatest force for change in history,” he explains. “It can lead to the massive poverty of those left out, or include everybody and lead to a new era of miraculous progress.” Establishing connections throughout Africa and the Caribbean will place students in Toledo in instant contact with people in many countries. “Such connections will enable our students to be actively engaged in discussions with people all over the world.” Another phase of the Africana studies program is the collection of data on the black experience that is found in thousands of sites on the World Wide Web. “We will organize access so that everyone in the country can use it,” Alkalimat predicts. Compiling such web sites enriches the academic quality of all theory, according to the professor. “If we’re talking about ‘race,’ students can link to a project and look at the dna of race. They can click over to an archaeological dig and scrutinize the facts. They can re-examine 19th century ideological notions with 21st century cutting-edge research.” The establishment of Africana studies, which includes the black experience in Africa, the Caribbean and the Americas, rather than solely Afro-American studies, commits the University to a more expanded curricular approach, the  professor says. “The only way to be educated today is to have an appreciation for our global orientation. No one can consider himself educated without such an understanding.” “Above all, Africana studies will center on academic excellence and ­social responsibility,” Alkalimat says. “By that I mean although it has its own ­particularity, it will fundamentally advance the core values of the University.” Alkalimat has a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Chicago, has studied in Ghana and devoted 10 years to the study of Malcolm x. He headed black studies programs at Fisk University and the University of Illinois. He has also taught at Spelman College, Northeastern University in Boston, Oxford ­University, the Free University of Berlin, and was a visiting professor at ut one year ago. He is currently publishing proceedings of three conferences on “Technology, Employment and Community” held at the University of Illinois, m.i.t. and the California State University at Los Angeles.

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Leadership and Vision (Documents 70–79)

There has always been exceptional leadership in the black community of Toledo. This has been demonstrated by their local achievements as well as their national reputations. We have now come into a time of crisis because the black leadership class faces negotiating new leadership roles for the Hip Hop generation. The success of this generational transition will determine future progress. Finally, there are important experiments utilizing information technology, thus emphasizing its vast sociological significance. Hip Hop culture is a digital culture, and that makes it inherently capable of producing qualified black twenty-first-century community leaders. The critical process is leadership succession. The twenty-first century will be exciting. 4.3.1 Ardella Law Reed (1918–1989)27 Ardella Law Reed was an outstanding African-American teacher of Home Economics in the Toledo Public Schools. She was born Ardella Gertrude Law, daughter to Wayman and Lera Law, on January 3, 1918, in Gary, West Virginia. There she attended public schools through high school. Having attended Bluefield State College and West Virginia State College, she obtained her Bachelor of Science degree. After further studies at Mary Manse College in Toledo, Ohio, she was awarded a Master of Science degree. Upon moving from West Virginia to Toledo, she resided with extended family members Louse and Richard Booker. Due to the lack of job availability, racism, and the outbreak of World War ii, initial employment was had at Erie Ordinance and at Doehler Jarvis on assembly lines. Beginning as a substitute teacher, she taught thirty-five years in the ­Toledo Public School system. The Bookers encouraged her to obtain certification to  enable her to teach special education at Gunckel School. After continued education, she became one of the first four African-American home economic teachers in the Toledo Public system. After a distinguished career, Ardella retired from the Home Economics Department at Robinson Junior High School where a refurbished Home Economics and Industrial Arts wing was named in her honor. Many of her former students became teachers in the same building. Her sincere interest in youth and desire to assure success in their endeavors led to initiating new programs and activities. Many students upon reflection agreed that it was in Mrs. Reed’s room that they learned how to act (social 27

Lera Doneghy, In Search of Our Past: Women of Northwest Ohio, vol. v (Toledo, oh: Women’s History Committee of the Women Alive! Coalition, 1996), 19–22.

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graces), set a table, cook, make a bed, and confront life issues. She developed in them a sense of pride in themselves, in their accomplishments, and their presentations. Ardella was a very strong advocate of assisting her colleagues, especially beginning teachers, taking them under her wings and instilling in them the correct way to do things. Lucretia Topsil Thomas, recently retired, looked upon Mrs. Reed as her mentor since she was a career role model and a real friend. She recalled the instructions on preparing lesson plans, on the importance of joining the union, of being able to work with one’s colleagues, and in being a positive role model to students. Ardella was a very loving wife and mother. She was married to Scottie Reed for 32 years, and was the mother of two children: a son, Jimmy (a.k.a. Jomo Asiyaholo) and a daughter, Lera Reed Doneghy. Innumerable people spoke of her being a stickler for details. If given a task, or initiating one, completion would be done to perfection, with style and grace. In addition to her innovations and humanitarian endeavors, Ardella launched an uphill campaign to have the Board of Education observe Dr. ­Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday. It finally became a reality, well before the national holiday was recognized. She was a very strong activist in the American Federation of Teachers union, and in the Democratic Party. As a member of various organizations, she worked diligently, untiringly and was proud to represent them at regional and national conventions. Ardella was initiated into the Alpha Lambda Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., in Toledo, Ohio, and she held the highest local offices. As Alpha Lambda’s Dean of Pledges, she counseled and befriended new and prospective members. Patricia Strong stated: “Mrs. Reed instilled good social and academic leadership skills, enthusiasm and follow-through; and charges were encouraged to finish whatever they started.” She was a charter member of Zeta Alpha Omega chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha, established on April 25, 1952. She served in many capacities and she was elected and served as Basileus (president) in 1955 and 1968. For her exemplary service to the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, she was awarded many citations and trophies and was made a Life Member. She sought an office on the regional level, but was unsuccessful. Mrs. Reed was recognized by the Great Lakes ­Region and awarded the “LaRue Fredrick Outstanding Soror” at the Pittsburgh, pa, conference in May 1965. (The Great Lakes region includes Ohio, Michigan, western Pennsylvania, and western New York.) For many years Mrs. Reed served as Graduate Advisor to the undergraduate chapter of Alpha Lambda at the University of Toledo. Among these women who have successful careers and community involvement are:

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Mrs. Joyce Jones, Alpha Kappa Alpha National Sorority, Inc. Nominating Committee, Links National Committees, Past Basileus of a.k.a., and Toledo Public School Administrator. Mrs. Elinor W. Allen, two-time Great Lakes Outstanding Graduate Advisor Awardee and Regional Coordinator of Graduate Advisors, Past President of local a.k.a. Chapters and retired Toledo Public School Reading Teacher. Mrs. Ann Battles, the first Great Lakes Region Cluster Co-Coordinator, a.k.a. International Standards Committee, Past Great Lakes Regional Director, Past local a.k.a. President and retired Toledo Public School Math Lab Teacher. Mrs. Edrene Cole, community activist, Outstanding Alumnus, University of Toledo, Minority Fellow, naacp-actso, Director and consultant, Links National Committee, Past Director of Head Start, Past Basileus of a.k.a., and retired Toledo Public School Administrator. Mrs. Barbara Tucker, Toledo Public School Foreign Language teacher, mentoree, and current Basileus of Zeta Alpha Omega Chapter. Dr. Barbara A. Baker, Principal of Lincoln Elementary School and private counselor, stated that “Mrs. Reed was an inspiration to so many young women not only in the educational system but also through Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority. She took the extra time to talk with so many of us before and after school and often at lunch time. Her message was always encouraging. Mrs. Reed helped us to see our way beyond poverty and our current living conditions. We were convinced that education was the key to success. She encouraged us to develop as many talents as we could to enhance our chances of success. Carrying ourselves with proper deportment and courtesy was always emphasized. She was there for us every step of the way through college and when we started our own careers and families. She was a role model worth more than words can ever say!” Ardella successfully chaired many aka dramas, talent shows of creative experience, the Harvest Festival Receptions, and Ebony Fashion Fairs, which raised thousands of dollars for scholarships. Her service to Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., will long be remembered. Mrs. Reed was an active member of an educator’s organization, Phi Delta Kappa, Beta Gamma Chapter. As a native West Virginian, she and others from her state organized a club that successfully advised and aided young people in attending West Virginia State College and Institute, W. Va. This club is still actively involved in sponsoring and exposing youth to their alma mater.

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Active membership in All Saints Episcopal Church was very important to Ardella Reed. There she was a delegate to various conventions, a member of the vestry and the choir, and a charter member of All Saints’ Toledo Chapter of The Order of the Daughters of the King, a lay order for women who take vows of prayer and service. She also designed the scrapbook, the All Saints’ chapter banner, and the Diocese of Ohio’s banner. As a member of Episcopal Church Women, she held a regional diocesan office; and she found special rewards in participation in the church’s Feed Your Neighbor Program because she was helping others. An extended family member, Frederick Syph, indicated that she gave people a sense of direction. He said that she talked directly to young people about the realities of life, and he recalled many trips where the Reeds took carloads of youngsters to games, parks, concerts, and other events. He felt this really showed a commitment not only to family but to the community at large. The birth of her grandchildren, Scott Edmond and Atarah Elana Doneghy, was a completion of the family unit in which Ardella and Scottie so much believed. On November 20, 1989, Ardella L. Reed died, leaving a living legacy for all to uphold and cherish. 4.3.2 Ella P. Stewart (1893–1987)28 In 1965, Toledo pharmacist and civil rights activist Ella P. Stewart was called “The First Lady” by the Blade. Indeed, Mrs. Stewart, who died in 1987 at age 94, lived a life that appeared to buck conventional standards for a black woman of her era. Part businesswoman, part civil rights leader, part cultural icon, she spent more than half her life in a segregated society yet never relinquished her insistence on equality between the races. A curator called her methods for social change “gentle yet firm, straightforward and creative.” Ella P. Stewart cut a swath through local and national civic circles that no one has equaled since. Before integration was the law, she refused to sit in Toledo theater balconies reserved for “coloreds” and forfeited her ticket on a Texas train by refusing to ride in a separate car for black passengers. And in the spring of 1957, after being asked to attend a reception as an honored guest by the Virginia Chamber of Commerce, she was asked to rescind her invitation when the southern planners discovered she was a “Negro.” 28

Rhonda Sewell, “Ella P. Stewart: A Civil Rights Activist,” Toledo Blade, December 26, 1999.

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Mrs. Stewart is credited with helping to integrate the local ywca and League of Women Voters. She held national and international appointments and was given personal invitations to four presidential inaugurations. Mrs. Stewart was said to be a member of Eleanor Roosevelt’s unofficial “Black Cabinet” and had the respect and attention of prominent members of Toledo’s establishment. She was the first black woman to graduate from the University of Pittsburgh School of Pharmacy, in 1916. Later she became a world traveler. Mrs. Stewart, who moved to Toledo from Pittsburgh in the 1920s, has been called an international humanitarian and stern matriarch of Toledo’s black upper crust. “There are a lot of people who made marvelous contributions, but they stayed within the system and would not dream of making other people uncomfortable. She had no problem with standing up and saying what was on her mind,” said retired educator Edrene Cole. In 1961, a Toledo Public elementary school was named for her. Today it ­houses a museum of her artifacts and documents. She is credited for her local contributions toward improved race relations, and is described as a woman of great discipline, a society type, and someone who gained entry into a white world commonly closed to other blacks of her time. Correspondence to her home varied from prominent local Toledo leaders of her day such as Paul Block, Jr., Glen Driscoll, and Ward M. Canaday, to letters from the u.s. State Department and the White House, to friends who often wrote asking for her opinions on cultural matters of the day. “She had gone as high as a black woman could go back then,” recalled William “Bill” Brower, a retired Blade associate editor and self-described former “publicity agent” for Mrs. Stewart. Still, with all of her accolades, she is probably best remembered for Stewart’s Pharmacy, at Indiana and City Park Avenues, which she owned with her husband, William Wyatt “Doc” Stewart. The couple opened the pharmacy in July, 1922, to a predominantly white trade. As the neighborhood’s racial makeup shifted, the store became the center of much black activity. However, the Stewarts never lost their white clientele entirely, according to a 1965 Blade story. The area around their drugstore was considered the hub of black social life—including the Indiana Avenue ymca, the Frederick Douglass Center, then located on Pinewood Avenue, and Third Baptist and All Saints Episcopal churches. These locations, including the pharmacy-drugstore, were places for blacks to gather and socialize, discuss important matters of the day, or plan upcoming events such as dances and social teas.

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The Stewarts resided above the pharmacy. There they also played host and hostess to noted blacks who had been refused rooms at such Toledo hotels as the Commodore Perry. “It was the clearing house for black professionals who came here,” recalled former Judge Robert Franklin. The Stewarts’ houseguests included singer Marian Anderson, educator Mary McLeod Bethune, historian Carter G. Woodson, early naacp leader W.E.B. Du Bois, cartoonist E. Simms Campbell, singer Paul Robeson, and the ranking black u.s. Army Gen. Benjamin O. Davis. “She was in the center of black culture and black life,” said Mr. Brower. Her social circle included the black bourgeoisie of the day: physicians, lawyers, club leaders, and educators. Judge Franklin’s wife, Kathryn, a retired social worker, said Mrs. Stewart was viewed by many as a matriarch in the black community. “Growing up, she was an integral part of my family. She was one of those persons that, when you returned home from college in the summers, you had to go by her house and visit and catch her up on things,” said Mrs. Franklin, whose late parents, Dr. Mayo A. and Rebecca “Reba” M. Harris, were good friends and travel companions of the Stewarts. The Stewarts, said Judge Franklin, “did a whole lot to try to improve the relationships between the races.” Moreover, Judge Franklin said, Mrs. Stewart carried a lot of clout with the city power brokers. “The whites in Toledo considered her one of our leaders. They would run [black] people past her to see if they were all right …. She had that kind of power,” said Mrs. Cole, who interviewed Mrs. Stewart in the 1970s for her University of Toledo master’s thesis, “Blacks in Toledo: A Resource Unit for Elementary Teachers.” “I’ve been described as a humanitarian—I still think of myself as the corner pharmacist,” Mrs. Stewart said in a 1950s radio commercial for a Salvation Army Christmas drive. “She has won the love and earned the respect of many people because of her fight for human dignity, world peace, and harmony among all nations,” a 1974 conference pamphlet stated of the Pan-Pacific & Southeast Asian Women’s Association, of which she was a very active member. In 1952, Toledo Mayor Lloyd Roulet invited Mrs. Stewart to participate in a reception honoring her “contributions toward community betterment.” And a letter proclaiming Feb. 28, 1984, as Ella P. Stewart Day from former Toledo Mayor Donna Owens sums up the respect people had for her: “We are fortunate to have a woman of Mrs. Stewart’s caliber as a resident of our city.” Born Ella Nora Phillips in the small village of Stringtown, va, Mrs. Stewart was the daughter of sharecroppers. Some recall Mrs. Stewart, a hefty woman,

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often was mistaken as East Indian, especially when traveling abroad because of her keen features, straight hair that she wore pinned up, and olive-toned complexion. Her mistaken ethnicity can be contributed to her paternal grandparents. Her grandmother was an Indian mixture of Massassoit and Cherokee, and her grandfather was white. At age 12 she began studies at Storer College in Harper’s Ferry, W. Va., and graduated in 1910. Mrs. Stewart married classmate Charles Myers, and they moved to Pittsburg. The couple divorced a few years later after their only child, Virginia, a toddler, died. Admitted to the University of Pittsburgh one year after she applied, she graduated and passed her state examination, thus making her the first practicing black woman pharmacist in the county in 1916. A shrewd businesswoman, Mrs. Stewart worked in hospital and drugstore pharmacies, some of which she owned and operated. She met and married “Doc” Stewart in 1920, and the couple moved first to Youngstown, where she was a pharmacist and purchasing agent in the Youngstown City Hospital. A few years later they relocated to Toledo. They purchased the corner building and established their pharmacy, which they ran until the mid-1940s. Retired educator Doris Bryant, 78, who described Mrs. Stewart as a “second mother” figure recalls her days spent in the pharmacy. “She was very strict but very genuine. She cracked the whip. She would do anything for you, but she made it clear that business and friendship did not mix. When you were in the store, she let you know that this was business,” recalled Mrs. Bryant, who from the age of about 12 stayed in the Stewart home whenever Mr. Stewart was away on holiday. Mrs. Bryant worked in the pharmacy on weekends during her teen years, earning $1. She recalls the Stewart home as filled with books, rubber tree plants, and mementos from her international travel; candy dishes, and a vast collection of fine china and sterling silver flatware. She said that Mrs. Stewart was a great cook, loved asparagus, and was an excellent quilter. Claude Thomas, 79, who worked briefly in the pharmacy as a clerk at the age of 19 while a student at the University of Toledo, said he recalls Mrs. Stewart’s more serious side. “She was a very strong woman who had her own beliefs. It did no one any good to try and change [her beliefs]. Her strong personality made her difficult to some that knew her. At the time I too was very strong headed. Her demeanor was sweet but very stern,” Mr. Thomas recalls. Mrs. Stewart’s activities in local, national, and international organizations were unprecedented. Her profession as a pharmacist opened the door for her to take active roles in such community service Toledo groups as the League of

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Women Voters, the Red Cross, the naacp, and the Toledo Board of Community Relations. She was an active member in prominent black women’s service groups such as the Enterprise Charity Club, the Study Hour Club, and in 1944 she was ­elected president of the Ohio Association of Colored Women. Her most noted accomplishment was her role as president from 1948 to 1952 of the highly political National Association of Colored Women. After her election with nacw, Mr. Brower said then-Blade editor-in-chief Grove Patterson ordered a profile story to be written on her. “That got her a lot of recognition,” said Mr. Brower of her presidency. “She was respected by a segment of the white community, and she was looked upon as the Ella P. Stewart by the black community,” he said. Her role in nacw took her abroad, as did her affiliations in the Pacific and Southeast Asian Women’s Association, where she was vice-chairperson of the group’s American Committee. In 1952, nacw selected her as delegate to the International Council of Women of the World in Athens, Greece. In 1954, the Department of State sponsored a study of social conditions in Asia and named Mrs. Stewart and another woman as goodwill ambassadors for the Education Exchange Service; she studied conditions in West Pakistan, Indian, Ceylon, Indonesia, and the Philippines. She was appointed to numerous political committees by Democratic and Republican administrations, including her appointment in 1951 to the u.s. Department of Labor’s Women’s Advisory Committee on Defense Manpower. In the early 1960s then-Secretary of State Dean Rusk appointed her to the executive board of the United States Commission of unesco. Mrs. Stewart’s last years were spent at Pelham Manor. There she corre­ sponded often with friends and international associates, often sending them poems or phrases from Byron, and Bible verses. “Friendship is love without wings” is one Byron quote she sent in shaky handwriting to a friend shortly before her death. Records of her life and contributions are in local public libraries, at Stewart School, the Women’s Studies Archives in bgsu’s Center for Archival Collections, and host of scrapbooks and papers dating from 1922 to 1987. Titled The Ella P. Stewart Collection, they can be found at the University of Toledo’s Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections. Mrs. Bryant sums up Mrs. Stewart’s impact. “She was a great lover of people. I remember her as a mother figure putting her arms around the globe—­ someone who takes in everybody.”

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4.3.3 Robert V. Franklin, Jr.: Leader in Law and Society29 Judge Franklin, retired judge of the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas, has been appointed to The University of Toledo Board of Trustees by Governor Richard Celeste. Judge Franklin, who retired at the end of 1985, will serve a nine-year term, from July 2, 1988, to July 1, 1997. He replaces the Rev. Lyman W. Liggins, whose term expired June 30. Judge Franklin is a member of the academic affairs and student affairs committee of the Board. After admission to the Ohio Bar in 1950, Judge Franklin served two years as a First Sergeant in the u.s. Army in Korea. Shortly after his return to the private practice of law in Toledo, he was appointed prosecuting attorney of the city of Toledo. Later he served a year as second assistant law director until his appointment to the Toledo Municipal Court in May, 1960. He was elected to a newly created seat on the Lucas County Common Pleas Court in 1968, winning re-election in 1974 and 1980. At the time of his retirement, he was the senior elected judge in Lucas County. Judge Franklin still sits by assignment for cases at the appellate, common pleas and municipal court levels. A native of Toledo, Judge Franklin received the Distinguished Attorney Award from the ut Law Alumni Association and the Toledo Bar Association in 1987. The award recognizes senior members of the Toledo Bar Association, not necessarily alumni of ut’s College of Law, for outstanding contributions to the legal profession and to the community. Judge Franklin is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi, national honor societies. In 1961, he was chosen by the Toledo Junior Chamber of commerce as Toledo’s Outstanding Young Man. He was among the first inductees into the Scott High School Hall of Fame. In 1982, ut awarded him the Gold “T,” an award given annually to an alumnus for outstanding success in his or her profession. The “Golden Gavel Award” was bestowed upon him in 1986 by the Ohio Common Pleas Judges Association. Judge Franklin also was the recipient of the Toledo Junior Bar Association’s Order of the Heel Award, given in recognition of help given by a senior member of the bar to young lawyers. He was the recipient of the Keystone Award from the Boys’ Clubs of America. He serves on the boards of directors of the ut Alumni Foundation, the Toledo Museum of Art, the Toledo Area Governmental Research Association, the Toledo Community Foundation, Trustcorp Bank (Ohio) and Woodlawn Cemetery. He is a member of the committee of 100 and is chairman of its government task force, and serves as president of the Toledo Automobile Club and 29

“Robert V. Franklin, Jr.,” Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, University of Toledo.

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Scholarship Fund, Inc. Judge Franklin previously served on the Defiance College and Morehouse College boards of trustees. A 1943 graduate of Scott High School, Judge Franklin earned his law degree from ut in 1950 and his bachelor’s degree in political science (cum laude) from Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia, in 1947. In 1986, he was honored nationally by nafeo as an outstanding graduate of a historically black college (Morehouse). In 1980, Morehouse awarded him an honorary doctor of law degree. A member of the Third Baptist Church, he is married to the former Kathryn Harris (m.s.s.w., The Ohio State University). Both of their sons are graduates of Morehouse College. Son Gary (j.d., University of Chicago) is assistant general counsel for Maxima Corp. in Rockville, Md. 4.3.4 Civic Leader Cordelia Martin30 The Model Cities Interim Health Center is a symbol of community dedication and service. Its establishment and success reflects the many areas of effort by Mrs. Cordelia Martin to improve the life of her community. Mrs. Martin was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but has lived in Toledo since 1921. After graduating from high school she attended the University of Toledo for a year and then transferred to Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, graduating with a major in sociology and a minor in psychology. After college, Mrs. Martin worked six months as an investigator for the Brand Whitlock Homes and about a year later she was married. She now has 12 children. In 1967, Mrs. Martin started working at Lincoln School as a parent aide. During this time she was elected as a trustee to represent the Lincoln School Area. While serving as a trustee she was appointed to the Policy Committee and was later assigned to the Health Functional Committee. After serving as acting chairman for the Health committee, Mrs. Martin was designated as the permanent chairman. Being involved in various health meetings, Mrs. Martin met representatives from Trans Century, a program funded by h.e.w. (The Department of Health, Education and Welfare). Mrs. Martin applied for a job with that organization and worked there from November, 1968 to November, 1969. While employed with Trans Century, she was still chairman of the Health Committee and was attending Policy Committee meetings. As a trustee, as chairman of the Health Functional Committee, and as an employee of Trans Century, Mrs. Martin was striving continually to organize 30

“The Model Cities Interim Health Center,” Toledo’s New Times Model Cities Newsletter 1, no. 5 (June 1971).

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people around all aspects of health. She made contacts with the health department, and the National and Regional hew offices. Mrs. Martin traveled, attended health conferences and held seminars with people from all parts of the United States who had experience with health centers. Trans Century was considered a communications project and gave Mrs. Martin an insight into the entire health field. Following a year’s contract with Trans Century, Mrs. Martin started working with the Model Cities Health Project at the downtown Planned Parenthood Center. She was employed as a supervisor over hud (Housing and Urban Development) community workers. When the staff became too large for the downtown center and the patient load doubled, Mrs. Martin was transferred to an East Side Facility. Mrs. Martin’s staff consists of one social worker and eleven community workers. There are three workers who speak Spanish, and one male worker and two new workers in training. During the entire period Mrs. Martin spent with the Health Functional Committee, as a member, and as chairman, she developed a realization that there should be a network of community-based health centers. Mrs. Martin’s constant contacts helped make it possible to relate her experiences to the committee and to inspire them to work towards the establishment of a health center to serve the Model Neighborhood. After the decision was made to establish such a center, a site committee was selected to look for a suitable site. The committee chose the building at 1636 W. Bancroft. In recognition of Mrs. Martin’s endeavors and efforts to improve the health care of all residents in the community, the center has been renamed The Cordelia Martin Interim Health Center. An open house and dedication was held on April 25, 1971. On June 4, 1971, there will be a banquet at the Catholic Club to honor Mrs. Martin and to express the gratitude of the residents for her many services to the community. 4.3.5 Wayman Palmer31 Wayman D. Palmer, 57, executive director of the Toledo Economic Planning Council who oversaw millions of dollars in improvement projects during nearly 10 years as head of the city’s community development department, died Saturday in the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md. Mr. Palmer also had served briefly in 1980 as director of the office of self-help development and technical assistance of the National Consumer Cooperative 31

“Wayman Palmer: Planning Council Head Was Ex-City Official,” Toledo Blade, November 12, 1984.

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Bank in Washington, d.c. He resigned that post when former President Carter lost his bid for reelection to President Reagan. Named community development director in 1973, Mr. Palmer spearheaded programs that brought hundreds of units of new housing for families and senior citizens, aided the struggle of neighborhoods fighting poverty and decay, brought some commercial revitalization in East Toledo and a renaissance for downtown, including the Sea Gate complex. The development department was a consolidation of the urban renewal, housing, inspection, planning activities and the federal model cities programs here, many of which had been bogged down by neighborhood politics and infighting. In 1981, Mr. Palmer reported that Toledo had received more than $29 million in Federal Urban development Action Grants which supported $185 million in private investment. The development programs here—primarily in the central business district—had created or retained some 6,400 jobs, Mr. Palmer said at that time. Mr. Palmer resigned the city post in 1982 when he was named executive director of the economic planning council. He also served as executive director for six years for the Economic Opportunity Planning Association of Greater Toledo, Inc., and was a member of the board of the Lucas Metropolitan Housing Authority. In 1966, Mr. Palmer headed the Work Experience Program for Youth and in 1971, he was elected president of the National Community Action Agency Directors Association. Mr. Palmer, who resided on Bancroft Street, attended Howard and Ohio State universities and received a master’s degree in guidance and counseling from the University of Toledo. From 1950 until 1952, he taught general science and mathematics in Columbia, s.c. He also taught in the Toledo public schools from 1952 to 1966. He was an army veteran of World War ii. A member of the American Personnel and Guidance Association, Mr. Palmer also served as past president and past treasurer of the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity. He also was a trustee of the Warren ame Church. In 1978, he was awarded the Toledo Metropolitan Area Council of Government’s Chairman Emeritus Award, and in 1979 he received the David Bennett Award from the Metropolitan Toledo chapter of the American Society of Public Administrators. Surviving are his sons, Kamal Najib and Royce Harris; daughter, Mrs. ­Jaclyn Palmer-Roach; sisters, Mrs. Eloise Campbell, Mrs. Frances McCullum, Mrs. Edith Wright and Mrs. Bonita Dunlap; and parents, Mr. and Mrs. Cecil Palmer.

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Services will be at 1 p.m. Thursday in the Warren ame Church. The body will be in the Dale Mortuary after 1 p.m. Wednesday, followed by a wake service at 7. The family requests that any tributes be in the form of contributions to the church’s building fund. 4.3.6 Black Panthers Patrol Dorr Street32 A group of Negroes who identified themselves as with the Black Panther organization patrolled the Dorr Street area Saturday night vowing that they were going to police their own neighborhood. At least six of the men carried rifles as they walked in pairs along Dorr Street, between Detroit Avenue and Hoag Street. Several were equipped with walkietalkie two-way radio units. The men explained that they were attempting to clean up their own ­community and that they would do what they could to curtail narcotics, prostitution, crime, and vice. Police had been notified in advance that the men were going to appear on the streets and that some would be equipped with rifles. In notification to police, the men indicated that they would remain within the law and would not have concealed weapons and that they would not be pointing weapons at persons. Detective Capt. William Gray said that as far as he could determine no law was being violated under these conditions. The rifles are not hand guns and are not covered under the city ordinance as such, he said. In what was termed a special announcement to “all people of our black community” the report said, “The Toledo chapter of the Black Panther party will be waging a campaign against narcotic traffic, prostitution, and crime in our black community.” It continued that Robert Ward “was murdered this past Thursday because of a narcotic and parole violation: this is the last black brother to be murdered by a white man supposedly performing a public protective police service in Toledo’s war against narcotic traffic, prostitution, and crime in Toledo’s black community.” The notice was over the name of Mike Cross, as deputy minister of defense of the Toledo chapter. The coroner’s office ruled self-defense in the shooting of Ward by Donald Shugarman, a state parole officer. 32

“Negro Group Patrols Dorr Street Area,” Toledo Blade, March 29, 1970.

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4.3.7 Local Black Leaders Hail King Holiday (1983)33 The national holiday to mark the life of Martin Luther King and his accomplishments should serve as a beacon of hope to young blacks and a symbol of the nonviolent struggle for civil rights for all Americans, local black leaders said Wednesday night. In telephone interviews, community black leaders expressed the hope that the day would be observed in reflection on Dr. King’s lifelong pursuit of the human principles of freedom, justice, and equality. Judge Robert Franklin, of the Lucas County Common Pleas Court, a former colleague and schoolmate of the late Dr. King, said the national holiday is a “great honor” and “very significant.” In reference to Dr. King’s assassination, Judge Franklin said the holiday is a recognition by Congress that Dr. King had “given up his life in the quest of freedom and should be rewarded.” City Councilman Bill Copeland said the action “indicates America recognizes what he has done and accomplished,” and his guiding principle of the nonviolent struggle for civil rights. “It means more to the black community,” Mr. Copeland said. “Generally what he stood for affected all our lives. We are still living out that concept.” The Rev. Floyd Rose, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Toledo branch, said the slain civil rights leader “suffered and died over principles that are in the best American tradition.” “It is our view,” Mr. Rose said, “that he was not simply a black leader, but a leader who happened to be black.” Mr. Rose joined others in expressing the hope the holiday would not become “just another day off from work and school.” He said the day would best be observed by reflection on Dr. King’s themes of “equal rights, justice, freedom, and the dream.” Mr. Copeland said the day should be observed like all national holidays, with each locale celebrating it in its own fashion. “Each state will have to take its own initiative,” he said. Judge Charles Doneghy, of the Toledo Municipal Court, said the recognition of Martin Luther King Day as a national holiday is as much an observance of the civil rights movement as it is of the man himself. The judge said the national holiday also marks a realization that Dr. King represented something broader than local civil rights activity, and like the ­Nobel Peace Prize awarded Dr. King, the holiday recognizes his efforts for 33

“Local Black Leaders Hail King Holiday,” Toledo Blade, October 20, 1983, 4.

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“­ human values and human decency for all men, regardless of their race, place, or station.” 4.3.8 Jimmy Jackson, Sports Hero and Businessman34 Two things are immediately apparent when you wander into Jackson’s Lounge and Grill on Huron Street in downtown Toledo. First, everyone is smiling. The customers are smiling, the servers are smiling. People are smiling at each other and talking to each other across tables and across the dining room. It’s not just lunch at Jackson’s. It’s a midday social gathering. The second thing that grabs your attention, at least during this nba off-­ season, is that Jimmy Jackson himself is there in his recently opened establishment. But Jackson is not just present. He is certainly making his presence felt. He works the room assiduously. He schmoozes the customers, he confers with the staff, he changes the channels on the tv behind the bar. And everyone schmoozes right back. Everyone has a word of appreciation. “Nice place, Jimmy” rings out constantly as Jackson takes care to graciously thank everyone who bestows a compliment and to say a few words to anyone who approaches. Jimmy Jackson, Toledo native and resident and Macomber High School graduate, where he led the team to its only state basketball championship. Jimmy Jackson, All-American at Ohio State University where he led the team to two Big Ten titles. Jimmy Jackson, businessman and community activist— make that Toledo businessman and community activist. Now, as Jackson enters his 11th year of professional basketball, he has thrown himself into full-fledged activity for career number two. By his own reckoning he expects to play “three of four more years” in the nba. After that, no more organized basketball. He is not going to be a coach on any level, he says, or a general manager or a franchise owner. He is already doing what he will be doing for many years to come. Is the passion for business a new one? “No, my heart has always been in business,” he says. And his is very specific about what type of businessman he is. He is “hands on.” He is not a silentpartner type and, in spite of the relatively high profile a restaurant provides, he is certainly not seeking out the glamorous enterprises—sports and entertainment, for example.

34

Fletcher Word, “Jimmy Jackson Shows Toledo You Can Come Home Again,” The Sojourner’s Truth 4, no. 1 (September 24, 2003): 5.

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As president and ceo of the jaj Company, his first venture was the purchase of the Adaris Group a year ago. Adaris is an engineering firm that specializes in soil, concrete and asphalt testing. The restaurant, Jackson’s Lounge and Grill, was purchased and remodeled as a venture for his father. And next on the agenda for the jaj Company is an “auto spa” that will include an eatery, and possibly a retail center, at the corner of Dorr and Upton, right in the heart of the neighborhood where Jackson grew up. Jackson has always been “all about business” but not just any type of business and not just anywhere. He is growing his business concerns in the central city because of more than mere coincidence. “It was a conscious effort of mine to help revitalize that neighborhood. If I don’t do it, or if we as minorities don’t do it, we can’t expect others to come in and do it.” Jackson’s commitment to the community has also been expressed through his James A. Jackson Foundation (jjf). The foundation has contributed funds over the years to the Frank W. Hale Jr. Black Cultural Center, the osu Department of Athletics, the Boys and Girls Clubs, Big Brothers, Big Sisters of Greater Toledo, the ywca’s Encore Plus Program, the Wayman Palmer Center and the Frederick Douglass Community Association, among others. He is the sponsor of a free week-long basketball youth clinic at the University of Toledo and sponsors a yearly aau basketball team. Jackson is the founder and sponsor of the Glass City Summer Basketball League and the ut Jim Jackson Summer Minority Institute. He has also become a fixture on the local scene delivering motivational speeches. As Jackson’s nba career winds down, the success he is working toward as a businessman should make that transition a bit easier. But there is still for Jackson some unfinished business in career number one. As the number four draft pick by Dallas after his junior year at osu, Jackson was poised for a number of years on the brink of stardom. However, bad team chemistry in Dallas—on and off the court—with the other two “J’s” (Jason Kidd and Jamal Mashburn), a bad ankle sprain in 1995, ownership/management changes in Dallas and a perplexing and undeserved reputation for selfishness prevented the superstardom that many had predicted for him when he left osu. Every year, for the last three of four years, Jackson has been kept dangling by nba teams as they try to find the last pieces to the puzzle entering the season. Last year, he did not get the call from Sacramento until after Thanksgiving. But it was worth the wait. Jackson calls the Sacramento experience—players, coaches and ownership—the best of his career. And had it not been for a playoff injury to Chris Webber, Jackson might have earned his first championship ring.

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This year Sacramento decided to go in a different direction—without Jackson. He is now waiting for the call, the summons back to the big time. A ring would be nice, but being that he is “all about business,” the ring is not the only incentive to keep playing. He will readily admit to having, as the cliché goes, “a love of the game.” However, he is candid about “the financial situation,” as he calls it. “The ability to reap the rewards earned because of a lifetime of lots of hard work.” And as he waits for the call, business goes on. His goal is “to continue to grow” the businesses that he has and to ensure their stability before he spreads his wings too far afield. Jackson is married to Shawnee, a Chicago native, whom he met in Atlanta. He has one son, Traevon, 10 years old, who lives with his mother in Columbus. Social Cyberpower in the Everyday Life of an African American Community (2004)35 What will the experience of the African American community be in the information age? This is a critical question as it appears more and more that the social transformation underway utilizing information technology is permanent and increasingly redefining standards for social life: literacy, job readiness, upward social mobility, and social power. Most African Americans were not among the early adopters of this new technology and therefore appear to be beginning the 21st century in much the same way as the 20th century, not at the cutting edge of economic development. This reality can be changed. The Murchison Center began in 1992 as a program of the St. James Baptist Church. It has become a full service community technology center, with 20 networked work stations, cable internet connection, and capacity for printing and multimedia. The program includes after school tutoring and adult c­ lasses four nights a week. The annual budget of the Murchison Center has been about $30,000, not including vista funding, which pays several volunteers just under $800 per month. There have been stages when the decisive influence on the center was the church, the government, and then the university. Each stage was cumulative, so that previous influence and contributions were not lost.

4.3.9

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Abdul Alkalimat, “Social Cyber Power in the Everyday Life of an African American Community: A Report on Action-Research in Toledo, Ohio,” in Community Practice in the Network Society: Local Action/Global Interaction, ed. Peter Day and Doug Schuler (London, Routledge, 2004).

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Current transformations appear to be towards greater community influence and inputs to the Murchison Center.36 The local community is the kind of neighborhood where people are usually locked out of the access and training needed to be an active part of the information society. As master’s student, center co-founder and executive director Deborah Hamilton described the area: It is located in central city Toledo where the community … is 70% poor or near poor. Ninety-seven per cent are African American in the immediate area (census tracts 25 and 26, Toledo, Ohio). The 1990 median income is $12,400 and $15,400 respectively in both census tracts. Single mothers head more than 60% of the households. One fourth of the residents are under 13 years of age.37 Toledo has had considerable effort put into developing community level ­technology resources. Two 1996 initiatives led to the formation of a local organization called Coalition to Access Technology and Networking in Toledo or CATNeT (http://uac.utoledo.edu/metronet/catnet/). A local housing manager got a Housing and Urban Development grant to build and staff several computer labs in private apartment complexes, and a local academic researcher got involved with a State of Ohio initiative, the Urban University Neighborhood Network. The network started with 9 labs and now has a membership of 34 labs.38 A recent survey to locate all of the public computing in Toledo found over 250 public access sites including schools and libraries.39 In a­ ddition, the ­Toledo labs are active in a statewide organization (Ohio C ­ ommunity ­Computing

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Abdul Alkalimat and Kate Williams, “Social Capital and Cyberpower in the African American Community: A Case Study of a Community Technology Center in the Dual City.” Pages 178–204 in Community Informatics: Shaping Computer Mediated Social Relations, Leigh Keeble and Brian Loader, editors. London: Routledge, 2001. Hamilton, Deborah. “Sustainability of a Community Technology Center: Action Research at the Murchison Community Center, Toledo, Ohio. Master’s thesis.” In Toledo Spiders Masters Class of 2002, published by Africana Studies Program, University of Toledo, May 2002. Page 13. Stoecker, Randy, and Angela C.S. Stuber. 1997. “Limited Access: The Information Superhighway and Ohio’s Neighborhood-Based Organizations.” Computers in Human Services. 14:39–57. Kate Williams and Abdul Alkalimat, “A Census of Public Computing in Toledo, Ohio,” pages 85–110 in Shaping the Network Society: The New Role of Civic Society in Cyberspace, Doug Schuler and Peter Day, editors. Cambridge, Mass.: The mit Press, 2004.

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­Network, http://www.occcn.org) and a national organization (Community Technology Centers Network, http://www.ctcnet.org). The Toledo model … proposes how a socially excluded community can be transformed into a networked community, able to mobilize cyberpower to ­advance its interests. In the model, the transformation from a historical community to a networked community is catalyzed by cyberorganizers and by the organizing and mobilizing impact of the content and interactivity of ­cyberspace. This is how the actual social organization of the community can create or cooperate with cyberorganizers to build an existence in cyberspace. The process intensifies as the community becomes more engaged in using i­nformation technology and dependent on the new opportunities of an entire community sharing a virtual collectivity. It is precisely this collective that will learn how to act, first in cyberspace like sending mass emails or signing a ­petition, or swarming emails, then by leaving cyberspace and taking action in the real world. Both of these actions, virtual and actual can be called c­ yberpower as the key staging area for the collective action was in cyberspace. 4.3.9.1 Cyberhair 4.3.9.1.1 Historical Community Taken together, hair care and hair design are an important part of social life, culture and identity in every society. In the black community they are especially critical because African hair has unique qualities for hair sculpture and because there is a long tradition of African American cultural excellence in this activity. The hair salons are centers of economic, cultural and social action. Doing hair is rooted in deep cultural economics, encompassing family labor, barter with friends, or doing it by oneself. The beauty salon was created to provide a service in the urban black community, especially in the 20th century. As a result of proletarianization, African American families became smaller, family networks were de-territorialized, and many services became commodified. The salons became centers of cultural production and economic exchange as well as “third places,” sites of public discourse that form a hub serving across a dense network of families, friends and acquaintances. Transgenerational interlocking networks of families and churches are vehicles for discourse. Beauty salons are a vital part of the African American public sphere. The main icon of the black woman as entrepreneur is Madame C.J. Walker, founding leader of the black hair care industry. She invented a new chemical process for hair care and design. But her impact went way beyond this. She recruited and trained a corps of hair care workers thereby giving beauticians

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a greater professional profile. This was the most stable form of independent business ownership for black women in the 20th century. She provided significant financial and moral support to the writers, artists, and institution-builders who became known as the “Harlem Renaissance.” She also did so with the political militants of the “New Negro” movement. However, today the political economy of the black hair care industry is changing. One major example is the retailing and wholesaling of black hair care products. In Toledo there is one black hair products distribution company over 40 years old. Over the last ten years Asian business interests have opened at least four megastores, each with more than ten times the floor space and product selection. Salons located in the major malls and department stores now include black people in their market. This has led to a tension between the traditionally more networked, “conversation-intense,” and slower beauty parlor in the community and doing hair as a commodity in a time-driven, mass market, mall environment. The beauty salon in the black community has historical roots but is in a state of crisis. There is some hope for the future, however, as the main black high school has a growing cosmetology program. Enrollment there is greater than that in many of the more high tech areas that lead to a college major in engineering and computer science. Enrolling in cosmetology is also evidence of a desire to get a skill and possibly be self-employed and able to support oneself and a family. 4.3.9.1.2 Cyberorganizing The Cyberhair project emerged in three stages: a conference, a class project, and a ma thesis project. The conference defined the project, the class began the enumeration of salons, and the thesis work built the Cyberhair website, “Black People’s Hair.” A symposium was held on 6–7 March 1997, “Black Peoples Hair: A Symposium on the Political Culture of Everyday Life.” … The conference was scholarly, with presentations on the mutual influence of African and African America hairstyles over the last five centuries. It was practical, with hair braiders demonstrating their work on volunteers. And it was emotional and personal, with participants sharing stories of their struggles with their hair and their identity. The conference set the framework for the Cyberhair project in three ways. The project would focus on cultural production rather than cultural performance. It would advocate Panafricanism as a cultural approach. And it would advocate the adoption of information technology as a technological foundation.

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The Africana Studies program then organized an undergraduate course called Cyberspace and the black Experience.40 Along with readings and seminar discussions, the course initiated a practical research project to build a database of Toledo’s African American beauty salons. Here a debate emerged over whether it was a “politically correct” action to study places that were hostile to a positive black identity, meaning did anything other than natural hairstyles. The one sister in the class with “trendy locks” was opposed to going to the beauty salons for this reason, but the others who all wore styles more in the mainstream of Black Toledo agreed that this project would make a big impact on the overall black community. They were responding to the design of the assignment, to build a cyberresource that might motivate people to become computer literate and cross over the digital divide. The one young man in the class took up the task of completing the database as his master’s project in Africana Studies. In his thesis, Brian Zelip explains his situation: “I am a white male. Every salon I went to was a black salon. 78% of the salons were owned by women. All of the salon owners were in their mid-30’s or older, whereas at the time of the research I was 24 years old …. It was anticipated that the research being carried out by me would be faced with some degree of resistance and non-cooperation.”41 He bases this on the social meaning of color, gender, hair and age. However, he then attributes his success to how these barriers were overcome: the salon owners’ respect for the research sponsors (ut Africana Studies and the Murchison Center) and for his knowledge of the African American community and culture. Zelip had been the hip-hop deejay on the campus radio station. 4.3.9.1.3 Cyberspace The website was built around the 1997 hair conference, the database of beauty salons, and a collection of images of Afro combs. This anchored the digital identity of virtual black hair in the actual space of cultural production rather than cultural performance. Beauty magazines stress cultural performance— gorgeous women, lots of documentation of spectacular events, product ads, and celebrities. The magazines are like dream books to guide stylist and the customer. In contrast, Cyberhair’s emphasis on cultural production targeted the universal experience of everyday life: 40 41

Alison Schneider, “Africana Studies 4900, ‘Cyberspace and the Black Experience,’ at U. of Toledo,” Chronicle of Higher Education (May 19, 2000, page A18). Zelip, Brian. “Black People’s Hair: The Digitization of Popular Culture. Master’s thesis.” In Toledo Spiders Masters Class of 2002, published by Africana Studies Program, University of Toledo, May 2002. Page 88.

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The Africana Studies Media Lab digitized a collection of combs from the us and elsewhere that the author gathered over a 35 year period. The process of organizing the digitized images facilitated our discovery that the Afro comb has passed through four historical stages: traditional, industrial, Panafrican, and global. The combs began in traditional ­society (made of wood), underwent further development in industrial society (metal), took new forms during the struggles for national liberation (wood, ­metal, and plastic), and now reflect the reality of globalization (extruded plastic).42 4.3.9.1.4 Networked Community In the project, students became cyberorganizers, relying on the historical community of salon owners, stylists, and customers to help build the site and determine its future evolution. Out of fifty salons, seven owners were found to have active email addresses, but none of the shops had a computer in the salon for business or the public. But as a result of contact with our project several salon owners and stylists have taken computer classes at the Murchison Center. Zelip went on a study tour of South Africa and took the opportunity to document hair care practices. On one occasion he found a beauty salon next to a cybercafé. The hair stylists had never been online. He gathered them in the cybercafé to view black People’s Hair on the web. When he returned to Toledo, he showed slides of the South African experience to the stylists who were in the site. This is a small example of cyberspace creating a Panafrican experience at the grass roots in the 21st century. Survey data collected by students identified a small number of salon owners who are interested in making efforts to use computers and the Internet. The Murchison Center set aside computers to place into salons, and a master’s student from the University of Michigan School of Information joined the project as cyberorganizer to carry out the installation and support of the pcs. This will enable the project to support the use of software for the salon as business, and the Internet and the World Wide Web for customers. In the future we will investigate the possibility of uniting an intensely individualistic group of entrepreneurs into a collectivity to serve common interests. 4.3.9.1.5 Conclusion Just as there are many bridges across the digital divide, there are alternative ways for a community to become networked. There are at least five models: 42

Zelip, 2002.

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(1)  early utopian community free-net projects, (2) experimental communities like Netville, (3) dot-coms built for mass participation like eBay, (4) social movements and political campaigns, and (5) public computing for social cyberpower. We have reported on action-research in Toledo, Ohio, involving a project to implement and study the public computing model, based at the Murchison Community Center. 4.3.10 Powell’s Beauty & Barber Supplies43 Powell’s Beauty & Barber Supplies is owned by the Powell Family and run by Calvin Powell. Powell’s is located at 901 Nebraska Avenue; it was originally opened in 1966 across the street from where it is now located. Powell’s is the only African‐American owned Beauty and Barber Supply business in Toledo.

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Calvin Powell (owner, Powell’s Beauty & Barber Supplies), interview by Renee’ Dunnavant, March 27, 2016.

chapter 5

Survival during Deindustrialization (2000–2016) Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson The opening of the twenty-first century provided many exciting opportunities and menacing threats to Toledoans, Americans, and citizens of the world. Two of the more powerful emerging forces that reshaped social institutions and conventions everywhere were the Internet and globalization. The economy, the family, personal aspirations, modalities of romance-seeking and fellowship, and the ability to harm others en masse have been transformed by this t­ echnology and the process of global social integration. Globalization is a dialectical process of local events being shaped by and shaping events far away, which contributes to a global consciousness. Many also see globalization as primarily the latest neoliberal stage of global capitalism. Larry Bartels in Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age chronicles the collusion between plutocrats and politicians to rig the global political and economic systems to their advantage against global society’s general welfare.1 Articles presented in this final stage illustrate how Black Toledoans were caught up in these cross currents that impacted everyone. However, a brief historical account of major twenty-firstcentury developments provides a context in relation to the selected articles. Mark Mizruchi in The Fracturing of the American Corporate Elite argues that “the American corporate elite once played an important role in addressing … the needs of the larger society. Since the 1970s, the members of this group have largely abandoned their concern with issues in the United States beyond those of their individual firms.”2 Thus: as George H.W. Bush’s Treasury Secretary, Nicholas Brady, put it, ‘Wall Street … financed the building of this country’s industrial capacity and infrastructure’ (quoted in Johnson, 2010, p. 62). National development coincided in a mutually beneficial fashion with wealth accumulation for leading capitalists in Western countries.3 1 Larry Bartels, Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age (Princeton, nj: Princeton University Press, 2008). 2 Mark Mizruchi, The Fracturing of the American Corporate Elite (Cambridge, ma: Harvard University Press, 2013), 4. 3 Patterson, Rubin. Transnational Capitalist Class: What’s Race Got to Do With It? Everything! Globalizations 10, 5, 673–690 (2013), quoting Johnson, S. 13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown. New York: Pantheon Books, 2010, p. 62. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi 10.1163/9789004281899_006

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The Toledo industrial landscape is littered with abandoned buildings that are testament to the abandoned commitment to America by financiers and industrialists. Businesses in municipalities that once thrived on providing services to the industrial and technology employees and subcontracting the workforce for the Fords and ibms of the economy also collapsed, thereby rippling and amplifying unemployment in the broader community. Between 2001 and the banking crisis of 2008, the United States lost 42,400 factories, including 36% of factories that employed more than 1,000 employees.4 Since manufacturing wages are as much as 20% higher than wages in other sectors for workers of similar skills and credentials, the loss of these jobs contributes to growing inequality and poverty. During the middle of the twentieth century, the largest u.s. employers included General Motors, Ford, and United States Steel, which all paid high wages, whereas by the beginning of the twenty-first century the largest employers included Wal-Mart, McDonald’s, and Kroger, all of which pay low wages. With the success of the Internet and other burgeoning markets, the twentyfirst century welcomed further globalization, but it came with a hefty price. Repercussions from the past, such as former President Reagan’s “War on Drugs” along with former President Clinton’s “Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994,” as well as his “Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, aka the Welfare Reform Act, manifested in nefarious ways. The War on Drugs” led to mass incarceration and the gross disfiguring of the black community. Welfare reform wrought consequences far more ominous and debilitating than was originally understood by the black community or by analysts of welfare policy, considering the fact that the 1996 Welfare Reform Act shifted resources from the unemployed to lower-income employed citizens. Those who were unemployed were largely left to fend for themselves. The bombing of the Twin Towers and the countless lives lost on American soil, 9/11, ignited the War on Terror under former President Bush. As a result, Islamophobia and xenophobia permeated the mediascape, both in America and abroad. The globalization and automation of production contributed to the deindustrialization of America and the attendant growth in inequality, poverty, family dissolution, and the devastation of inner cities across America. In his classic book When Work Disappears: The World of the New Urban Poor, William Julius Wilson describes the unfolding impact of this process in considerable 4 McCormack, 2009.

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detail.5 One can easily see Toledo in the unfolding deindustrialization process described in Wilson’s work. In the first decade of the twenty-first century, metro Toledo lost 50,000 jobs, which constituted nearly 1 in 12 jobs statewide, whereas Toledo has only 1 in 40 Ohio residents. This means that Toledo lost more than three times the jobs as other areas of the state, or three times its share of jobs. The Buckeye State had 594,000 fewer nonfarm jobs at the end of 2010 than it did at the turn of the twenty-first century, over 400,000 of these jobs lost in Ohio were in manufacturing, and, again, manufacturing wages are higher on average than wages in other sectors of the economy. Since 2012, the manufacturing picture in Toledo has begun to improve. Some of this improvement can be explained as a narrowing of the production gap as reported in The Economist.6 Now that unions of manufacturing workers have been weakened, leading to real u.s. wages declining by 2.2% since 2005 while wages have risen by 19% per year in India and China, global labor arbitrage is not as advantageous as it was previously. This means the lower wages in countries such as China and India are no longer sufficiently low so as to almost automatically result in moving production facilities from the United States to those countries and then repatriating the productions for distribution in the United States. In fact, companies are beginning to “reshore” on America. In 2012, a survey of “American companies” with sales of over $10 billion reported that 48% of them have begun or have plans to reshore more manufacturing in the United States. Reductions in energy costs due significantly to fracking in the Northeastern part of the state have also contributed to some reshoring. However, fracking comes at enormous human health and environmental costs, from earthquakes to groundwater contamination, to exposure to toxic chemicals, to methane leaks contributing to climate change, among other problems. Many lives were loss in this violence [...], but other sorts of violence directly affected certain communities in the u.s. For example, Hurricane Katrina was a powerful storm that was a human-made disaster due to public policy choices, from expanding heat-trapping gases, to weakening wetlands and other ­ecosystems, and the inadequate construction of levees, among other policy choices. These public policy choices, formulated and implemented by politicians, left many black families with their homes completely destroyed and their lives totally upended. The lethal combination of Reagan’s War on Drugs 5 William Julius Wilson, When Work Disappears: The World of the New Urban Poor (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996). 6 From The Economist, 2013.

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and Clinton’s Crime Bill tremendously adversely impacted numerous black families who were split apart to feed, in many cases, for-profit mass incarceration. Increased police violence fueled the #BlackLivesMatter movement, beginning after the nonindictment of George Zimmerman, who pursued and killed the unarmed Trayvon Martin in 2012. Many other fatal attacks from police upon unarmed black people have received much scrutiny, including those on Aiyana Jones, Mike Brown, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Sandra Bland, Freddie Gray, Quintonio Legrier, Betty Jones, and countless others. Suggested policies have been to make police officers wear cameras and to use community policing to reduce fatalities. The quality of life and overall life chances for citizens of a community are shaped by the broader opportunity structure of the economy and society. University of Chicago political scientist Michael Dawson developed the notion of “linked fate” as an analytical method for understanding common or baseline political affiliations and sensibilities among Americans, almost irrespective of their position on the economic scale. Most African Americans in Toledo remained primarily in predominantly black, inner city, poor, and working-class communities, and the ongoing tough economic picture during the first dozen years of the twenty-first century only served to reinforce the political “linked fate” principle, notwithstanding the rat-a-tat of urban violence in Toledo’s Black community. Despite the predominance of Blackness in the black community, the economic diversity among African Americans is expanding. Frye (2014) is among those demographers chronicling the inner city-to-suburbia black flight in ­recent decades: Consider, for instance, that among central cities of the 100 largest metropolitan areas, 33 experienced declines in their black populations….  Among the largest 100 metropolitan areas, 96 showed gains in their suburban black populations. Of these, 76 had larger increases in the past decade than in the 1990s.7 Increasingly, African Americans may be continuing to vote Democrat up and down the ticket and be supportive of heavy government involvement in areas of equity promotion, but their social and cultural experiences are diversifying by class and other dimensions. The articles in Stage Four reflect this transformation.

7 Frye, 2014.

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In 2008, America went into a recession, and then Senator Barack Obama was elected as President of the United States, the first African American to hold the position. The first bill he signed as president was to bail out American companies and banks that were “too big to fail.” Some of these companies employed more than 50,000 Toledoans. But many of these positions were consolidated or outsourced. President Obama, through the Affordable Care Act (aca), also fulfilled his promise of transforming the health care industry, moving closer to universal health care. Of the 21,000 uninsured Toledo City and Lucas County residents, the aca was an option to help people take control of their health. Despite these global hardships faced in the last sixteen years, Toledoans, particularly Black Toledoans, remain hopeful for a brighter future. Advancements in early childhood education and postsecondary education give e­ vidence of a better community that new generations will inherit and build upon. The green industry continued to take root in Toledo, which has the potential to help diversify the city’s economy, as well as engage Black Americans in associated trades and career opportunities. Toledo’s traditions of celebrating African American culture, dance, and music continue as they bring the community together. In all, Black Toledoans have stood firm against adversities as witnessed in Black Toledo since 1787, and this perseverance has propelled the community to continue to push for a better tomorrow. In Stage Four, selected articles discuss notable Black Toledoans’ projects and festivals and how they have kept the community thriving. This last stage will present the evolution of Black Toledoans as well as highlight where Toledo should be headed. 5.1

Facing Poverty and Twenty-first-century Racism (Documents 80–83)

The crisis facing African Americans in Toledo follow the national patterns of what is happening to other cities. Ohio is one of the most urbanized states, with 78% of Ohioans living in urban areas, including Cleveland, Akron, Cincinnati, Dayton, and Columbus. The infant mortality rate runs in the depths of a third-world country (Document 80). As of 2011, Toledo is the us city with the highest leap in concentrated poverty, that is, poor people living in poor neighborhoods.8 Nazis are on the march (Document 81). Black males are particularly suffering (Document 82), but there continues to be the advocacy of black business development by the middle class (Document 83). 8 “Toledo Area Poverty Rise Worst in the U.S.”. Toledo Blade. December 15, 2016. http://www .toledoblade.com/Economy/2011/11/03/Toledo-area-poverty-rate-worst-in-U-S.html.

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5.1.1 Population9 Rob Hibbard grew up in an all-white North Toledo neighborhood, and he remembers a time when blacks were chased out of the area for daring to enter it. Lisa Culp grew up in an all-black central city neighborhood, and she remembers a time when that area had few, if any, whites. They both moved their families to the 2000 block of Mansfield Road in the last decade. Now their children are among the many of different families and races playing together in the West Toledo neighborhood. “Everybody gets along,” Mr. Hibbard said. “I don’t have a problem.” The Hibbards and Culps are front-line witnesses to a substantial drop in neighborhood racial isolation in Lucas County in the last decade. Since 1990, roughly 62,000 more people—black and white—are more likely to see someone of a different race when they walk their dog, get their mail, or mow their lawn. They are people who live in census blocks—small areas of about 100 people—where the racial makeup dropped below 85 percent for one race. While racial isolation remains the norm in the county, an analysis by the Blade of figures from the u.s. Census Bureau shows: • In 1990, more than 84 percent of whites and more than 43 percent of blacks in Lucas County lived in racial isolation. • But by 2000, the percentages of people living in racially isolated neighborhoods had dropped to 74 percent for whites and 34 percent for blacks. The analysis does not include migration of the county’s Hispanic population, because the census bureau does not classify Hispanic as a race, such as Caucasian or African-American, but as an ethnicity, such as Irish or German. Integration has changed the faces of several Toledo neighborhoods, from the Polish Village in North Toledo to the old Colony neighborhood in West Toledo. It also has changed the makeup of schools in the area and is expected to affect the realignment of city council districts. To be sure, Toledo in 2000 is not the racial utopia that some social activists have dreamed of. The analysis shows that integration in the county is mostly because of black families moving into formerly all-white neighborhoods in Toledo. They’re taking the place of whites who die or move out to the suburbs, and Toledo’s decrease in whites still outnumbers its increase in other races. 9 Joe Mahr, “Fewer Racial Barriers in Lucas County: Now Numbers Show Divide Narrowing though Separation Is Still the Norm,” Toledo Blade, Sec. A, May 20, 2001.

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The trend has left more inner-city census tracts with no whites, from 142 in 1990 to 183 in 2000. They house about 10 percent of the county’s black population. At the same time, the migration of blacks nearly halved the number of Lucas County whites living in wholly white census tracts. In 1990, 115,398 whites—30 percent of the white population—lived in blocks without an ­African ­American. In 2000, that number was down to 66,852 people, or 19 percent of the county’s white population. And while blacks experienced double-digit percentage gains in many outlying counties, they remained a small share of the population, from 1.9 percent in Monroe County to 0.2 percent in Fulton County. With blacks holding such a small share of the population, racial isolation remains rooted in suburban counties like Wood, where 90.5 percent of the population lived in racial isolation in 1990. Ten years later, that level had dropped just 1.5 percent, and none of the county’s census blocks was at least half black. In Lucas County, the integration has left some older, white residents uneasy about the changes—particularly in formerly working class enclaves like the Lagrange area. But many of the residents of the newly integrated areas, of both races, said they have had few problems living side by side. Still, the trend leaves a question for academics: Will the newly integrated neighborhoods remain integrated, or is the integration that went on in the  1990s  just a transition to neighborhoods that eventually will become all-black? 5.1.1.1 Toledo’s segregation For much of the 20th century, integration was a dirty word. Real estate agents, bankers, and landlords forced most Toledo blacks to live in certain pockets of the city. The biggest was a triangle-shaped area of the central city—south of Washington Street and north of Erie Street—that expanded west as more blacks came to the city. Still, it was never big enough to meet housing demand—forcing blacks to cram a dozen or more friends and family members into decaying rental homes and even garages. By the 1940s the area was being called “the ghetto.” By then, a national appraisal guideline warned that “the infiltration of inharmonious racial groups” would slash property values—providing even nonracist whites a reason to shudder at integration. City council in 1967 passed an ordinance forbidding housing discrimination, only for Toledoans to vote down the ordinance at the polls, by more than 2-to-1.

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The point was moot a year later, when Congress passed a national fair ­housing law. By 1990, many neighborhoods between Ottawa Park and Hill Avenue had been integrated, along with a neighborhood just east of Toledo Hospital and a handful of pockets in East Toledo. Integration became the norm as well for nearly all neighborhoods inside the I-75/ I-280 interstate ring around the central city. The most notable exception was the Polish Village—an area centered at Lagrange Street and Central Avenue. That, however, would change by 2000—one of the many racial shifts in the county. 2000 Census figures show: • In a triangular-shaped area bordered by Cherry Street, the Maumee River, and Manhattan Boulevard, there was a loss of 7,841 whites over the last ­decade and an increase of 3,854 blacks. Between 1990 and 2000, the ratio of whites to blacks had dropped from 2-to-1 to nearly even. • From Toledo Hospital west to Douglas Road, north to Sylvania Avenue, and east to Jackman Road, there was a loss of 1,487 whites and a gain of 838 blacks, with blacks growing from 8 to 18 percent of the population. • Pockets of integration appeared in South Toledo, south and east of Highland Park, and the western edge of Toledo up to Reynolds Road. The affluent Valleybrook subdivision—northeast of Reynolds and Bancroft Street—now is a third black. • And, busting the white-to-black trend, four census blocks in eastern Spencer Township in the western part of the county turned from black ­segregation to integrated. Whites seeking greener pastures have built expensive homes in the sandy-soiled area once home to an enclave of black farmers—going from 89 percent black in 1990 to 70 percent black in 2000. Dr. Carter Wilson, a political science professor at the University of Toledo, said part of the trend may be explained by the general nature of integration. Racial and ethnic groups historically spread out, slowly, from their core housing areas. “It is rare for racial and ethnic populations to hop over areas,” he said. So as whites continue their outward migration—in search of bigger homes, better-perceived suburban schools, and less crime—the city’s black population may be doing the same thing from the central city, albeit a few decades and miles behind whites.

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Dr. Patrick McGuire, who heads ut’s Urban Affairs Center, said low-income areas like North Toledo adjoin the central city and offer affordable housing for low-income blacks. For middle- to upper-income blacks, nearby areas of West Toledo beckon. Dr. McGuire argues that the dispersion of whites and blacks has less to do with race and more to do with how much people can afford for housing. In other words, it’s not the “white flight” of old. 5.1.1.2 Change on Lagrange When civil rights activists chose to protest the defeat of the fair housing referendum in 1967, they marched through the heart of the Polish Village, a predominantly white area that was home to thousands of Polish descendants who resoundingly voted to overturn the ordinance. The 500 mostly black marchers were met by about 150 jeering whites at Central and Lagrange as they trekked to Woodward High School. You wouldn’t know it from talking to Essie Foster. The 62-year-old African American moved into a home just a half-block from the corner in 1991—with her family becoming the first blacks on the block. Ms. Foster had endured glares and resentment growing up in Alabama, and she feared her family would endure such resentment on Central Avenue. The opposite happened. A white neighbor quickly came over to greet them after they moved in, and others welcomed them on the block. Now other blacks have moved to the block, and she said no one appears to have a problem with race. “It kind of surprised me,” she said, as she sat on her front steps with her great-granddaughter, 5. “We even get Christmas cards from a [white] neighbor,” Ms. Foster said with a smile. Ms. Foster is among the participants of the biggest racial shift in any Lucas County neighborhood in the 1990s. For every two blacks who lived in North Toledo in 1990, there were three by 2000. And, for every three whites there in 1990, there were two by 2000. The change can be seen in the ranks of the six elementary schools that predominantly draw students from the area. In 1990, their combined enrollment was 45 percent white and 46 percent black. Today, it is 62 percent black and 27 percent white. The rest include other races and Hispanic students, which, unlike the census, the district considers a separate race. Such population shifts have fueled overall changes in the district’s racial makeup. Toledo Public Schools—which covers much of Toledo—has gone

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from a majority white district, 57 percent in 1990, to one where black students narrowly outnumber whites, 46 percent to 45 percent. The racial migration in North Toledo led one of the area’s lead economic development engines—Lagrange Development Corporation—to change the symbolic name of its business district in 1998 from the Polish Village to the Polish International Village. And now the development corporation—for the first time in its 20-year ­history—has a president who is black, Olivia Holden. For the Polish Village—a mix of low- to middle-income neighborhoods— the demographic changes likely will coincide with a change in city council districts. The districts must be redrawn to reflect uneven population losses throughout the city, and 4,700 more Polish Village residents—everyone south of ­Central—are expected to be switched from the predominantly white District 6 to the predominantly black District 4. The area has experienced changes besides racial demographics. Compared to the rest of the city, crime isn’t decreasing as fast. The rate of serious felonies in North Toledo dropped by 10 percent in the 1990s, half the citywide average, according to an analysis of Toledo police statistics. Real estate values aren’t increasing as fast either. For single-family houses built in North Toledo before 1988, median value has increased 22 percent since then, while the median value of all singlefamily houses in the city rose 54 per cent, according to the county auditor’s office. Some older white residents, like Farris Caperton, point to a deteriorating neighborhood and blame the insurgence of blacks. “They expect everyone to step around them, listen to their complaints, and cater to them,” he said in between sips of a beer at a Lagrange Street bar. “I ain’t going to do that.” But many other whites—young and old—shake their heads at any suggestion that race has played a part in the area’s problems. It’s an influx of r­ enters— of any race—who lack respect for their properties and landlords unwilling to demand it, they say. “I think the people are moving out of this area because the crime is getting bad and things are getting out-of-control,” said white resident Don Carey, a neighborhood activist. “It’s not a racial thing. It’s a slumlord thing.” In fact, Ms. Holden and Terry Glazer—Lagrange development’s executive director and a Toledo Public Schools board member—say the neighborhood’s saving grace could be its diversity. If neighborhood leaders can stamp out neighborhood blight, improve schools, and bring down crime even more, they believe the area’s diversity will

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lure a growing market of homebuyers who loathe cookie-cutter, lily-white suburban neighborhoods. “You ever gone to dinner and had mashed potatoes and mashed potatoes and mashed potatoes? Tell me, is that good?” Ms. Holden said with a smile. “I prefer … a melting pot of people with new ideas, good ideas.” 5.1.1.3 The Colony The buffet of races has taken hold in another part of the city without any effect on crime or property values. In the recently integrated Colony area around Toledo Hospital and just north, single-family housing values have increased 54 percent since 1988—the same as the city as a whole. And, during the 1990s, the rate of serious felonies dropped 26 percent—better than the citywide average. Mr. Hibbard and his wife, Deb, who are white, moved to Mansfield Road from North Toledo in 1993. They said they didn’t see an area that was undergoing racial change. They saw a stable neighborhood with potential playmates for their two children. That some neighborhood children were of different races was a benefit. “When they grow up and go out in the real world, they’re going to have to work with people of every color,” Deb Hibbard said. “You can’t bring them up to be a racist.” Lisa Culp and her husband Tony, who are black, moved their family of five down the street last year from the predominantly black Brookley Boulevard, south of Dorr Street. She ponders moving to the suburbs someday, but said she fears her children would be so uncomfortable socializing in overwhelmingly white areas that they’d stay home. “I’d rather have them be able to get out and about,” she said. More affluent Toledo neighborhoods have drawn African Americans like Larry and Annie Sykes. In 1996, Mr. Sykes—a banker and Toledo Public Schools board member—bought a house in the Valleybrook subdivision off Bancroft. In the 1990s, the number of blacks doubled in the subdivision, where houses routinely fetch more than $150,000. The couple said they know of no problems between black and white neighbors. “We all respect one another,” Mr. Sykes said. “We all get along.” 5.1.1.4 Keeping Integration For much of the 20th century it’s been an easy bet in Toledo and much of the rest of the country: If an area becomes integrated, expect it to become predominantly black in a decade or two. For decades sociologists have pointed to versions of the “tipping” theory, that whites are ok with integration to a point. If too many blacks move in,

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whites begin to leave. Whites stop moving there and blacks continue to—­ tipping the neighborhood to all-black. Research shows the tipping point is changing. A 1993 University of Michigan study found that 69 percent of Detroit whites said they’d live in a 20-percent black neighborhood. In 1976, 50 percent of Detroit whites said the same thing. But some researchers are saying it’s not really race that prompts “white flight” today as much as social class. In a 1999 study, Dr. David Harris, a University of Michigan sociologist, measured property values to determine how sought-after integrated neighborhoods were. He found that property values do decline in neighborhoods that become more than 10 percent black. But it’s not because of race per se. It’s because people—of any race—prefer to have more affluent and well-educated neighbors, and blacks remain underrepresented in those areas. In property values, socio-economic status matters more than race. “What if you had a neighborhood that was 20-percent black, but all the blacks were Michael Jordan?” Dr. Harris said. “What if you had a 100 percent white neighborhood, but 20 percent were Tim McVeighs or Jeffrey Dahmers?” Because of higher levels of poverty among African Americans, low-income integrated areas have a greater chance to become predominantly black. But more affluent neighborhoods may not. “If Toledo has a large black middle class and a growing black middle class, then perhaps you’re going to see levels of integration stay high,” he said. Dr. Wilson and Dr. McGuire, of ut, agree that the north end has a better chance of having more predominantly black neighborhoods develop than the area around Toledo Hospital. But each said they hoped the analysis shows a trend of increasing acceptance of integration among both races. “Whenever you have more experiences and more voices at the table, the conversation gets richer,” Dr. McGuire said. 5.1.2 Nazi March10 Last October, the National Socialist Movement sparked a riot in Ohio. It was an untrammeled victory for the neo-Nazis. In years past, the Toledo, Ohio, neighborhood of Polish Village was heavily populated with Polish-American factory workers who lived comfortably on 10

David Holthouse, “Racial Tensions High in Toledo-Area Neighborhood after National Socialist Movement March,” The Intelligence Report, April 19, 2006, Southern Poverty Law Center, https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2006/racial-ensions -high-toledo-area-neighborhood-after-national-socialist-movement-march.

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middle-class wages. But when auto and glass plant jobs fell off, many longtime residents moved away and were replaced by blacks and Hispanics who now live alongside poor whites in small, run-down houses. Unemployment and gang activity are high in Polish Village. Racial tensions sporadically flare into violence. Last summer, a feud began between two families in the neighborhood. Amelia Gray, who is black, said it all started when she accidentally dinged her ­next-door neighbor Tom Szych’s car while backing out of her driveway. Szych, who is white, accused Gray’s children of trespassing and throwing garbage in his yard. He began videotaping Gray’s house and called police at least 75 times to report “suspicious black kids” and death threats from gang members. (“Mr. Szych’s calls were highly exaggerated and found to be without merit,” Toledo Police Chief Mike Navarre said later.) Szych told a television news crew that “almost all” of the blacks in his neighborhood were criminals. Later that summer, police seized a handgun from Szych after he allegedly waved it at Amelia Gray’s children. “It’s just blacks he doesn’t want here,” Gray said. “He just wants his old Polish neighborhood back.” Enter the Nazis. In mid-September, a group called the National Socialist Movement announced that white residents of a Toledo neighborhood “plagued by nigger crime” had called an nsm hotline. In response, the group said it would march through their neighborhood in a show of force to intimidate “the Negroid beasts victimizing White citizens.” The nsm identified the caller as Tom Szych’s father, John Szych, who also lives on the block, as does Tom’s brother James Szych. All three Szychs denied calling the Nazis. But Tom Szych said he’d welcome them. “If the Nazis come in and want to fight the black crime, if they can do better than our Toledo police, hey, more power to [them], you know,” he said. Because they promised to stay out of the street and stick to public sidewalks, the Nazis were not required to apply for a parade permit. City officials informed angry black leaders that nothing could be done to keep the Nazis out. In fact, they would be marching with a heavy police escort. “Unfortunately, they have the right under the First Amendment, and as distasteful as it is, we have to protect them,” said Chief Navarre. In the days leading up to the Nazi march, police learned the word on the street was that rival gangs in Toledo had declared a temporary truce and formed an alliance to take on the nsm. “The intelligence indicated the gangs were c­ alling a peace among themselves and would show a unified front,” said Deputy Police Chief Derrick Diggs. “They felt the Nazis were challenging them.”

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The night before the march, the mayor of Toledo appealed for calm during a speech to the 2,000-strong congregation of a Baptist church. Community leaders organized an “Erase the Hate” rally in hopes of drawing ­anti-Nazi protesters away from a confrontation with the Nazis. Three hundred did attend the ­anti-hate rally at a senior center the morning of Oct. 15. But many more showed up in the streets on what turned out to be a warm and sunny day. By late morning, a grand total of 14 uniformed nsm members were huddled under police guard at Woodrow Wilson Park, the march’s pre-announced ­rallying point. They hoisted a banner that read, “White People Unite! Fight for Your Race!” Across the street, about 200 anti-Nazi protesters chanted, “Enough! Enough! We’re going to fuck you Nazis up!” A quarter mile away, a mob of another 300 to 400 protesters rapidly accumulated near a major intersection along the route of the march, which had been publicized the day before. The anti-Nazis in both locations were mostly local blacks and Hispanics, some wearing gang colors. There were also several dozen white youths with bandanas across their faces. These were outside agitators, mostly militants from a group called Anti-Racist Action. The Toledo Police Department had 150 extra officers on duty in the area. But the heavy police presence had the opposite of a calming effect. A crackdown by the department’s new Gangs/Crime Suppression Unit had strained police relations with North Toledo’s black residents. “Why do police protect the Nazis, but when five African-Americans are standing around we get questioned and maybe frisked by the police?” asked Pastor Monsour Bey of North Toledo’s First Church of God. “Aren’t the Nazis a gang? Whose side are the police on?” Bottles and rocks began flying before the Nazis could leave the park. The nsm march was over before it started. Police officers threatened to arrest the Nazis if they did not get back in their cars and leave. The Nazis complied and hurried away with a police escort, but the riot’s fuse had been lit. The mob began burning and looting when officers fired tear gas and flash-bang grenades. Meanwhile, the Nazis arrived at the Lucky Duck Tattoo Shop in West ­Toledo. They changed out of their uniforms and some got tattoos while they all watched the first news reports from the scene they’d just fled. The rioting lasted four hours. Twelve officers were injured, one seriously when a rock struck her in the head. One hundred and fourteen adults and juveniles were arrested. During the mayhem, shots were fired at Tom Szych’s house and a brick was hurled through his back window. According to reporters at the scene, Szych returned fire from inside his house, shooting six times over a crowd before yelling,

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“Want some more?” The next morning he brandished his .357 on cbs News’ “Early Show.” At a press conference that day, Chief Navarre said the violence had been much worse than police had expected. He said in retrospect it was clear that city officials should have persuaded the nsm to march in a “neutral location” rather than a residential neighborhood. “These groups thrive on this kind of attention,” the chief said, “and what happened yesterday was a victory for them.” 5.1.3 Black Males11 African-American males have been classified from everything from aggressive to lazy; to being well endowed to not taking care of their children; to being great athletes to having spent time in jail at some point in their life. It seems that along with every positive that can be used to romanticize the black male; there are two negatives that are associated, in equal, to dilute his character on the basis of race and stereotypes. If that is not enough of a challenge, the health needs and risk for AfricanAmerican men has directly affected their mortality rate to a staggering 7.1 years less than their male counterparts, on the basis of ethnicity alone! When compared by gender, black men have higher death rates than women for all leading causes of death. Our African-American males experience many of the following disparities: racial discrimination, lack of affordable health services, poor health education, cultural barriers, poverty, employment that does not provide health insurance, insufficient medical and social services catering to the education and screening specific to black males. John H. Gregory, the founder of the National Center for Urban Solutions (ncus), decided he had spent enough time seeing African-American males suffer through the one thing they should be able to take control of, their health. He recognized a healthy man equals a healthy family and stepped forward with the resolve that black males have to take accountability for themselves. Thus began a growing movement, beginning in Columbus, which spread to Toledo, along with other cities! That movement is the African-American Male Wellness Walk Initiative which focuses on men’s health, specifically targeting black men. Gregory is not shy about sharing that The Initiative is organized for black men by black men. Hearing of this Initiative, Toledo Fire Chief Brian Byrd and fellow Firefighter Tony Hague decided to participate in the 8th Annual African American Males 11

Erika D. White, “The Color Line Begins with Black Males,” Linkedin Pulse, July 17, 2015, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/color-line-begins-black-males-erika-d-white.

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Wellness Initiative one summer with their families, in Columbus. They came back from the experience inspired to expand The Initiative here, locally. While Columbus is gearing up for his 9th Annual Walk Initiative, Toledo helped expand the movement with their 1st Annual African American Male Wellness Walk Initiative on Saturday, August 3, 2013. The Initiative has gained a great deal of support from the National Center for Urban Solution, Mayor Paula Hicks Hudson, The City of Toledo Fire & Rescue, The International Association of Black Professional Firefighters, Mercy Health Partners, CareSource, Buckeye Health Plan, Toledo Lucas County Library, Fitzone by Erika, Promedica, University of Toledo, African American Legacy Project, & Kistler Ford to name a few; and, the sponsors for this event continue to grow. The only thing that is needed is you! The Annual African American Male Wellness Walk Initiative will take place at the African American Legacy Project, 1326 Collingwood, near Dorr St. This is a family event that is presented by the Glass City Black Brothers United (the Toledo Chapter of the International Association of Black Professional Firefighters) that will include free, fun activities for the kids, as well as the adults. Beginning at 7:30 am, screenings for cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular, to name a few, will be free to men. Black males are dying of preventable diseases, and it begins with us. The walk will begin from this location at 10 am, bring yourself and a loved one. Save a Life! For information or sponsorship opportunities please contact: Brian Byrd (567) 298–9689 or [email protected] and I look forward to seeing you there! The Fitzone Team will be getting you warmed up at 9:30, perfect time before the 5K! 5.1.4 The Importance of Black Business12 I have studied this issue for some time now and have come to the conclusion that we will not solve the economic and social problems that have plagued our community for the past few generations unless we change our thinking and behavior relative to supporting our businesses. Why, you might ask? When we don’t have control over our own commerce we are at the mercy and control of others. Have you wondered how non-black owned businesses (white, Middle Eastern, Asian) dominate the small businesses in our community while at the same time knowing that they would never allow this to happen in reverse in their communities? It is called the control of commerce. 12

Jay Black, “The Importance of Supporting Black-Owned Businesses,” The Sojourner’s Truth 35, no. 8 (2015), 8.

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Have you wondered why every other ethnic group supports its own except us? Perhaps they understand this concept more than we do. I must add that it is not possible at this time for us to spend 100 percent of our discretionary income with black-owned businesses because we are not in every b­ usiness discipline locally. For instance, there are no black-owned new rv dealers in this area so there is no opportunity to buy a new unit from an African American. The good news is we can begin to reverse these adverse trends by consciously changing our behavior and by spending some of our money with African ­Americans on a consistent basis. I challenge you to make an effort to patronize a black-owned business at least three times a month for starters. If you need help with finding quality African-American businesses call the taacc office. Listed below are just three benefits of supporting our businesses on a regular basis. 1.

2.

3.

We have greater control of what goes on in our community. For those of you who are old enough remember the days when Dorr, City Park, Division and Collingwood streets formed the core of our communities’ business district, there was a tremendous sense of pride in knowing that we “owned something.” Our children saw black business owners on a daily basis and could more readily aspire to be one of them. We had control over who worked in those businesses and our dollar turned over multiple times before it left our community. The unemployment rate was much lower in our community then than it is today. Unemployment Rate. We will begin to reduce the unemployment rate in our community if we can help our businesses grow. Go into any ­African-American-owned business and you are apt to see African Americans working in them. There is a large and growing segment in our community whom no one will hire (except us). These are the ex-felons, and Bobos, Junebugs, Shykondas and Aquacenas in our families and churches. There are approximately 2.0 million African-American owned b­ usinesses in America and approximately 1.9 million unemployment amongst ­African Americans. If we would help our businesses grow by patronizing them on a consistent basis we could conceivably solve the unemployment problem in our community. Crime Rate. We can reduce the crime rates in our community by helping our businesses grow. How? When Pookie is gainfully employed he doesn’t have time to get with the wrong crowd and consequently get into trouble. We could also drastically reduce the recidivism rates for those who are currently in the system if they had access to gainful employment once they exit the system.

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The Challenges of Black Leadership (Documents 84–90)

Within this crisis there has been a resurgence of black leadership in the ­mainstream. The best example of this has been the election of black mayors— Jack Ford (2002–2006) (Document 84), Michael Bell (2010–2014) (Document 85), and Paula Hicks-Hudson (2015–present) (Document 86). In general these mayors were and are social reformers but were and are limited because the deindustrialization weakened the tax revenue stream available to city government. Edna Brown became the first African American to represent Toledo in the Ohio State Senate (Document 87) It is also important that there are active leaders in trade unions, as ­represented by the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (Document 88). The ­Northwest Ohio Black Media Association (nobma) does an annual list of leading ­African Americans, and we include here the 2009 list of twenty-four people. They are mainly to serve the community positions in both business and nonprofit ­organizations (Document 89). Additionally, there are numerous black female physicians and dentists (Document 90). Structural transformations within the economy—such as financialization and transnationalization of the economy, automation of production, deindustrialization, and deunionization—have made it exceedingly difficult for leaders, including those in Toledo, to improve the life chances for urban African Americans. Where there has been collectively a rising share of corporate income and profits generated from financial services, a rolling creative destruction of automated-engineered job losses based on radical innovation breakthroughs, and declines in private sector unionization over the past half century from one in three to one in thirteen, committed public sector office holders have been limited in their capacity to effect desired changes on behalf of their respective constituents. In such instances, greater mobilization among rank and file community members becomes all the more critical (Patterson and Thompson 2017). 5.2.1 Jack Ford13 Ford, Jack 1947–2015 Contemporary Black Biography COPYRIGHT 2005 Thomson Gale At a Glance…. Born John Marshall Ford in 1947 in Springfield, oh; son of Edna and Stanton Ford; married Claudia Worthy Ford (divorced, 1990); married Cynthia 13

Timothy Borden, “Ford, Jack 1947–.” Contemporary Black Biography…. Retrieved November 07, 2016 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/education/news-wires -white-papers-and-books/ford-jack-1947.

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Hall Ford, March 1992; children: Jessica, (first marriage); Jacqueline, (second ­marriage); Ryan, (stepson). Education: Ohio State University, ba, social work, 1969; University of Toledo Law School, jd, 1975; University of Toledo, ma, public administration. Religion: Baptist. Politics: Democrat. Career: Ohio Youth Commission, counselor, 1969–80; University of Toledo, adjunct instructor of political science, 1979–01; Lucas County Substance Abuse Services, Inc., director, 1980–94; City of Toledo, city councilman, 1987– 94, mayor, 2002–2006; Forty-Ninth District, Ohio State House, representative, 1994–01. Address: Office—Office of the Mayor, One Government Center, Suite 2200, Toledo, oh 43604. On November 6, 2001, Jack Ford won a surprising victory over his opponent in the mayoral race in Toledo, Ohio. His triumph over a well known county treasurer, who was far better funded, was just one of the remarkable aspects of the election. Even more astounding was Ford’s margin of victory: with over sixty percent of the vote, his win qualified as a landslide victory. It was not the first time that Ford had staged such an upset. After a career as a youth counselor and director of a drug-treatment program, he had easily won election to Toledo’s City Council in 1987 in his first run for elective office. In his subsequent council bids Ford emerged as the top vote-getter in the city, a fact that led to his appointment as president of Toledo’s City Council in 1993. After leaving his council post to assume a vacant seat in the Ohio House in 1994, he again rose to a top leadership position by winning the Ohio Democratic Party’s seat as house minority leader in 1998. With a term-limits provision ending his career in the Ohio State House, Ford decided to run for the top elective office in Northwest Ohio and succeeded in his 2001 bid to become Toledo’s fifty-seventh mayor and the first African American to hold the post. 5.2.1.1 Early Injury Led to New Path John Marshall “Jack” Ford was born in 1947 in Springfield, Ohio. He was the second son of Edna and Stanton Ford, who separated when he was just six weeks old and later divorced. Edna Ford married John Watkins six years later and had another son, Bruce Watkins. Working as a cook in a fraternity house at Wittenberg University in Springfield, Edna Ford Watkins sometimes brought home books that students had given her to share with her sons. The books became one of Jack Ford’s most prized possessions. After he entered politics, his voracious reading habits earned him the nickname “The Professor” from some of his colleagues. As a teenager Ford stood over six feet tall and was a standout player as a guard on the Springfield South High School football team. His playing was good enough to earn an athletic scholarship to Ohio State University (osu),

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where he played on a team coached by college-sports legend Woody Hayes until an injury in his sophomore year curtailed his athletic career. The injury turned out to be a blessing in disguise as it allowed Ford to focus on his studies. He c­ ompleted his bachelor’s degree in social work at osu in 1969 and accepted a job as a counselor with the Ohio Youth Commission, which took him to Toledo, Ohio. Ford worked for the Ohio Youth Commission for eleven years. During his tenure there, he entered the Law School of the University of Toledo, where he completed his j.d. in 1975. Ford later added a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Toledo to his accomplishments. Ford also married the former Claudia Worthy, an attorney, and the couple had one daughter, Jessica. The Fords divorced in 1990 but remained on good enough terms that Ford’s ex-wife later hit the campaign trail on his behalf during his 2001 mayoral run. In 1979 Ford began teaching an A ­ frican-American politics course at the University of Toledo at the request of a former professor. Ford originally took the class on as a one quarter experiment, but found the class so enlightening and interesting to teach that he offered to continue teaching the course on a regular basis and did so for the next 21 years. Ford also taught courses regularly in Africana Studies. 5.2.1.2 Entered Politics with Success Always interested in politics, Ford served as an advisor in the Toledo city council and Ohio state legislature races of some of his colleagues in the 1970s and 1980s. When his friend, Nelson Grace, left the Toledo school board in 1985 to serve on the Toledo city council, Ford’s name was mentioned as a possible replacement. Yet Ford was passed over for the position, despite his knowledge and experience. The disappointment fueled Ford’s desire to run for elective office. “I felt like I had been done wrong,” he explained to the Toledo Blade in 2001, “From that point on I decided not to take appointments. I was going to run for office the next time I could.” That opportunity came in the 1987 Toledo city council race, which Ford entered and won on his first attempt. It turned out to be the first of his four consecutive terms, and from 1993 onward Ford served as the council president. Although African Americans had served on Toledo city council since the 1940s, Ford was the first African American in the city’s history to hold the title of president. As a popular city council member, Ford became one of Toledo’s best known politicians during his tenure there. Ford was also well regarded by his political colleagues for his ability to build consensus and avoid open conflict on issues. Donna Owens, a Republican who served as the city’s first female mayor during Ford’s first term on city council, told the Toledo Blade in 2001,

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“One of the things about Jack, he’s certainly strong for any cause he believes in. He really cared about people improving their lot in life. He always treated me with respect, which, I think, is critically important, especially if you’re a female in an authoritative position.” Ford’s ability to build political support across ethnic and gender lines would indeed prove crucial to his later mayoral bid. In 1994 Ford left his seat on Toledo City Council to replace Casey Jones in the Ohio House from the state’s 49th district. He later won reelection in 1996, 1998, and 2000, running the last two times unopposed. Although he came from a solidly Democratic district, Ford was at a disadvantage in a state legislature controlled by an overwhelming Republican majority. Although he introduced thirty-six legislative bills during his seven years in the House, only three became laws. In 1998 Ford became the head of the Democrats in the House, making him Ohio’s house minority leader. 5.2.1.3 Elected Mayor of Toledo In 1992 Ford married Cynthia Holmes Hall. The couple added a daughter, Jacqueline, to their family, which included Hall’s son, Ryan, from a previous marriage. A substance-abuse counselor, Cynthia Ford had a particular interest in working with children. She also proved to be a political asset to her husband on the campaign trail, as Ford told the Toledo Blade in a December 2001 profile of his wife. “She literally won votes for me. I would be at festivals and I would see her talking to a couple or individual for forty minutes. I would go over and apologize for her talking to them so long and they’d say, ‘We weren’t going to vote for you, but now we’re going to.’ After that happened eight or ten times, I learned to shut up.” Under Ohio’s term-limits law, Ford could not run for his House seat in 2002 and instead decided to enter the Toledo mayoral race. As a late ­entrant into the election, he faced an uphill battle. A strong Democratic candidate, Lucas County Treasurer Ray T. Kest, was far ahead in the polls and was ­expected to cruise to an easy victory. As the two emerged from the p ­ rimary as the candidates in the general election in November of 2001, Ford had ­acquitted himself well during the debates, even giving himself the n ­ ickname ­“Smilin’ Jack” to poke fun of his sometimes grave public demeanor. Ford also gained the respect of voters for staying away from personal attacks during the election, even after reports surfaced about his opponent’s debts and past allegations of sexual harassment. On election day, helped by several key labor union endorsements and the backing of most of Northwest Ohio’s other elected officials, Ford emerged with an astounding 60.5% of the vote.

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With the city experiencing an economic downturn during his first year in office, Ford had to delay some economic development projects and cut funding to several community development programs in order to keep a balanced budget. In his 2003 State of the City address, Ford acknowledged that fiscal responsibility had forced his administration to make some difficult choices but looked forward to implementing several major infrastructure projects, including a $450 million, fifteen-year water-treatment and sewer-construction project. Ford also thanked Toledo voters for passing an $800 million levy to upgrade the city’s public schools, one of his administration’s biggest accomplishments during its first year. 5.2.1.4 Sources 5.2.1.4.1 Books Porter, Tana Mosier, Toledo Profile: A Sesquicentennial History, Toledo Sesquicentennial Commission, 1987. 5.2.1.4.2 Periodicals Toledo Blade, October 28, 2001; November 7, 2001; December 9, 2001; January 3, 2002. Toledo City Paper, February 27-March 5, 2003. 5.2.1.4.3 On-line “Mayor Jack Ford’s State of the City Address 2003,” City of Toledo, Ohio Official Website, www.ci.toledo.oh.us/index.cfm?dept=deptl9nav&page=page3352 (March 12, 2003). “Mayor’s Biography,” City of Toledo, Ohio Official Website, www.ci.toledo .oh.us/index.cfm?dept=dept19nav&page=page3374 (March 12, 2003). “Mayor’s Inaugural Address,” City of Toledo, Ohio Official Website, www .ci.toledo.oh.us/index.cfm?dept=dept19nav&page=page2518 (March 12, 2003). 5.2.2 Michael Bell14 Michael P. Bell was elected Mayor of Toledo, taking office on January 4, 2010. Bell’s love of family and dedication to Toledo are behind his desire to lead his hometown through some of the most challenging times it has faced in decades. Mayor Bell’s life work is bringing people together to solve problems. He believes that Toledo must be a great place to do business, and he pledges to 14

State of the State Conference, “Michael P. Bell, Former Mayor of Toledo,” March 24, 2010, University of Toledo, http://iis.stat.wright.edu/sos/archive_SOS_2010/bio_Presenters/ Michael_Bell.htm.

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work regionally to create a favorable business climate and remove barriers to progress. Bell has over 19 years of executive experience as Fire Chief and State Fire Marshal, managing multi-million dollar budgets, and over 500 employees, and working with multiple agencies and business interests. His career in Public Service began in 1980 when he joined the Toledo Department of Fire and Rescue as a firefighter and later became a certified paramedic/emt. In 1990 he was appointed as Chief of the Toledo Fire and Rescue Department, the first African American as well as the youngest person ever to lead the department. He remained in that position for over 16 years. Under his leadership, the tfd earned the prestigious honor of Accreditation by the Commission on Fire Accreditation, a certification held by only the most elite fire departments. In 2001, following the tragic events of September 11th, Bell was tapped to lead the homeland security efforts of the region, bringing public safety ­organizations, hospitals, businesses, school districts and neighborhood organizations together to handle the challenges of that most difficult time in our nation’s history. In 2007, he was appointed as State Fire Marshal by Ohio Governor Ted Strickland. In that position, he implemented the “Everyone Goes Home” program, stressing firefighter safety. That program earned the Seal of Excellence Award from the Firefighter Life Safety Initiatives Program. Mayor Bell grew up in North Toledo attending Spring Elementary School and Woodward High School where he was inducted into its Hall of Fame. He is a graduate of the University of Toledo where he earned a degree in Education, with a concentration in business. He was awarded a scholarship during his ­junior and senior years. He was co-captain of the ut football team, and was named the ut Student of the Year in the field of Education during his senior year. Michael is the oldest of Norman and Ora Bell’s four sons. He is predeceased by his brother Shawn. His parents instilled in him many valuable lessons that he lives by, most importantly that you must treat people fairly and nothing good comes easy. Mayor Bell has served the Northwest Ohio community through countless civic organizations, volunteering his time and serving on the boards of the Boys and Girls Club, The American Red Cross, Bethany House, The American Liver Foundation, the Old Newsboys Goodfellows where he served as President, Easter Seals, the Boy Scouts of America and the Salvation Army. He has also been an active supporter of the American Cancer Society and the Toledo Symphony.

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He is a member of the International Fire Chief’s Association and received the President’s Award for his efforts with diversity. He is a life member of the naacp and a member of True Vine Missionary Baptist Church. 5.2.3 Paula Hicks-Hudson15 Born one of eight children of a combined family and raised in the city of Hamilton located in Butler County, Ohio, Paula often cites education as a pathway to success. This comes from the encouragement of her father, a Hamilton city department worker, who stressed the importance of education during her adolescent years. With that mindset, Paula attended Spelman College, a historically black higher education institution for women in Atlanta, Georgia where in 1973 she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in political science and journalism. She then continued her educational studies at Colorado State University where she graduated with a Master’s degree in communications development in 1975. Following graduation, Paula and her family returned to Wilberforce, Ohio where she taught readiness skills to underprepared students in the Upward Bound Program at Central State University. It was through this experience that Paula saw the challenges that young people faced with the legal system. As a result, Paula returned to law school with a focus on juvenile justice issues. After graduating with her Juris Doctorate from the University of Iowa, Paula moved with her family to Toledo in 1982. As a Reginald Heber Smith Fellow, she began her career at Toledo Legal Aid Society representing senior citizens and working with several community groups. Paula’s purpose has centered on improving the quality of her community through her hard work in the public and private sector. During her 35-year professional career, she has worked as assistant Lucas County prosecutor, assistant public defender and assistant state attorney general. From 1998–2002, she served as the legislative director of the Toledo City Council. Following that, she served as the director and deputy director of the Lucas County Board of Elections and chief legal counsel to the Ohio Office of Budget and Management under Governor Ted Strickland. From negotiating labor contracts for Ohio Shared Services Center and teaching domestic relations law to conducting voter education activities for Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur, Paula has advocated for a diverse range of issues in a holistic and sensible way. 15

Mayor’s Office, “Paula Hicks-Hudson Mayor of Toledo,” Mayor’s Office, City of Toledo, oh, http://toledo.oh.gov/government/mayors-office/.

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Of particular note are her numerous programs and efforts geared toward youth well-being and educational issues. As a Court Appointed Child ­Advocate-Guardian ad Litem, she is trained in mediation and advocates for neglected and underrepresented youth. As a result of her efforts, she has been honored by the Urban Minority Alcohol and Drug Outreach Program. On January 22, 2011 Paula was appointed to City Council to replace Michael Ashford. She won a special election for the District 4 spot on May 3, 2011. She then was the top vote getter in the September 13th municipal primary election and went on to win the November 8, 2011 General Election for a four-year term to the District 4 seat which began on January 3, 2012. She became President of Council on February 26, 2013 during a special council meeting. On February 17, 2015 Paula was sworn in as Mayor for the City of Toledo, following the passing of D. Michael Collins on February 6, 2015. 5.2.4 Edna Brown16 Edna Brown: “I had been employed, as I said, with the City of Toledo for some 32 years and I retired in April of 1992. I was very active with the union and was on the city’s, believe it or not in this time and day, negotiating team. I was on the union’s negotiating team. We were sitting around talking one day and someone mentioned the new form of government that had just been voted in, the strong mayor district council at large council. And as we discussed it, someone said, ‘Edna you can’t run for your union office, why don’t you run for city council?’ And we joked about it, and the next thing I know I was getting a petition and got it signed. We thought, well if you don’t get elected we’ll talk to the mayor and have him appoint you to a board or a commission. Well I was very fortunate and blessed that I did by a very narrow margin; I did get elected to City Council and I found that it was an easy transition from being a city employee, a union official and an elected official.” Willie McKether: “Is it because you were still representing people and fighting for people’s rights? Is that it?” Edna Brown: “Absolutely, absolutely. And I think that is what has kept me going is because I find so much satisfaction in being able to help what I refer to as the less fortunate people.” Willie McKether: “In your terms on City Council, what are some of your proudest accomplishments as you were a member of City Council?”

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Edna Brown, interview by Willie L. McKether, May 11, 2009, pp. 7–9, transcript, the Edrene Cole African American Oral History Collection, Toledo-Lucas County Public Library, Toledo, oh.

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Edna Brown: “I think perhaps my proudest accomplishments are not so much what I did for people but the satisfaction that I got when I was able to pick up the telephone, call a director, call him by his name, he knew who I was, and be able to get problems solved for them. One of the biggest contributions I believe I’ve made was not so much to the citizens of Toledo but to other members of City Council because of my city experience and my knowledge of the city budget. And that I taught many of the elected officials exactly how to read the budget, and what the different funds were and so on and so forth. So I think that was a tremendous contribution on my part because that helped them to better serve the citizens.” Willie McKether: “Okay, let’s fast forward and talk a little bit about your role as our state representative. In looking at your bio you serve on a number of committees and subcommittees—the House Finance and Appropriations Committee, Chair of the Human Services subcommittee, the House Commerce and Labor Committee and many, many others. What’s the process for getting selected to these various committees?” Edna Brown: “Well the process is, you are able at the beginning of each term to request the committees that you wish to serve on. And of course it’s up to the head of your party, in this case the speaker of the House this year, as to whether or not you are appointed to those committees. They take into consideration your background, your training, your education, the things that they know you have knowledge of, and that’s kind of where they will put you. Now the Finance and Appropriations Committee, that’s a prestigious committee and so your knowledge of various things are taken into consideration as well as trying to select members from different parts of the state. So I was very, very pleased that I was put on the committee again this term and received the chairmanship that I requested.” 5.2.5 Coalition of Black Trade Unionists17 Toledo Chapter Coalition of Black Trade Unionists held their annual black history month banquet and honored community leaders on Saturday, March 5, 2016 at Ramada Inn. The 28th annual dinner focused on the theme, “Still ­Striving to Overcome,” and welcomed dignitaries, union workers and supporters. The program opened with warm greetings from facilitator Sergeant Anita Madison of the Toledo Police Command Officers Association, “Giving honor to our Lord. It’s a pleasure to be here and serve for this very special occasion.” 17

Tricia Hall, “Annual Black History Month Program Honors Three Community Leaders,” The Sojourner’s Truth, March 21, 2016, http://www.thetruthtoledo.com/story/2016/031616/ bhm.htm.

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The 2016 honorees were Toledo City Mayor Paula Hicks-Hudson, for political achievement; Helen C. Cooks, PhD, for community activism and Erika D. White for trade unionism. The dinner also featured guest speaker State Representative Fred Strahorn of Dayton, minority leader of the Ohio House of Representatives. “It is truly an honor to be in the presence of so many individuals who support us annually. I want to thank each of you and welcome you here tonight. Please fellowship because we appreciate your support,” said Cenia Willis, cbtu chairman and retired afscme local 1184. The annual dinner was supported by naacp Toledo Branch, Northwestern Ohio Building and Construction Trades Council, Region 2-B uaw, National Association of Letter Carriers, Greater Northwest Ohio afl-cio Central Labor Council, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local Union 8, Toledo Federation of Teachers, Mecca Temple 43, Ohio State A Phillips Randolph Institute, afscme Ohio Council 8, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Incorporated, C. Brown Funeral Home, Inc. and Preneed Center, uaw Local 1435, afscme Local 3794, liuna Laborers’ Local 500, Ohio afl-cio, InteraCopy Printing, African American Police League, Congresswoman Mary Kaptur, Cecilia M. ­Adams of Toledo City Council, State Rep. Michael D. Ashford, Councilwoman Yvonne Harper, cwa Local 4319, Democratic Women in Action and Instaplak Event Photography. Toledo Chapter Coalition of Black Trade Unionist officers and committee members are: Cenia M. Willis, chairman and committee member; C ­ heryl Tyler-Folsom, vice chairman and dinner co-[chairman]; Pierrette Talley, ­ ­secretary; Henry McCoy, treasurer and dinner committee member; Cheryl Bennett, ­Sergeant at Arms; Cerssandra McPherson, co-chairman and committee ­members: Micheal Alexander; Phil Boles; Gary Johnson, John Folsom and Jim Snodgrass Sr. 5.2.6 Top Toledoans of 200918 Here they are! Northwest Ohio Black Media Association’s (nobma) first annual list of the Top Toledoans—the Top Toledoans of 2009. They were influential, they were exciting, they got things done. Some built things, some saved lives and some saved souls. Most of them made our lives just a little bit better in some way or the other.

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The Sojourner’s Truth, “nobma Announces The Top Toledoans of 2009,” January 27, 2010, http://web.archive.org/web/20101229073143/http://www.thetruthtoledo.com/story/2010/ 012710/NOBMA.htm (accessed February 16, 2016).

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Some, on the other hand, put themselves in a position to make such a difference. How did we select the Top Toledoans of 2009? We had suggestions from readers, to be sure. We threw that in with the committee of our media observers, then we slugged it out. There may be a few that others may claim should be on the list, we don’t dispute that. But we can guarantee you that every single person on this list belongs on this list. Appropriately enough, we top the list with the man who captured the city’s top prize—Mayor Mike Bell. Mayor Mike Bell—At the Top of The Top Toledoans for 2009 How easy a selection was this one? At the very top of our list of Top Toledoans sits Mayor Mike Bell. Bell, who at the start of the year was the State of Ohio Fire Marshall after an impressive 16-plus years as Toledo’s Fire Chief, returned home in the spring to launch his candidacy for mayor—his first political campaign. An immensely popular figure, Bell ran his campaign largely on his own terms: “I’m going to bring people together to work [o]n Toledo’s issues;” “we’re going to focus on regionalism;” “we’re going to turn this thing around together.” 5.2.6.1 Mike Bell And, he declined to change his style. He rode his motorcycle, he walked around in his leather vests and, above all, he emphasized his integrity and his ability to work with people. Above all, he eschewed party politics and ran as an independent. It worked, all of it. When the dust settled, the graduate of Woodward High School and The University of Toledo, former football athlete, youngest fire chief in Toledo history and the longest serving, had earned a decisive victory in the mayoral contest against his former classmate at Woodward, Keith Wilkowski. Mayor Mike Bell is nobma’s Top Toledoan of 2009. 5.2.6.2 Wanda Butts Wanda Butts’ 16-year-old son Josh died in a water accident in 2006 and since then Butts has set out on a mission—to tell the Toledo area and the nation that African-American children need to learn how to swim. Hence the Josh Project. To date hundreds of students have been given free swimming lessons at the Greater Toledo Aquatic Club at St. Francis de Sales High School and Butts’ mission has been reported in 2009 on such high-profile media forums as Bryant Gumbel’s Real Sports and the cbs Evening News.

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Butts has traveled the nation telling the story of the Josh Project to a­ udiences from coast-to-coast such as at the Golden Goggles Awards ceremony in B ­ everly Hills, ca and at the April Pools Day program at Norfolk State University. The usa Swimming Foundation created a video about the Josh Project for their Make a Splash Initiative. Donations have kept the Josh Project afloat and once a year, Butts hosts a Soulfood Extravaganza, her major fundraising activity. For more information on this cause, visit www.joshproject.org or call 419-973-1383 5.2.6.3 Kamaron Kyser Let’s say it’s the last Thursday of the month and you’re just itching to get out of the house and meet some folks? Who you gonna call? Thosefellas … that’s our guess. And the leader of Thosefellas, a one-year-old organization, who hold such networking affairs on the appointed day, is Kamaron Kyser. “Our interest is in spreading resources and helping people do business together … making connections,” says Kyser. So once a month—check your social media for the information—Kyser and Co. bring together folks to socialize, network and expand their horizons. He calls it “bringing forward thinkers together in one place.” Calvino’s, PizzaPapalis, Fifth Third Field, Lucas County Arena, the Omni and the Toledo Club are some of the gathering spots Thosefellas have utilized over the past year. What started as a few stragglers had grown into a must-attend affair over the course of 2009. That should have come as no surprise, really. After all, dude’s got over 4,000 Facebook friends. Kyser, a graduate of Rogers High School, The University of Toledo and Assets Toledo, is a case manager with lmha during the daylight hours. At nighttime, he’s out there bringing people together. 5.2.6.4 Suzette Cowell OK, so what doesn’t Suzette Cowell do in Toledo? As everyone knows, she’s the head of the Toledo Urban Federal Credit Union on Dorr Street and is in the process of raising funds to move that operation into a brand new facility to be built on the corner of Dorr and Detroit. She’s also one of the movers and shakers behind the Dorr Street Coalition, an organization of area businesses and residents attempting to bring Dorr Street kicking and screaming into the 21st Century.

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Five years ago, Cowell decided [to] really climb a mountain and bring an African-American Festival to Toledo. She started it on the corner of Detroit and Indiana for the first three years, then moved it to The University of Toledo’s Scott Park Campus in year four. In year five—2009—the festival exploded. “Did you ever think you would see anything like this in Toledo?” asked Cowell as she gazed over the crowd of about 5,000 on the Saturday night of this summer’s festival. The first year, between 600 and 700 total tickets were sold for the weekend event. What a difference a lot of dedication can mean. 5.2.6.5 Billie Johnson For more than three decades, Billie Johnson, executive director of the Area Office on Aging, has dedicated her life to helping senior citizens and her agency is widely praised as one of the most effective social service organizations in the area. She has led aooa to expand its services and programs into the funding of home care services. Each year, it seems, Johnson piles another accomplishment on top of the others. Even with a 40 percent cut in state funds last year, Johnson and her staff were able to get a replacement levy passed which will bring in a total of $3.8 million a year for Lucas County senior services. In 2009, Johnson also helped start the ball rolling on building a new facility to house the J. Frank Troy Center which her agency funds. During Johnson’s tenure, the aooa has developed into a premier Area Agency on Aging in the nation. She has been responsible for the development of three non-profit wholly-owned subsidiary corporations. In addition to the seniors whom she advocates for daily, Johnson has long served as a mentor to women through her leadership in area organizations such as Zonta International and The Links, Inc. In 2008, Johnson was inducted into the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame. 5.2.6.6 Bishop Duane Tisdale Bishop Duane Tisdale was appointed to Friendship Baptist Church as an assistant pastor in 1985 and a year later was named senior pastor. He’s been on a roll ever since. The church purchased 17 acres of land on Nebraska Avenue in 1993 to build a new structure which was completed in 1998. In the interim, Tisdale and the church started the Toledo Urban Federal Credit Union and he served as the first chairman of the board, a group home for boys and a ministry for women.

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In 2002 a transition home was opened and then, in 2003, Tisdale and his flock started a community development corporation Friendship New vision, Inc. fnvi was more recently certified as a community housing ­development ­organization and has undertaken numerous projects around the city to ­rebuild and remodel homes to bring to residents of Toledo affordable housing. Friendship Baptist celebrated its 100th anniversary just five short years ago, but due in no small part of Tisdale’s efforts, the past 25 years have been a period of unprecedented accomplishments. Each year, for example, the housing stock in Toledo benefits from his New Vision. 5.2.6.7 Juanita Savage Person “She is the glue that holds the place together,” said one of the Kitchen for the Poor’s board members of Juanita Savage Person, director of the agency that feeds thousands of poor folks on an unimaginably small budget. Person has led the agency her father founded in 1969 for the past 18 years with the help of sister Henrietta Spearman, the head cook, and brothers ­Harvey Savage, Jr., the president of the board, and Raymond, the driver who delivers meals to those who can’t get to the agency’s location on Vance. She has, however, been working at Kitchen for the Poor since she was 15 years old. The good news is that the Kitchen is still going far in an effort to fulfill its mission—as Martin Luther King once said and is memorialized over the entrance of the Kitchen—to “let no man go hungry.” The bad news, in this particular economy, is that there are so many more mouths to feed. In 2009, for example, the Kitchen reached record highs of service with more than 34,000 lunches served on site and another 1,500 delivered to shut-ins. But that’s what Person’s purpose in life is—to serve others. “People feel good at … the holidays when they can give. But I get to feel this way all the time.” 5.2.6.8 William Keaton There are no magic pills to educational success, says William Keaton, principal of the Ella P. Stewart Academy for Girls, just a dedicated staff and lots of help from the community. But someone has to lead the way and that would be Keaton who directs one of a handful of public single-gender academies in the nation. In the six years since Stewart became a single-gender academy, the school has been in three locations even as it is blazing the trail, along with Lincoln Academy for Boys, and making the case for such schools.

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Under Keaton’s guidance, the school has achieved a continuous improvement ranking over the past several years on the Ohio Report Card with a most recent performance index grade of just over 80 percent. In order to broaden his students[’] educational opportunities, Keaton has worked with groups such as the Links, Inc, for mentoring and tutoring, the ­University of Toledo’s Eberly Center for tutoring and Fifth Third Bank to start a branch at the school and help students learn about banks and savings accounts. In 2009, Keaton and Stewart opened a museum—the Mrs. Ella P. Stewart Museum—in the school to honor its namesake and to inspire students to ­pursue their math and science studies. 5.2.6.9 Lisa McDuffie The Toledo ywca has long had temporary housing for women and children. For many years, however, the agency was forced in too many cases, due to a lack of capacity, to discharge women from their housing units well before they were ready. It was a “heartbreaking situation” says Lisa McDuffire, executive director of the agency for the past nine years. It was a situation McDuffie corrected this year as she oversaw the construction of a new building of 43 units adjacent to the standing structure on Jefferson Avenue. That was a $10 million project financed by Huntington Bank. In addition to the new building, soon the existing facility will be remodeled to add 22 units, also for permanent housing for battered women. McDuffie, a licensed social worker, earned her undergraduate degree from Findlay University and a master’s from Case Western Reserve University. And while she obviously had a stellar 2009—how many folks are putting up new buildings these days in downtown Toledo, after all—one excellent tradition at the ywca continues. The Milestones Awards (the 2010 winners were a­ nnounced just this week) has always been and continues to be the best awards show in town. 5.2.6.10 Wilma Brown Toledo City Councilwoman Wilma Brown, now president of City Council, is completing her third and final term as the District 1 representative. Her passion for some years now has been the re-birth of Dorr Street. To that end, as a councilwoman she has directed her efforts to seeing that new businesses are brought to the corridor and that existing businesses are upgraded. She helped bring in a new strip mall at Westwood and Dorr several years ago and was instrumental in the Walgreen’s project at Reynolds.

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That huge, empty apartment building at Parkside and Dorr? Brown fought for years to get that monstrosity torn down and was finally successful. She was also instrumental in getting Dorr Street re-paved a few years ago. Her signature project, however, is the Brownstones at Dorr Street—aptly named to be sure. She has worked on bringing in new housing on Dorr for years. The first groundbreaking, in fact, was back in 2007. But in 2009, the units were completed—the first six in what will be 20-plus if Brown has her way. Now that she’s been installed as president of Council— the third time was a charm—she may have the opportunity to have her way a little more often over the next two years. 5.2.6.11 Angela Steward “One day you wake up and find you are 240 pounds … two hundred and forty, tired, sick and always hurting,” recalls Angela Steward of her own journey to physical fitness. One year later and 100 pounds lighter, Steward, a longtime paralegal for a Sylvania law firm, started helping others get fit with her “Fabulously Fit” ­program—a high-energy, intense combination of dance, turbo, weights and kickboxing. It’s not a program for the faint of heart. In 2009, Steward burst onto the scene, displaying her fitness methods around town, at The Studio on Airport Hwy and in the ywca’s Women’s Heartplus program. Each class brings about two dozen women together for a non-stop hour of toning and cardio routines. “You can give me one more,” shouts Steward to her class on a typical day. One more turns into two more, then three more. Then a little rest … about five seconds worth, before Steward guides the group into the new routine. Wanna get fit? Get Fabulously Fit. 5.2.6.12 Sheila Gibson Sheila Gibson, who looks to be a year or two over 25 years of age, has been teaching dance for just about that long. “I feel that it is the purpose of dance, to give praise to God,” says Gibson of her calling. “I’ve always tried to walk the Christian walk.” Gibson’s Positive Force Christian School of Dance has been walking the walk for years now. She teaches dance around the clock holding 13 different ballet classes for different ages and for different levels of expertise, as well as a number of jazz dance classes. And then there is the annual recital—the company will hold its eighth this year in early June—which Gibson plans and choreographs.

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In 2009, Gibson’s efforts brought a bigger pay-off than usual as two of her dancers—then 18-year old Tyree Bell and then 10-year old Nicole Herndon— caught the attention of national talent scouts. Nicole eventually went to the Big Apple and wowed the crowds of film and stage producers with her dancing and acting. Gibson, a Rogers high graduate who earned her bachelor’s degree at Bowling Green State University, never stops adding on classes, tinkering with the recital or making sure that all of her dancers are able to participate in the big annual event. 5.2.6.13 Calvin Lawshe “I didn’t know we had such capable, bright and experienced planners in this office,” said Calvin Lawshe two and a half years ago when he was pressed into service as director of the Plan Commissions—a combination of the Toledo city Plan Commission and the Lucas County Planning Commission. Lawshe had already had a career at The University of Toledo as, first, an instructor and full professor, and then as an administrator, retiring as assistant to the president. He walked into a department, say close observers, that was desperately in need of a seasoned administrator who could bring discipline and allow the staff to perform their functions. He did all that. Moreover, Lawshe, a graduate of Macomber High School with both undergraduate and master’s degrees from ut, has become a vital part of the area’s development process, say those same observers, helping to bring together the functions of zoning, planning and land use so that the disparate elements in the community—lcic, Port Authority, ut—who deal in development can start working on the same page. Lawshe also revived the concept of area conferences in which experts in planning and economic development can share their wisdom with all in the region—a concept lauded by state officials who hope the idea will be emulated by regions around the state. Rev. Cedric Brock Pastor of Mt. Nebo Baptist Church, president of the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance (ima), ombudsman for the Toledo Public Schools, sales director at the Ramada Inn on Secor, Rev. Cedric Brock has become Toledo’s Man for All Seasons. At one moment he’s gathering members of the ima to speak out about the Route 66 bar shooting or the Linda Hicks shooting fatality. The next moment he’s over at Poor Henry’s Barbershop making sure that his “Adopt a Haircut” for inner city school boys is going well. Then, he’s

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organizing a vacation bible school with four other churches along Detroit Avenue. Simply put, Brock, like so many of our Top Toledoans, was all over the city in 2009. As the tps ombudsman, he meets with hundreds of school children and their parents every year in an effort to sort out fact from fiction and ensure the grievances are equitably aired. And, of course, there’s all that stuff he does at Mt. Nebo—classes, workshops, prison ministry … well, you get the picture. 5.2.6.14 Charles Cohen It took some doing, some arm-twisting to get Charles Cohen out on the golf course. When his friends suggested he take up the game, he saw it merely as a long walk spoiled. When he finally gave in—in the early 1960’s—he was immediately smitten. His game developed to the point that he joined the United Golf Association, a black national golf organization that sponsored tournaments around the country. Later, he decided that it was his duty to make the game more accessible to minority youth. So in 1992 he formed the Toledo Minority Golf Association and now he teaches the game year round—winter months in a church basement. He started the Annual tmga Golf Tournament that year and in 2009 the 18th annual tournament was held as about 50 youngsters from around the country traveled to the Detwiler Golf Course to display their skills. Several dozen volunteers assist Cohen with his teaching and the annual two-day golf tournament that brings area college coaches out to scout the youngsters. Golf has grown in popularity among minority youngsters recently, particular because of the presence of Tiger Woods, but in the early 90’s it was Cohen who served as a pioneer in the sport. It’s been a long walk for Cohen, a long delightful walk. 5.2.6.15 Patricia Hogue, Ph.D. Patricia Hogue—chairman and assistant professor in the Department of Physicians’ Assistant at The University of Toledo and assistant dean of Diversity, Student Recruitment and Retention for the College of Medicine—teaches, counsels, sees patients, serves as a faculty advisor to the on-campus chapter of the Student National Medical Association, publishes, researches women’s health, minority health and geriatric issues, holds licenses as a registered nurse and a board certified physician assistant. And she finds time to continue her own studies, earning her doctorate in gerontology in 2007.

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“I’m a pack mule,” says Hogue. “I just do it all.” 5.2.6.16 Patricia Hogue, Ph.D. She doesn’t just do it all on the ut Health Science Campus where she is the mentor for just about every student of color who seeks a facilitator and a ­resource, she does it all in the greater community as well. Hogue is a member of the Links, Inc., the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc, and has been on the boards of the Northwest Ohio Planned Parenthood, the Ohio Association of Physician Assistants and the ywca of Greater Toledo. Hogue received a nobma Impact Newsmaker Award in 2009. “God revealed to me that I’m here for diversity. It’s about health care disparities and one way to eliminate those disparities is to increase the number of health care providers.” 5.2.6.17 Olivia Holden Olivia Holden, executive director of ASSETS Toledo, a training program for small business owners and aspiring entrepreneurs, passed a milestone with ASSETS this year. The non-profit, faith-based organization held its 30th graduation. So far, Holden and ASSETS have graduated 982 potential entrepreneurs in the 13-week, 25-class course that is taught by volunteers from the real business world. If you have never attended an ASSETS graduation, you’ve missed a treat. The enthusiasm Holden displays for her tasks and her students is almost palpable, as is the appreciation her students show her. Holden, however, is more than a classroom leader, she is also leading by word and example in the greater community. She has served on a variety of boards, including a stint as president of the Board of Community Relations. Just this past year, Holden took up the cause of the departure of the Kroger Store on Manhattan and jumped in to help lead the cause to retain the store. “I’m calling for a boycott,” said Holden at the time. “If Martin Luther King could do it, so can we. This is absolutely wrong, this is corporate greed and they are no better than Enron.” 5.2.6.18 David Bush In 1990, David Bush managed to get a book of his poems into the hands of ­renowned poet Nikki Giovanni during her visit to Toledo. “You’ve managed to create a definite voice,” she later wrote him while ­encouraging him to help others.

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Several years later, Bush, who works at the Toledo-Lucas County Library, was asked to meet with a 13-year old student—a “professional poet,” she called herself. That introduction led to a meeting with seven other students and before long The Madd (“make a direct difference”) Poets Society was born … and continues 10 years later. During that time, all of the Society’s high school seniors have graduated. “Creativity, confidence and cogitation—that’s how I get teens to write,” says Bush of his students who hold a host of performances throughout the year to showcase their talents. The organization also has a theatre program and a hiphop debate team. The program’s alumni have moved on to colleges around the state and the country. For his achievements, Bush was received a nobma Impact Newsmaker Award in 2009. 5.2.6.19 Richard Mitchell, Esq. Richard Mitchell earned his law degree from The University of Toledo in 1989 and immediately began working at the prestigious law firm of Shumaker, Loop & Kendrick llc. Specializing in labor and employment law. He became partner by the age of 35 but five years ago, he left the firm to go into business for himself. It’s been five good years at Mitchell Law llc and Midwest Community Title, Ltd. It’s been a number of good years, in fact, both inside and outside of the office. Mitchell has always been involved in more than just the law. He was one of the founders of the Northwest Ohio Black Chamber of Commerce, which, over recent years has morphed into the African American Bureau of Commerce; he served a stint as president of the Thurgood Marshall Law Association and he also served as president of the former Middle Passage Political Action Committee. “I strongly believe in political activism,” he has noted in the past. “And I believe the greatest service is in being a real servant to others.” In 2009, Mitchell reached a notable career accomplishment by being named local legal counsel for Penn National Gaming, Inc, the company that will be operating the Toledo casino—anticipated to open in about two years. 5.2.6.20 Celia Williamson, Ph.D. Did you know that Toledo is one of the nation’s top cities for the recruitment of children into prostitution and trafficking?

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Celia Williamson, Ph.D., University of Toledo associate professor of social work, has made it her life’s work to educate the community about the dangers of prostitution and the way children and women are victimized by the cycle of violence and drug addiction. The research of the former social worker, who graduated from Woodward High School and earned degrees in social work from ut, Case Western and Indiana University, resulted in the formation of Second Chance in 1993, an outreach program to assist the victims of prostitution. Her most recent efforts, just in this past year, included working with the Ohio State Trafficking Commission and developing statistics for trafficking victims, creating a prevention video and curriculum for use in schools and agencies that assist children and serving as the chairman of the Lucas County Trafficking Coalition. Williamson has also used conferences, roundtable discussions and theatrical productions to educate not only the Toledo area but also the world about the needs and risks of those victimized by the commercial sex industry. “This is God’s plan for me. I have to do this. I can’t sleep at night if I don’t. Once you hear one woman speak of the violence and trauma, you can’t give up.” 5.2.6.21 Yusuf Lateef A 32-year old artist who studied at the Columbus College of Art and Design, Yusuf Lateef has spent the last several years literally making his mark all over Toledo. His latest project, in collaboration with fellow artist Adam Russell, is a mural titled RISE atop the Vistula Building on Summit Street. In 2009 alone, Lateef displayed his art—which incorporates existing ­elements within the compound of found materials—at Bozarts Gallery, the Art Tatum Gallery, Artomatic 419, the Ground Level Coffee House and the Red ­Carpet Event. Lateef has collaborated on numerous occasions with the Community HeARTbeats group to produce such pieces as the North-End mural Project and the Aurora House mural Project. Lateef has been painting for years. He was a naacp a.c.t.s.o. national ­Silver Medal winner as a high school student and his first exhibition was in 1993, at the tender age of 16. Keep looking up at Toledo buildings—Lateef’s creativity is on display. 5.2.6.22 John Jones John Jones took over the helm of the Greater Toledo Urban League in mid2008 just as the economy was about to tank and non-profit agencies, always the first segment to feel the squeeze in bad times. Keeping the local Urban

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League afloat has been a challenge ever since, but Jones has managed to do just that and more. The son of a preacher, a minister himself, Jones had a long history with the Urban League before he ascended to the presidency. He had served on the board of directors and had led the gtul Young Professionals. “The State of the Urban League is strong,” said Jones in 2009 at a State of the Greater Toledo Urban League Address, at Indiana Avenue mbc. “We have gone through some ups and downs but the positive energy of this community has enabled us to keep moving.” And with that, Jones effectively informed the community what he and the organization were doing to press on with their mission and he let them in on what they could do to help the gtul and each other. Looking forward, the gtul under Jones’ leadership is on the verge of committing itself to taking bold new steps in an effort to fulfill its goal of empowering communities and changing lives, particularly in the area of education. Keep an eye on Jones and the gtul. 5.2.6.23 Charlene Gilbert Charlene Gilbert, an acclaimed film-maker, is a professor in The University of Toledo’s Women and Gender Studies department and the director of the ­Eberly Center which exists to support learning, discovery and engagement “enabling women to reach their highest potential,” says the mission statement. The ­Center’s roots lie in the creation of the Women’s Advisory Committee at ut in 1977. Gilbert, however, is pushing the Center to reach its own highest potential. The Center has received three recent grants to expand its services beyond the university and into the community. They are building capacity, adding volunteers to tutor girls, assisting at lmha and the Battered Women’s Shelter, holding a High School Day on March 19 of this year for 50 high school girls to try to raise their interest in math and science. The Center holds workshops for women in developing healthy relationships, understanding self-esteem and assertiveness training, among others. As for Gilbert, a Yale grad and relatively recent arrival to the area, she’s ­another one of those in-demand types that make Toledo hum. She serves as the chairman, for example, on the ut President’s Council for Diversity. 5.2.6.24 Cynthia Thompson For a number of years, Cynthia Thompson and her husband Ron owned Midwest Stamping in Maumee, number 28, in 2003, on Black Enterprise’s list of the 100 largest black-owned industrial/service businesses in the United States. He was ceo and she was vice president of human resources.

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Thompson earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan, a master’s degree in nutrition from Michigan State University and an mba from Washington University. Time consuming as that position was, Thompson found enough time to ­become involved in the community. In 2002, she was elected chairman of the National Board of Directors of the Girl Scouts of the usa—the highest ­volunteer position in the world’s largest female organization. Closer to her adopted Toledo area home, Thompson serves on The University of Toledo Board of Trustees and the board of directors of the Toledo ­Museum of Art where she has worked to bring tma closer to the areas m ­ inority communities. Although the Thompsons now spend a good deal of their time in the ­Carolinas, both remain of tremendous service to their adopted community. 5.2.7 Black Women Physicians and Dentists19 There are, perhaps, as many as 20 Toledo area black, female physicians and dentists in all manner of specialties. These are some of them: Dr. Karen Adams-Ferguson, md, an obstetrician/gynecologist, is a Toledo native from a legendary local family. Her mother, Dr. Samantha Adams, was the Toledo area’s first female African-American chiropractor and a former president of the Toledo School Board. Her siblings include former Toledo Public School administrators Cecelia Adams (now a school board member) and Denise Adams Onyia. Dr. Adams earned her undergraduate degree from The University of Toledo and her medical degree from The Ohio State University. Her practice is located at A Woman’s Answer on Monroe Street. Dr. Michelle Boose, md, mph, is a family medicine physician. A graduate of Notre Dame Academy, Dr. Boose earned her undergraduate degree from Kent State University and her medical degree from ut’s College of Medicine in 2008. She completed her residency at the Flower Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program in 2011. She is a recipient of the local 20 Under 40 Award. Dr. Boose practices with ProMedica and is on the board of the ProMedica Physicians and Continuum Services as well as the Ohio Academy of Family Physicians Foundation Board.

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“A Celebration of Women’s History Month: Doctors Then and Now,” The Sojourner’s Truth, March 4, 2015, http://www.thetruthtoledo.com/story/2015/030415/doctors.htm.

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Dr. Louito Edje, md, is a family medicine physician and director of the Toledo Hospital Family Medicine Residency—the first female AfricanAmerican program director there and was the youngest chief of staff in the 100-year history of the Hospital. Dr. Edje entered Michigan State University at the age of 16 and earned a degree in physiology. She received her medical degree from the University of Michigan becoming the first female and first minority president of her medical school student body. She currently serves on the St. Luke’s Hospital Board of Directors, the Toledo Children’s Hospital Board and is the chairman-elect of the um Medical Schools Admissions Committee. Dr. Debra Fulton, dds, graduated from Case Western Reserve School of Dentistry in Cleveland in a class that contained only three African ­Americans and she was the only female African American. A Youngstown, oh native, Dr. Fulton majored in chemistry at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and worked as a chemist for four years in Akron for General Tire and Rubber Company before enrolling in dental school. She landed in Toledo to join the practice of longtime African-­American dentist Dr. Franklin Duffy as he was nearing retirement. She would take over when he did in fact retire. Her offices are on West Laskey Road. Dr. Anita Lewis-Sewell, md is a Toledo native and graduate of Scott High School. She earned her undergraduate degree from ut in communication and her medical degree from the Medical College of Ohio (now the ut College of Medicine). She is a family practice physician who has worked with the Neighborhood Health Association, prior to a move to Fremont to work for the Community Health Services. Dr. Lewis-Sewell is currently a ut health educator and writer on health issues. She has been a project director for numerous Minority Health Month seminars, conferences and health fairs. Dr. Hope Mitchell, md, a dermatologist with offices (Mitchell Dermatology) in Perrysburg, is the only black dermatologist—male or female— in northwest Ohio. Her private practice has a staff of a dozen women— nurse, medical assistants, receptionists, billing manager. A New York City native, Dr. Mitchell earned an undergraduate degree at the University of Rochester, where she would meet her future husband, attorney Richard Mitchell of Toledo. They came to Toledo to earn advanced degrees and start a family. After working for a local dermatology firm, she formed her own firm about 10 years ago. Dr. Taiwo Ngo, dds, a native of Nigeria has a dental practice in the Toledo area that includes three different offices. A graduate of the

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­ niversity of Michigan Community Dental Health Program, Dr. Ngo U comes from a family of medical professionals. Her father is a pediatrician and her mother a radiologist—both u.s. citizens who reside in Nigeria. Dr. Ngo’s twin sister is a pediatrician in California, another sister is a pharmacist in Dayton and a brother is an ear, nose and throat specialist. She and her husband Gift, who earned his mba in finance from Case Western Reserve, formed the Midwest Dental Center llc 13 years ago on Alexis Road and have since expanded to Lagrange Street and Airport Highway. Dr. Anyse Storey, md, is a urologist with a private practice on Heatherdowns Blvd. She is the only African-American female urologist in northwest Ohio. Dr. Storey, a native Clevelander, attended Mt. Holyoke College in Massachusetts where she earned a bachelor’s of arts degree, the U ­ niversity of Cincinnati’s Department of Biomedical Communications for an ­advanced degree before returning to Cleveland to earn a medical degree from Case Western Reserve. She arrived in Toledo for her internship and residency at the Medical College of Ohio and was the first female in that urology residency program—“the last male bastion in medicine,” she has said. Dr. Storey stayed in Toledo to join St. Vincent’s Hospital staff and has affiliations at most of the area hospitals. Dr. Traci Watkins, md, is a family practice physician with ProMedica Physicians Westgate Medical Group and is currently the lead physician with that group. Dr. Watkins, married to local attorney Pariss Coleman, earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan with a bachelor’s of science and psychology, and her medical degree from osu, after which she did her residency with the Toledo Hospital. She has been on staff at Toledo Hospital and Flower Hospital since 1999. She has served on or participated in more than a dozen boards and activities with ProMedica over the years and been active in an equal number of community boards and activities. Dr. Jenny Zamor, do, is an obstetrician/gynecologist who just recently joined A Woman’s Answer on Monroe Street. From Queens, ny, Dr. Zamor earned her medical degree from Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine. She performed her internship at Summa Health in Akron and her residency in obstetrics and gynecology at O’Bleness in Athens, oh. She has been in practice for 16 years.

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Diverse Black Education Leaders and Activities (Documents 91–100)

Many black educators in Toledo have tried to rise to the challenges facing Toledo’s black population with varying levels of success. Although their efforts often lacked the necessary efficacy to improve educational outcomes as desired and needed, no one could doubt the efforts of the city’s numerous black educators over the decades in the public school system, the public library system, and at the University of Toledo. A few of the many champions in this arena are covered in this section: Ella Stewart Academy (Document 91); Romules Durant, School Superintendent (Document 92); Helen Cooks, Founding Director of Toledo Excel (Document 93); Simmie Blakney, First Black Chair at University of Toledo (Document 94); Pauline Kynard, Director of Art Tatum African ­American Resource Center at Kent Branch Library (Document 95); Angela Sine­r, Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Toledo (Document 96); Green Column (Document 97); Green Africana Studies (Document 98); and Committees to Improve Black Student Retention and Graduation at the University of Toledo (Documents 99 and 100). 5.3.1 Ella P. Stewart Academy20 The words come easily to Sharon Olson when asked to describe the namesake of the school where she has taught for 30 years. “She loved raising people up,” Ms. Olson says of Ella P. Stewart, one of the first African-American women pharmacists in the country and the first in northwest Ohio. “She loved lifting people up and she loved the kids here at her school.” Although Mrs. Stewart passed away in 1987, her spirit is alive and well at the Ella P. Stewart Academy for Girls, the first single-gender public school in the state of Ohio when it was switched from a regular elementary school in 2003. Principal Teresa Quinn beamed when listening to Ms. Olson describe the school’s namesake because the idea of lifting up the girls in her care is ­paramount to her educational philosophy. “We’re all about respect, positivity and building their self-esteem,” Ms. Quinn says. “We tell them, ‘walk like you have an invisible crown on.’” Ms. Quinn says the staff at the school, 707 Avondale Ave., has embraced the single-gender concept, participating in book studies and professional 20

Toledo Public Schools, “Ella P. Stewart Academy Strives to Produce Women of Prestige,” Toledo Public Schools website, May 28, 2015, http://www.tps.org/tps-proud/tps/ news/1052-ella-p-stewart-academy-strives-to-produce-women-of-prestige (accessed February 12, 2016).

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­development to teach girls to enhance their leadership skills rather than engage in negative behavior. Her philosophy is evident in the school motto (“Where Girls of Integrity become Ladies of Prestige”) and in the school’s mission statement: “We, the staff of Ella P. Stewart Academy for Girls, value professional integrity, positive attitudes, open communication, collaboration and high academic standards for ourselves and our students.” The commitment to turning the girls into strong leaders is reinforced throughout the school, from having a museum dedicated to Ella P. Stewart that shows off the many treasures she amassed when traveling overseas as an ambassador, to having each corridor and other locations named for famous women, including current presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. When Shannon Tisdale joined the staff four years ago as the school’s counselor, she was determined to focus on the positive rather than the negative. “I want them to do the positive thing. Positive behavior can be taught. Let that be the norm,” she said. Or, as third grader Kailah McGee puts it, “We build each other up but we never tear each other down.” Fourth grader Airlia Parrish adds, “We treat each other like sisters.” From developing a close-knit staff to resolving conflict, the emphasis is definitely on being a family, Ms. Quinn says. And that means, say Ms. Quinn and Ms. Tisdale, an emphasis is put on resolving conflict in a constructive way. “We want teachers to work it out in their classrooms,” Ms. Quinn says. “We talk things through with the students and the teachers and the staff and we get the parents involved.” The questions that are asked include, “How do we move forward? How can we be cordial and work together?” That message is an essential part of making the Stewart girls college and career ready, Ms. Tisdale says, because they will encounter all kinds of people at a university and in the work force. “We have a very positive, quiet and safe atmosphere here,” Ms. Quinn says. Ask students what they like best about attending Ella P. Stewart Academy for Girls, and it’s a long list they rattle off. “I like all the activities they have,” says Jakya Warren, who has been at the school since kindergarten and who is graduating from the sixth grade this year. (The school now goes from K to 6th grade because of the establishment this year of the Jones Leadership Academy, which offers a take on single-gender education for grades 7–9. Plans call for the school to eventually be 7th through 12th grades).

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Jakya talks of the Kids Unlimited afterschool program, during which girls first do their homework and then eat and learn new subjects. And there was the fashion show held during a recent open house and the annual spelling bee that she won. “My favorite subject is math,” she says, with plans to attend Jones in the fall and to eventually become a nurse like her mother. “I want to follow in my mother’s footsteps,” she reveals. Airlia, the fourth grader who has been at the school since first grade, says she also likes Kids Unlimited as well as the chance to be part of Girl Scouts and Young Women of Excellence. She loves reading, so a favorite memory was when parents were invited to lunch and then were able to tour the Book Fair with their children. “I want to do what my mom does,” she says, adding that her mom is a store manager. Kailah, the third grader, was new to Stewart this year after attending a charter school. “The reason I like it is we do different things than the other academies,” she states. Her eyes lit up when talking about plans for an upcoming day. “Next week, we’re going to have a whole entire day about science,” she says. She talks animatedly about a recent project in which the class raised p ­ ainted lady butterflies. “I got to release them,” Kailah remembers. When prompted by Ms. Quinn, she volunteers that these butterflies “can scare away their predators with their wing colors. Their wings are so fragile that they can snap and break.” The fragility of the spirit was a topic of discussion during a tea held on the evening of May 20, when the school’s 28 sixth graders were allowed to bring two guests and were feted for their accomplishments. The invites for the event read: “Just as a porcelain tea cup is beautiful, unique, delicate yet strong, so are our young ladies. We honor their move from Girls of Integrity to Young Ladies of Prestige.” Jakya says, “It was a nice event and it was a way for everyone to say goodbye.” The tea cup, she learned, is like the girls: beautiful, royal, different and fragile. “The message is that you don’t have to try so hard to be a different person. You can be yourself,” Jakya recounts. Ms. Quinn and Ms. Tisdale know their biggest challenge is combatting the conflicting messages that the girls get from the media and when they’re away from the school. The girls are required to adhere to a strict uniform code while in school and lessons about dress stress presenting themselves correctly in all situations.

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“We try to show them that when they go out, ‘this is how a successful woman acts and dresses,’” Ms. Quinn says. “We are different by design.” A major focus for the upcoming school year will be integrating data into i­nstruction so the school can reach the coveted excellence mark in academics. “Our reading strength has always been strong but there’s a stigma that girls can’t do math. We’re going to change that,” says Juanetia Williams, the inclusion specialist at the school. “We can grow stronger.” Or, as the school creed says, “We are exceptional. We are extraordinary. We make no excuses. We never fail because we never give up! We believe in ourselves. We believe in each other. We believe success is our only option! We are the girls of Ella P. Stewart Academy!” 5.3.2 Romules Durant, School Superintendent21 Dr. Durant, a product of Toledo Public Schools, spent his high school years attending Waite High School, where he won multiple awards while playing football. He went on to attend the University of Toledo on a football scholarship where he was a 4-year varsity award winner. He was a 2-time Jon Binder Award recipient, which is given to the player who exemplifies “true heart and courage.” In addition to athletics, Dr. Durant earned more than 15 academic scholarships. He received a Bachelor of Education Degree in 1998, a Master of ­Education Degree in 2002, and a Doctorate Degree in Educational Administration and Supervision in 2007, from the University of Toledo. His doctoral ­dissertation “The Collective Factor of Social Oppression and Urban Poverty on the Achievement of Black Students” was considered for Dissertation of the Year. Dr. Durant has spent the past 14 years working for the Toledo Public School District, as a teacher, administrator, and assistant superintendent. He was most recently selected as the Interim Superintendent/ceo of tps. In his work, he became the driving force behind data-driven decisions that assisted in the increase of state performance rating of 16 of the 17 schools. Yearly, he meets in New York with other professional educators from across the country as a consultant to devise plans on essential education topics for the department of education. Dr. Durant has appeared on multiple discussion panels, and has presented at both the local and state levels on various initiatives.

21 “Romulus tps Superintendent,” tps Proud, Toledo Public Schools, December 14, 2015, http://www.tps.org/tps-departments/superintendent Web. Accessed on May 5, 2006.

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Dr. Durant has been inducted into both the “Distinguished Waite Alumni Hall of Fame” and the “Morrison R. Waite Athletic Hall of Fame.” As a result of his community work, he was also inducted into the “Birmingham Hall of Fame” and was honored by the state government as a “Distinguished Citizen.” A ­ frican American Legacy Project selected him as a 2010 recipient of the “Emerging Leader Award” and also a recipient of the 2011 Toledo Branch naacp “Freedom Fund Award.” In 2012, he earned the “20 Under 40 Leadership Award” and was also a recipient of the National Sorority of Phi Delta Kappa “Calla Lily Educator’s Award.” Also [in] 2012, his work with the saab mentor group earned the naacp “Youth Award.” In 2013, he was awarded the “Community Image Award,” by the Perry Burroughs Democratic Women’s Club. Additionally, the former Mayor of Toledo honored him for his work with the North End Community Beautification Project. Dr. Durant is the co-chair of the nationally recognized teacher peer review program called the Toledo Plan, as well [as] the Urban Leadership Development Program designed to develop future instructional leaders. He has received national recognition for his saab mentor group which was twice nationally recognized as “saab Chapter of the Year,” and he was honored with the “Outstanding saab Advisor Award.” He is a board member of the National Principal Leadership Institute (also serving as a national coach), ­Partners in Education, former trustee of the Economic Opportunity Planning Association and the City of Toledo Board of Community Relations, among [other] organizational boards in the local community. He is one of the y­ oungest members of the Rotary Club of Toledo. Dr. Durant is one of the creative engineers and implementer of the tps Transformation Plan: (K-8) schools, d­ istance-learning, credit-recovery/on-line academy, pre/post secondary ­credits, and thematicschools, as well [as] many other ­innovative initiatives. Dr. Durant, himself comes from an impoverished background, which inspired his doctoral research, formulated around the oppressive platform of today’s achievement gap. He has a passion for motivational speaking and is dedicated to working with the youth and the community at large. 5.3.3 Helen Cooks and Toledo Excel22 Dr. Helen C. Cooks, creator and guiding light of TOLEDO EXCEL, saw a crack and decided promising children weren’t going to slip through it anymore.

22

Office of Excellence Programs, “Toledo excel a Success Story,” Division of Student Success, University of Toledo, https://www.utoledo.edu/success/excel/about.html. Accessed November 7, 2016.

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“­At-risk students were getting some attention. So were the gifted students. But you had this ‘B’ group that no one was giving attention to. We saw potential there.” So in 1989, 50 rising high school freshman with a B average from groups ­traditionally underrepresented in higher education became ut’s first EXCEL class. Thus the story was told in the University of Toledo 2003 President’s Report. Since it began in 1988, TOLEDO EXCEL, a scholarship incentive program at  The University of Toledo, has been striving to prepare students for success in college. EXCEL involves student members of groups u ­ nder-represented in higher education—including African, Appalachian, Asian, Hispanic and Native Americans—in pre-college academic programs to increase their self-­esteem, cultural awareness of diversity, and civic involvement. Among EXCEL’s services to high school students are Saturday School, Summer ­Institutes, tutoring, academic retreat weekends, campus visits, advising for strategic admissions and financial aid, and ethnographic field studies in the u.s. and abroad. Criteria for participation in EXCEL are stringent because applications far exceed space available. EXCEL students attend annual Summer Institutes and may travel within the u.s. or to countries such as Mexico, China, Ghana, or South Africa. Student attendance at academic retreats during the year, and ­parental support, are required. Each student is expected to maintain at least a “B” average in his/her high school academic curriculum. EXCEL’s innovative curriculum, designed to challenge students with content not closely resembling “regular” school curricula, has included The Aging Process, Ethnic America, Global Cities, The Civil Rights Movement, and Global Diversity, including the Partnership for Educational Awareness and Cultural Exchange (PEACE Project). Among academic skills, writing is emphasized, as is research on Civil Rights in the u.s. and Human Rights around the world. The Office of EXCELlence works productively with ut administration, and grants have enhanced University funding to cover costs of the TOLEDO ­EXCEL program. Owens Corning Fiberglas and Owens-Illinois, Inc. head the list of generous local sponsors of EXCEL and the Annual Conference. To date, there are more than 1,100 students in the EXCEL “pipeline.” Of groups i–xix, 798 students, 96% have enrolled in college; 74%, or 611 students, have enrolled at ut; 84% of EXCEL scholars are college graduates or students matriculating towards college graduation. Students for EXCEL Group xxv are being r­ ecruited. Enrollment and achievements of EXCEL students is but a partial return on ­investment in the program, as is recognition that the program helps dreams be realized.

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Simmie Blakney: First Black Department Chair at the University of Toledo23 Dr. Simmie Blakney retired in June as chairman of the Mathematics Department of the University of Toledo, after more than 30 years as an educator and 26 years at the university. Dr. Blakney’s beginnings in rural, segregated Mississippi and his eventual professional success tell a story Benjamin Blakney considers inspiring. “He loved math, but he enjoys so many other things,” Benjamin Blakney said. “He’s someone capable of blending all those factors. If there were only two words to describe my father, they would be ‘focused’ and ‘resourceful.’” Some interests that allowed the ut professor to get away from his academic work are stamp collecting, photography, and rock tumbling—a method of shaping and polishing rocks for jewelry. Dr. Blakney came to ut in 1964 after teaching at all-black Grambling State ­University in Louisiana. He had earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics at tiny Tougaloo College and master’s and doctoral degrees at the University of Illinois. “I’d been in a setting with whites [in college] before, so that didn’t really bother me, coming to the University of Toledo,” said the former National Science Foundation fellow. “In Mississippi, life was very uncomfortable, and the limitations were so great. I made a pact to myself that I was going to make something out of this.” He said the challenge of problem solving drew him enthusiastically to mathematics. “Students used to ask me what can you do with a mathematics degree,” said Dr. Blakney, 62. “Mathematics is a part of most everything in life. I tried to teach mathematics [as] solving some of life’s problems. I only hope that came across in the classroom.” Dr. Blakney hired Sheila Anderson as his secretary in 1975 when he was department chairman. Ms. Anderson said she watched Dr. Blakney show both discipline and compassion toward students, and cooperation and friendliness toward co-workers. “He is proud of his field of study,” Ms. Anderson said. “There is a strictness about him, but he was very respected by his students. He follows through on commitments. When people ask you about a problem, that is usually it. With Dr. Blakney—he comes back to make sure things are better.” 5.3.4

23

Clyde Hughes, “Tough Out the Challenges,” Toledo Blade, August 14, 1990.

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Benjamin Blakney is the oldest of three sons in whom Dr. Blakney shows a lot of pride. Willard is a logistics operator at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton. His youngest son, Erickson, is a statistics and research supervisor at the Daytop Village drug treatment center in New York City. “I started from day one letting them know what I expected of them,” Dr. Blakney said. “Excelling and being someone was not something special but a part of ­normal life. I told them as long as they wanted to be something, that’s all I ask.” Among the calculus, algebra, and analytical geometry books stacked on his bookshelves, Dr. Blakney has found room for “Bertha,” the cactus plant his wife, Era, bought him as a gift when he moved into his University Hall office. Dr. Blakney became the chairman of the ut Math Department in 1970. The current chairman, Dr. Harvey Wolff, who succeeded him in 1980, credited him with being a constant ambassador for the department. Dr. Blakney received a plaque in June from ut’s Association of Black Faculty and Staff—an organization he helped create—for his work in the Math Department. He also served as chairman of the Martin Luther King, Jr., scholarship committee and the university’s ethnic studies committee. Although Dr. Blakney has retired from full-time teaching, he is not retiring from life. He is starting a weekend math tutoring class at Warren ame Church, 749 Norwood Ave. Children from the fourth grade to high school will receive guidance in math. “You have to get them early,” Dr. Blakney said. “If you don’t, bad study habits set in and the fear of math that everyone has does too.” 5.3.5 Pauline Kynard24 A Life Of Purpose: Pauline Kynard (1956–2016), A Vanguard of Toledo’s African American Culture and History By Rhonda Sewell Guest Column Little did anyone realize that an historical baton had been passed from legendary jazz pianist Art Tatum to our community’s steward of culture and ­librarianship Pauline Kynard. It was the year 1956—the season of Tatum’s death and poetically, the same year of Pauline’s entrance into the world. This seeming connection was by no means a mere coincidence. For one could argue that Tatum was boldly intentional in his transition—knowing that

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Rhonda Sewell, The Sojourners Truth, January 13, 2016, accessed http://www.thetruth toledo.com/story/2016/011316/purpose.htm.

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his iconic legacy would be maintained, enhanced, and fiercely protected by one Pauline Kynard. This keeper of culture and history will deeply be remembered as the true emotional architect of the Art Tatum African American Resource Center at Kent Branch Library. Although she retired in 2012 after dedicating 37 years working her way from her teens as a page to a branch manager in the Toledo Lucas County Public Library system, it was her longtime supervision of the Tatum Center that the community recalls as being her most passionate imprint upon the Toledo area. Her recent death on Sunday, January 10, 2016 in a Columbus hospital shook a community which felt that she left her life’s journey far too soon at the tender age of 59. The statuesque Pauline, with high cheekbones, coupled with an unforgettable smile and twinkling eyes appeared far younger than her years. She was cut from what our grandmothers called good stock. The kind of beautiful being that peppered a room emitting good feelings and a sense of pride by simply entering. Pair this sentiment with Pauline’s commitment and dedication to AfricanAmerican culture and there you have the very definition of a woman who made it her mission to uplift the story of her people with pride and dignity. Although it was cancer that ultimately took our dear sister, mother, grandmother and friend, Pauline’s illness was incapable of robbing her family, siblings, children, friends and granddaughter of a beautiful life dedicated to knowledge, black culture, commitment to family and travel. She was born Pauline McNeal on November 27, 1956, in Toledo. She graduated from Libbey High School in 1975—the same year she began her enduring library career. Her evolution occurred through her dogged pursuit of education. She earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Toledo and obtained a master’s in library information science from San Jose State University, taking online classes and in person at the college in California. Although she held several library positions, it was from 1991 to 2006, during her supervision of the Art Tatum African American Resource Center, where she was best known for her expertise and knowledge in African-American culture, history, art and literature. She also served as the former Chair of the Ohio Library Council Diversity Awareness and Resources Committee. Joan A. Harris, president of the Tatum Center’s Citizens Advisory Board, said that it will forever be Pauline’s stellar efforts, dedication and community ­contacts that made the Center flourish to the present day: “She worked tirelessly to develop our Center into an outstanding informational mecca in Northwest Ohio,” recalls Harris.

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Brett Collins, the current specialist of the Tatum Center, conveyed his grief over such a sudden loss and expressed that her death is a reminder of how “delicate and fleeting” life can be. Collins and the Board continue to enhance the ­Center with community programming and annual anniversary observances of the Center’s namesake—the late iconic jazz pianist Art Tatum (1909–1956), who was reared in Toledo. It was the 1980s, the era that many recall as the development of local black librarianship with names like Judy Jones, Mott Branch manager, Dorcel Dowdell, retired Main Library manager and several others that would begin their careers together and remain cherished friends over the years. Judy was one of Pauline’s closest friends and shared these reflections: “Cancer has no victory because Pauline never stopped fighting to live a full life. I have been reading over our texts for the last year, and I found this post from Pauline that defined how she lived her life: ‘She is forever a champion and my hero. She fought not just for herself, but as an example to her children and granddaughter to never give up and to live life to the fullest,’” said Jones, who admitted that since the news she had to search deep for her voice to honor her late friend. She added that Pauline’s educational accomplishments broadened her perspective. In a recent Blade news obituary, another dear librarian friend Faith Hairston, manager of Kent Branch Library, said the Tatum Center started in 1989 and expanded under Pauline’s guidance, gaining a reputation for its collection of art and literature and documentation of local African-American history and cultural programs. “The work she did really established the center as we know it today,” Hairston told the Blade. “She helped to build the book collection. She helped to build the art collection, not only the art in the Art Tatum Center but in bringing in artists from throughout the community.” Dowdell, retired Main Library manager, recalled the impactful role that Pauline Kynard played in the establishment of the Art Tatum African American Resource Center: “One of the reasons why the Art Tatum Resource Center has such a deep and rich collection is because Pauline and I traveled to African-American bookstores in Detroit and Cleveland during the early years of the Center’s development,” recalled Dowdell. “Pauline was passionate about the Center’s collection and programs. As the manager of Main Library, I wanted to be an example not only to P ­ auline,

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but all of the African-American staff at the library. I was so proud to see her graduate from library school and how her career progressed through the years.  She never stopped striving to be the best manager she could be. In the days and weeks to come, those of us close to her will remember so many things we shared. She loved her family and the library. I can still hear her asking, ­‘Darcy (her nickname for me), what do you think about this?’” Dowdell added. Pauline was also known for her programmatic thrust in propelling successful annual Kwanzaa celebrations and standing-room-only Black History Month events. In 2003, this article’s author—a former Blade journalist who interviewed Pauline numerous times on black history, captured a moment of introspection during coverage of one of many Kwanzaa celebrations hosted by the late Pauline Kynard. Here, Pauline reflects: “Throughout the year, I usually concentrate on one or two of the (Kwanzaa) principles, depending on what I’m doing in my life. This year, I’ve been especially concentrating on the principle Nia, or purpose, and ­asking myself questions around having more purpose in my life and career,” Pauline said. Her life was indeed already full of purpose. Political analyst and radio personality Schylar Meadows described Pauline as a steward and cultivator of the black community whose legacy will forever be the Tatum Center. Longtime naacp leader WilliAnn Moore said of Pauline’s passing: “We have lost a great mind and contributor to the Toledo community.” Perhaps it was Kathleen Greely, of The International Black Summit, Inc., who explained Pauline’s life most profoundly: In every black commUNITY there is someone that holds the space for commitment to commUNITY and sharing the kind of research that makes teachers and parents proud of what their youth submits or recites in class or on stage. Ms. Kynard has been responsible for a great many good grades and great proposals. “She was our modern-day vanguard—the unsung hero in the Toledo commUNITY that worked in the right place at the right time. I would not be surprised if there are hundreds of children (some that have now become adults), that have expanded their literary works or interest in literary arts due to the life or time spent at Kent or Mott Branch Library having worked with Ms. Kynard.”

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At press time, family members were making funeral and service arrangements with The House of Day Funeral Services www.houseofday.com. Surviving are her daughter, Shanika Kynard; sons, Shaun and Shamar Kynard, who works at the Sylvania Branch Library; sisters, Tamara McNeal and Denise “Cookie” Wraggs; brothers, Bobby and Roland McNeal, John and Jerry Johnson, and ­Roger Daniels, and one granddaughter whom she was devoted to named “Nene.” (Rhonda B. Sewell, Library Governmental Affairs and Media Strategist, compiled this special tribute for The Truth newspaper on behalf of Pauline Kynard’s Library family.) 5.3.6 Angela Siner25 “African-American history should not just be for Africans. It should be for Americans, period, because it is part of America’s history.” This statement only begins to illustrate the strong cultural beliefs of Angela Siner, an instructor in the sociology and anthropology department. After receiving her undergraduate degree from Grambling State University in Louisiana, and earning her master’s degree from the University of Southern ­Louisiana, which is now known as the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, Siner came to ut to teach at the former Community and Technical College a decade ago. “What’s kept me here for ten years is that I really enjoy teaching the classes that I teach and the students that I teach,” she said. Siner said she feels that she shares a particular bond with her African ­American students. “My attitude toward African-American students is really very maternal,” Siner said. “I want them to feel as though they have someone they can talk to,” she said. “My door is always open to any African American student. I see myself as a teacher, an advocate and a mentor.” Siner teaches several core courses, including “Africana Civilization,” “African-American Culture” and “American from 1865,” and instructs mainly at the Scott Park campus. “From the academic side, I feel that African-American students need to know that they can be successful at The University of Toledo,” she said, “They have someone, in me, that they can talk to about academics, as well as [about] ­personal issues.” Siner feels that she is a voice for students. She is happy to advocate for students if they are having a problem with a professor or any other area in the university, she added. 25

Laura Teichman, “Advocate for All,” The Independent Collegian, University of Toledo ­ rchives, Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, University of Toledo Library. A

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Siner does not just limit her involvement with students to the classroom. “I’ve worked with many student groups on campus,” she said. “I’ve done a lot of work with the Black Student Union, and another group on campus that was an African-American women’s group.” bsu President Jamilah Jones said Siner is someone who is always there for students. “She’s always been a support for students on campus,” said Jones, a junior majoring in secondary education and political science. “She has always been very personable and works with students a lot, that’s what I like about her.” Siner said she has mixed feelings about the way in which Black History Month is typically celebrated. “I’m under the impression that it should be celebrated just one month out of the year. It should be an ongoing process that is included in the history of America,” she said. “It’s a very good idea to celebrate because then it’s showcased, but I think it needs to be placed in the context of American History.” Siner said she thinks that various people all over campus should be featured throughout the year, instead of just during one month. “There are some ­extraordinary things for students at The University of Toledo,” she said, “and they should be recognized also.” 5.3.7 Green Column and Green Africana Studies26 What does the black community need in response to present-day demands for a “greener” environment? My “green” column will tell you what we need! We need more black people who are environmentally engaged so that they can create new local green organizations; gain green collar employment; become entrepreneurs of green products and services; and alter the focus of national and global environmental organizations to include social justice issues. I welcome you to my new green column, which will appear in the economic section once a month in The Truth. The American society and economy are about to be reengineered around Green industries and sensibilities—black communities must not be left ­behind. This green column is being created to help instigate thinking and conversation centering on environmental issues relative to black communities in ­general and in the Toledo area in particular. Speaking globally, black people s­ uffer ­disproportionately from environmental degradation, but we are far from the forefront regarding environmental organizations seeking redress and a more sustainable way of life. In America, for example, Brownfields as opposed to greenfields, or areas that are actually or potentially contaminated 26

Rubin. Patterson. “Here Comes the Green Column.” The Sojourner’s Truth. June 17, 2009.

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environmentally, are overly concentrated in African American and Latino neighborhoods. It turns out that race, not homeownership or home value, is the determinative factor of brownfield location. Brownfields may not pose the demonstrable and immediate health risks to communities that active hazardous facilities pose, but they adversely affect communities in more stealthy ways: they undermine social capital, erode community pride, and stall economic development. Brownfields, which are subject to contaminant migration, also pose potential environmental dangers by, among other things, impacting groundwater. For a global example, in Sub-Saharan Africa, the region’s 750 million citizens generate less than two percent of global carbon emissions, but they suffer most of the world’s deadly effects of climate shocks. Africans are living through more pronounced and prolonged droughts in some areas and floods in others. The areas on the continent suitable for agriculture, the length of growing seasons, and the yields of food staples are all projected to decline due to industrial practices of rich nations who have literally turned up the world’s thermostat. Despite being hit hardest by the ill-effects of climate environmental degradation, black communities’ worldwide are not active in environmental movements and organizations to the degree needed. Notes Robert Bullard, the prolific African American scholar of environmental studies, “blacks must become more involved in environmental issues if they want to live healthier lives.” Two reasons are often cited for why African ­Americans are not inclined to roll with environmental movements. First, the thinking is that African Americans and also other blacks have bigger, more immediate fish to fry, such as addressing crumbling black communities, grinding poverty, and broken families, high unemployment and incarceration rates, poorly performing schools, serious health issues, and racial discrimination (which affects all of the aforementioned) before they can indulge the “luxury” of focusing on environmental concerns such as climate changes and the threat of polar bear extinction. In short, it is argued, African-Americans and blacks throughout the world have their priorities right by focusing primarily on social justice first. This line of thinking is wrongheaded but understandable. The second reason, as argued by some, is that, at least up until very recently, black people tended to equate “environmentalism” with conservationism. The material basis for this ­argument is that many of the prominent mainstream environmental organizations have had a conservationist orientation (e.g., the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the National Wildlife Federation). Fortunately, the streams of social justice and environmental protection have experienced a degree of merging over the past decade. The movement that blacks are joining and energizing

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today is the environmental justice movement, which contends that no community should bear a disproportionate share of the burden of an industrial ­society and  all communities should benefit from the transition to a global green economy. Moreover, I am sympathetic to the view that blacks have always been environmentalists: from great grandma demanding we turn off that light when we leave a room to Africans living more in harmony with nature in Africa for centuries before Western penetration and subsequent domination. But such thinking and actions are incommensurate with the environmental crisis upon us today. That is, the environmental tipping point that we have today requires arming ourselves with substantially more knowledge and engaging ourselves more energetically in activist campaigns for sustainable living after a century and a half of destructive industrialism. A crisis embodies both danger and opportunity. The danger associated with the present-day environmental crisis is our inability to sustain the American economy and the global economy, as we know them, by continued use of the reigning production paradigm. America’s material wealth and comfortable lifestyle have required scooping up more and more resources from the environment and processing these resources industrially into finished products, using greenhouse gas-inducing technologies, then dumping these often toxic finished products and production technologies back into the environment. Throughout thousands of years of civilization development, humans have buried and burned their waste. In the industrial age, with more elaborately toxic and greenhouse gasenhancing technological prowess and the intense capitalist-consumerist demand for ever  more “new-and-improved” material goods, the discarded ­rubbish ­became far greater and more ecologically lethal. In this modern era, burying or burning our garbage comes in the form of toxic waste dumps and municipal landfills and incinerators. The exhaustion of minerals, the loss of biodiversity, and the destabilizing environmental effects of climatic shocks from fossil fuel based industrial production are making it abundantly clear that this production paradigm that has served Westerners so well in terms of material wealth and comforts can’t be sustained, not for themselves and certainly not for the rest of the world that is rushing to improve the quality of their lives, largely through the use of the same production paradigm. Nevertheless, billions of citizens in developing and impoverished nations are clamoring for a bigger piece of the action relative to Western-style consumption and lifestyle. To accommodate these additional nations, we would need over five new planet Earths to provide the minerals, ecosystems, and environmental sinks to burn and bury their fossil fuels and toxic wastes. Since

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we’ve got only one planet Earth, one course of action for addressing this crisis  is a whole new paradigm shift in industrial production: from destructoindustrial to eco-industrial. Destructo-industrial production is the only industrial production we have known, as it destroys the environment in step with more industrial production. But industrial production isn’t inherently environmentally destructive. Eco-industrial production severs the heretofore link between industrial production and environmental destruction. Eco-industrial production, which is the opportunity wing of the crisis, includes advanced renewable energies. For example, northwest Ohio is a national leader in the research, development, and commercialization of solar, biofuel, and wind technologies. Consequently, the emerging advanced renewable energy eco-industry is providing new c­ areer opportunities for local citizens and talent is being recruited from around the country and around the world to help expand the industry. Such opportunities are expected to expand rapidly, not only because of recent technological breakthroughs and increasing market demands for green products and ­services, but because of the Obama presidential election. President Obama is as intellectually committed to a green economy and is as beholden to investors in the renewable energy industry as President Bush was intellectually committed and beholden to Big Oil. Venture capitalists and us corporations constituting a new “green-industrial complex” have expanded their lobbyists threefold in just the last year alone. With an Obama Administration, oil subsides will continually shrink while eco-industrial subsidies will continually expand, thereby expanding green-collar opportunities in Northwest Ohio and other parts of the nation. African-Americans must remain informed about green-collar employment opportunities and must be trained to take full advantage of such opportunities. We must not allow a whole new jobs-producing sector to emerge that recreates and exacerbates the existing racial and social inequalities. This inaugural column provides a frame and a flavor for the local, national, and global green issues I will cover. Look for my discussions in the economic section next month and every month following. Meanwhile, get greener! 5.3.8 Edwina Kofi-Opata and Green Africana Studies27 Although I was aware of global warming, climate change, and issues pertaining to the environment as a whole when I first started college, my knowledge of 27

“Africana Studies Student Develops New Passion for the Environment.” In Rubin ­Patterson’s Greening A ­ fricana Studies: Linking Environmental Studies with Transforming Black Experiences. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. (2015).

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the environment was miniscule. I was, however, given a wider platform when I decided to write on some aspects of climate change within the international system as part of my thesis requirement in graduate school at the University of Ghana. I became intrigued with how developing countries were positioning themselves to tackle head on the issue of global warming and climate change and the problems they created for societies. My curiosity had been aroused following the research, but I did not know what I was going to do next. Everything was put in perspective when I came to the University of Toledo for another graduate degree. Although my major at the time was political science. I knew I wanted to focus on the environment—but from a global perspective, not one limited to a particular geographic region. I began to look for courses that were geared toward my interests. I registered for an Africana studies class entitled Environmental Inequalities and Opportunities, though originally I was not sure what it held in store for me. All I knew was that the class was going to address the environmental inequalities faced by sections of the global society based on race, class, and location. My experience in taking the class was overwhelming. My professor constantly emphasized the opportunities to be gained by moving away from the use of fossil fuels to clean energy and encouraged us to investigate further. Based on that encouragement, I applied for an internship with the Columbus, Ohio chapter of the Sierra Club. Although I wanted to be at the forefront of discussions on renewable energy, I was assigned to researching coal plants. The Sierra Club has been in the vanguard of promoting an effective moratorium on new coal power facilities through its Beyond Coal campaign. I was fascinated by the social dimension of the research: the underlying questions of how communities in which coal plants existed were involved in the process of shutdowns and the unnerving contention surrounding the future of coal plant employees, as well as alternative uses for degraded lands. The debate in recent times has been on how to cope with massive job cuts that would result should global society transition from the use of fossil fuels to renewable energy. However, the green economy would provide just as many jobs as the status quo. To bridge the gap of unemployment, emphasis should be placed on skills development at different levels of engineering targeted at coal plant workers in particular as well as the general public. Engineering skills are needed to support various aspects of green economy such as the building and servicing of wind turbines, solar panels and other forms of technology. The ready availability of individuals with the necessary skills is an important and necessary building block. One interesting observation in the course of my research was the alternative use of remediated brownfields that generate incomes for the site of communities and address the issue of lost taxes.

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On the whole, what I gathered from my research experience was an awareness of the constant need for communities to be proactive in every activity within their domain—particularly with regard to the environment. More broadly, my internship work has connected with my earlier interest in developing countries and their position within the international system as it pertains to global warming, climate change and the transition to a green economy. As that transition continues, further research into satisfying the energy needs of the African continent will be essential. With the completion of my master’s degree behind me, I am now a doctoral student in spatially integrated social sciences. My focus is on energy and environmental policy with an emphasis on energy sustainability in Africa. Improving African American Male Graduation Rates: Eliminating the Black–White Graduation Gap28 5.3.9.1 Background On November 18, 2011, the majority of African American male professors, senior administrators and professional staffers, and a few key student leaders met to initiate an action-oriented dialogue focusing on the terribly low African ­American male graduation rate at ut. The 5-year graduation rate of African American males of approximately 10.8% is the lowest on campus. Such a horrifically low graduation rate for this or for any population of students obviously has staggering implications for the students, for our University, and for the broader society. The challenge is so huge until it demands an “all hands on deck” approach. Furthermore, if one accepts the proposition that insight gleaned from general studies of ways to improve graduation rates are thought to be capable of benefitting even the weakest academic performers—and there is reason to accept that proposition—then there is also reason to accept the proposition that insight gleaned from specific studies of ways to improve graduation rates among the weakest academic performers can also benefit students in general. This report, with recommendations, is informed by three sources of insight: (1) a systematic qualitative study of African American male first-year students based on structured interviews; (2) assessments and recommendations by ut African American male professionals; and (3) an extensive review of the literature concerning African American male challenges and successes in ­college.

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Rubin Patterson and Willie McKether. March 13, 2012. “Improving African American Male Graduation Rates: Eliminating the Black–White Graduation Gap.” Report to the ut ­Faculty Senate. https://www.utoledo.edu/facsenate/docs/African%20American%20 Retention_Graduation%20Taskforce%20Faculty%20Senate%20Presentation.pdf.

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Insight gleaned from collective meetings and one-to-one interviews with ­African American professional men at ut is interspersed throughout this report. Similarly, knowledge gained from the extensive literature review shaped our overall approach to this project. As for the student interviews, there is a dedicated section explaining the methodology and the findings. At the end of this report, starting on page 9, you will find recommendations that we think will begin to make significant improvements in African American male student performance at ut. Most ut African American male faculty, staff, and administrators know individually and collectively that we can add considerably to the institutionalwide efforts to significantly elevate the graduation rates of this population. In light of the fact that all of the African American male professionals on campus today have graduated from predominantly white institutions, we have some unique insight that should be systematically tapped to assist African American male students struggling today to matriculate to graduation at ut. Many of the cultural and structural factors militating against the academic success of ­African American male students today have been successfully dealt with by ut’s African American professionals. Such professionals who are not only willing but who are also eager to connect with this young population in productive mentoring relationships represent a powerful resource that should be tapped more directly. African American professionals on campus can work proactively with colleagues across the campus on both cognitive and noncognitive factors that affect the prospects of student academic success. The extent and nature of students possessing an “academic self-concept” are one of the best noncognitive predictors of academic success. Students with strong ties to communities that do not privilege values necessary for completing college can experience some dissonance when trying to adjust to and integrate into college life. Such dissonance diminishes the likelihood of students developing a meaningful academic self-concept. Helping students, particularly African American men, cross this divide with a transformed identity should be a fundamental goal. 5.3.9.2 What Works and Doesn’t Work When university structure and African American male cultural practices work in synthesis against these students, the outcome can be lethal to their academic prospects. A university structure that does not help African American male students handle the dissonance created by the transition from environments that are at best marginally supportive of academic pursuits to environments that immediately demand and privilege academic skills and values will largely fail such students. And when African American male students have not

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been socialized to the cultural practices of an academic self-concept and selfefficacy in academic domains as preparation to fulfill career goals, they will primarily fail. Thus, when the institutional and cultural deficiencies work in synthesis, they produce a failure multiplier effect. Conversely, in those instances when there is institutional structure that helps students with adjustment and integration to college life and provides them with tools for collegiate success, and in those instances when students have acquired through mentorships the impulse and confidence to rely on their will and resourcefulness to overcome barriers, the synthesis of these two factors results in a success multiplier effect. African American men from some communities are socialized to act out their masculinity in ways detrimental to their academic success. Related to this is what former Columbia University provost and new Stanford University Education School Dean, Claude Steele, refers to as “stereotype threat.” As a psychologist, Steele’s extensive and widely cited studies show that societal stereotypes about group members, or even the group members’ perceptions that societal stereotypes are being applied to them, can affect the academic performance of such group members. A coping response by many as a means of defending themselves from stereotype threat is to “disidentify” with academics or not develop an “academic self-concept” altogether. A part of our challenge is to help these young men understand the necessity of applying winning strategies of translating institutional and societal difficulties into motivation to ­succeed through their agency, rather than translating these difficulties into oppositional behavioral responses that are detrimental to their academic success. ut presently has only marginal facility to systematically address this ongoing need. In other words, what is currently in place does not go far enough to address the needs of African American male students on campus. High-achieving African American students have a high-level of self-efficacy in which they see themselves as agents of their own success, thereby r­ elying on their will and resourcefulness to overcome whatever barriers existing between them and their career goals. Self-efficacy is primarily socialized, and many students have received such socialization at home before enrolling at a university. For those who have not been socialized with such a resilient character trait, one of the greatest assets a university can provide to such students—perhaps on par with content knowledge and technical skills and even the college ­credential itself—is self-efficacy and an indefatigable sense of self-determination. One reason why African Americans at historically black colleges and universities (hbcus) have higher graduation rates than their counterparts at non-elite predominantly white institutions (pwis) is that this population of

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students, on the whole, receives more mentoring. African American men at hbcus in particular are far more likely to develop productive mentoring relationships than their counterparts at pwis. Studies consistently show that students who are participants in positive mentoring relationships have exceedingly more enriching college experiences than those who do not. While hbcus generally have far fewer resources than their pwi counterparts, they nonetheless provide structures and mentoring that help students who often approach the university with less impressive academic credentials to ultimately graduate. Improving the academic performance of African American male students at ut must address both structural and cultural issues to affect both noncognitive and cognitive factors of success. Either unfavorable structural or cultural obstacles for poor and working-class African American young men, who are largely first-generation college students, can sharply reduce graduation rates for this population of students, but when these two sets of obstacles are combined and working in synthesis, they have proved to have an adverse multiplier effect on graduation. ut has (or has had) some key ingredients on which to build. Programs such as Toledo Excel have demonstrated for over two decades that an investment of resources beyond a baseline can result in higher retention and graduation rates. Over 80% of Toledo Excel students graduate and they have gone on to become significant assets to society as professors, medical doctors, attorneys, corporate executives, entrepreneurs, and many other types of professionals. Toledo Excel currently takes in annual cohorts of approximately 50 students. Investing additional resources to the existing infrastructure could allow them to more than double their incoming cohorts. The University of Toledo has produced a number of pioneers whose work centered on student development, but none whose work is more important than that of Dr. Helen Cooks and Dr. Roderick McDavis. Helen Cooks, founder of Toledo Excel, completed a master’s thesis on student development in 1974. The ideas embedded in that thesis led her to subsequently develop the Toledo Excel Program, which has produced well over a thousand students. Also in 1974 at ut, Roderick McDavis, current president of Ohio University, completed his doctoral dissertation that also involved student development. The former ut Office of Student Development (osd) was crucial to their studies and their crowning achievements in higher education. They both report that multifaceted and properly funded osds that enhance fundamental skills and specific cultural factors affecting self-efficacy are simply indispensable. The Africana Studies Program is another proven success despite its acute underfunding. We know from ut institutional data that African American

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enrollment in Africana Studies courses affects or is at least correlated with ­African American graduation. The average 5-year graduation rates for A ­ frican ­American students entering ut in fall 2003, 04, and 05 varied by the number of Africana Studies courses they took. For those who enrolled in no ­Africana Studies courses, their graduation rate was 11.9%. Those who took one to three courses had graduation rates of 32.6%, and those who took four or more ­Africana Studies course had a graduation rate of 41.7%, which is higher than the campus average. Africana Studies only has a director and one visiting professor. ­Investing additional resources in Africana Studies for two to three additional faculty members will increase the course offerings to African ­American and other students, thereby particularly boosting the graduation rate of A ­ frican American students and the campus average. ut’s former African American Student Enrichment Initiatives Office (asseio) is among those offices that made some contributions to African ­American student success, though that success was limited due to resource challenges and other factors. aaseio had a director and a graduate assistant. Such an investment and design are likely to be insufficient to assist students ­institutionally and culturally to successfully make the transitions necessary for collegiate success. 5.3.9.3 Recommendations As stated earlier, just as general graduation-promoting institutional knowledge and activities can favorably impact all students, including the weakest academic performers, such knowledge and activity specifically designed to assist the weakest academic performers can also assist students generally. A reconstituted Office of Student Development is definitely needed to assist students who are clearly ill-prepared for a successful university experience, from the perspective of skills, self-awareness, and expectations. A new umbrella Office of Student Development could house the existing Counseling Center as well as staff who could assist with a range of student deficits, from academic skills to self-efficacy. Just one of the many advantages would be to “de-stigmatize” counseling, as it would be housed in the same office where students already go for assistance with, say, math tutoring. Students in general and African American males in particular tend not to be well-informed about the benefits that can stem from the services provided by counseling centers. A better understanding that is likely to occur from the new physical and institutional connection within student development would be a positive side-effect. On the one hand, students may begin to take advantage of the Counseling Center, but on the other hand, the other section of the student development office that assists students with everything from academics to

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family issues could reduce the need for the excellent counseling from the professional psychologists, except for more severe cases. The new ut osd would also assist students, particularly African American males, with the dissonance they experience when they first arrive at ut. No longer would they immediately have to fall behind, never catch up, and not know how to handle the attendant frustration. The summer transition program would prepare students before the fall term, lessening the prospect of such dissonance, and the student development office would be there to assist students throughout the academic year. In addition to the counselors, a few new staff members are required. The future student development specialists with proven and impeccable track records should be identified through national searches. Although we do not claim to recommend a precise number, it seems reasonable to expect that a director and a staff of six professionals would provide the critical support to assure the assistance required. In addition to these seven new positions, seven graduate students and fifteen peer advisors would be required. This is similar to the level of staff effort that existed within the former ut osd. Two to three additional Africana Studies professors would provide more opportunities for successful mentorship relationships and, more important, more opportunities to reach a much larger share of the African American ­student population. And as institutional data report, these students’ enrollment in African Studies courses is correlated with higher graduation prospects for African American students at ut. Moreover, as the Africana Studies program has a focus on sustainability, entrepreneurship, and South Africa, such specialized areas are likely to be attractive to all student demographics. Nevertheless, the program has never had the faculty strength to make a significant impact. As ut proceeds with fulfilling its staffing needs to meet its strategic objectives, University searches, particularly on the main campus, should appoint more highly qualified African Americans who would eagerly serve as effective mentors to these students. We should bear in mind that not only are many African American students first-generation college students, but they are also from ­predominantly African American neighborhoods and have attended weak schools where student enrollment is predominately African American. They therefore have few if any points of reference and experiences from which to draw when they first arrive at ut. Not only do they often have a skills shortage, they also have an experience shortage when interacting day-to-day in a predominantly white institution. At least first-generation white students, with few exceptions if any, grew up in predominately white neighborhoods and attended predominately white primary and secondary schools. Therefore, when

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they arrive at ut, the university environment appears less foreign and less intimidating. 5.3.10 Retention and Graduation Taskforce: Diversifying Student Retention and Academic Success29 Dr. Jacobs, President of the University of Toledo, correctly states that ut adds more value to the lives of students than Harvard or Yale as the highly motivated and brilliant students at those institutions are clearly going to be successful, even without the Ivy League education and degree. But at ut, as a metropolitan open-enrollment university, we transform the lives of students as a result of our access and elevation of intellect and skills that we provide to students who have fewer options. We can transform many more lives more consistently and more profoundly if we could more ­reliably create and deliver a set of ­academic and adjustment support services to students who frequently enter without requisite fundamental academic skills. Students whose family and intimate community privilege the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are rewarded by universities will do well in school. The majority of ut’s underrepresented students do not come from such ­communities, which means that ut’s challenge has to be to help cultivate the attitude and develop the skills required for success in college. The requisite intervention strategies for student retention in the form of academic and adjustment support programs are more intellectually and bureaucratically challenging than strategies of student recruitment, but the payoffs for retaining and graduating the overwhelming majority of students are huge for the students, the community, and certainly for the university’s bottom line. The 2010 data for percent black of incoming class and the graduating class were 11.3 and 4.2, respectively, show that our greatest challenge is retention and graduation, not recruitment. The campuses we visited have succeeded in crafting the right mix of academic and adjustment support services for their students. We are challenged with creating, implanting, and executing such support services that are right for our campus. This report comprises specific recommendations that we think could enable ut to significantly increase the retention and graduation rates of underrepresented students. At base, we need to change the academic tradition and culture among underrepresented students at ut. There are only two broad ways of a­ ccomplishing this goal. One approach (which is the one we do not endorse) calls for the ­University 29

Rubin Patterson et al. “Retention and Graduation Taskforce: Diversifying Student Retention and Academic Success.” Submitted to Provost, 2013. Unpublished Document.

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to become selective, thereby accepting only those ­underrepresented students from communities that have already cultivated in students the a­ ttitudes, skills, and knowledge-base to be required and rewarded at ut. The other approach calls for the University to begin the intermediate-term process of transforming this demographic of students’ academic tradition and culture by significantly reimagining and relaunching the full-array of our academic support services. Starting with summer bridge students and with first-year ­living learning community students, the University can begin the process of creating a space for initially small numbers of students where the center of gravity is pulled toward academic success rather than an individual or peer-to-peer high tolerance for academic failure. Sufficient staff members are required to create a “cultural cocoon” where there are higher levels expectations and support. Students in athletics programs and academic programs such as Excel graduate students at significantly higher rates in part because they are n ­ urtured in such cultural cocoons. Again, this will not happen overnight, but by growing the summer bridge from 30 students to 100 students and growing the multicultural and other such living learning communities to as many as 200 per year as part of that cocoon, we will be on the way towards transforming the tradition and culture of underrepresented students at ut 5.4

Revitalization of Community (Documents 101–110)

In addition to these areas of black individual leadership, there are organizational programs providing forms of collective leadership. One of the main ways the black community is sustaining itself is in the realm of cultural programming. As in most black communities there is excellence in music and dancing. An example of black dancing have been the Afro Ball, the annual citywide dance for high school students (Document 101). Toledo is also part of the national spread of the dance step called “Chicago Steppin” (Document 102). Del Ray Grace Sr. is leading the movement of Sacred Steel based on the steel guitar. He is also developing a museum that features Toledo as the national center of this musical genre (Document 103). Charles Welch, a radio executive, saw to it that music was broadcasted in the black community (Document 104). One could always count on Black Toledo’s favorite music and dance, along with good fellowship, at the African American Festival (Document 105). Other key cultural and political contributions include: Toledo Horsemen Club (Document 106); African American Legacy Project (Document 107); Black Lives Matter Resolution (Document 108); Name Change at Scott High School

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(Document 109); and Art Tatum African American Resource Center (Document 110). 5.4.1 Restoring the Afro-Ball30 The year was 1987 and on that particular Friday, the school day was crawling to an agitating end. I was anxious to get home. More so than on any other school day. My dad had a surprise for me. Back in the 1980’s, my family owned a clothing boutique. Often I would come home and find all sorts of the latest fashions sprawled across my bed. This was one of those days and, as expected, my dad “came through.” Mr. King was no slouch, I had the complete ensemble—shoes, designer nylons, handbag and a white quarter length fur were the accents to an elegant sequined gown. I was a freshman in high school and it was my first dance. Yet, not just any dance. If you are walking down memory lane with me, then you know this was not Homecoming or a student council dance. Even the acclaimed junior/ senior prom paled in comparison to this night. Our night—The Citywide Afro-Ball. In the early 1980’s, key educators within the black community came together and discussed an epiphany of sorts, the designation of an evening set aside to acknowledge and honor the music, the cunning sense of style, the incomparable beauty, the distinction and the insurmountable intelligence of our people. This was not just a night out for the black kids, this was a teaching tool. What better lesson to learn than one that embraces and celebrates the heritage and culture of a people, who are without a question, tried and true? In 1982, Don Martin, Ernie Jones and C.J. Martin joined forces and brought the novel idea for a dance to life. The theme expanded and Arnethia Tooson, Marvin Vines, Brenda Powell, LaRouth Perry and Avie Dixon joined the ranks of those whom modern-day advisors revere as “pioneers” of the Afro-Ball. Through their hard work and dedication an event evolved that became known as the favorite of the local limousine and tuxedo companies. The Citywide Afro Ball students arrived at the ball in style! The young men were dapper, to say the least, in their tuxes with tails, Dobb hats and canes. The young ladies donned sequined, taffeta and silk evening gowns. On this night, our teens dressed to impress! There was absolutely no room for “half-steppin” here. 30

India Santos, “Restoring the Afro Ball,” The Sojourner’s Truth, February 7, 2007, 16.

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The citywide courts were the epitome of culture and school pride. If not in authentic African garb, their dresses and tuxedoes were representative of the school’s colors. Members of the courts “represented” by tastefully performing choreographed routines before crowning the kings and queens of their respective schools. During the course of the evening, scholarships were given. We later danced the night away. We mingled with old friends we had not seen since the sixth grade. Simply put, we had a good time. We had a good time. There were no fights, no chair throwing—no evenings ruined. In 2005, somehow the dream became defiled and in 2006 deferred. When there is no purpose, chaos will prevail. Initially, the local buzz was “there isn’t an Afro-Ball anymore.” We do not even recognize hidden racism within our own community. There are fights and “drama,” so to speak, at homecomings and proms all the time. They are not cancelled. So why the Afro-Ball? As a people, we have an uncanny ability to shut ourselves down without a second thought. Thankfully, Avie Dixon had second thoughts. Last spring, she called a meeting for all citywide advisors. Three advisors answered the call. From that meeting was born the three “R”s: Restoration, Revival and Renewal. The Afro-Ball is back! Citywide Afro-Club advisors have again come together with the goal of restoring the Ball to its original purpose: an evening for our youngsters where culture is celebrated. The 2007 Citywide AfroBall, “Back in the Day,” will be February 17, 2007 at the Gladieux Meadows on Heatherdowns Blvd. a two entrée buffet of lasagna and grilled chicken is included. Bids are $3.00 per person. Bids will not be sold at the door. The last date to purchase a bid is February 9, 2007. Bids are on sale at Scott, Libbey, Start, Woodward, Rogers, Waite, Springfield and Central Catholic High Schools. They are also available at St. John’s Jesuit and Notre Dame Academy. The attire is strictly formal. Young ladies are expected to be in after-five, formal eveningwear. Young men are expected to be in tuxedoes or formal suits. As in the past, citywide courts will be presented and kings and queens crowned. Two scholarships will be awarded to qualifying seniors. A new award, “Club of the Year,” will be presented to the club that excelled in service to the community. Do you remember your Afro-Ball? Advisors are imploring parents to keep the Ball alive for their children. Revive your school’s AfroClub. Some of our schools do not even have active clubs. Speak with administrators and make sure that cultural diversity is being welcomed and embraced in your child’s

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school. Restore the purpose of the club and the Ball by encouraging your child to attend the Afro-Ball. Renew the celebration of our culture by sharing with your children, students and youth groups your memories of the Afro-Ball from “Back in the Day.” 5.4.2 Steppin in Toledo31 In 2001 Dwayne Douglas exposed Toledo to Detroit Urban Ballroom Dancing. From 2001–2004 he taught at various nightclubs throughout the city like The End Zone, The Blue Print and the Emporium before settling in at the Elks Lounge on Junction from 2002 to the present day. Through the years the dance has grown in the city to the credit of exposure to various styles of dance from our influence from Detroit, mi. We began to travel to Detroit regularly to Bop, Latin Hustle, Ballroom and finally began to be exposed to Chicago Stepping. At this point around the end of 2003 various groups began to form to not only promote/teach the dance but to start holding events the new dancers could patronize. Groups that formed were Smooth Flava, Mind, Body and Soul, Glass City Hustlers, ubu, United We Step, United Ladies of Step and Fancy Footwork. Through the years these groups were a pillar in the community, teaching at various schools, churches, and community centers. In time the influence of Chicago Stepping transformed the city and most dancers and now you can see this dance being featured throughout the city at most adult affairs. Today only three groups have survived the times. Fancy Footwork still ­teaches ballroom dancing every Saturday at the common space from 5–7 p.m. on Reynolds Rd. Dwayne Douglas still teaches at the Elks Lounge every Sunday from 6:30–8 p.m., and Mind, Body and Soul in collaboration with Smooth Flava holds an event every first Friday of the month at the Garden Lake Hall. This 31

Juan Hall, interview, January 6, 2016. World’s Largest repeated renown stepper Anne Hunter from Detroit has come to Toledo to teach and individuals travel to Detroit to her classes. They also go to Detroit to take classes with well-known groups such as U + ME = WE for lessons who are also renown steppers and not only repeated winners of the Worlds Largest, but hold Masters titles. The dance community in Toledo has many genres and small outlets to express them, these are a few in Toledo: Perry Chilus whose group is called United We Steppin started teaching in 2006, teaches on Tuesday nights 6–9 p.m. at 1700 Reynolds road at the Common Space. Perry also holds a dance every 3rd Friday at the African American Legacy Project building. A local stepper Leonard Gregory has a place at 5015 Bennett where he holds open dancing and helps newcomers to perfect their steppin and practices the new hustles on Monday evenings from 7:30–9:30 p.m. free to all. Dwayne Douglas also teaches Ballroom dancing on Tuesdays at the Gonzales 1949 Broadway St. from 7–9 p.m. Dwayne also holds open dancing where he dj’s after his class at the Elks Lodge on Sunday nights.

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event features dance lessons from 6:30–8 p.m. and open dancing from 8 p.m.– midnight, to provide a monthly venue for the people in the dance community to show off their skills and talents. Juan Hall of Mind, Body and Soul in association with Walter Jenkins of the Big Hat Gentlemen of Detroit decided to start hosting a national yearly event in Toledo (Mid-West Steppin Ball) featuring strictly Chicago Stepping. This event began 7 years ago and has grown to national prominence and attracts dancers from all over the country, Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Raleigh, nc, Washington, dc, just to name a few. Chicago Stepping is now the most featured dance Toledo has adopted. In recent years Toledo has produced dancers that have presented in the World Largest Steppers Contest hosted in Chicago and has produced as recently as 2015 a first place winner in the beginner category, Christopher McClellan. Steven Corggens also placed in the amateur category in 2008. You can still find us at the places mentioned above, Chicago stepping has become the biggest thing since the black church. 5.4.3 Steel Guitar Sacred Music32 Del Ray Grace was born in Toledo, Ohio at the Toledo Mercy Hospital, on ­September 28, 1960, to Curtis and Loretta (Brownlee) Grace. To this union were born seven children, four boys (Timothy, Calvin, Del, and Edwin) and three girls (Toni, Angela, and Fran). Del is the fourth child in the birth order…. The Stateline Church is where Del and his sisters began to take an interest in the church’s music tradition. At about the age of thirteen, Del heard the late Bishop Henry Wayne White of Detroit, Michigan play the Hawaiian steel guitar in a church assembly and was hooked from that point forward. The very next Sunday he told his Pastor that he desired the gift to play the Hawaiian steel guitar like Bishop Henry Wayne White…. The love of the music tradition became evident in his life as he began to travel to churches in other cities to absorb all the knowledge that he could from talking to many of the older musicians gaining tips and other information to become a better musician. Del’s sister Angie, an excellent musician as well, was known for recording every church service on cassette at that time, so he could always count on her for audio footage. As time progressed he wanted to be involved in presenting sacred steel music to the masses. He formed an instrumental ensemble and asked his ­father, Curtis Grace, to name the group. Without hesitation he responded, “The A ­ mazing Grace Praise Band, the best band in the land.” The body of work produced by Del Ray Grace Sr. and his road to get to this place in time, is not coincidental 32

Del Ray Grace Sr., The Gospel of Sacred Steel (Toledo, oh: Sacred Strings Records, 2015), 2–6.

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but by divine destiny. The Bible says, Psalm 119:133, “Order my steps in thy word: and let not any iniquity have dominion over me.” Sacred Strings Records Inc. is an independent record label located in Toledo, Ohio. The label, founded in 2009 by Del Ray & Kelli L. Grace and later incorporated as a 501c (3) non-profit organization in 2012. ssr Inc., exist to foster an appreciation for the African American steel guitar tradition through programs of collection, preservation, education, and outreach. Unlike most traditional record labels, ssr Inc. specializes exclusively in producing compilation albums of various sacred steel artists. Each year since 2009, sacred steel compilation projects have been released by the record label in the form of dvd and cd with audio and video footage taken from several live S­ acred Strings Showcase concerts. This annual concert is a celebration of sacred steel musicians that come together to share performances for the masses. ssr Inc. has a catalog of sixteen published sound recordings of various sacred steel artists in its discography. The record label has also produced thirteen dvds of live concerts proving to be the largest resource of sacred steel music available. Their goal is to protect, preserve, and interpret this rare music tradition by providing a platform for the musicians to showcase their talent, creating a public awareness by keeping the music alive and relevant. ssr Inc. plays a pivotal role in the sacred steel community. The founders of the label were both born and raised in the Jewell Dominion Church from children. As a historian of the music, and a musician with over forty years of experience within the tradition, Del Grace was blessed to sit under the tutelage of many Jewell Dominion sacred steel pioneers of that era. This vantage point provided him with a unique insight and understanding of the role of sacred steel in church worship services…. In 2012, Sacred Strings Records Inc. received a proclamation from the office of the mayor of the city of Toledo. ssr Inc. was recognized for their commitment to the preservation and promotion of the time honored steel guitar tradition of African American music also known as sacred steel. The Honorable Mayor of the City of Toledo, recognized and declared the month of August as Sacred Steel Music & History Month. 5.4.4 Charles Welch33 Both fate and faith came together to play a key role in making Toledo businessman Charles Welch’s dream of owning a radio station in Toledo come true. 33

Alan Abrams, “Charles Welch: He Puts The Juice in Toledo Radio,” The Sojourner’s Truth, pp. 6, 9, June 25, 2003.

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Now in its seventh year of broadcasting, wjuc-fm (107.30)—better known as “the Juice”—is rated as the Number one urban radio station and ranks in the eighth spot among the 18 radio stations in the Metro Toledo area. Fate came into play because almost from [the] time he was a teenager in Detroit, [W]elch appeared to be preordained to follow a career in radio. And it took a lot of faith for Welch to persevere during the ten-year court battle between Welch and other applicants for the permit for the radio station that would [become] The Juice. What gave Welch the ability to continue the struggle and not despair or give up in frustration? “I’m an honest person. I’m a Christian. And I believe in God,” said Welch explaining why he believes he triumphed over adversity. As Welch says, he stayed focused upon “the three P’s prayer, perserverance and patience” as he successfully entered the history books as the first local ­African-American to build a radio station from the ground. Welch’s success may also have had a lot to do with his upbringing. Welch was born in Talledaga, Alabama to Ethel Mae and George Welch, [w]hom he calls “My hero.” The family moved to Detroit when young Welch was 14. Although his father worked as [a] janitor at General Motors, his son recalls that “He dressed up in a suit and tie everyday. He taught me that people would respect you more if you dressed in a suit and tie and he was right. Even the service attendant at a gas station would treat you differently,” said Welch. Welch graduated from Detroit’s Northeastern High School, where one of his classmates was the future singer and television star Della Reese. “I remember I used to push her off the piano stool so I could sit down and play,” recalled Welch. “She was very much into being a gospel singer back then,” he said of Reese since their school days. Back then, Welch was also much in demand as a singer. He performed with Buddy Lamp and Walter Johnson at Detroit’s then popular Webb-Wood Inn venue. “I was doing a lot of cabarets back then and once opened for Brook Benton at the famous Club 20 Grand,” recalled Welch. But the defining moment that molded his future career came not while he was on the stage singing, but when he was filling in at the party room on Gratiot and [V]an [D]yke for two disc jockeys Ken Bell and Leon Isaacs—The lover. “The big time disc jockeys who were supposed to mc the dance would always show up about two hours late, so I would be on stage spinning the records and talking to the audience until they arrived,” said Welch. “[O]ne night, Ken Bell came in and heard me, and told me I [s]hould be on the radio.” “So I went to disk jockey school, the Electronic Institute of Technology, on Woodward Avenue near the old Motown building. After graduating, I applied

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for a job at Radio Station wjlb where the dis[k] jockey legends like Frantic Ernie Durham, Joltin’ Joe Howard, Long Tall Lean Lanky Larry Dean and Senator Bristoe Bryant had worked, but the station wouldn’t hire me.” “Then I heard about a job [with] wklr, the Booth Broadcasting outlet in Toledo. And on February 4, 1969 I drove [d]own here, and I stayed. I went on the air, and I’ve never really gone off the air since,” said Welch. After one year as an on-air personality, Welch was promoted to Program Director. A year later, he became Station Manager. During that time, Welch became owner and operator of the Pantheon Theatre, the Pantheon Record Shop, and the Foxx Shop Boutique—all in Toledo. However, that wasn’t his first experience as an entrepreneur. Before coming to Toledo, he had owned a car wash and Cadet Club, a popular tavern on Van Dyke and Forest in Detroit. Welch spent ten years with wklr, leaving to accept a job as Sales Manager at kcoh Radio in Houston. Welch wasn’t comfortable being away from his family in Toledo, so after a year and a half, he returned to Toledo and worked for the Ohio Lottery Commission for two years. But Welch had radio in his blood. He returned to the medium as General Manager of wwws in Saginaw from 1981 to 1983, leaving to become General Manager [of] wvoi in Toledo, owned by rapidly growing Jacor Communications. After five years with wvoi, and in his 18th year in the broadcasting industry, Welch decided it was time for him to pursue his dream of radio station ­ownership. Along with [four] other applicants, Welch applied to the Federal Commission (fcc) to construct a radio station licensed for Swanton, Ohio. However, Welch’s filing with the fcc created a perceived conflict of interest with his job at wvoi. He left Jacor to take a sales job at Fox’s wupw-tv, Channel 36 where he remained for a year. Welch’s combination of radio and television sales experience brought him to the attention of Barden Cable Television in Detroit. He became their Director of Advertising [and increased] revenue by 149 percent. Welch, who commuted from Toledo, continued to increase Barden’s advertising revenue for seven years. Meanwhile, years of rejections, denial and appeals led to a long and costly court battle in Washington, d.c. between Welch and the other applicants for the one available radio station permit. After ten years, the District Appellate Court in Washington gave the fcc the green light to grant the construction permit to Welch Communications, Inc. “But it still took us another four years after that before we could get our funds together,” said Welch. The Juice signed on the airwaves F[eb]. 22, 1997 operating on what Welch called “a shoestring budget.”

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Welch has used the success of wjuc to contribute to the community. To celebrate the station’s first anniversary, he set into motion a fundraiser which netted the The Kitchen for the poor $12,000 and kept it from closing its doors. The station’s second-year anniversary was celebrated with a “kiddie party” to raise money [for] Vanisha Collins to [u]ndergo cancer surgery at Cleveland Clinic. That was the first of many fundraisers for children in which Welch has taken an active role. Welch can often be found in the production booth at wjuc. He still plays blues on Saturdays and sings in choir at St. Paul ame Zion Church, where he is a trustee. He also serves as a board member of the Toledo Urban Federal Credit Union, where he chairs the marketing committee. As a businessman, Welch and two partners, former New Detroit[,] Inc., President Paul Hubbard and Myron Stewart, publisher of the Toledo Journal, own the local Church’s Chicken Franchise. Welch said the local franchise has completely recovered from the problems caused by employee theft at several levels of the business, which included Operation and General Managers down to shift employees. All those employees have been replaced. In addition each of the partners has now assumed personal responsibility over one of the three outlets. Welch oversees the Byrne and Glendale Store. A strong family man, Welch is devoted to his wife Marjorie and their four grown children: Rosalind, Katrina, Debra and Charles. Debra lives in ­Perrysburg and the others reside in Toledo. Both Debra and Charles work with their father at The Juice. Says Welch, “I am grateful that [G]od has put me and kept me in a position where I can help myself, help my family and help those he sends my way.” 5.4.5 African American Festival34 The African-American Festival started from a dream, Suzette Cowell dreamed one night about the gathering of people, our people. In this dream Suzette saw Tom Joyner, she saw people eating and being entertained and having a good time. Cowell went to work the next day to the Urban Credit Union and said “we are going to have a festival.” She then went to the community, had a meeting at the Mott Library, every nay sayer came up with why they shouldn’t, couldn’t or wouldn’t. Suzette told them “every community but ours has something,” she walked away and left it at that. About a month later Suzette went to Church, it was a “high” praise sermon and every one was feeling the spirit move through the Church. Suzette went down on her knees and had that same dream, then she heard God say to her “I’m gonna show you it’s me.” The Preacher stopped 34

Suzette Cowell, interview by Renee’ Dunnavant, March 15, 2016.

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in the middle of her sermon and walks up to Suzette and says, “God told me to tell you to do what he told you to do.” Monday Suzette went to work, she and staff got books out and learned how to do a festival. The first African American festival in Toledo was held in July 2005 at Nelson Park on the corner of Indiana and Smead, it was like a big family reunion with approximately 600 guests. There were booths with soul food and all kinds of goods to buy, while the Funk band provided the entertainment. In 2015 the Festival has grown to approximately 15,000 guests and the entertainment has grown into a line-up of artist. 5.4.6 Toledo Horsemen Club35 The Toledo Horsemen Club was established and has persisted for more than 30 years under the leadership of President James Brooks. We are a non-profit organization that serves young people from ages 12 to 18. Our vision statement is simply to bring awareness to our inner city kids. We welcome others as well. We educate them and teach the basics of horseback riding. Our club participates in picnics, parades, campouts, church functions, birthdays, and trail rides. We have participated in the Old West End parade, Labor Day parade, African American Festival, Toledo Christmas parade, ut homecoming game parade, and various functions at Smith Park. We feel our combination of skills and experience in horseback riding along with our passion for animals make us a qualified group of unique individuals who want to contribute to our community. 5.4.7 History of the African American Legacy Project The African American Legacy Project or the aalp was founded in 2004 by Robert Smith. His goal was to create a place to keep and share culture and history of African Americans from Northwest Ohio. This place began as a small building on Upton Ave in Toledo, Ohio, not much bigger than a trailer. This “place” held collective memories, stories, pictures, artifacts and more that were and still are meaningful. On October 5, 2012 Ascension Lutheran Church announced the council’s decision to deed their church to the aalp located at 1326 Collingwood. With great support from the community, the aalp relocated soon after with not only room to share history and culture but to also provide community offices, meetings and events such as Dorr Street Live. Today, the aalp still stands and is getting better each day fulfilling its motto of “Preserving the past; gifting the future.” 35

From an interview with Frank Huddleston done by Renee’ Dunnavant, January 7, 2015.

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5.4.8 Black Lives Matter Resolution36 Date: August 11, 2015 Resolution No. 15-629 Title: Resolution in Support of the Black Lives Matter Movement Department/Agency: Commissioners Contact: Lindsay Below, Executive Assistant Summary/Background: The Board of Lucas County Commissioners upholds the ideals of equality under the law, racial justice, and human dignity for all. The ­recent deaths of Eric Gamer, Michael Brown, Freddie Gray—and many other citizens, compel questioning of whether or not equal justice under the law is possible for people of color—particularly those who may be economically d­ isadvantaged. These deaths reveal a growing social economic division that threatens the current and future well-being of people of color and society as a whole. Law enforcement officers are bound by duty to protect the public in a manner that is lawful, honorable, and professional. We recognize that police ­departments across the nation are striving to engage in constructive dialogue and good faith ­efforts to improve relations between officers and communities of color and young people. However, racial profiling remains a very serious issue and improvements must be made to protect the lives and civil liberties of our citizens. Lucas County wishes to express solidarity with the thousands of men and women throughout the nation who are peacefully expressing their outrage and frustration at the deaths of unarmed people of color. We must respect and encourage the understanding of the experiences and traditions of our county’s many populations and cultures. We must work to eliminate ­racial and ethnic disparities, support efforts to promote racial equality, and fight against institutional racism. 5.4.9 Name Change at Scott High School37 On Monday, October 20, 2014, The Links, Inc will coordinate a dedication ceremony at Jesup W. Scott High School to recognize the name change of the school’s performing arts theater. The theater, formerly named the Little Theater, has been renamed the Louise J. Brower Performing Arts Theater in honor the first woman principal of Scott High School. 36

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Lucas County Board of Commissioners, “Resolution in Support of the Black Lives Matter Movement,” Resolution No. 15-629, Lucas County, oh, https://lcapps.co.lucas.oh.us/carts/ resos/16973.pdf. Accessed November 3, 2016. The Sojourner’s Truth, “Name Change Ceremony at Scott Honors Former Toledo Educator,” October 15, 2014, http://www.thetruthtoledo.com/story/2014/101514/name.htm (accessed January 20, 2016).

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Brower, in fact, was the first woman principal of a large, metropolitan high school in the state of Ohio, among her many “firsts.” She became, in 1955, the first African-American woman appointed to an administrative position in the Toledo Public School System (tpss at that time) when she was named assistant principal of Gunckel. In 1967 Brower was the first African-American to head a majority white school when she was named principal of Walbridge Elementary. Brower passed away on January 8, 2003. Born in 1920 in Johnstown, pa, Louise Johnson earned a bachelor’s degree in math education from West Chester Teachers College and began her career as a teacher in a one-room school in Cambridge, md. After one year, she returned to the Philadelphia area to teach. There she met William Brower, a reporter. They married in 1947 and moved to Toledo when William became a reporter for the Blade becoming one of the first African Americans to work as a reporter at a major daily newspaper. Louise joined the teaching staff at Robinson Junior High School. William, who died in 2004, was a trailblazing journalist at the Blade, earning numerous awards and honors, including a nomination in 1951 for a Pulitzer Prize for his series “Fifteen Million Americans” about the living conditions of African Americans in a segregated nation. In 1996, William won the National Association of Black Journalists’ Lifetime Achievement Award. Louise, said her son William, Jr, a writer and consultant in the Washington, d.c. area, believed in instilling a “sky’s the limit” philosophy. “She was the ultimate mother and was devoted to me and my father,” said William, Jr. “She was also devoted to the young people she taught and helped as well. She was taskmaster, but it was always with a purpose. She wanted to maximize my potential and she wanted to maximize the potential of the children she taught.” In addition to her professional duties, Louise Brower was an active participant in community activities. She was a member of The Toledo Chapter of Girlfriends, Inc, The Links, Inc (she served as a president of that group), The Study Hour Club, Phi Delta Kappa, Coterie Club, National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women’s Clubs, Inc, Toledo Planned Parenthood, among others. While the official name change for the Performing Arts Theater occurred in 2003, “we discovered some of the [Toledo Public Schools] administrators were unaware of the renaming of the Little Theater since an official ceremony never occurred,” said Links member Laneta Goings. The Dedication Ceremony will take place on Monday, October 20 at 4:30 p.m. at Scott High School.

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5.4.10 Art Tatum African American Resource Center38 The Toledo-Lucas County Public Library established the Art Tatum African American Resource Center in 1989. The Tatum Center evolved after extensive local and regional research revealed a need for an African American cultural center for all residents of Lucas County. Located in Toledo’s historic Old West End, the Tatum Center shares space with Kent Branch Library, which has served the Old West End community since the branch library opened in 1917. The Tatum Center was designed to be a permanent and dependable community resource. Its mission is to provide cultural, educational and historical information on the varied and unique African American cultural heritage and experiences. In implementing its mission, the Tatum Center strives: • To establish and maintain a comprehensive collection of print, audio and visual materials and artifacts which are indicative of and significant to ­African American culture. • To disseminate information and quality materials which illustrate and interpret the distinctive and rich culture of African American people. • To sponsor an active and ongoing schedule of community-oriented programs, including presentations of the fine and performing arts and workshops on a variety of timely subjects. The Tatum Center serves as a hub for Lucas County residents, where they can meet and exchange ideas. The Center offers a specialized reference and archival collection, reference services and programs for the study and research of black culture. 5.4.10.1 History The development of the Tatum Center was a collaborative effort between Library officials and members of the Toledo African American community. Clyde Scoles, Director of the Toledo-Lucas County Public Library (t-lcpl), saw this partnership as a key element in the effective development of the center. The planning and implementation stage began in 1987 with t-lcpl’s Board of Trustees approving the project. The Board authorized $25,000 to build a collection of books and other resources of print and non-print material. Next, a task force of Library personnel was formed. The task force worked to select a community advisory committee (which later became the Citizens’ Advisory Board) to assist the Library in meeting the goals and objectives adopted for 38

Toledo Lucas County Public Library, “Art Tatum African American Resource Center,” (2000) http://web2.toledolibrary.org/research/explore-our-collections/african-american/. Accessed May 4, 2006.

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the Center. The original members were Dr. Melvin Terrill, Bina Perkins, Mr. Melroy Liggins, Ms. Betty Amison, Ms. Janet Hopings, Ms. Virginia Haywood Smith, Ms. Edrene Cole and Mr. Nate Rogers. The group’s initial charge was to: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Advise on subject areas and types of materials that would be most useful for users of the Center. Advise on planning programs at the Center; suggest topics and speakers or personnel that would have broad appeal to the community. Provide community support for the Center’s programs. Assist in fund-raising and grant proposal writing. Help choose a name for the Center and plan a dedication ceremony.

Today, the Citizens’ Advisory Board remains an active force offering strong guidance and support. In September 1993, the by-laws were revised to accommodate the growing demand for participation on the board. More members were added to the board. Currently the Citizens’ Advisory Board seats eighteen (18) members. In choosing a name for the Center, the community was once again invited to participate. A citywide “Choose A Name” essay contest was launched during Black History Month of 1989. The name was to represent the Center’s originality and its significant purpose. The Library’s Board of Trustees selected the ­winning entry with recommendations from the Center’s Citizens Advisory Board. Ruth Cornwell submitted the winning entry: Art Tatum African ­American Resource Center. Today, looking back eleven years ago, the Center’s establishment was clearly a milestone and it continues to be an inspiration to many Toledoans, particularly residents of the African American community. Those from the African ­American community were well aware that Art Tatum, an internationally known jazz pianist from Toledo, had not been given recognition by his hometown. The Center’s name thus recognized Art and his musical accomplishments, personal perseverance and creative talent. These were also qualities that the Center works to inspire and encourage in contemporary Toledo citizens.

Arthur (Art) Tatum Jr. October 13, 1909–November 5, 1956

Many regard Art Tatum of Toledo, Ohio, as the greatest pianist in the history of jazz. Although blind in one eye and nearly blind in the other, Tatum gained an international reputation among jazz lovers for his truly unique piano technique and inventive improvisations. Tatum began his ascent to musical acclaim in Toledo with wspd radio and at the Chateau La France, a Dorr Street nightclub. His first piano solos were

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recorded in 1933 and he earned important musical awards until his death. The Smithsonian Institution’s “Jazz Piano” collection states that Art Tatum’s extravagant technique and uncanny harmonic imagination intimidated all other pianists. Jazz pianists continue to draw on elements of Tatum’s music for ­inspiration and he exerts a continuing influence on the evolution of jazz piano. 5.4.10.2 Collection The collection room of the Art Tatum African American Resource Center houses circulating and reference material. These resources have served as a focal point for Library patrons seeking information on the history and culture of peoples of African descent. The collection, which consists of books, magazines, journals, microfiche, audio and videotapes, and compact discs, has rapidly expanded over the years. Subject and genre strengths of the collection include slavery and antislavery in the United States, fiction, the Harlem Renaissance, nineteenth and twentieth c­ entury black women authors, black biblical heritage, inspirational and African art. Many schools, church groups, university students, study groups and residents of Northwest Ohio utilize the Tatum Center’s resources for study and ­research of the black experience. The Center’s resources definitely serve all ages. 5.4.10.3 Programs The Tatum Center’s on-site programs encourage a heightened appreciation for black history and culture. The many cultural programs provide the community with many opportunities for growth and understanding of the black ­experience. Ongoing programs and special events have included book discussion groups; visiting speakers and performers; family storytelling; group tours; community forums; observances of special occasions such as Black History Month, Women’s History Month, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and Kwanzaa. 5.4.10.4 Kwanzaa The Toledo-Lucas County Public Library has sponsored the citywide Kwanzaa festival since December 1989. Since then, many local organizations, agencies, groups, the Toledo Museum of Art and The University of Toledo have joined forces with the Tatum Center in co-sponsorship. Kwanzaa, an African American cultural celebration created by Dr. Ron Karenga in 1966, is one of the fastest growing cultural holidays in the United States. It highlights the African-American community’s pride in its African heritage and customs while celebrating present-day family and friends. In Toledo, the Kwanzaa experience has been an uplifting and positive one. Each year, Toledo’s ­African American community looks forward to collectively coming together for this time of celebration. Kwanzaa is a time for rejoicing,

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remembrances, reassessment and recommitment to the Nguzo Saba, or the seven principles of Kwanzaa. The recognition of Kwanzaa and the embracing of its concepts is evident not only in the festival’s attendance each year, but also in the growing volume of requests for information and assistance from schools, churches and community groups in the Toledo area. Highlights of the celebration features performances, special children’s activities, discussion groups, afro-centric fashion shows, an African Market of eclectic merchandise and the Feast featuring ­African and African American-inspired cuisine. 5.4.10.5 Arts An ancient African proverb states that a culture can be best influenced and defined by the works of its artists. The Toledo African American community has a rich cultural heritage in areas of the fine and performing arts. Toledo born artist Art Tatum, jazz pianist, had such an amazing grace at the piano that his ingenious style has influenced the playing of pianists the world over. Other nationally-known Toledo-born artists—such as Wil Clay, illustrator of children books; the late LeMaxie Glover, sculptor; Marvin Vines, painter; and Jerry Reed, tap dancer—have all helped to defined and illustrate the rich cultural heritage of African Americans. The Tatum Gallery of the Art Tatum African American Resource Center ­offers local artists gallery space to exhibit and demonstrate their works. It has been a birthing cradle for new born artists, a venue for radical, moderate, and conservative artists, and a bed of roses for those established artists who want to be in a comfort zone, but still have the desire to be artistically challenged. The Tatum Gallery has been a haven where various artists freely share, exhibit, perform, vocalize, perfect, and present their artistic talents to an accepting and supportive viewing public. It will continue that role in the 21st century. 5.4.10.6 Music Each year the Tatum Center holds its annual jazz concerts in October, celebrating the birth of Art Tatum and honoring his many achievements. Art Tatum continues to inspire many, from the young aspiring artists to the older accomplished pianists and musical trios. Local jazz artists striving to reach the level achieved by Art Tatum are invited to perform. Jazz greats of Toledo such as Stanley Cowell, Mozart Perry, Claude Black, and Eddie Abrams have ­performed on the Tatum stage. An added link to the Center’s namesake is that Art ­Tatum’s family members are residents of Toledo and regularly attend these annual ­concerts. Toledo’s jazz enthusiasts have embraced the live jazz concerts and support them wholeheartedly. Art Tatum’s October 13, 1909 birthday and his subsequent insurmountable accomplishments continue to be celebrated at the Art Tatum African American Resource Center.

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5.4.11 Fletcher Word39 Fletcher Word is the co-owner and publisher of The Sojourner’s Truth, which is known as Toledo’s African-American newspaper. Since 2002, the weekly has reported local, state and national information of interest to the African-­ American community. The Sojourner’s Truth’s readership is approximately 70,000. A graduate of Harvard University with a degree in Government, Fletcher Word serves on ­executive committees of the Northwest Ohio Black Media Association, the Toledo Press Club, and the Greater Toledo Urban League. He is also a board member of the Toledo Museum of Art Cultural Diversity Committee, and the ut Africana Studies Program. Fletcher Word not only spotted an unmet business niche for a Black newspaper in a midsize city of approximately 300,000—­one-quarter Black—and a metro area of over 700,000, he also filled a cultural void in the black community. The Sojourner’s Truth tells the story of Toledo’s Black experience and celebrates that experience in a way other media outlets would not and could not. 5.4.12 James Cooks40 Mr. James Cooks was born on September 19, 1937 and died August 3, 2016. After attending Scott High School, he served in the us Air Force. By that time, he had discovered his passion and talent as a chef and caterer, which ultimately spanned 50 years and won him a place in Toledo’s cultural history. In 1967, Mr. Cooks was elected Vice President of the Professional Culinary Association of America. He was also President of Professional Chefs Association in Toledo, a board member of Christian Brothers, a life-long member of the naacp, and a Big Brother and mentor for Big Brothers/Big Sisters, Inc. In 1970, Mr. Cooks was one of only 25 African-American Owners and ­Operators of a McDonald’s Restaurant nationwide. His restaurant in ­Toledo Ohio at ­Monroe Street and Auburn Avenue employed hundreds in the ­community, ­especially young people, giving many of them their first job—­ including former mayor Mike Bell. In 1990, along with his business partners, he opened Club 300 Catering, Inc. In the 1990s, Club 300 was The place to be for Black ­Toledoans for Sunday brunch after church and for the Summer Sunday ­Evening Jazz Series that included major jazz artists such as Marion Meadows.

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chapter 6

Black Toledo: The Historical Impulse toward Social Justice Abdul Alkalimat and Rubin Patterson 6.1

Theoretical Reflection

The historical experience of Black Toledo is an important case study of an African American urban experience. But it is much more than that. It provides the basis for theoretical reflection on fundamental aspects of African American history in general, as well as a case for the comparative study of other cities. So after examining the details of Black Toledo, it is important for us to answer the question of how it can help us understand a bigger swath of social reality. First, we will develop theoretical reflections that are logically anchored in the experience of Black Toledo, and then consider on a comparative basis how the particularity of Toledo is both similar and different from that of other cities. The details of history, of course, far exceed our ability to capture and describe all aspects of the human experience, even though in current times the digital focus on Big Data is attempting to do so. Hence, there are various techniques for getting at the patterns and meanings of the Black Toledo historical experience. In this volume we have employed the empirical process of collecting primary and secondary documents that are based on our critical judgment and exemplify the overall process. Now we turn to the theoretical task of abstracting out of these documents the general pattern they suggest and the general theoretical concepts about the historical process. 6.2

Historical Periodization and Social Transformation

This volume presented our documentary collection as organized in four historical periods: Origin, Formation of Community Life, Community Development and Struggle, and Survival during Deindustrialization. This pattern fits into the general historical periodization of the African American experience generally and the Black Toledo experience specifically. Similarly, Figure  1 illustrates the historical modes of social cohesion and social disruption in the black community. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi 10.1163/9789004281899_007

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This general theoretical framework posits that there are two dialectically opposite poles of experience that interact to describe the historical process. There are times when the experience is relatively stable during which there is considerable transgenerational continuity. The opposite occurs when this continuity abruptly changes and the disruption consequently changes the most basic aspects of life (see Figure 1). The relative stability of the urban experience is the context for our analysis of the Black Toledo experience. Toledo was developed as an urban industrial center, so it had no agricultural roots. There were three fundamental aspects of the transformative experience that birthed Black Toledo: from the South to the North, from agriculture to industry, and from rural to urban. Our documents describe the objectivity of this process by focusing on data of population growth and political economy. This data is presented in the context of the political culture of the state, the legal framework of the structural racism imposed on black people creating the environment within which social development had to take place. There is also the subjectivity of people within this framework. There were virulent racists. But there were also freedom-loving people in Toledo, for example, James Ashley, the congressional author of the 13th Amendment to the us Constitution. The black urban experience of Toledo has always been in constant change, marked by multiple experiences happening simultaneously. During the time of slavery, freedom seekers were passing through on their way to Canada while others were settling in. However, those who were settling in were attacked and had to fight to beat back racist hostility and to establish the right to participate Modes of social cohesion

Modes of social disruption

Africa Slave trade Slavery Emancipation Rural Great migrations Urban Crisis Networked Society

Figure 1 Social cohesion and social disruption

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in public institutions such as the vote and schools. And during the 21st century the process of deindustrialization began to impact the community, hitting the neighborhood in turn with the devastating impact of “root shock,” the destabilization of all forms of institutional stability. 6.3

Dialectics of Urbanization and Proletarianization

The creation of an urban black community involves the process of establishing social life and employment, which we can respectively call urbanization and proletarianization. Urbanization refers to people living in densely populated city areas structured around markets and neighborhood institutions including schools and churches. This stands in stark distinction to rural communities where people more often live in more dispersed fashion. Proletarianization refers to the process of people entering a job market to work for a wage in contrast to being on the farm and producing agricultural commodities for a market. In the city one works in a labor market. Black Toledo developed into a community within an industrial city, even though the jobs available were not the main value producing production jobs but rather the related service jobs that provided the lowest pay. The housing stock available to Blacks was the cheapest and in the poorest condition. Therefore, structural racism forced blacks into restricted areas, creating black ghettos. The unintended result is that black people of both the working class and the middle class were forced into the same restricted areas. Fortunately, this situation enabled the segregated black community to aggregate its resources and, therefore, created the basis for social development. A market developed so that there was some level of black business development, especially in service and distribution. There was also the possibility for political development. This makeup of Toledo’s black community also created space for professional development in that segregated schools opened up jobs for black teachers and administrators, as well as openings for lawyers and health-care professionals. The driving social force has been the class structure of the industrial process, anchoring the structure of the city in its political economy. Within the segregated environment, the black middle class was an immediate and vital resource for the community in that it provided the professional and business assets needed for the maintenance of a decent quality of life. Additionally, black middle-class elites provided necessary relationships with the white mainstream leadership, which allowed them opportunities to represent the interests of the black community, especially since they were physically limited to being part of it.

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Blacks

Capitalist class +

Black middle class

Class White workers _

Black workers Figure 2

Overlapping race and class relationships

But during the industrial experience, limited relationships between white leaders and black middle-class elites did not create the complete picture, as there was more to the community than middle-class elites. The discipline of work anchored the black community in a pattern of stability. There was a class flow via wages that sustained these businesses and institutions, as well as sustainable participation in transgenerational networks. Part of the dynamic of the class structure is the class conflict that takes place under normal circumstances in a capitalist firm. But the structural conflict of black workers involves the complexity of finding ways to unite with white workers and black middle class elites, that is, white workers based on ­economic exploitation at the workplace and black middle class elites based on the ­racist exploitation in all forms toward the Black segregated community, just ­because it is black. Figure 2 illustrates straightforward race and class  ­overlapping ­relationships. White elites have always been of a higher ­status than black elites, and white workers have collectively been of a higher status than black workers. 6.4

Dialectics of Inequality and Democracy

The conflicting social experiences solidified patterns of inequality. Class is fundamentally the distinction between owners of a business and the workers hired as labor, also including management and service occupations as ancillary social formations aligned with either labor or capital. But inequality is also the layering of differences in the system of stratification, often called socioeconomic status (ses). There are three aspects to this system:

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1. Educational attainment 2. Income 3. Occupational prestige The masses of black people were on the low end of each of these systems of social inequality, and even when objectively equal with whites, racism precluded any semblance of equality. One of the great political aspects of any society is the relationship between patterns of inequality and the possibility of democracy. Democracy implies the maximum participation of the adult population in the process. It was only after the 15th Amendment to the us Constitution that it became theoretically possible for African Americans in the United States to be treated equally. Then the de facto structures of inequality took over as the major impediments. A fundamental assumption for democracy is trust, the belief that the system works and that majority rule can be exercised in a fair and equitable manner— along with the rights of the minority respected. Total trust in this system has always been problematic for black people, as decisive policy and practice have seldom been guided by high principles of ethical standards leading to social justice. However, the Black Toledo community has demonstrated that the fight for social justice has been both within the mechanisms of the political system, such as voting and running for office, and through the actions of social movements outside of the system bringing pressure upon it. As Black Toledoans learned, a scarce resource that enables people to participate in the political system is time, which is often a factor relative to one’s work and family responsibilities. The masses of black people are workers and have the most limited amount of disposable time that can be given to work in the political process. Inequality is the greatest social force that negates the possibility of democracy. 6.5

Culture and Social Solidarity

The greatest mitigating force that has enabled black people to sustain community life under the conditions of inequality and racist oppression has been the practice of culture, both maintaining traditions of cultural practices and facilitating ever-present forms of cultural creativity. The church has been the most important institution for cultural practice, including the collective acts of performing music, collective preparation and sharing of culinary production, practicing and consuming rhetorical styles of speaking, and reaffirming moral principles through religious rituals.

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Black proletarian culture has generated the greatest and most unique contributions to American culture with the secular music called jazz. Black ­Toledo produced perhaps the greatest jazz pianist, Art Tatum. However, the most widespread cultural practice has been in the area of popular music and social dancing. Popular rhythm and blues songs have been the sound track for the lives of black people, and dancing aggregates people in the ever-changing styles of pleasure expressing body movement and entertainment. Another aspect of how culture can overcome inequality, as demonstrated in Toledo’s Black community, has to do with gender and the fact that black women have faced triple oppression based on class exploitation, racism, and gender discrimination. Women, as expected, played essential roles in the family for the socialization of the children, as well as assumed key staff positions in the church (of course other than the male dominated ministry). Women also formed organizations and provided continuity of leadership in their segregated community. 6.6

Memory and Community Sustainability

Finally, no community can be sustained without memory of itself, its history that reveals its strengths. The community’s strengths set the agenda for each successive generation. Much of this memory is reserved and preserved in institutions such as libraries. Of course, this is one of the strengths of Black Toledo, as its Art Tatum Resource Center, run by the public library system, plays this role along with its department of local history. On the basis of this general theoretical reflection, it is possible to compare Black Toledo with other cities. 6.7 Situating Black Toledo vis-à-vis Other Books on Urban Black Experiences It is worthwhile to briefly situate the investigatory approach and publicationtype of Black Toledo vis-à-vis other options, such as a monograph or a traditional anthology. A solo-authored monograph and a multi-contributor anthology of the black experience in Toledo represent two book approaches to disseminating important narrated historical accounts about the black experience in this northern industrial city. The solo-authored monograph has the advantage of a single author providing a threaded argument concerning a focused topic using primary and/or secondary research and guided by his or her understanding of key themes, factors, and data sources. A monographic production—whether it

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be a dissertation or a published book—of Black Toledo affords the researcher the opportunity to conduct original scholarship to address a lacuna in the literature and shed much-needed light on African American social life that aligns with their curiosity and passion. LeRoy Williams’s dissertation is the best illustration of such a work on Black Toledo. Conversely, the anthology has the advantage of exposing readers to the voices and findings of several different researchers on a specific subject. The collection of several more-or-less selfcontained scholarly articles provides a diversity of perspectives on the subject at hand, as opposed to the singularity of thought and evidence assembled and embodied in a solo-authored monograph. With an anthology, researchers can present, within a single book, debates on the subject, thereby exposing readers to more complexities concerning the book’s subjects. Black Toledo represents yet another approach to collecting and disseminating information on the single subject of the black experience in Toledo by drawing on a large collection of relevant newspaper articles, academic journal articles, and monographs on key themes to tell the story directly of the black experience in Toledo. The adage of newspaper articles being the first draft of history is self-evident within the Black Toledo publication. One advantage of employing our approach to investigating and communicating the social history of Black Toledo is that the context and zeitgeist of the various moments of the black experience in Toledo are revealed right along with the historical facts of the experiences covered throughout time. In other words, when an issue, for instance, is discussed in the book concerning the first wave of black ­migration—and some, of course, landed in Toledo—readers learn not just about the issue, but they also become more in touch with the sensibilities of the community at that moment in history. The point we are attempting to convey here is that Black Toledo and other social historical subjects can be better understood when they are investigated and the results are published in the forms of a solo-authored monograph, an anthology, and as a collection of thematically aligned newspaper articles and other publications; the approaches provide different and complementary contributions. As editors of Black Toledo, our goal was twofold. First, we wanted a compendium of frames that readers could comprehend, one after the next, as illustrated by earlier newspapers and other publications, so that readers could appreciate the running social history of the black experience in Toledo. We wanted our work to be included among the indispensable staples for anyone seeking to understand the black experience in Toledo in historical context. So the first goal is admittedly narrow, yet very important. The second goal was to produce a social historical work that provides bigger lessons for readers with interest beyond Toledo.

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With regard to the first goal, our work is in the mold of other major historical accounts of the black experience in a particular city. An example is Nikki Taylor’s Frontiers Of Freedom: Cincinnati’s Black Community 1802–1868. Her Black Cincinnati book covers the black experiences that were unique to Cincinnati, such as its propensity for unrivaled mob violence for a northern city. She narrates well-researched historical accounts of how Blacks, by the end of the 1860s, had moved from individualized vulnerability to a collective consciousness. For anyone interested in the black experience in Cincinnati during the first two-thirds of the 19th century, Professor Taylor’s work is absolutely indispensable. Again, our first goal of Black Toledo is parallel to this type of contribution, albeit using a different mode of research and communicating our findings. Other examples of historical accounts of the black experience in a particular city include Christopher Robert Reed’s Black Chicago’s First ­Century: ­1833–1900, and Joe William Trotter’s Black Milwaukee: The Making of An ­Industrial Proletariat: 1915–1945. First and foremost, these works provide critical ­narration of historical accounts of life experiences of black populations based on p ­ ainstaking research. In other words, there is intrinsic value in knowing the documented history of the black experience in cities across America. The second goal of Black Toledo is to present key lessons and takeaways that are insightful and relevant to understanding the black experience beyond ­Toledo. For this goal, there are many important works to follow as guides that examine the black experience in a single city—or even a given neighborhood within a given city, and even along a street or a corner within a given city—and yet offer lessons for understanding and relating to African American social life beyond that corner, street, neighborhood, or city. Some of the many works that have examined the black experience in a single city or a section of a city, that have yielded relevant conclusions about black experiences writ large, and have suggested topics worthy of further investigation include the following: W.E.B. DuBois’s The Philadelphia Negro; St.  Clair Drake and Horace Cayton’s Black Metropolis: A Study of Negro Life in a Northern City; Elliott Liebow’s Talley’s Corner: A Study of Negro Street Corner Men; Elijah Anderson’s Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City; Mitchell Duneier’s Slim’s Table: Race, Respectability, and Masculinity; and William Julius Wilson’s When Work Disappears: The World of the New Urban Poor. With DuBois’s Philadelphia Negro, readers are exposed to in-depth information and analyses of the social conditions and mores of blacks who lived in Ward 7 of Philadelphia at the end of the 19th century. But readers are also invited to glean lessons beyond this case study, lessons that are applicable for ef-

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fective responses to the lived realities that are recognized in any black community in the United States. When reading DuBois’s documented accounts of the ills of black Philadelphians such as their struggle with poverty, crime, and drug addiction, one can easily understand the universality of these conclusions of metropolitan-based blacks, both then in the last decade of the nineteenth century and now as we close out the second decade of the twenty-first century. Similarly, as explained in Drake and Cayton’s Black Metropolis, “Every American city has its own industrial and labor history. … and to all industrial cities everywhere—new kinds of people have come from time to time to fill the gaps at the bottom of the occupational hierarchy” (xxxvi). Drake and Cayton extracted these and other universal themes from examining black communities such as Bronzeville on the South Side of Chicago. Black Metropolis discusses the experience of blacks who migrated from the American South to Chicago in search of industrial jobs and social opportunities in the nation’s most segregated city. Versions of those migratory and settlement struggles for dignity and equality in the city, as well as the sense of social life in Bronzeville as discussed in Black Metropolis, were being played out in many American cities after World War ii. Thus, although Drake and Cayton studied blacks in one city, they produced a work that was critical for understanding the northern urban black experience in general. Elijah Anderson in Code of the Street produced a prism for viewing poor and working-class urban black communities across the nation by simply interviewing African Americans along Philadelphia’s Germantown Avenue. The takeaway for much of black America from studying African Americans along one street in one city at one moment in time was that inner-city violence was regulated through an informal code of the street around respect. Anderson’s analytical concepts of “decent” families and “street” families observed along Germantown Avenue were subsequently found useful for understanding poor and working-class neighborhoods in cities across the nation. Mitchell Duneier’s Slim’s Table: Race, Respectability, and Masculinity is yet another example of a sociological work examining a part of the black experience by studying the social life and interactions of black men in one city, ­focusing on men who were frequent patrons of Valois cafeteria in Hyde Park on Chicago’s South Side. The black men who frequented the cafeteria in ­Duneier’s book embodied and projected strong moral sensibilities, an unshakable sense of social responsibility, and an iron-clad sense and command of the virtues of civility and discretion. But these men were tormented by the incongruence between their sense of self and what the broader public thought of them. ­Duneier’s work suggests that the qualities of the black men who were c­ ontemporaries of Slim and his sitting buddies at the cafeteria could

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be projected­onto black men of their generation in cities across the country. Toledo’s ­Weldon Douthitt is a contemporary of Slim and his sitting buddies. ­Weldon, an ­octogenarian non-college educated African American man of moral rectitude and ­intellectual rigor, successfully served as the campaign manager for Jack Ford, the first A ­ frican American mayor of Toledo. Weldon Douthitt has left his i­mprint on the black community throughout Toledo for more than forty years. Duneier was telling the life story of African American men such as ­Weldon who are in their senior age and who remain active in black communities around the country. Finally, in William Julius Wilson’s When Work Disappears: The World of the New Urban Poor, based on empirical data from neighborhoods in Chicago’s Black Belt, he concluded with nationally applicable observations about how social disorganization followed chronic joblessness. Readers of When Work Disappears can easily see the social patterns discussed concerning neighborhoods such as Woodlawn based on Wilson’s Urban Poverty and Family Life Study in city after city around the nation. One of the many commonalities of these studies is that they each presented a study of the black experience in a single city and consequentially introduced lessons that allow readers to reflect on the various aspects of the black experience in cities around the country and the inherent similarities in each, thus allowing readers to better understand the black experience as it exists nationally. Black Toledo should be read in the same fashion. In studying the black experience in Toledo, Ohio, from 1787 to 2016, we found both structural assimilation and a sustained black enclave. Social scientists have debated if, how, and the extent to which an ethnic group’s structural­ assimilation affects the members’ involvement in their respective ethnic ­community, and vice versa. Fugita and O’Brien (2001) note that “traditional assimilationist perspectives … imply that as members of an ethnic group become structurally assimilated, they will give up their ethnic ties” (p. 990). Black Toledo belies the traditional assimilationist perspective because, as black ­Toledoans moved more into the economic and political mainstream of the city, they did not give up their ethnic ties. That said, the content of Black Toledo illustrates the need for nuance when discussing the dialectic of structural assimilation and maintenance of the ethnic enclave due to the way ethnic ties are mediated through social class and opportunity structure. Not unlike the books by Taylor, DuBois, Drake and Cayton, Liebow, Anderson, Duneier, and Wilson, Black Toledo covered the black experience within a single industrial city to provide additional and greater understanding of how issues of race, social class, power, and culture shape the life of individuals and communities in Black America.

Available African American Materials1

Papers, Theses, and Dissertations

Caldwell, Kimberly M. From Africatown to “Out Stickney”: Reminiscences of a Toledo, Ohio African-American Community: 1919–1960. Thesis (Ph.D.)—Bowling Green State University, 2001. xxii, 307 leaves. (R977.113 Cal). Cole, Edrene B. Blacks in Toledo: A Resource Unit for Elementary Teachers. A Project as Partial Fulfillment of the requirements of the Master of Education degree, University of Toledo, 1972. 57 leaves. (qR301.4519 Col). Donahue, Matthew A. A Study of the Blues, the Toledo Blues Scene and the Hines’ Farm Juke Joint. Thesis (m.a.)—Bowling Green State University, 1992. xi, 131 leaves. (qR781.643 Don). Hibbert, Martha. Toledo’s Board of Community Relations as a Community Organization Agency. Toledo: M. Hibbert, 1954. 22 leaves. Written and submitted as part of the Community organization class requirements. (qR352.0771 Hib). Mosier, Tana E. Brand Whitlock Homes: The Land, the People, and the Project. Thesis (m.a.)—University of Toledo, 1981. iv, 190 leaves. (qR363.5 Mos). Nelson, Thomas C. The Aliened American: The Free Negro in Ohio, 1840–1851. Thesis (m.a.)—University of Toledo, 1969. 11, 117 leaves. (qR977.103 Nel). Rinehart, John S. The Negro in a Congested Toledo Area. Thesis (m.a.)—Bowling Green State University, 1940. 98, iv, iv leaves. (qR305.896 Rin). Williams, LeRoy T. Black Toledo: Afro-Americans in Toledo, Ohio, 1890–1930. Dissertation (Ph.D.)—University of Toledo, 1977. 357 leaves. (qR977.113 Wil).



naacp, Toledo Chapter

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Toledo Branch. Annual Freedom Fund Banquet. Toledo, Ohio: naacp. Toledo Branch, 2000–2002 (R326.0977 Nat). National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Toledo (Ohio) Chapter. The History of the Toledo Chapter of the National Association For the Advancement of Colored People: 1915 Thru 1976. [Toledo: Toledo naacp, 1976]. [15] p. (R301.4519 Nat).

1 Donna Christian, “Partial Bibliography, Resources in Local History & Genealogy Department, African American History in Lucas County,” Toledo Lucas County Public Library, (c) 2010.

298

Available African American Materials

75th Anniversiary [sic] of History of the Toledo Chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People 1915–1990, Third Chapter Chaired In the United States. [Toledo: Toledo naacp, 1990]. [18] leaves. (fR305.896 Sev). Smith, Clarence G. Containment of Minority Groups Through Housing. Prepared for Toledo Chapter, naacp. [Toledo? 1967]. 60 [7] leaves. (qR331.83 Smi).



Frederick Douglass Community Association

Albertus Brown, An Appeciation and Farewell, Founder Frederick Douglass Community Center. [Toledo, Ohio, Byron-Palmer, 1927] 32 p. (R92 B877). Community Planning Council of Northwestern Ohio, Inc. Analysis of Information on Five Work Agencies: (Based On Material Supplied By The Agencies) Toledo, Ohio: The Council, 1976. [ii], 28 leaves. (Includes Frederick Douglass Community Association) (qR361.7 Com). Frederick Douglass Community Association Inward Bound Cultural Arts Program. ­Toledo, Ohio: Toledo Council of Social Agencies, 1967. 5 leaves. (fR305.896 Fre).



Board of Community Relations

Toledo (Ohio). Board of Community Relations. Education in Action. Toledo, Ohio: Board of Community Relations, 1961. 32 p. (R331.83 Tol). Toledo (Ohio). Board of Community Relations. The Findings and Recommendations of the Toledo Board of Community Relations on Education and Its Relationship to the Toledo, Ohio Community. [Toledo, Ohio]: The Board, 1967. 20 leaves. (qR371.829 Tol). [Intergroup Studies for Teachers] [Toledo, Ohio: Board of Community Relations, 1962] (Title assigned by cataloguer.) CONTENTS: Some social and personality factors in scholastic performances of minority group children/Martin Deutsch—Atlanta and Washington: racial differences in academic achievement/Frank H. Stallings— The role of the counselor in the guidance of Negro students/Dennis L. Trueblood. (R371.908 Int). Toledo (Ohio). Board of Community Relations. Report. Toledo, oh: The Board, ­1948–1996 (incomplete) (qR323.3 Tol). Toledo (Ohio). Board of Community Relations. Survey on Non-White Employees for the City of Toledo, Ohio. Toledo: The Board, 1964. 22 leaves. (qR331.13 Tol). Toledo (Ohio). Board of Community Relations. The Toledo Board of Community Relations’ January 1967 “Survey on Negro Employment for the City of Toledo” and the Directive on “Affirmative Action in the City’s Equal Employment Opportunity Program” Effective February 1967. Toledo: The Board, 1967. [42] leaves. (qR331.13 Tol).

Available African American Materials



299

The Study Group

1986 Black Public Opinion Survey, Presented To: The Central Committee Of Black Organizations And Churches. By The Study Group. [Toledo, Ohio: The Group], 1986. i, 31 leaves. (qR977.113 Nin).



50 Men & Women of Toledo, Inc.

50 Men & Women of Toledo, Inc.: Dedicated to Serving Toledo Area Minority Youth. [Toledo, Ohio: 1993]. 1 v. (loose-leaf) (R369.2771 Fif).



Blade Article Reprints

Blade (Newspaper: Toledo, Ohio). Negroes in American Civilization. Toledo: The Blade [1969]. 44 p. (Reprints of 22 articles from the Blade, Toledo, Ohio, from June 16 to July 7, 1968.) (qR326 Bla). Brower, William. “15,000,000 Americans” A Personal Inquiry Into the Status of the OneTenth of Our Population That Constitutes What Is Called “The Negro Problem.” ­Toledo: Toledo Blade [c1951]. 43 p. (R326 Bro). Brower, William. Black America—20 Years Later. Toledo: The Blade, [1972] 41 leaves. (Book composed of photocopied newspaper articles. The 19-part series, “Black America—20 Years Later,” appeared in the Blade from March 5 to March 23, 1972.) (qR305.896 Bro). Brower, William and Eddie B. Allen, Jr. America in Black and White. [Toledo: ToledoLucas County Public Library. Local History Dept., 1999] (Photocopy. Originally published: Toledo, Ohio: The Blade, 1996. Articles are a follow-up to Mr. Brower’s previous newspaper series: 15,000,000 Americans published in 1951 and Black ­America—20 Years Later published in 1972.) (R305.896 Bro).

Miscellaneous Attitudes and Preferences of Toledo’s Central City Residents Towards Housing and Neighborhood Quality, 1974–1975. Toledo: hope Inc., 1975. 100, [18] leaves (R363.5109 Hop). Barton-Aschman Associates. Equal Opportunity in Housing. [Toledo]: Toledo-Lucas County Plan Commissions, 1969. 34 p. (qR331.83 Bar). Dallas Handbook of Negro-Owned Business, Professional Persons, Churches and Organizations of Toledo, Ohio and Vicinity, June 1960. Toledo: Dallas Stenographic

300

Available African American Materials

Service,­1960. 30 p. (“Issued in connection with the First Conference on the Negro in Business [in Toledo]”) (qR917.7113 Dal). Donahue, Matthew A. I’ll Take You There: An Oral and Photographic History of the Hines Farm Blues Club. Toledo: Jive Bomb Press, 1999. xii, 119 p. (qR781.643 Don). Toledo Journal Black History Edition. Toledo: Toledo Journal, 1992. [February 3, 1992] (fR305.896 Tol). Toledo-Lucas County Plan Commissions. Negro Housing Patterns in Lucas ­County. 1973 update. Toledo: Toledo-Lucas County Plan Commissions, 1973. 12 [2] p. (qR301.540977112 Tol).



Magazines and Newspapers

Midwest Urban (Jan. 29, 2008-Dec. 14, 2009) Microfilm. Profile (A Sanders Publication, Alfred L. Sanders, ed.) v. 1 November 1968-December 1969. Sojourner’s Truth (Feb. 8, 2002–Dec. 29, 2010) Microfilm. Toledo Bronze Raven (January 1951-January 10, 1976) Microfilm. Toledo Journal (January 6, 1980-December 29, 2010) Microfilm. Toledo Script (June 21, 1947-February 12, 1949) Microfilm. Toledo Sepia City Press (April 3, 1948–May 13, 1950) Microfilm.



Manuscript Collections

Mss. Coll. 27 Black American History Papers. Mss. Coll. 135 Rev. Robert D. Boyd Collection. Mss. Coll. 20 Churches of Toledo Collection. Mss. Coll. 148 Jerry A. Reed, Jr. Tap Dance Collection. Mss. Coll. 137 The Study Group, Inc. Collection. Mss. Coll. 234 Toledo Spiders: A Joint Archive of the W.J. Murchison Community Center and the University of Toledo Africana Studies Program.



Oral History Interviews—Series #4—Afro-American Experience in Toledo (Descriptions are Copied from Inventories Compiled Shortly after the Interviews Occurred)

Barnett, Welton E. Interview #2, July 7, 1967 (1 cassette) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History).

Available African American Materials

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Mr. Barnett began his newspaper career in his home state of Arkansas where he assisted with the publication of the Arkansas State Press. Upon coming to Toledo, he began the Toledo Script which ran successfully from 1945–1954. Later, Mr. Barnett left Toledo for California to become editor of the Golden West magazine. During this interview, Mr. Barnett comments upon the struggle for civil rights, the adjustments between the North and the South, and many other interesting topics. Benton, Rev. Elijah Interview #4, July 15, 1976 (1 cassette, transcript—qR92 B4783 Ben) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Rev. Benton was born in 1896 on a farm in Maysville, Mississippi. He relates his early childhood memories, and then proceeds to explain his call to the ministry. He has been pastor of Mt. Zion Baptist Church for 48 years and gives a full history of that institution on this tape. He also comments on such events as Prohibition, the Depression, and the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Cole, Frank S. Interview #9, September 22, 1976 (2 cassettes) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Mr. Cole discusses his life as a child in Mississippi. Upon reaching adulthood, he entered the service and was dishonorably discharged along with several others, due to a racial incident. After serving the resultant prison term, he returned to Toledo and became involved in radio and tv repair work. The bulk of the interview concerns itself with the concept of “black pride.” Mr. Cole is also active in many civic affairs and ran unsuccessfully for City Council in 1973. Mr. Cole feels that blacks should now be concerned with gaining political and economic strength. He laments that groups such as the Toledo chapter of the naacp, Affirmative Action, and the Board of Community Relations aren’t channeling their energies in these directions. Goodloe, Herbert S. Interview #8, September 13, 1976 (1 cassette) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Dr. Goodloe was the third black dentist to practice in Toledo. On this tape he discusses the barrier that race proved to be in establishing his business. He also discusses his memories gathered from over fifty years of living in Toledo. His reminiscences trace the gradual improvement of race relations in this city. Johnson, Rev. Giles Junius Interview #7, August 31 & September 1, 1976 (2 cassettes) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Rev. Johnson was born in Virginia in 1903. His father was a slave, his mother, a lay preacher. Rev. Johnson discusses his childhood days which he spent as a sharecropper until he went to a Negro college in ­Virginia. He continued his schooling at great risk as he was often threatened by the Ku Klux Klan. After his call to the ministry, he came North and first pastored in Lima, Ohio. In the 1940s he became pastor of Friendship Baptist Church and continues as head of that congregation to date. Rev. Johnson discusses here the formation and

302

Available African American Materials

implementation­of the Board of Community Relations. He served on this committee for over thirty years. This tape contains his recollections of many Toledo landmark battles for Civil Rights. McAffee, Robert Interview #3, July 19, 1976 (1 cassette). Mr. McAffee was born in Kingstown, Jamaica approximately eighty-eight years ago. Son of a Jamaican sailor and a New Orleans mother, he was brought to this country when he was eight or ten years old. He discusses his jobs, which have included working construction, being a waiter in dining cars, and finally his experiences as a chauffeur. Having settled in Toledo in 1922, he is able to discuss such events as Prohibition, the Ku Klux Klan parade of 1924, and the Depression. He also comments on the “red light” district, bootlegging and the numbers racket. McDonald, Aretha Interview #13, October 5, 1979 (1 cassette) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Mrs. McDonald was born in Toledo in 1890. She spent her early years in East Toledo and North Toledo, left the city in 1915 and returned in 1923. She told of growing up, of her work, and of the changes she saw when she came back to Toledo in 1923. Marshall, Hazel V. Interview #6, July 21, 1976 (1 cassette) (toledolibrary.org> Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Mrs. Marshall has been a resident of Toledo since the early 1900s. She shares many of the problems faced by herself and her family due to their race. Her narration is especially interesting where it documents the increasing hostility toward blacks as more families moved North following the World Wars. Moreland, Geraldine K. Interview #12, April 18, 1978 (1 cassette) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Mrs. Moreland talks in great detail about the major events of the 1920s. She covers such topics as Prohibition, the Ku Klux Klan parade of 1924, Woman Suffrage, Marcus Garvey’s “Back to Africa” Movement, the effect of wwi on the Toledo economy, Communism, racial tensions, the numbers racket and legalized prostitution. Reed, Albert L. Interview #5, July 20, 1976 (1 cassette, transcript—qR92 R3232) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Rev. Reed discusses the history and significance of Braden Methodist Church. He also relates his role in the religious community at large be defining his participation in many religious organizations. He has also been active in many civic organizations such as the naacp, Model Cities program, Board of Community Relations, etc. Because of his influential position within the black community he was able to help control the tensions facing this community in the 1960s. Rev. Reed offers some interesting insights into the current crisis for black theologians, the black family, and the struggle for responsible black involvement and participation in the government’s power positions.

Available African American Materials

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Rice, Flute Interview #10, October 14, 1976 (1 cassette, transcript—qR92 R4957) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Mr. Rice was born the youngest of fourteen children in Huntsville, Alabama. He came to Toledo to stay with an older sister and finished his early schooling at Gunckel. He returned to the South to finish high school and college. After serving in the military, he returned to Toledo where he held a variety of jobs including the principleship of Scott High School and the position of Coordinator of Adult Education for the Toledo Public Schools. This tape is especially valuable as a record of Toledo’s all black high school during the most publicized years of the Civil Rights Movement, 1968–1975. Smith, Clarence G. Interview #11, November 10, 1976 (2 cassettes, transcript—qR92 S6445) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Clarence G. Smith was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He was graduated from the University of Pittsburgh. He came to ­Toledo in 1927 and attended law school at the University of Toledo. He was admitted to the bar in 1934. He served two terms as Toledo naacp president (1937 & 1938) and was a member of the legal redress legislative and housing committees. He was also the Ohio president of naacp (state chapter) in 1949–1950. This interview deals mainly with Smith’s law cases between 1930 and 1960. These tapes contain a wealth of information concerning the Negro’s struggle for civil rights in Toledo. Washum, Clinton Interview #1, April 21, 1976 (2 cassettes) (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Digital Collections of Northwest Ohio > tlcpl Ohio Memory > Oral History). Mr. Washum was born in 1890 in Paducah, Kentucky. As a young man he settled­in Buffalo, New York, where he worked with the railroads. In 1924 he left New York and came to Toledo, attracted by this city’s railroad activity. Mr. Washum discusses the adjustment he was required to make as racial discrimination increased in the late ‘20s. As a Toledoan, he was involved in the building of the present main library, and also participated in the modernization of the Anthony Wayne Trail. The interview also includes a discussion of Mr. Washum’s unusual heritage: his paternal grandfather was Cherokee, his paternal grandmother was Irish. His mother was American Negro.

Videorecordings The Afro-American Experience in Toledo [dvd videorecording] Toledo, Ohio: Cinegraphis, 1982. 1 videodisk (25 min.) (Traces the development of the Afro-American community in Toledo from its early establishment to the present. It surveys the city’s black churches, businesses, local leaders and organizations.) (305.8 Afr). Cornerstones: the African Americans [videorecording]/produced by the Public Broadcasting Foundation of Northwest Ohio. Toledo, Ohio : wgte, 1998. 1 dvd (50 min.)

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Available African American Materials

African Americans came to Toledo seeking freedom, helped energize the city by building churches, businesses, and other institutions, and contributed to the cultural life of the city. Includes information on community leaders like Ella P. Stewart, LeMaxie Glover and Art Tatum, among others. (305.896 Cor). Memories of Black Residents of Birmingham [videorecording]. 1984, 1 videocassette (36 min.) (Interviews with Mrs. Georgie Craver Martin, Mrs. Margaret Toadvin and Mrs. Ethel Larkin, conducted on Apr. 27, 1984 by Carol Ann DeBrul for the Birmingham Cultural Center. Three women talk about their memories of the black ethnic influence in the Birmingham neighborhood of Toledo.) (977.113 Mem). Minority Report [1990] [videorecording]. Toledo, Ohio: wtvg, c1990. 1 videocassette (120 min.) Covers activities and organizations aimed at minorities, especially AfroAmericans, in Toledo. (R977.113 Min).



Edrene Cole African American Oral History Collection of Lucas County (toledolibrary.org > Local History > Edrene Cole Collection)

Merle Abbott: Mr. Abbott discussed his childhood in Van Wert County and in Toledo, his work life, his military service, and the political climate in Toledo. Lillian Ashcraft-Eason: Dr. Ashcraft-Eason briefly discussed her work life and then focused on her work with Edrene Cole: what they tried to do with the oral history project and why it is important. June Boyd: Ms. Boyd discusses her life in Toledo; her education; her life in Germany as a military wife; her political life; and her accomplishments, both as a politician and as an individual. Edna R. Brown: Ms. Brown discussed her early life; Dorr Street; her political life and the contributions she made to the city of Toledo during that life. Wilma Brown: Ms. Brown briefly discusses her life: her arrival in Toledo; her role in ­Toledo City government and in the revitalization of Door Street; and her perspective on race relations, both in Toledo and in her hometown of Birmingham, ­Alabama. She also reminisces about Edrene Cole. Bill & Cheryl Catlin: Mr. and Ms. Catlin discussed his brother and her uncle, Wendell Catlin, a leader in real estate and in real property development in Toledo. Henry Clark: Mr. Clark discussed his childhood in Mississippi and in Toledo; his work life and military service; and the climate of Toledo. Eddie Cole: Mr. Cole discussed his childhood in Mississippi, his education, his military service, his life in Toledo, and his community service. Robert Culp: Rev. Culp discussed the role of the church in community life and its effect upon individuals’ spiritual life.

Available African American Materials

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Gwen Ellis: Ms. Ellis discussed her career as a teacher; the role of the church, especially the Warren African Methodist Episcopal Church, in the lives of its members; and her marriage to Clampton Boots Ellis. Gladys Glenn: Ms. Glenn discussed her husband, Herbert Glenn, Sr., one of the Tuskegee Airmen, and their life in Toledo. Karen Glover: Ms. Glover discussed the life and career of her father, Lemaxie Glover. Her interview is followed by an interview with Jan and Philip Sultz. The Sultzes knew Lemaxie Glover at Cranbrook and share their memories of him as a student there and their ensuing lifelong friendship with him. They stress his character, integrity and his unfailing warmth toward everyone he knew. Mary Gregory: Ms. Gregory discussed her life as a child in Marion, Indiana and Toledo; the role of the church in her life; her mother’s life; her decision to become a nurse; and her professional life. Ms. Gregory was the first African American to graduate from a Toledo nursing school. Oscar Haynes: Mr. Haynes discussed his life in Arkansas and in Toledo. Marjorie Hoskins: Ms. Hoskins discussed her life in Carbondale, Illinois and in Toledo. She also discussed the riots in Toledo in the 1960’s and the importance of the church. John Moore: Mr. Moore discussed his life and his determination to learn, to grow, and to achieve as much as he possibly could. WilliAnn Moore: Ms. Moore discussed her childhood in Toledo; Dorr Street; the role of the church in the community; and her professional life as a community activist. Maude Rixey: Ms. Rixey discussed her life in Toledo, the role of the Brand Whitlock homes in the African American community, the community’s pride in itself, Dorr Street, and her relationship with Edrene Cole. John Roberts: Rev. Roberts discussed his childhood and his life as the pastor of the Indiana Avenue Missionary Baptist Church and the role of the church in the black community. Fred Russell: Mr. Russell discussed his childhood in Little Rock, Arkansas and in ­Toledo. He talked about his short stint in the Navy and his work life. Though Mr. Russell worked a variety of jobs his primary work life focused on shoeshine operations. Eddie Turner: Mr. Turner discussed his childhood in Toledo and his professional life as a police officer. He touched briefly on his friendship with Edrene Cole.

Bibliography Abrams, Alan. “Charles Welch: He Puts The Juice in Toledo Radio.” The Sojourner’s Truth, pp. 6, 9, June 25, 2003. African-American History Ohio Black Laws 1804. September 7, 2005. Available: http:// afroamhistory.about.com/library/blohio_blacklaws.htm. Alexander, Christine. “Computer-based Africana Studies Curriculum Established; ­Alkalimat Is Appointed Director.” ut Times 12, no. 2 (September 30, 1996): 1–2. Alkalimat, Abdul. “Social Cyber Power in the Everyday Life of an African American Community: A Report on Action-Research in Toledo, Ohio.” In Community Practice in the Network Society: Local Action/Global Interaction, edited by Peter Day and Doug Schuler. London: Routledge, 2004. Alkalimat, Abdul and Kate Williams, “Social Capital and Cyberpower in the African American Community: A Case Study of a Community Technology Center in the Dual City.” Pages 178–204 in Community Informatics: Shaping Computer Mediated Social Relations, Leigh Keeble and Brian Loader, editors. London: Routledge, 2001. Anderson, Elijah. Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City. New York: Norton. (1999). “Ashley’s Account: The Execution—Interesting Particulars.” Daily Toledo Blade 09 December, 1859. Retrieved from http://www.toledoblade.com/Nation/2009/11/29/ Ashley-s-Account-The-Execution-8212-Interesting-Particulars.html. Barden, Thomas E. and Matthew Donahue. “Hines Farm Blues Club.” Living Blues (May/June 1992). Barden, Thomas and Matthew Donahue. “Those Were the Days.” Toledo Blade, March 21, 1993. Bartels, Larry. Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age. Princeton, nj: Princeton University Press, 2008. Black, Jay. “The Importance of Supporting Black-Owned Businesses.” The Sojourner’s Truth 35, no. 8 (2015). Brower, William. “Low Profile Held by Toledo on Race Issues.” Toledo Blade, March 22, 1972. Brown Funeral Home, Inc., C. Home page. http://www.cbrownfuneralhome.com/. Brown, Joyce. In Search of Our Past: Women of Northwest Ohio Volume iv. Toledo, oh: Women’s History Committee of the Women Alive! Coalition, 1994. Buchanan, Alma. “History of Warren ame Church, 1847–1977.” Warren ame Church. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://warren-ame.org/church-history/. Chenier, Robert P. “Moses Fleetwood Walker: Ohio’s Own ‘Jackie Robinson.’” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 65, no. 4/66, no. 1 (1993/1994): 34–49. Chronicle of Higher Education, May 19, 2000, A18.

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The Civil Rights Act of March 1, 1875. July 24, 2006. Available: http://chnm.gmu.edu/ courses/122/recon/civilrightsact.html. Cole, Edrene. A Project Entitled Blacks in Toledo: A Resource Unit for Elementary Teachers. Master’s thesis, University of Toledo, 1972. Doneghy, Lera. In Search of Our Past: Women of Northwest Ohio, vol. v. Toledo, oh: Women’s History Committee of the Women Alive! Coalition, 1996. Drake, St. Clair and Horace Cayton’s Black Metropolis: A Study of Negro Life in a Northern City. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. (2015). DuBois, W.E.B. Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. (1995). Duneier, Mitchell. Slim’s Table: Race, Respectability, and Masculinity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. (1992). Ford, Tom. “Blacks at ut Protest ‘Injustice.’” Toledo Blade, May 5, 1992. “Frederick. Douglass at College Hall.” Toledo Blade 02 August, 1864. Fugita, Stephen and David, O’Brien. “Structural Assimilation, Ethnic Group Membership, and Political Participation Among Japanese Americans: A Research Note.” Social Forces 63.4: 986–995. Gearhart, Tom. “Negro History Available at Toledo Store.” Toledo Blade, September 15, 1968. Gindy, G. The Underground Railroad and Sylvania’s historic Lathrop House: including an accounting of the owners and occupants of Sylvania’s historic Lathrop House since 1835. Bloomington, in: AuthorHouse, 2008. Hall, Tricia. “Annual Black History Month Program Honors Three Community Leaders.” The Sojourner’s Truth, March 21, 2016. http://www.thetruthtoledo.com/­ story/2016/031616/bhm.htm Hamilton, Deborah. “Sustainability of a Community Technology Center: Action ­Research at the Murchison Community Center, Toledo, Ohio. Master’s thesis.” In Toledo Spiders Masters Class of 2002, published by Africana Studies Program, University of Toledo, May 2002. Henry, Tom. “Toledo Jazz Enthusiasts Lament the Closing of Murphy’s.” Toledo Blade, June 1, 2011. http://www.toledoblade.com/local/2011/06/01/Toledo-jazz-enthusiasts -lament-the-closing-of-Murphys.html (accessed January 21, 2016). “Hiring Blacks at tu.” Toledo Blade. January 13, 1986. Holthouse, David. “Racial Tensions High in Toledo-Area Neighborhood after National Socialist Movement March.” The Intelligence Report, April 19, 2006, Southern Poverty Law Center. https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2006/ racial-tensions-high-toledo-area-neighborhood-after-national-socialist-movement -march. House of Day Funeral Service. “Our History.” http://www.houseofday.com/our-story .html.

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Hughes, Clyde. “Tough Out the Challenges.” Toledo Blade, August 14, 1990. Hunt, Imelda. “An Oral History of Art Tatum during His Years in Toledo, Ohio, ­1909–1932.” PhD diss., Bowling Green State U, 1995. Johnson, Everett. “A Study of the Negro Families in the Pinewood Avenue District of Toledo, Ohio.” Opportunity: Journal of Negro Life, 7 (1929). Johnson, S. 13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown. New York: Pantheon Books, 2010. Kisiel, Ralph. “Ellis Named Head of City Schools; 1st Black to Win Post.” Toledo Blade, December 8, 1990. Knabenshue, S.S. The Underground Railroad. Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, 14 (1905): 396–403. Landon, Fred. “Over Lake Erie to Freedom.” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 17 (1945): 132–138. Lester, J. Too Marvelous for Words: The Life and Genius of Art Tatum. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. Levstik, Frank R. “The Toledo Riot of 1862: A Study of Midwest Negrophobia.” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 44 (Autumn 1972): 100–106. Lewis, Holden. “Black Leader at ut Pushes the Envelope.” Toledo Blade, May 23, 1994. Lewis, Holden. “ut President Meets with Black Students.” Toledo Blade, May 19, 1994. Liebow, Elliott. Talley’s Corner: A Study of Negro Street Corner Men. Lanham, md: Rowman & Littlefield. (2003). “Local Black Leaders Hail King Holiday.” Toledo Blade. October 20, 1983. Loewenberg, Ted. “The Blade and the Black Man: 1867.” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 44, no. 3 (1972). Lucas County Board of Commissioners. “Resolution in Support of the Black Lives Matter Movement,” Resolution No. 15–629. Lucas County, oh. https://lcapps.co.lucas .oh.us/carts/resos/16973.pdf. Mahr, Joe. “Fewer Racial Barriers in Lucas County: Now Numbers Show Divide Narrowing though Seperation Is Still the Norm,” Toledo Blade, sec. A, May 20, 2001. Martinez, Federico. “Local Prince Hall Masons Mark 150 Years of History, Brotherhood,” Toledo Blade, February 16, 2014. http://www.toledoblade.com/Culture/2014/02/16/ Local-Prince-Hall-Masons-mark-150-years-of-history-brotherhood.html. Maurant, Maisha T. “Afro Ball Celebrates Heritage.” Toledo Blade, February 29, 1996. Mayor’s Office. “Paula Hicks-Hudson Mayor of Toledo.” Mayor’s Office, City of Toledo, oh. http://toledo.oh.gov/government/mayors-office/. McKee, J. “Changing Patterns of Race and Housing: A Toledo Study.” Social Forces 41, no. 3 (1963): 253–260. Mizruchi, Mark. The Fracturing of the American Corporate Elite. Cambridge, ma: Harvard University Press, 2013. “The Model Cities Interim Health Center.” Toledo’s New Times Model Cities Newsletter 1, no. 5 (June 1971).

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Index Affordable Care Act 207 African American Bureau of Commerce 239 African American Festival 269, 278 African American Legacy Project 278 African American Male Wellness Walk Initiative 218 African American Student Enrichment Initiatives Office 266 Afro-Ball 270–272 See also Jones, Ernie Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical University 161 Ali, Muhammad 167 Alkalimat, Abdul 1, 13, 178 Allen A.M.E. Church 80 Alpha Kappa Alpha 99, 181, 182, 238 Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater 178 Amazon Lodge 44 Amison, Betty 282 Anderson, Elijah, author, Code of the Street 293, 294 Apollo Bar 151 Aptheker, Herbert 1 Area Office of Aging 232 Armstrong, Louis 82, 139, 150 Art Tatum African American Resource Center 2, 253, 270 history of 281 advisory board 282 collection, programs, kwanzaa 283 arts, music 284–285 Arts, dance 235, 236 Ashford, Michael D. 229 Assets Toledo 231, 238 Basie, Count 85, 147, 150, 155 encounter with Art Tatum 82–83 Bell, Michael 48, 220 Norman Bell 48 mayor of Toledo 224–225 attributes of 230 Black attorney 110–115 Black baseball players 83, 85, 86, 87, 88, 90 Black bookstores and cultural stores 143, 144, 145 Rev. Al Reed 144

Black Codes of Ohio 5, 8 Black insurance companies 72 Black Laws in 1804 10 Black librarians 253, 254, 255 See also Kynard, Pauline Black Lives Matter Revolution 269, 279 Trayvon Martin 206 Black Panthers 122 establishment in Toledo 136, 137 Dorr Street patrol 192 Black Power movement fighters 136 Black Trade Unionists 229 Black Women Physicians 242, 243 Bowling Green State University 165, 174, 175, 236 writing center 174 Boyd, June 121 childhood of 130–135 growing up in the Brand Whitlock Homes 130–135 Clyde Bond-Jones, mother 132 Brand Whitlock Homes, housing ­project 100, 107, 120, 121, 130–135, 297 Brown, Edna 220, 227, 228 Brown, John 15 the hanging of 19–20, 23 General Taliafero 20, 21, 22 the issue of slavery 38 Brownfields 257, 258, 261 Bryant, Doris 186 Bush, George H. W 203 California State University 179 Calumet Lodge 45 Carlos, John 136 Case Western Reserve University 234, 240, 243, 244 Cayton, Horace 57, 293 Celeste, Richard 188 Central Catholic High Schools 271 Central State University 226 Champion Spark Plug Co. 63, 107, 128 Christian Brothers Development Corp. 129 Christian Workers’ Conference 95, 96 Chrysler 1, 128, 129 Cincinnati Enquirer 30, 35

313

Index Cleaver, Eldridge 144 Coalition of Black Trade Unionists 220 28th annual black history month ­banquet 228, 229 Cole, Edrene 9, 182 historical work of 2 Oral History Collection 304 Cole, Frank S 128, 301 Coleman, Pariss 244 Collins, D. Michael 227 Collingwood Avenue Presbyterian Church 79 Colorado State University 226 Colored Boy’s Brass Band 93 Coltrane, John 178 Columbia University 91, 264 Commercial, newspaper 41 Community Technology Centers Network 196, 198 Cooks, Helen C. 229, 265 and Toledo Excel 249 Copperheads 30, 33 Cornell University 92 Cowell, Stanley R. 132, 152, 285 Culp, Lisa 208, 213 Culp, Robert 129, 136 Cyberorganizing 198, 199, 201 Cyberhair 199 Damas, Mike 106, 109, 129 Defiance College 189 Deindustrialization 203, 204, 205 De Paris, Wilber 81 Devilbiss High Schools 162 DiSalle, Michael V. 130 Doneghy, Charles 193 Dorr Street Coalition 231 Dorr Street Corridor, black businesses 121–124 Douglass, Frederick 15 Dred Scott Case 7 Du Bois, W.E.B. 185 The Philadelphia Negro 57, 293 Dunbar, Paul Laurence 78 Durham, Barbee 72 D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation 55 Ealey, Chuck 139, 168, 169 Economic Opportunity Planning ­Association 128, 191, 249

Edison, Thomas 9 Ella P. Stewart Academy for Girls 233, 245, 246, 248 Ella P. Stewart Junior Federated Club 117 Ellington, Duke 82, 83, 139 Engels, Friedrich 57 Enterprise Charity Club 187 Environmental Justice 258 Farrakhan, Louis 177 Federal Council of Churches 95 Firelands Pioneer 17 First in Field 72 Fisk University 161, 179, 189 Fletcher Henderson Band 82 Flower Hospital 18, 242, 244 Ford, Henry 56 Ford, Jack 47, 105, 295 Prince Hall Masons 47 biography of 220–224 Ford Motor Company 120 Franklin, Robert V. 130 Frederick Douglass Center 184 Frederick Douglass Community ­Association 73, 117, 195, 298 Frederick Douglass Community Center 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 107, 298 history of 90–94 Frederick Douglass Community House 94 Frederick Douglass Recreation Center 91, 92 Free University of Berlin 179 Friendship Baptist Church 232, 233, 301 Friends of Freedom Society 18 Fugitive Slave Act 7, 18 Fugitive Slave Bill 16 Garvey, Marcus 144, 302 General Mills 129 General Taliaferro 20, 21, 22 General Washburne 35 Gibson, Inez 141 Gillespie, G.H 42, 151 Golden Rule Circle Club 97, 98 Good ‘n Plenty Restaurant 129 Governor Hays 9 Grambling State University 251, 256 Great Depression, the 82 Greater Toledo Urban League 240, 241 Greenpeace 258 Gunckel School 127, 133, 180

314 Haitian Revolution 8 Harambee, Inc. 130 Harlem Renaissance 56, 141, 142, 199, 283 Harrison, William Henry 122 Haughton Elevator Company 119 Hendricks, Jon 139, 150, 151 Henrietta Society 98–101 Henry’s Jeweler & Giftware 138 Hines’ Farm Blues Club 85, 145–148 Hines’ All Stars 88 John Lee Hooker 85, 146 B.B. King 146 Freddy King 146, 147 Louis Jordan 147 History of the African American Legacy Project 278 Holyoke College 224 Hooker, John Lee 85, 146 Horton, Frank 175, 177 Howard University 178 Hubbard, Paul 277 Hudson, Paula Hicks 218, 226, 229 Hughes, Langston 140, 141 Hurricane Katrina 205 International Black Summit 255 Jackson, Jesse 105 Jackson, Jimmy 194 Jackson State College 158 James A. Jackson Foundation 195 Jarvis, Doehler 119, 180 Jesus Only, Church of Deliverance 124 Jimmy’s Carry-Out 123 John Harter Coal and Ice Co. 72 Johnson, Candy 152 Johnson, Jeffrey 175, 177 Jones, Ernie 270 Jordan, Louis 147 Jordan, Michael 214 Joyner, Tom 277 Kaptur, Mary 226, 229 Karenga, Ron 283 Katznelson, Ira 57 Keaton, William 233, 234 Kent Branch Public Library 245, 253, 254, 281 Kent State University 158, 242

Index King, B.B. 146 King, Freddy 146, 147 King, Martin Luther Jr. 105, 130, 135, 143, 181 national holiday 193 King, Rodney 120, 172 Kirk, Andy 150 Kitchen for the Poor 233, 277 Klotz, Solon 113 Kynard, Pauline 245 tribute to 25–256 See also Black librarians Langston, John M. 34, 37 Lawshe, Calvin 236 Lee, Spike 156 Lincoln Elementary School 182 Lincoln Motel 123 Lock, David R. 29 Louis, Joe 140, 141 Louisiana Purchase 8 L’Ouverture, Toussaint 8, 34 Lucas Metropolitan Housing Authority 191 Macomber High School 194, 236 Marshall, Thurgood 235, 239 Martin, Trayvon 206 Mass Movement League 107 Mays, Willie 90 McClure, Wilbert “Skeeter” 139, 165–168 McDavis, Roderick 265 McKinney’s Cotton Pickers 81 Miami University 169 Michigan State University 242, 243 Millinder, Lucky 150 Million Man March 161 Mississippi State University 159 M.I.T. 179 Model Cities agency 128 Model Neighborhood Residents ­Associations 130, 137 Monroe, James 52 Morehouse College 189 Mortuary 138 House of Day Funeral Service 138 Moten, Benny 82 Mott Branch Library 255 Mott, Richard 16, 41, 43 Mt. Nebo Baptist Church 236, 237

315

Index Mt. Zion Baptist Church 301 Muhammad, Dr. Khallid Abdul 169 Murchison Center, cyberpower 196, 197, 200, 201 Murphy, Clifford 151, 154 Murphy’s Place 151–155 Candy Johnson 152 M&L Rendevouz Bar 124

Ohio Civil Rights Commission 108, 126 Ohio Congressmen, 19th century 43 Ohio Wesleyan College 92 Ohio’s Black Codes 8 Owens Corning, company 131 Owens, Donna 185, 222 Owens-Illinois, Inc. 129, 250 Oxford University 179

naacp, Toledo chapter 2, 99, 129, 130, 174, 185, 187, 226, 229, 240, 249, 255, 297–298, 301, 302 and the Klu Klux Klan 101, 102 Black Panthers 137 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People 117, 126 National Center for Urban Solutions 217 National Chamber of Commerce 7 National Council for Black Studies 2 National League Chicago White Stockings 49 National Park Service 18 National Urban League 91, 92 National Wildlife Federation 258 Navarre, Mike 215, 217 Negro American and National Leagues 87, 90 Negro Business League 71 Neighborhood Improvement Association 9 Newsbee, editor 102 New York School of Social Work 91 Northeastern University 166, 179 Northwest Ohio Black Chamber of Commerce 239 Northwest Ohio Black Media Association 220, 229, 239 Northwest Ohio History 2 Northwest Ordinance of 1787 7 Notre Dame Academy 242, 271 Notre Dame High School 168 Nunn, McClinton 135

Palmer, Wayman 120, 190, 195 Paramount Theatre 44 Parker, Charlie “Bird” 150 Parks, Rosa 112 Patterson, Rubin 1, 5, 13 Penn, Robert 108, 128 People’s Tribunal 123 Perry, Mozart 285 Phi Beta Kappa 188 Pinewood Avenue District 57, 184 primary residential colored district of Toledo 73–76, 85 Poor Henry’s Barbershop 236 Prince Hall Freemasonry 44–49 Prince Hall Grand Lodge 44 Prince Hall Masonic Lodge 44, 45, 48 Prosser, Gabriel 8

Obama, Barack 207 Oberlin College 9 Observer, The and Cornelius Edwoods 115, 116, 117 Ohio Association of Colored Women 187 Ohio Bureau of Employment Services 129

Race Relations Week 71 Randolph, A. Phillip 83, 107 Redding, Otis 85 Reed, Rev. Al 144 Rhodes, James 111 Rivoli Theatre 84 Robinson, Jackie 86, 90 Robinson Junior High School 180, 280 Rockefeller, John D. 55 Rogers High Schools 142, 164, 231 Roosevelt, Eleanor 184 Roosevelt, Theodore 80 Rose, Floyd 193 Rotary Club 81, 249 Roulette, Lloyd 109, 185 Rusk, Dean 187 Rusty’s, jazz club 153 Schreiber, Cornell 101 Scott High School 150, 151, 156, 160, 161, 166, 189, 243, 281

316 Scott High School (cont.) namesake 15 Hall of Fame 88, 188 wxts radio 155, 156 theater name change 279 Flute Rice 127, 139, 160–161 SeaGate Centre 110 Sewell, Rhonda 252 Sherman, John 31 Sierra Club 258, 261 Simmons, James B., vice mayor 100, 105–110, 120, 129, 131 Sixteenth Street Baptist Church 120 Sneed, Glenda v Spelman College 179 Springfield High School 4 Stagecoach Mary 42, 52, 53, 54 St. Clair Drake 57 St. Francis De Sales High School 230 St. John’s Jesuit 271 St. Paul ame Zion Church 277 St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church 45 St. Peter’s Mission 53 Steel Guitar Scared Music 273 Steppin’ in Toledo 272 Stewart, Ella 117, 141, 234 pharmacist 72, 120, 183–187 houseguests 185 civil rights activism 183–187 supporters 184, 185, 186 Ella P Stewart Academy 245–246 Stewart, Myron 277 Strickland, Ted 225, 256 Study Hour Club 99, 140–142, 187, 280 Swayne Field 87, 89 Sylvania Masonic Lodge 19 Tatum, Art 81–83, 252, 291 band members 81 companions of 149 African American … Resource Center 253, 254, 270, 281–285, 291 Taylor, Zachary 122 The Bronze Raven 117, 147 The Collegian 150, 177 The Economist 205 The Sojourner Truth 256 The Toledo Voice 117

Index Third Baptist Church 72, 157, 189 Thomas Temple Church of God in Christ 124 Thurgood Marshall Law Association 239 Toledo Ballet 19 Toledo Blade 2, 4, 26, 43, 94 the beginnings of 9 and the black vote 29–40 baseball 50, 87 Toledo Bronze Raven 300 Toledo City Council 229 Toledo Club 50, 51, 81, 152, 231 Toledo Colored School Association 42 Toledo Council of Churches 95, 96, 97, 104 Toledo Excel 245, 249–250, 265 See also Cooks, Helen C. Toledo Fire Department, captain 128, 131 Toledo Jazz Society 154 Toledo Journal, and publisher 277 Toledo Metropolitan Housing Authority 114 Toledo Police Department 128 Toledo Public Schools 182, 242 superintendents 127, 139, 163, 245, 248 Toledo Retail Merchants’ Association 72 Toledo Scale Company 64, 219 Toledo school desegregation 40 Toledo Urban Federal Credit Union 231, 232, 277 Toledo Ursuline Convent 52 Toledo ywca 234 Top Toledoans of 2009 229–242 Truth, Sojourner 15, 28, 29 Turner, Nat 8 Underground Railroad 2, 7, 15, 16, 43 and Elijah Anderson 17 Lathrop House 18, 19 Richard Mott 16, 41, 43 Union of Black Toledo employees 251 Union Party 29, 30, 31, 38 United North Community Development Corporation 212 University of Chicago 179, 189, 206 University of Illinois 179, 251 University of Iowa 226 University of Louisiana-Lafayette 256 University of Michigan 50, 173, 201, 214, 242, 243, 244

317

Index University of Pittsburgh 184, 186 University of Rochester 243 University of Toledo 159, 188, 189, 195, 221–222, 225, 231, 236, 237, 239, 240, 242, 245, 248, 250, 253, 261, 265, 284 black athletes 87 Chuck Ealey 139, 168–169 Jimmy Jackson 194 Calvin Lawshe 236 McGuire, Patrick 211, 214 black protest 172 student leaders 174, 175, 177, 255, 256, 257 president Horton 175, 177 black employees 237, 238, 241, 251, 256 sociologists 211, 214 African American male retention 264 Valentine 84 Vesey, Denmark 8 Wade, Benjamin 35 Waite High school, namesake 7, 10 Waite, Morrison 7, 10 Waiters and Bellman’s Club 149 Walker, Madame C.J. 198 War on Drugs 204, 205 Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections 2, 187

Warren A.M.E Church 40, 41, 48, 118, 150, 191, 192, 252 founding of 42–43 namesake 44 Warren, Charles W. 44 Washington, Booker T. 71 Washington, George 7, 8 Wayman Palmer Center 195 Wayne State University 166 Welch, Charles 269, 274 Welfare Reform Act 204 West Virginia State College 180, 182 Whig Party 18, 122 Whitlock, Brand 78, 79, 80 Wilkowski, Keith 230 Williams, Leroy 2, 57, 292, 311 Willy’s Overland Motors 120 Woods, Tiger 237 Woodson, Carter G. 1, 185 Woodward High School 84, 211, 230, 240 wtod 117 wxts 155, 156 wxut 155 X, Malcolm 105, 143, 178, 179 Zenobia Shrine 45 Zeta Alpha Omega 181, 182 Zulus 9