The Once and Future Mayor

Submitted by lmcshane on Tue, 12/11/2018 - 08:19.

 

The world's richest man, the first billionaire, lived in East Cleveland at what is now Forest Hill Park on over 700 acresof land. Euclid Avenue was "Millionaire's Row" and the 2nd wealthiest street in the nation behind Park Avenue in Manhattan, New York. When I attended shopping center conventions to introduce developers to the city my pitch was that he left us with everything.

I described the city's once glory as being the "Beverly Hills" of the North Coast. Just like Alexandria, Virginia was 6.5 miles from D.C., East Cleveland was the same distance from downtown Cleveland. In 45 minutes by light rail any East Cleveland resident can hop a rapid and travel to the airport, get on an airplane and go anywhere in the world.

Residents live within 5 minutes of two world class hospitals, a university, museums and the Cleveland Symphony Orchestra. This was before University Circle built up all that "stacked up" shit to keep from crossing under the bridge.

One of the things I liked about Rockefeller is that he was an abolitionist and required the same from Standard Oil's board members. He and his son, John, Jr., invested over $65 million to educate the Descendants of Slaves through their "General Education Department."

The deal for Spellman College was cut at Forest Hill Park and is named after his wife, Cettie's, family. Martin Luther King, Jr's grandmother and mother attended Spelman. I'd often say had the world's greatest East Cleveland resident not invested in Spellman there'd be no MLK because his female nurturers would not have had the education that nurtured them to lead him to greatness. Think of all the contributions of the graduates of Spellman and their offspring that would not have occurred without an East Cleveland resident's investment. This is just a sample of what I'd shared with developers, investors and anyone who'd listen about the city.

East Cleveland's charter was one of the earliest in the state. So other charter cities modeled their charters after it. There's a Supreme Court of the United States case captioned Frisbie Co. v. East Cleveland 1918 which set a national standard that vendors doing business with the government won't get paid if they participated in violating laws with elected officials. The case says they should know better. Frisbie built water and sewer lines along Doan and Hayden when the city was a township around 1904. When it became a village in

Another U.S. Supreme Court case, Moore v. East Cleveland. 1974, established that cities could not enact ordinances to determine the composition of families who lived there. Inez Moore was a grandmother who took in her son and two grandsons. The grandson's weren't brothers but cousins, so they didn't fit the East Cleveland ordinances model of a family. East Cleveland's housing ordinances were racist. Most criminaliz Moore's case set up challenges against other racist housing ordinances against the nation.

One of East Cleveland's residents and former school board member, attorney Harold Burton, was Cleveland's law director and later mayor before he campaigned for the U.S. Senate and was appointed to the Supreme Court of the United States. He'd been an NAACP member. Yes. He buffered the views of KKK member and SCOTUS Chief Justice Hugo Black and got him to change his mutha fuckin' mind to go against racial segregation in public schools, in admitting blacks to law schools and in stopping all white private Democratic clubs from existing to control local politics to disenfranchise black Republicans and white Republicans.

Yeah. The Descendants of Slaves were once Republicans and proud of that shit. I think Rockefeller is turning all over in his grave because the Descendants of Slaves he believed should be liberated now embrace the pro-slavery Democratic and KKK party. The racist deed restrictions that existed in cities like Shaker Heights that said no home sales to African Americans, Jews, Italians of low-descent and Catholics were also "opinioned out" by Burton. He's actually my favorite Cleveland mayor from an historical perspective. To you relatives of Jesse Owens, he welcomed him back from his "fuck you" visit to Germany where he dogged out the "master race" in front of Adolf Hitler. To you descendants of Norman Minor, he's the mayor who gave him the job as the city's first black assistant prosecuting attorney. East Cleveland ... again.

You remember another SCOTUS case, Brown v. Topeka Kansas Board of Education that ended segregation in schools? That was Burton's "majority" opinion. East Cleveland was all up in the house on that decision.

When you appreciate the history of a place and the contributions of its citizens you have a different feel for it. At Lake Park Tower had the Rockefeller's still lived in the city and the building existed we'd have been next door neighbors. When I looked over the city from the 19th floor I understood Rockefeller's perspective from the top of the hill overlooking Euclid Avenue and Lake Erie. I actually stood at the top of the hill where his 41 room mansion existed to get his front yard perspective. Y'all call it "Sled Hill."

It was the highest elevation point in the city. Stand there and you'll see Lake Erie and the buildings downtown. Standard Oil's headquarters at Superior and West 6th Street across from the Anthony Celebrezze State Office Tower was once the tallest building in the city before Tower City was built. Rockefeller could see his offices from his front yard.

The railroad lines that travel through the city were built by the Rockefellers and that family inspired men like Burton. They inspired and helped women like Sophia Packard build Spelman. Often as mayor I would ask myself what would Mr. Rockefeller want for his city if he were alive and were communicating.

The Rockefeller home in Forest HIlls was their summer residence from 1878 to 1914. February 1st was "tax day" in Cuyahoga County. Because his wife got sick and they had to stay past that date the county's tax commissioner saw a payday and hit the Rockefeller's with taxes on everything. East Cleveland was fucked out of it's highest tax paying resident then like it was fucked out of Huron Hospital by Cleveland Clinic and James Rokakis' 3rd party tax lien sales. That single event began the city's decline.

What did the Rockefeller's do? Well, let's just say the house burned down in 1917 and so did the riding stable. The riding stable remnants are still off to the right of the trail as you approach from the Euclid Avenue side.

The Rockefeller's didn't return to Cleveland and moved everything to New York. They invested into New York what could have supported East Cleveland and Cleveland ... forever. One small-minded political idiot drove them out.

If it's any consolation to the East Cleveland residents who are looking for someone to blame over the city's demise than blame the idiot politician who fucked with the Rockefeller's.

And folk, look. Just because I've served and express political interests doesn't mean I'm looking for another office to seek. I have no interests in returning to East Cleveland or even seeking the mayor's job in Cleveland again. I'm not living my life for "that" future.

I'm a writer who's written about the folk in this town off and on since 1978 for other newspapers and my own. There's some stuff I know some of you don't that I think you should know; so I share it when it hits me. I started my first newspaper in East Cleveland in 1979 to share information with the city's residents. I'm sharing information today. Don't take it anywhere else.

The only city official I know is Nate Martin. I don't know the rest of them, personally. All I write about is what they're doing because there's information people should know in a way that's not being shared with them by reporters who don't have my insights or depth of experiences. Use it if you want. Ignore if it you want. The choice is yours.

I also see why the Rockefeller's kept returning for 38 years and burned the place down as they left. East Cleveland, as a place, is like a fucking addiction. I understand the symbolism of burning away an addictive attraction.

One day there'll be no more words coming from me about you folk in East Cleveland or anywhere else. After 40 years of watching new generations of people repeat the dumb shit of past generations it gets a little old.

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East Cleveland was the home of the richest man in the world - John D. Rockefeller.  Only in Cleveland would the mob take this real estate and make it the rock bottom by design.

"everyone wants to go to heaven, but no one wants to die, first" 

Eric J. Brewer doesn't spare a punch : 

Y'all probably wondering why I published Forest City's Sam Miller's picture. Keep reading. Hey Sam. It's been a few years since I was in your office with Lou Reyes. You couldn't invest a dime in East Cleveland. Thanks for fucking us on the Huron Hospital closing.

The days of affordable health care are a reality of Ohio law pursuant to R.C. 749.01 if Cleveland residents decide they want it. $50 a year on a $50,000 house. It's been on the books as a gift to Ohio citizens since October 1, 1953 as the work of two of the city's more thoughtful mayors: Harold Burton and Frank Lausche.

Under a "municipal" hospital employee wages are controlled by council's salary ordinances. Medical procedures are done at cost and not for profit. You won't get $350,000 a year vice presidents; $1 million a year heads of security like Gordon Snow; and no $3 million a year hospital presidents. The highest paid employee won't make any more than the mayor ... by ordinance.

Cleveland Clinic is the mafia. Medial Mutual, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Ohio ... mob controlled. One of the Clinic's board members is a former mafia shooter. One of its legal board members works for a mob-connected law firm. That shit didn't die. They reinvented. Medical care is the new racket.

Jackie Presser took $2 billion in Teamster pension funds and invested it in Blue Cross Blue Shield of Ohio. It's detailed to some extent in the late Ken Seminatore's civil claim against his law partner, John Climaco. They were getting $1 million in monthly retainers. Ken didn't get his real cut.

Presser also took another $2 billion and invested it in Bank One when they had about 4 branches. They took over the bank. Climaco's firm got another $1 million in monthly retainers from that deal, too. I used to work with his former bodyguard, Tony Hughes. Tony owned "The Forge" party center. Black folk flooded the place. I got a chance to meet singer Freda Payne at the spot. Tony and I got along well when we later worked together. I also know the man who got Presser's papers.

The current profit-driven medical environment in Cleveland is a mob creation. They got control of the HMO's. Their people got on the boards. Forest City's Sam Miller serves and has served on both Cleveland Clinic and Medical Mutual's board.

Sam is honest about his youth. His nickname was "Skinny" or "Game Boy" when he was in the Jewish mob with Morris Kleinman, Louis Rothkopf and that pimp, Shondor Birns.

The one board paid Sam served on paid and the other set prices. Actually, both set prices. It's a helluva conflict but you'll never learn about it in the PD because its publisher, Terrence Egger, is on the Cleveland Clinic board covering up for the other mob characters. So there'll be no U.S. Department of Justice "anti-trust" investigation when the Jewish lawyers leading the U.S. Attorneys office here in northern Ohio work for law firms that get paid off the hospitals. Everybody's "taken care of" so everybody's quiet.

Think of all the closed hospitals and think about how the mob operates. Kill the competition. Why would Cleveland Clinic and UH buy hospitals to close? They're all Hill-Burton Act hospitals that were supposed to be free forever thanks to a former Cleveland mayor who thought about us from the U.S. Senate. The mob doesn't do the same type of "hits" they did before shooting up mutha fuckas and putting bombs in cars. It's all very respectable. Corporate control.

Free hospitals were intentionally eradicated by the corporate mob boards that now control health care in Cleveland. MetroHealth''s no different. This shit is business and "the people" of Cleveland need to understand it.

I'm saying let's organize our own "mob" of informed, hard core, ruthless Cleveland citizens; put our "hit" together and take these mutha fuckas out with a free municipal hospital that's controlled by "the people's gang" through our mayor and 33-member part-time city council. Fuck "regionalism" and shrinking council. That's mob talk.

We need "more" and not "fewer" hard core Cleveland minds on deck. That shit's another mob tactic. Control the local government players and punk them out with the mob-controlleld newspaper whose publisher served and serves on the Cleveland Clinic board; and voted to close Huron Hospital. They kept that shit quiet, too.

Sam. The late Robert "Bob" Thompson, Sr. told me how y'all fucked him on the Forest City / Dillon deal. You muscled in through Dillon out of Akron. He said Albert Ratner and Ruth, when she worked for Carl Stokes, told him to close "TomRob Developers" and come work for y'all on Brookpark. He didn't want to buy building materials from y'all so he built his own supply company on Harvard next to the old Juva De when Dale Carter and his dad owned the place. Supreme Materials. TomRob Developers. That brother was a bad mutha fucka. He said y'all sicced the HUD folk on him. Prevailing wages. A black man couldn't hire black construction workers to build high-rises. Y'all fucked up a lot of "our" shit.

Pick your mouths up off the floor. This shit is real. I wouldn't print it if it wasn't. It's all still the rackets. You just don't see it.

Have a good day, Sam. Cleveland. Do you want your free fucking hospital back? R.C. 749.01 needs to be protected like the Holy Grail. $50 a year on a $50,000 home.

Bumpy Johnson. Remember him? My kinda brother.

 

 

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