Great Lakes Science Center marks 25 years, keeps evolving, educating, entertaining, Cleveland.com, September 27, 2022

 

This year, the Great Lakes Science Center marked its 25th anniversary.David Anderson, cleveland.com

Great Lakes Science Center marks 25 years, keeps evolving, educating, entertaining
By Marc Bona Cleveland.com, September 27, 2022
The link is here

 

Video from “Cultural and Political Sources of Cleveland’s Great Cultural and Civic Institutions” w/Prof David Hammack 3.23.2021

 

TUESDAY, MARCH 23, 2021 AT 7 PM EDT
“Cultural and Political Sources of Cleveland’s Great Cultural and Civic Institutions”
On March 23 at 7pm, join David Hammack, CWRU Hiram C. Haydn Professor of History Emeritus, who will speak to this theme:

Why is Greater Cleveland home to so many notable private institutions? The Cleveland Orchestra and the Cleveland Museum of Art both make persuasive claims to be among the very best in the United States. University Hospitals and the Cleveland Clinic give the region two nationally-notable medical systems. The city’s religious and nondenominational social welfare charities have for more than 100 years been national leaders in raising money and developing effective responses to new challenges. University Circle constitutes a university-cultural district surpassed by just a handful of cities in the United States. This lecture will explore the cultural, economic, and political sources of the region’s extraordinary private institutions.
The recording is here:
Cosponsored by CWRU Siegal Lifelong Learning, Cleveland History Center and The League of Women Voters of Greater Cleveland

A History of University Circle in Cleveland Subtitle: Community, Philanthropy, and Planning Author: Darwin Stapleton

A History of University Circle in Cleveland

Subtitle: Community, Philanthropy, and Planning

Author: Darwin Stapleton

The link is here

1. The Context of the Circle: Community, Philanthropy, and Planning
2. Doan’s Corners: A Changing Community
3. Neighborhoods, Outreach, and Discrimination
4. System, Sobriety and Shaping the Circle: Jeptha H. Wade, Amasa Stone, and Hiram Hayden
5. Case School and Its Neighbor: Community as Co-Existence

6. The Michelson-Morley Experiment

7. Science, Technology, and the Rise of the Military-Industrial Complex

8. Gathering the Circle: Art, History, and Music for the Public

9. The Kinship of Nonprofit Institutions

6. The Michelson-Morley Experiment

Bibliography of Darwin H. Stapleton’s Publications on University Circle, Cleveland and Ohio History

About the Author

“Philanthropy in Cleveland: A Shared Legacy in a Diverse Community” by Dr. John J. Grabowski

The pdf is here

Philanthropy in Cleveland:  A Shared Legacy in a Diverse Community
by Dr. John J. Grabowski

Cleveland has many landmarks, both contemporary and historic.  Of these, Euclid Avenue occupies a significant place in the history and public memory of Cleveland.   Many citizens know that it was once “Millionaires Row” and that it was recognized as one of the finest residential avenues in the nation.  They lament that its grandeur is gone.  “Why did they tear down all those fabulous houses” is a common plaint.   Yet, some Clevelanders recognize that Euclid Avenue lives on – its legacy exemplified in the museums, colleges, hospitals, and service agencies that its residents’ fortunes helped create.

The ability to make that connection often leads to discussion of another aspect of the city that is common currency – the recognition that its history of altruism and philanthropy is of national consequence.  There is no argument about the fact that the community pioneered concepts such as unified fund raising and the community trust, and that now, even in the face of demographic decline, it remains able to support a not-for-profit cultural, educational, medical, and social service infrastructure envied by many larger communities.  This raises perhaps the most critical questions: where did the tradition of altruism arise, why did it become so predominant in the city, and, most importantly, how has it survived demographic and economic changes?

Cleveland as New England   — Stewardship
Old Stone (First Presbyterian) Church symbolizes the starting point – indeed the seed – of philanthropy in Cleveland.  The founders and early settlers of the city were largely Congregationalists or Presbyterians, many of whom had roots traceable to Puritan New England and to the concept of stewardship embedded in that deep history.  Stewardship implied care of one’s community, which in New England and early Cleveland was generally a homogeneous group of co-religionists.   As Cleveland expanded beyond its New England roots, the concept was generally extended to the broader community.   An important example of this can be found in the history of the Severance Family, a story particularly well told in Diana Tittle’s book, The Severances: an American Odyssey from Puritan Massachusetts to Ohio’s Western Reserve, and Beyond.  The family’s (including that of the Longs and Walworths who would marry into it after settlement in Cleveland) “stewardship” began as typically Puritan and then moved well beyond, from helping establish the city’s first library in 1811 to the building of Severance Hall, the home of the Cleveland Orchestra in 1931.

Stewardship, however, was a concept not limited to these specific Protestant denominations.    Rebecca Rouse, a Baptist who came to Cleveland with her husband, Benjamin, in 1830, was involved in a number of philanthropic activities that extended beyond that denomination, including the establishment of the Cleveland Protestant Orphan Asylum in 1852.  During the Civil War, she organized local women into the Soldiers Aid Society, a branch of the US Sanitary Commission.  It provided a variety of services to soldiers, ranging from sending blankets to the front to taking care of the wounded and invalided.  Interestingly, her granddaughter, Adella Prentiss Hughes, would go on to form the Musical Arts Association in 1915 which would establish the Cleveland Orchestra in 1918, an ensemble that would then move to a new home, Severance Hall.

Cleveland’s growth and industrialization would challenge the manner in which this founding principle of the community’s philanthropic impulse was used in several ways.   First was the manner in which a concept that had been applicable in small communities, or segments of those communities, might function in a growing city.   In 1810, a year before the library was established, the community consisted of approximately 57 individuals.   In 1830, the year of the Rouses’ arrival, its population was 1,075 and in 1850, two years before the orphan asylum opened, it stood at 17,034 and that of neighboring Ohio City at 6,375.   By 1866, the year after the Civil War, it was 67,500.

That growing population posed another challenge to the concept of stewardship.  It was, by 1860,  over 40% foreign born and comprised not only of various Protestant denominations, but of Catholics and Jews as well.   The city these communities now shared was no longer the large New England mercantile town of the 1840s, but one moving toward an industrial future that would be characterized by increasing social differences based on wealth, belief, and ethnicity, and one in which social issues, such as poverty, disease, industrial injury, equitable educational opportunity, and environmental degradation would become increasingly evident.

The Multiple Manifestations of Stewardship in Gilded Age Cleveland.
Between 1850 and 1890, Cleveland citizens established nearly sixty new charitably supported agencies, ranging from orphanages, to hospitals and old age homes to new educational institutions (see the excellent timeline of Cleveland philanthropy on the Western Reserve Historical Society website)

A review of the list of these organizations reveals several significant things about charity in the early part of the industrial era.   First, the concept of stewardship continued, albeit often in a parochialized manner wherein the Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish communities created parallel agencies, including hospitals, orphanages, aid societies, and old age homes.   Secondly, this division in and of itself argues that one cannot simply define stewardship as a Protestant concept.   Whether defined as Tzedakah in the Jewish community or more broadly as charity for Catholics and other Christians, each of the new groups settling in Cleveland came to rely on their traditions to care for community needs.

The division of Cleveland’s philanthropic agencies along religious, and often within subordinate ethnicities or denominations, was representative both of prejudices as well as identity-based needs.  There was a strong Protestant-Catholic rift in nineteenth century America and it was reflected in Cleveland.  Among both Catholics and Jews there was a concern about proselytization in Protestant-directed agencies and of cultural issues.   Would an observant Jew in a Protestant hospital be able to eat meals that were Kosher?   Indeed, this issue would eventually bifurcate agencies within the Jewish community itself.   Prejudice was, however, a strong ancillary force behind the creation of ethnic specific agencies.   The inability of Jews to practice in “mainstream” hospitals led, in part, to the establishment of Mt. Sinai Hospital, which opened in 1916.  The most visible divide in social service and philanthropic agencies would be demarcated by race.   The opening of the Home for Aged Colored People (now Eliza Bryant Village) in 1897 would be the first visible manifestation of this.  It would come at a time when a growing African-American population would find itself confronting hardening racial attitudes in a city once known for its relative tolerance.  Michael Metsner’s thesis, “‘Save the Young People” The Generation Politics of Racial Solidarity in Black Cleveland, 1906-1911,” provides an excellent review of a community dealing with the city’s move toward defacto institutional segregation.

This “division” of stewardship in Gilded Age Cleveland extended far beyond the major institutions that have come, historically, to represent philanthropy in Cleveland.   Within almost every church and synagogue or temple there existed multiple charitable and aid agencies, focused both on the needs of congregants as well as on broader charitable endeavors, such as missions.   Within each of the growing immigrant communities there existed similar aid societies, some religiously affiliated, some more secular.  Many of these took the form of fraternal or sororal insurance agencies that provided death and burial benefits for members.   While not solely charitable, they often contributed to immigrant or religiously-related causes.  With the exception of Laura Tuennerman-Kaplan’s  book, Helping Others, Helping Ourselves, there has been little historical exploration of this area.   Some of these insular organizations would come to have considerable impact.   The St. Andrew Scottish Benevolent Society (1846) would establish the Scottish Old Folks Home.  The First Catholic Slovak Union, founded in Cleveland as a regional organization in 1890, would come to encompass units throughout the US and Canada.

While Gilded Age Cleveland saw a multiplicity of philanthropic endeavors, it also witnessed two factors that hinted at consolidation of effort and, importantly, the beginning of a tradition of stewardship that moved beyond a particular religious community or group.  The harbinger of consolidation was the creation of the Charity Organization Society in 1881.  In 1887 it would merge with the Bethel Union which had been established as a branch of the Western Seamen’s Friend Society, established in 1830 and one of the community’s oldest charitable endeavors.  The organization that emerged, Bethel Associated Charities, was unlike the Bethel Union, which was evangelical in outlook.  It was fully non-sectarian and focused on rationalizing charitable aid in the growing community.  As such it set an important precedent for those attributes which would make the city’s philanthropic community nationally notable in the twentieth century.

This move toward rationalization was paralleled by an expansion of philanthropy because of the great wealth accumulated by some Clevelanders in the years after the Civil War.  This essentially marks the period in which the Euclid Avenue cultural legacy began to be built.  Not only were the “gifts” larger, but they were far less likely to be confined to or by the donor’s religious affiliation.   There are multiple stories illustrative of this, many of which link to the Avenue.

If we travel on Euclid Avenue to the intersection with East 40th Street, the southwest corner (a site now occupied by the Northeast Regional Sewer District) is where John D. Rockefeller’s town home once stood.  Rockefeller came to the Cleveland area (settling with his family in Strongsville) in 1853.   An ardent member of the Baptist church, he believed strongly in the concept of stewardship and began giving to the church when, in 1855, as a young clerk in a local commissions firm he received his first earnings.   Eventually, when he became wealthy, he became the target of a multitude of requests for assistance and would hire someone to assist in their evaluation.   That, in the long term, would lead to the creation of the Rockefeller Foundation.  Importantly, throughout this period, roughly from the 1870s on, the meticulous records of his donations go well beyond the Baptist community.   His donations to African American organizations were significant (perhaps the most notable being the funding that insured the growth and future of Spelman College in Atlanta). Although Cleveland-legend likes to believe that he left the city with little, agencies ranging from social settlements such as Hiram House and  Alta House, and cultural agencies such as the Western Reserve Historical Society all benefited from his wealth.    Certainly his largest educational donation went to create the University of Chicago, but there remains a Rockefeller Building on the CWRU campus and not far away is Rockefeller Park – his gift to the city for its 1896 centennial.

That park links to Wade Park, a gift to the city by Rockefeller’s across-the-street neighbor (northwest corner of Euclid and E. 40th), Jeptha Homer Wade who made his fortune as one of the founders of Western Union.  The institutions that surround Wade Oval in University Circle, most particularly the Cleveland Museum of Art, benefited from his and from his grandson’s, Jeptha H. Wade II, donations of both monies and collections.

If we move west from the Rockefeller-Wade corner to East 22nd Street, we find the Mather Mansion on the Cleveland State University campus.  One of the last to be built on the street and one of the very few remaining it is perhaps the best symbol of the continuity and expansion of the puritan concept of stewardship for Samuel Mather was descended from the Puritan Mathers of New England.    An iron ore baron, Mather conceived his community to be the entire city.   So did his wife, Flora Stone Mather, the daughter of Amasa Stone who came to Cleveland in 1851 and made his fortune building railroads.   The family’s philanthropy is, perhaps, most evident in and around the campus of Case Western Reserve University.  Stone would provide a half million dollars to promote the move of Western Reserve College from Hudson to Cleveland in the 1880s.  Its mens’ college would be named Adelbert, after Stone’s son who died while a student at Yale.  Its womens’ college came to be named after his daughter in honor of her support.  (Gladys Haddad’s Flora Stone Mather: Daughter of Cleveland’s Euclid Avenue & Ohio’s Western Reserve is an excellent chronicle of her life and philanthropic activities)  Nearby, the Mather Pavilion at University Hospitals honors Samuel for his support of Lakeside Hospital and his advocacy of its move to the University Circle area in the mid 1920s.

One of the major questions that surrounds the philanthropy of Gilded Age millionaires such as Mather, Rockefeller, and Wade centers on motivation.  What, beyond the concept of stewardship, would have motivated them to give such enormous gifts?    Certainly they had money to give, for (except during the Civil War) there was no federal tax on income until 1913 and then, until 1917 there was no deduction available for charitable gifts.   Arguments as to motivation sometimes center on guilt or charity as a means to secure eternal salvation.  Then too, their donations could shape institutions that would help mold the community as they might like it, one in which their values became those of the city.   There is also the matter of the social status one could gain through charitable activities — to be a “pillar of the community” was and is a measure of rank.   Whatever the motivation, the benevolence of families such as these set a model for community support for other people of means that was pivotal in creating the cultural, educational, and medical foundations of contemporary Cleveland.

Rationalizing Philanthropy – Progressive Era Cleveland.
The current image of Cleveland as a model of philanthropy is not so much based on the amount of annual contributions as it is to the innovations the community applied to charitable activity from the 1890s through the 1920s.   These innovations were in concert with many ideas about rationalizing, organizing and improving industrial production and society during the progressive period.  Indeed, it was the rationalization of industry that, in large part, built the fortunes that could be allocated toward philanthropic projects and provided the model as to how they might be administered.

The city’s philanthropic needs grew geometrically during the period 1890-1920, driven by a rapidly growing population and the lack of anything resembling the social safety net of contemporary times.  In these years the population more than doubled, rising from 261,353 to 796,841.  Largely driven by immigration and migration, this increase left sections of the inner city severely overcrowded.

The main philanthropic response was the social settlement house, an agency based upon the actual residence of the social workers within a particular neighborhood where they offered education programs, built playgrounds, and assisted residents in dealing with political issues, poor housing conditions, and the travails of being a newcomer to the city.  Established largely by young, middle class individuals imbued with the spirit of Social Gospel, the settlement movement began in England and found its way to the US before the end of the 1880s.  It arrived in Cleveland in the mid-1890s with the establishment of Hiram House and Goodrich House (now Goodrich-Gannett).   By 1910, there were eight major settlements in the city, including Alta House, the Rainey Institute, the Council Educational Alliance (now the JCC), and East End Neighborhood House.  By the early 1920s, four more, including Merrick House,  Karamu (founded as Playhouse Settlement), West Side Community House, and University Settlement had been established.

While the settlements derived from what might be called inspired youthful altruism, they soon became exemplars of a more rational approach to social needs.  They used designated staff to visit neighborhood homes and assess family needs – this being an early form of casework.  They created playgrounds and gymnasia where structured recreation was offered to neighborhood youth, and they focused on education as a means to better the lives of the residents in the areas they served.

That this number of agencies began with what was often a personal or group impulse or dream and then prospered – often creating substantial staff infrastructures – indicates that funders were convinced by their mission.   That certainly was true, but as individual requests from increasing numbers of agencies came to the “usual and customary” funders, the issue was raised as to whether the stewards of the community, or the community as a whole, were responsible for the community’s philanthropic needs.  That led to one of Cleveland’s major innovations – unified, community fund drives.

While the first step taken in this direction was, as noted earlier, the creation of the Charity Organization Society in 1881, the seminal moment took place within the city’s Chamber of Commerce in 1900.   The Chamber epitomized the modernization of business practice and was increasingly an advocate of progressive urban reform measures.    In 1900 it responded to a growing concern among donors as to the worthiness of the many charitable institutions that were soliciting their support.  It created a Committee on Benevolent Institutions in that year, which surveyed and ascertained the legitimacy of local charities and then made that information available to the public.   One of the members of the committee was Martin A. Marks, a prominent businessman in the city’s Jewish community.

Marks and several other Jewish businessmen of German and Hungarian background then took the ordering of charity to a new level.  In 1903 they created the Federation for Jewish Charities (today’s Jewish Community Federation).  The Federation went a step beyond the vetting process initiated by the Chamber’s committee.   They centralized the solicitation of funds for agencies in the Jewish community.  Organizations affiliated with the Federation agreed to cease soliciting funds on their own.  That responsibility and the oversight of the allocation of the funds raised in unified community effort fell to the Federation.

Together with Samuel Mather, Marks advocated for a similar program for all charities in Cleveland.  This occurred in 1913 with the establishment of the Federation for Charity and Philanthropy.  Its first unified campaign was fully non-sectarian and reached out to a large number of potential donors.  By doing so, it greatly exceeded the funds that had been raised individually by the member organizations in the past.   Its technique was copied nationally for Victory Chest drives during World War I and was the precedent for the Community Chest drive of 1919 in Cleveland, which is the parent of today’s United Way campaigns.

In the same year as the city’s first Community Chest drive, the Catholic Church established its own general solicitation under the auspices of the Catholic Charities Corporation, thus providing the city with a triad of unified fund-raising initiatives.

The following year, another philanthropic innovation, perhaps the most noteworthy of all, was put in place.   For centuries, wealthy individuals had left or given funds to be held in trust or as foundations to support what they considered worthy causes at the time.  With time, the need for funds for a specific purpose would lessen or disappear.   Frederick H. Goff, a banker and lawyer, was concerned about this “dead hand of the past.”   His response was to create the Cleveland Foundation, a community trust in which individuals or organizations could bequeath fund for designated or non-designated purposes.  Whenever a designated purpose no longer remained viable, the funds could be repurposed.  Earnings  from the funds in trust were then to be allocated by a distribution committee (created by public and private nomination) as appropriate to their designated purpose or, if undesignated, to what they believed were critical contemporary needs of the community.

While Cleveland pioneered in rationalizing charitable funding in the Progressive era, it also was at the forefront of another trend – the formal training of social workers.   The rise of casework, recreational theory, and institutional management dictated that a progressive era social worker had to have an organized skill set to accompany her or his altruist impulse.   In 1915, Western Reserve University created the School of Applied Social Sciences (today’s Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences) to train social workers.  It was one of the first such schools in the nation to be affiliated with a university.   Many of its early students would get their field training with organizations such as Associated Charities or the many settlement houses in the city.

These innovations and events served to add luster to Cleveland’s growing national reputation as a modern, progressive city, a reputation that began to flourish under the mayoralty of Tom Johnson and which truly blossomed in the 1910s, particularly under the leadership of Newton D. Baker.  They also served as models for other similar entities in other cities.  By 1920, Cleveland was not only the fifth largest city in the nation, but it had a model of organized charity and philanthropy was widely studied and emulated.

Public Sector Philanthropy
During the 1920s, Cleveland’s well organized system of private philanthropy serving private cultural and social service institutions met almost all of the city’s needs.   Yet, there was a public system in place.   The city had erected a poorhouse in 1827.   That was replaced by a city infirmary in 1855, the predecessor of today’s Metro-General Hospital.  During times of economic depression (in the 1870s, 1890s, and just after World War I) the city provided “outdoor” relief to the unemployed.  That consisted of coats, groceries and coal for heating.   Most notably, but often not recognized, the city oversaw education – both through the public school system and the Cleveland Public Library which was established in 1869.   Yet, excepting the library and school system, these efforts paled in comparison with private social service agencies and, indeed, during those times when outdoor relief was necessary, it was criticized for attracting paupers to the city.

This status quo would be challenged and changed by the Great Depression.   At the depth of the depression in 1933, unemployment in the city reached 30%.   Private agencies were unable to cope with the situation.  Need had risen and donations withered.   Even the wealthiest Clevelanders  found themselves not as wealthy as before.   When Samuel Mather, possibly the richest man in Ohio,  died in 1931 his bequests could not be paid because the value of his stock investments had dropped.   The drop of value in John L. Severance’s investments meant it took longer for him and, later his estate, to pay his pledges for the construction of Severance Hall.

The crisis was extreme and in August 1933 the staff of all private relief agencies became employees of the Cuyahoga County Relief Administration because Federal relief funds could no longer be allocated to private organizations.   The hard-pressed private agencies had been distributing public funds (from the city) for two years prior to being absorbed into the county system.  The experience of the Depression provided important precedents.  In 1948 Cuyahoga County established a welfare department, todays division of Health and Human Services.

Public sector involvement in areas that had been once the purview of private philanthropy went well beyond direct relief.   Federal programs such as the WPA created work opportunities that not only provided employment, but changed the city’s landscape.  WPA funds helped support an enormous expansion of the Cultural Gardens.  They were central to building part of the Shoreway as well as improvements to numerous parks.   The WPA also supported artists whose murals still adorn public buildings.  It also funded theater and opera as well as the Federal Writers Project, an agency which produced several important book manuscripts on Cleveland’s history and an invaluable index to the city’s press for the period 1818-1877.   The Historic American Buildings Survey created detailed drawings of structures that today aid restorationists or provide the only record available of buildings that have been subsequently razed.

To some, this Federal intrusion into the arts was unacceptable.  But it set a precedent for the creation of the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts in the 1960s, just as the provision of state and federal funds for human needs during the Depression created the basis of the public-private social service system today.  The creation of Cuyahoga County Arts and Culture in 2006 is an important localized “echo” of tax-funded public assistance for the arts and humanities.

Continuities and Conclusions
World War II provided an antidote for Cleveland’s economic woes.  While the programs of the WPA were immensely helpful in providing jobs and diminishing unemployment, the buildup to the war and the war itself revivified the city’s industries.    With nearly full employment and new in-migration coming to fill war work positions, the city prospered as did its private philanthropic and cultural agencies.

Between 1946 and 1955 over 50 new philanthropic or charitable agencies were established.   Of these 34 were either foundations or trusts.   Many of these bore the names of famous old families – Swetland, Bolton, Gund, Bicknell, Ireland, Humphrey, Eaton, Ingalls, and Mather among them.   This development was spurred by a tax law change in 1949 which was favorable to their establishment.  By century’s end, over 40 additional family foundations had come into being.

The establishment of these foundations was significant in that they represented the continuity of the tradition of community stewardship, albeit in a new twentieth century guise.  More significant was the fact that they represented the diversity of that stewardship.  Foundations bearing family names such as Gries, Mandel, Horwitz, Wuliger, Gerson, Rosenthal, Murphy, O’Neill, McBride, Veccio and Bruening evidenced the entry of Jews and Catholics as major players in community stewardship.  Even though some of their foundations focused on Jewish or Catholic needs, all were open for fund requests for broader community needs.

This diversification of family trusts has also been reflected by the creation of new community foundations.   The United Black Fund, established in 1981 has become a major funder for initiatives in the city’s African-American community joining other groups such as the Cleveland chapter of the Links as well as traditional African-American sororities in supporting the black community and representing it to the general community.  The Third Federal Foundation, created in 2007, has its origins in Third Federal Savings and Loan, an institution with deep roots in the city’s Polish community.  Its grants have helped revitalize the Broadway neighborhood, supported secondary education, and have given the Polish-American community a new prominence in regional philanthropy.

The growth of the foundation sector was propitious because it paralleled a huge expansion of local cultural and charitable agencies in the period after the mid-1960s.  Many of the cultural agencies rose because of the availability of Federal NEH or NEA funds during this period as did entities such as public radio and television.  Foundation funds were critical start-up additions to their operations and when Federal funds diminished, often provided the lifeline that allowed for their continuity.  However, in some instances, such as the Cleveland Ballet, rescue proved impossible.

Certainly the creation of new family and corporate foundations has been the central factor in Cleveland’s most recent philanthropic history, as has been the diversification of the membership of the boards of many cultural and charitable institutions.   They no longer so much represent the city, but the region, and within the region, a changing demography, one driven by new migration and immigrations streams from Asia, South Asia, and Mexico and South America.   But,  there are other aspects of that history that are of considerable consequence, particularly given the challenges that have faced the city in the years since 1960.

Chief among these is the decline of the city – both in terms of population and in its economy.    Cleveland’s population peaked at 914,808 in 1950.  Sixty years later, it stood at 396,815 making it the 45th largest city in the nation.  Like other Great Lakes industrial cities, it has lost virtually all its heavy industrial base, but light industries in and around the city still thrive.   Nevertheless, twenty-first century Cleveland has one of the highest poverty rates in the United States.  There also remains a palpable racial divide that encompasses not only black and white, but sometimes new “minorities” who have come to the city and region in the years since the 1960s when a new immigration law replaced its heavily racialized predecessor.   Yet, to look only at the city is to ignore another major change that has occurred since the halcyon days of the Progressive era.   Cleveland is now part of a region ( the appearance of which could first be sensed during the Progressive era), and although regional governance remains a chimera, economic linkages, charitable reach, and social issues transcend municipal borders.

The city and northeastern Ohio’s ability to confront these issues rests largely on a partnership that has linked philanthropy directly to public policy.  Led by the Cleveland Foundation, other foundations, families and corporate funders have increasingly supported initiatives seen as critical to the revitalization of neighborhoods, educational opportunity, and programs that build skills and entrepreneurial opportunity.   In doing so they have not neglected the cultural agencies that are the community’s gems.   Here they have both supported facility growth, and  programs that help the arts reach new audiences and become fiscally more responsible.

Perhaps the best way to conclude this essay, and literally see how philanthropy has shaped the city in the past and continues to do so in the present, is to return to Euclid Avenue.  Doing so also allows one to see how the traditions of stewardship and “progressive” philanthropic effort have evolved to reflect the twenty-first century city they serve.

  • In the Huntington Building at Euclid Avenue and Public Square, we find the headquarters of Global Cleveland, an agency focused on attracting skilled immigrant talent to the community.  It exists because of foundation and family funding.
  • At the E. 14th Street intersection we find ourselves at Playhouse Square – an entertainment complex that survived only because of a remarkable confluence of government and private support in the 1970s.   Nearby are the headquarters of the Cleveland Foundation, United Way, and IdeaStream – the public radio and television provider that represents the importance of private philanthropy in the support of contemporary publically-funded organizations
  • At the Cleveland State University campus we come across the Levin College of Urban Studies and the Ahuja College of Business – each illustrates the growing diversity of stewardship in Cleveland.
  • At the intersection of E. 40th (on the site of the Wade family homes) stands the Jane Hunter Building, named in honor of the African-American nurse who established Cleveland’s Phyllis Wheatley Association.
  • At E. 67th and Euclid, across from Dunham Tavern, the oldest existing building on the street, is the headquarters of Jumpstart, an entrepreneurial and innovation incubator which receives support from multiple philanthropic sources to carry out its mission of revitalizing the regional economy.
  • The Cleveland Clinic Campus appears at E. 88th Street.  Here the names on the buildings of the city’s largest private employer indicate the diversity of stewardship which has support the institution.  They include Crile, Miller, Glickman, Tausig, and Zielony, and Tomsich.  Other names adorn buildings in Clinic branches throughout the region.
  • The headquarters of the United Cerebral Palsy Center at E. 100th is named in honor of Iris S. and Bert L. Wolstein.
  • At the southeast corner of the intersection of E. 105 St. stands the William O. Walker Building.  Constructed by the state and named after a prominent African-American journalist, it is now owned jointly by University Hospitals and the Cleveland Clinic

Our trip ends at University Circle.  Here names from the old Millionaires Row abound on the buildings of Case Western Reserve University, University Hospitals, area museums, and even the landscape.    These names – Mather, Hanna, Harkness, Bolton, Humphrey, Rockefeller, and Wade – are hallmarks of the community’s philanthropic past.   But they share company with names that testify to the inheritance of the tradition they helped start.  Seidman, Veale, Shafran, Smith, Dively, Wolstein, Lewis, and Mandel are among the new names in the Circle and in regional campuses of some of the institutions such as Ahuja is in  UH’s medical center in Beachwood.   What this rather short journey indicates is that the tradition of philanthropy in Cleveland is intact and that its inheritance and continuity is not dependent upon race, religion or ethnicity, but rather on the commonality of stewardship and the multiple factors that engender stewardship within human society.   That philanthropy is particularly special in Cleveland and northeastern Ohio is, in part, related to this diversity of stewardship, but more so to the progressive stamp that the city placed upon it in the early decades of the Twentieth Century.

Dr. John J. Grabowski holds a joint position as the Krieger-Mueller Historian and Vice President for Collections at the Western Reserve Historical Society and the Krieger-Mueller Associate Professor of Applied History at Case Western Reserve University. He has been with the Society in various positions in its library and museum since 1969. In addition to teaching at CWRU he serves as the editor of The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History and The Dictionary of Cleveland Biography, both of which are available on-line on the World Wide Web (http://ech.cwru.edu). He has also taught at Cleveland State University, Kent State University, and Cuyahoga Community College. During the 1996-1997 and 2004-2005 academic years he served as a senior Fulbright lecturer at Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey. Dr. Grabowski received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees in history from Case Western Reserve University. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa.

Philanthropy in Northeast Ohio aggregation

1 “Philanthropy in Cleveland: A Shared Legacy in a Diverse Community” by Dr. John J. Grabowski
2 Frederick Harris Goff, Rockefeller Philanthropy and the Early History of U.S. Community Foundations
3 Reform, Charity and Philanthropy from the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History
4 Philanthropy in NE Ohio Time Line
5 Women in Philanthropy and Charity
6 Philanthropy in Cleveland from the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History
7 Cleveland’s Settlement Houses from the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History
8 Settlement Houses in Cleveland Unit

Reform, Charity and Philanthropy from the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

A comprehensive listing of the people, places and events concerning philanthropic topics in NE Ohio from the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

The link is here

or click on any of the subjects below

1525 FOUNDATION 
ABOLITIONISM 
ACHIEVEMENT CENTER FOR CHILDREN 
ADAMS, ALMEDA C. 
ADDISON, HIRAM M. 
AHS FOUNDATION 
AIDS TASKFORCE OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
AIKEN, SAMUEL CLARK 
AIR FOUNDATION 
ALI-BEY, OMAR 
AMERICAN LUNG ASSN. OF NORTHERN OHIO 
AMERICAN RED CROSS, CLEVELAND CHAPTER 
AMERICAN WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE ASSN. 
AMERICANIZATION 
ANIMAL PROTECTIVE LEAGUE 
ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETIES, BLACK 
ASSOCIATED CHARITIES 
B’NAI B’RITH 
BAKER, EDWARD MOSE (MAX) 
BAKER, HENRY M. 
BAKER, NEWTON DIEHL 
BALDWlN, JOHN 
BAPTIST BROTHERHOOD 
BARNETT, JAMES 
BARRY, FRANK T. 
BATH HOUSES 
BATTISTI, FRANK JOSEPH 
BEARD, CHARLES AUGUSTINE 
BEAUMONT LOUIS D. 
BEECH BROOK, INC. 
BEGIN, FLOYD L. 
BELL NEIGHBORHOOD CENTER 
BELLAMY, GEORGE ALBERT 
BELLEFAIRE 
BELLFLOWER CENTER FOR PREVENTION OF CHILD ABUSE, INC. 
BEMIS, EDWARD W. 
BENJAMIN ROSE INSTITUTE 
BERNON, (BERNSTEIN) MAURICE 
BETHEL UNION 
BICKNELL FUND 
BICKNELL, WARREN, JR. 
BIG BROTHER/BIG SISTER MOVEMENT 
BINGHAM, CHARLES W. 
BIRTHRIGHT, INC. 
BLACK, COL. LOUIS 
BLACK, MORRIS ALFRED 
BLANCHARD, FERDINAND Q. 
BLOSSOM HILL SCHOOL FOR GIRLS 
BLOSSOM, DUDLEY S. 
BLOSSOM, EMILY ELKINS 
BLUE, WELCOME T. , SR. 
BOHN, ERNEST J. 
BOLE, ROBERTA HOLDEN 
BOLTON FOUNDATION 
BOLTON, CHARLES CHESTER 
BOLTON, CHESTER CASTLE 
BOLTON, FANNY MANN HANNA 
BOLTON, FRANCES PAYNE 
BOLTON, KENYON C. 
BOND, ROBERT L. 
BOOK AND THIMBLE CLUB 
BOOTH MEMORIAL HOSPITAL 
BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA (BSA) 
BOYER, WILLIS BOOTH 
BOYSTOWNS 
BRITTON FUND 
BRITTON, BRIGHAM 
BRITTON, GERTRUDE HASKELL 
BROWN, ANNA V. 
BROWN, DOROTHY GRACE MASON 
BROWN, JOHN 
BRUSH FOUNDATION 
BRUSH, DOROTHY ADAMS HAMILTON 
BRYANT, ELIZA 
BUCKEYE-WOODLAND COMMUNITY CONGRESS (BWCC) 
BUILDING CODE OF 1904 
BUREAU OF CHILD HYGIENE 
BURROUGHS, NELSON MARIGOLD 
BURTEN, LONNIE L. JR 
BURTON, HAROLD HITZ 
BUSINESSMEN’S INTERRACIAL COMMITTEE 
BYERS, EDGAR S. 
CADWALLADER, STARR 
CAMP WISE 
CAMPBELL, MARION WINTON STRONGHEART 
CARR, CHARLES VELMON 
CASE, LEONARD, JR. 
CASE, LEONARD, SR. 
CATALYST: FOR CLEVELAND SCHOOLS 
CATHERINE HORSTMANN HOME 
CATHOLIC CHARITIES CORP. 
CATHOLIC CHARITIES SERVICES CORP. 
CENTER FOR COMMUNITY SOLUTIONS 
CENTER FOR FAMILIES AND CHILDREN 
CENTER FOR THE PREVENTION OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE 
CHADSEY, MILDRED 
CHAMBER OF COMMERCE-CITY PLAN COMMITTEE 
CHARITY ORGANIZATION SOCIETY 
CHASE, RUSSELL N. 
CHIEF THUNDERWATER 
CHILD CARE 
CHILDREN AND YOUTH 
CHILDREN’S AID SOCIETY 
CHRIST CHILD SOCIETY 
CITIZENS LEAGUE OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
CITY CLUB OF CLEVELAND 
CITY MANAGER PLAN 
CITY MISSION 
CLARK, HAROLD TERRY 
CLEAN-LAND, OHIO 
CLEMENT, KENNETH W. 
CLEVELAND AMERICAN INDIAN CENTER 
CLEVELAND ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY 
CLEVELAND BAPTIST MISSION SOCIETY 
CLEVELAND BEAUTIFUL COMMITTEE (CBC) 
CLEVELAND BOYS’ SCHOOL IN HUDSON 
CLEVELAND CITY TEMPERANCE SOCIETY 
CLEVELAND COMMISSION ON HIGHER EDUCATION 
CLEVELAND COUNCIL ON WORLD AFFAIRS 
CLEVELAND DAY NURSERY AND FREE KINDERGARTEN ASSN., INC. 
CLEVELAND DEVELOPMENT FOUNDATION 
CLEVELAND FEMALE ORPHAN ASYLUM 
CLEVELAND FOUNDATION 
CLEVELAND HUMANE SOCIETY 
CLEVELAND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL 
CLEVELAND INTERNATIONAL PROGRAM (CIP) 
CLEVELAND JOB CORPS 
CLEVELAND LADIES TEMPERANCE UNION 
CLEVELAND MUSIC SCHOOL SETTLEMENT 
CLEVELAND RAPE CRISIS CENTER 
CLEVELAND SIGHT CENTER OF THE SOCIETY FOR THE BLIND 
CLEVELAND TENANTS ORGANIZATION 
CLEVELAND WORKHOUSE 
CLEVELAND WORKS INC. 
CLEVELAND: NOW! 
COAKLEY, JOHN ALOYSIUS 
COMMISSION ON CATHOLIC COMMUNITY ACTION 
COMODECA, CHARLOTTE 
CONNERS, WILLIAM RANDALL 
CONSUMERS LEAGUE OF OHIO 
COOLEY, HARRIS REID 
CORCORAN, CHARLES LESLIE 
CORLETT, SELENE 
COTILLION SOCIETY OF CLEVELAND 
COUNCIL FOR ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES (CEO) IN GREATER CLEVELAND 
CRAIG, LILLIAN 
CRAWFORD, FREDERICK COOLIDGE 
CUNIN, JOHN 
CUYAHOGA COUNTY ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY 
CUYAHOGA COUNTY COLONIZATION SOCIETY 
CUYAHOGA COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN SERVICES 
CUYAHOGA COUNTY SABBATH SOCIETY 
CUYAHOGA COUNTY TEMPERANCE SOCIETY 
CUYAHOGA COUNTY UNIT OF THE AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY 
CUYAHOGA METROPOLITAN HOUSING AUTHORITY 
DALTON, HENRY GEORGE 
DAUBY CHARITY FUND 
DAUBY, NATHAN L. 
DAVIS, ALAN 
DAY, WILLIAM HOWARD 
DE LANCEY, WILLIAM J. 
DELANEY, RALPH DAVID 
DEMMY, OLEAN WELLS 
DIABETES ASSN. OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
DISPLACED HOMEMAKER PROGRAM 
DIVELY, GEORGE SAMUEL 
DIVORCE EQUITY, INC. 
DORCAS HOME 
DRURY, FRANCIS EDSON 
DU PONT, ZARA 
DUMOULIN, FRANK 
DURDEN, EDWARD 
EAST END NEIGHBORHOOD HOUSE 
EATON, CYRUS STEPHEN 
EDUCATIONAL TRUST 
EDWARD J. AND LOUISE E. MELLEN CENTER FOR MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS TREATMENT AND RESEARCH 
EINSTEIN, RUTH WEINER 
EISENMAN, CHARLES 
ELEANOR GERSON 
ELISABETH SEVERANCE PRENTISS FOUNDATION 
ELIZA BRYANT VILLAGE 
ELIZABETH RING AND WILLIAM GWINN MATHER FUND 
ENVIRONMENTALISM 
EVA L. AND JOSEPH M. BRUENING FOUNDATION 
F. J. O’NEILL CHARITABLE CORP. 
FAGAN, HARRY 
FAIR HOUSING PROGRAMS 
FAMILY PLANNING 
FAMILY SERVICE ASSN. OF CLEVELAND 
FATHER MATHEW TOTAL ABSTINENCE SOCIETY 
FEDERATION FOR COMMUNITY PLANNING 
FENN, SERENO PECK 
FENSTER, LEO 
FERRELL, FREDERIC LEONARD 
FESLER, MAYO 
FINKELSTEIN, LOUIS 
FIRMAN FUND 
FITCH, SARAH ELIZABETH 
FLORENCE CRITTENTON SERVICES OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
FLYNN, EILEEN ELEANOR FINLIN 
FOOTE, JOHN A. 
FOSTER, CLAUD HANSCOMB 
FOUNDATION CENTER-CLEVELAND 
FOUNDATIONS 
FRANKLIN CLUB 
FRED A. LENNON FOUNDATION 
FREE MEDICAL CLINIC OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
FREIBERGER, ISADORE FRED 
FRIEDMAN, MAX R 
FRIENDLY INN SOCIAL SETTLEMENT 
FRITZSCHE, ALFRED 
FROHRING, PAUL R. 
GANNETT, ALICE 
GAY COMMUNITY 
GAYLORD, GLADYS 
GEORGE GUND FOUNDATION 
GEORGE M. AND PAMELA S. HUMPHREY FUND 
GEORGE S. DIVELY FOUNDATION 
GEORGE W. CODRINGTON CHARITABLE FOUNDATION 
GEORGE, ZELMA WATSON 
GERSON, ELEANOR 
GIDDINGS, JOSHUA REED 
GILBERT W. AND LOUISE IRELAND HUMPHREY FOUNDATION 
GIRL SCOUTS 
GITLIN, DAVID 
GLICK, HELEN RUTH WEIL 
GOFF, FREDERICK H. 
GOLDEN AGE CENTERS OF GREATER CLEVELAND, INC. 
GOLDEN AGE CLUBS 
GOLDHAMER, SAMUEL 
GOODRICH-GANNETT NEIGHBORHOOD CENTER 
GOODWILL INDUSTRIES 
GORDON, WILLIAM J. 
GREATER CLEVELAND NEIGHBORHOOD CENTERS ASSN. 
GREATER CLEVELAND ROUNDTABLE 
GREVE, BELL 
GRIES FAMILY FOUNDATION 
GRIES, LUCILE DAUBY 
GRIES, MOSES J. 
GRIES, ROBERT HAYS 
GROSSMAN, MARY B. 
GUND, GEORGE 
HAAS, VINCENT P. 
HADDEN FOUNDATION 
HADDEN, MARIANNE ELISABETH MILLIKIN 
HALLE, SALMON PORTLAND 
HANNA, LEONARD C., JR. 
HARAMBEE: SERVICES TO CHILDREN AND FAMILIES 
HARKNESS, ANNA M. (RICHARDSON) 
HARRISON, MARVIN CLINTON 
HARRY K. AND EMMA ROSENFELD FOX CHARITABLE FOUNDATION 
HART, ALBERT BUSHNELL 
HARVEY, KATE BENEDICT HANNA 
HASKELL FUND 
HAUSER, ELIZABETH 
HAYES, MAX S. (MAXIMILIAN SEBASTIAN) 
HCS FOUNDATION 
HEALTH FUND OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
HEIGHTS AREA PROJECT 
HEIGHTS COMMUNITY CONGRESS (HCC) 
HEITLER 
HENRIETTA, SISTER, CSA 
HERRICK, MARIA M. SMITH 
HERZOG, BERTHA BEITMAN 
HILL HOUSE 
HIRAM HOUSE 
HOLDEN, LIBERTY EMERY 
HOLLY, JOHN OLIVER, JR. 
HOLMES, ALLEN C. 
HOLY CROSS HOUSE 
HOLY FAMILY CANCER HOME 
HOME OF THE HOLY FAMILY 
HOMELESS, VAGRANTS, AND TRAMPS 
HOPE HOUSE 
HORACE KELLEY ART FOUNDATION 
HORVATH, HELEN 
HOUGH AREA DEVELOPMENT CORP. 
HOWE, FREDERIC C. 
HUNTER, JANE EDNA (HARRIS) 
HUNTINGTON, JOHN 
HURLBUT, HINMAN B. 
IGNATIA, SISTER MARY, CSA 
INGALLS, DAVID SINTON JR. 
INNER CITY PROTESTANT PARISH (ICPP) 
INNER CITY RENEWAL SOCIETY (ICRS) 
INTERCHURCH COUNCIL OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
IRELAND FOUNDATION 
IRELAND, JAMES DUANE 
IRELAND, MARGARET ALLEN 
IRWIN, JOSEPHINE SAXER 
JACKSON, JAMES FREDERICK 
JACKSON, PERRY B. 
JAYCEES 
JELLIFFE, ROWENA WOODHAM 
JELLIFFE, RUSSELL W. 
JENNINGS HALL 
JENNINGS, ELIZABETH (ELIZA) WALLACE 
JENNINGS, MARTHA F. HOLDEN 
JEWISH CHILDREN’S BUREAU 
JEWISH CHRONIC RELIEF SOCIETY 
JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER 
JEWISH DAY NURSERY 
JEWISH FAMILY SERVICE ASSN. 
JEWISH FEDERATION OF CLEVELAND 
JEWISH VOCATIONAL SERVICE (JVS) 
JOCHUM-MOLL FOUNDATION 
JOHN F. AND DORIS E. ERNSTHAUSEN CHARITABLE FOUNDATION 
JOHN HUNTINGTON FUND FOR EDUCATION 
JOHN P. MURPHY FOUNDATION 
JOHNSON, TOM L. 
JONES HOME OF CHILDREN’S SERVICES, INC. 
JONES, CARLOS L. 
JONES, MYRTA L. 
JUDSON RETIREMENT COMMUNITY 
JUMPSTART INC. 
JUNIOR LEAGUE OF CLEVELAND, INC. 
KARAMU HOUSE 
KELLEY, HORACE 
KELVIN & ELEANOR SMITH FOUNDATION 
KIDNEY FOUNDATION OF OHIO, INC. 
KIWANIS CLUB 
KLAIMAN, RALPH 
KLUNDER, BRUCE W. 
KOKLOWSKY, ALBERT, S.T. 
KULAS FOUNDATION 
KULAS, ELROY JOHN 
LAKEVIEW TERRACE 
LAMPL, JACK W. JR. 
LANG, H. JACK 
LAUB FOUNDATION 
LAZAR, ALMA TREBEC 
LEAGUE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS 
LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS (LWV) OF CLEVELAND 
LEBLOND, CHARLES HUBERT 
LEGAL AID SOCIETY OF CLEVELAND 
LEIMKUEHLER, PAUL ELMER 
LEONARD, WILLIAM ANDREW 
LESBIAN/GAY COMMUNITY SERVICE CENTER OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
LEVIN, ALBERT ARTHUR 
LEVINE, MANUEL V. 
LEWIS, ROBERT ELLSWORTH 
LINKS, INC. 
LIPSCOMB, JAMES SAMUEL 
LITTLE SISTERS OF THE POOR 
LOMOND ASSN. 
LOUIS D. BEAUMONT FOUNDATION 
LOUISE HARKNESS AND DAVID SINTON INGALLS FOUNDATION, INC. 
LUCAS, CHARLES P. , SR. 
LUCILE DAUBY AND ROBERT HAYS GRIES CHARITY FUND 
LUDLOW COMMUNITY ASSN. 
LUTHERAN HOME 
MADONNA HALL 
MAGEE, ELIZABETH STEWART 
MANDEL ASSOCIATED FOUNDATIONS 
MANDELBAUM, MAURICE J. (MOSES) 
MARGARET WAGNER HOUSE 
MARGUERITE M. WILSON FOUNDATION 
MARINE TOTAL ABSTINENCE SOCIETY 
MARKS, MARTIN A. 
MARTHA HOLDEN JENNINGS FOUNDATION 
MARTHA WASHINGTON AND DORCAS SOCIETY 
MARTINEK, JOSEPH 
MARY B. TALBERT HOME AND HOSPITAL 
MASTIN, THOMAS 
MATHER, ELIZABETH RING IRELAND 
MATHER, FLORA STONE 
MATHER, SAMUEL 
MATHER, SAMUEL LIVINGSTON 
MATHER, WILLIAM GWINN 
MAYO, LEONARD WITHINGTON 
MCBRIDE, LUCIA MCCURDY 
MCCULLOUGH, W. THOMAS 
MELLEN FOUNDATION 
MELLEN, EDWARD J., JR. 
MERRICK HOUSE SOCIAL SETTLEMENT 
MEYETTE, GRACE E. 
MIDTOWN CORRIDOR, INC. 
MILDRED ANDREWS FUND 
MILLER, RUTH RATNER 
MITCHELL, L. PEARL 
MONTGOMERY REV. ANZO 
MORGAN, DANIEL EDGAR 
MORIARTY, ELAINE M. 
MT. ST. MARY’S INSTITUTE 
MUNICIPAL OWNERSHIP 
MURCH FOUNDATION 
MURCH, MAYNARD HALE 
NARAL OHIO 
NASH, HELEN MILLIKIN 
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE 
NATIONAL COUNCIL OF JEWISH WOMEN (NCJW), CLEVELAND SECTION 
NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR WOMEN (NOW) 
NEIGHBORHOOD PROGRESS INC. 
NORTH COAST HARBOR, INC. 
NORTH, JESSE (JACK) E. 
NORTHERN OHIO SANITARY FAIR 
NORTON, DAVID Z. 
NORTON, LAURENCE HARPER 
NORWEB, EMERY MAY HOLDEN 
OHIO CITIZEN ACTION 
OHIO REGIONAL COUNCIL OF THE UKRAINIAN NATIONAL WOMEN’S LEAGUE OF AMERICA, INC. 
OLD AGE/NURSING HOMES 
OLLENDORFF, HENRY B. 
ORPHANAGES 
ORTHODOX JEWISH CHILDREN’S HOME 
OUR LADY OF FATIMA CENTER 
PACE ASSN. 
PARK SCHOOL 
PARMADALE FAMILY SERVICES 
PAUL & MAXINE FROHRING FOUNDATION, INC. 
PAWS 
PAYNE, OLIVER HAZARD 
PERERA, JOHN B. 
PERKINS, ANNA “NEWSPAPER ANNIE” 
PERKINS, EDNA BRUSH 
PERKINS, JOSEPH 
PERRY, HILBERT W. 
PHILANTHROPY 
PHILLIS WHEATLEY ASSOCIATION 
PIERCE, LUCY ANN BOYLE 
PLANNED PARENTHOOD OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
PODOJIL, ANTOINETTE “TONI” 
POLICE ATHLETIC LEAGUE (PAL) 
POLLOCK, SAMUEL 
PORTER, NANCY LYON 
POUTNEY, RICHARD IRVING 
PRENTISS, ELISABETH SEVERANCE ALLEN 
PRENTISS, FRANCIS FLEURY 
PRETERM, INC. 
PRITCHARD, D. JAMES 
PROGRESSIVE SLOVENE WOMEN OF AMERICA 
PROHIBITION AMENDMENT 
PROHIBITION PARTY 
PROJECT EVE 
PROSSER, DILLON 
PROSTITUTION 
PUBLIC HOUSING 
PUTNAM, MILDRED OLIVE ANDREWS AND PETER ANDREWS PUTNAM 
RAINEY INSTITUTE 
RANKIN, ALFRED M. 
RATNER, LEONARD 
RATNER, MAX 
RAWSON, BARBARA HAAS 
RAWSON, LOUISE R. BARRON 
REAVIS, JOHN WALLACE 
REGIONAL GOVERNMENT 
REINBERGER FOUNDATION 
REINBERGER, CLARENCE THOMPSON 
RELIANCE ELECTRIC CO. 
RENNER FOUNDATION 
REVELT, RICHARD D. 
REVOLUTION BOOKS 
ROCKEFELLER, JOHN D. 
ROGERS, MARGARET MARIE HARDEN 
ROSE, BENJAMIN 
ROSE-MARY CENTER 
ROTARY CLUB OF CLEVELAND 
ROUSE, REBECCA CROMWELL 
RUBINSTEIN, JUDAH 
RUTHENBERG, CHARLES 
S. LIVINGSTON MATHER CHARITABLE TRUST 
SAINT ANN FOUNDATION 
SALTZMAN, MAURICE 
SALVATION ARMY 
SAMPLINER, HERMAN 
SAPIRSTEIN, JACOB J. 
SCHMITT, DOROTHY PRENTISS 
SCHMITT, RALPH S. 
SCHOENFELD, MAX 
SCHOTT, HAROLD C. 
SCHUBERT, LELAND 
SEARS-SWETLAND FAMILY FOUNDATION 
SECOND FOUNDATION 
SETTLEMENT HOUSES 
SEVERANCE, CAROLINE M. 
SEVERANCE, JOHN LONG 
SEVERANCE, LOUIS HENRY 
SHERWIN, BELLE 
SHURTLEFF, GLEN KASSIMER 
SILVER, ABBA HILLEL 
SMITH, ALBERT KELVIN 
SMITH, DOROTHY 
SMITH, HARRY CLAY 
SNOW, JANE ELLIOT 
SOCIAL SERVICE CLUB 
SOCIETY FOR THE RELIEF OF THE POOR 
SONS OF TEMPERANCE 
SOUTH WAITE FOUNDATION 
SPALDING (SPAULDING), RUFUS 
SPANISH AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
SPARLIN, ESTAL EARNEST 
ST. HERMAN OF ALASKA MONASTERY AND HOUSE OF HOSPITALITY 
ST. JOSEPH HOME FOR THE AGED 
ST. JOSEPH’S ORPHANAGE FOR GIRLS 
ST. MARY’S ORPHAN ASYLUM FOR FEMALES 
ST. VINCENT DEPAUL SOCIETY 
ST. VINCENT’S ORPHAN ASYLUM 
STANTON (DAY SESSIONS), LUCY ANN 
STELLA MARIS DETOX CENTER 
STONE, AMASA 
STONE, MORRIS SAMUEL 
SUTLER, ELEANORE MARGUERITE YOUNG 
SUTPHEN, REV. PAUL FREDERICK 
TAYLOR, RICHARD S. 
TEMPERANCE 
TEMPLUM HOUSE 
THOMAS H. WHITE FOUNDATION 
THOME, JAMES A. 
TILLEY, MADISON 
TOWNSEND PLAN 
TRACY, FLORENCE COMEY 
TRACY, JANE ALLYN FOOTE 
TRANZONIC FOUNDATION 
TRAVELERS AID SOCIETY 
TREMCO FOUNDATION 
TRENKAMP, HERMAN J. 
TREU-MART FUND 
TREUHAFT FOUNDATION 
TREUHAFT, WILLIAM C. 
TUCKERMAN, LOUIS BRYANT 
TULLIS, RICHARD BARCLAY 
TURNER, CARRIE STARK 
UNDERGROUND PRESS 
UNITED BLACK FUND OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
UNITED FREEDOM MOVEMENT (UFM) 
UNITED LABOR AGENCY 
UNITED WAY SERVICES 
UNIVERSITY SETTLEMENT 
URBAN COMMUNITY SCHOOL 
URBAN LEAGUE OF GREATER CLEVELAND 
URBAN, HELEN E. WILLIAMS 
VISITING NURSE ASSN. OF CLEVELAND 
VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE SERVICES 
VOLUNTEERS OF AMERICA OF NORTHEAST OHIO, INC. 
WADE, EDWARD 
WADE, JEPTHA HOMER II 
WADSWORTH, HOMER C. 
WAGNER, MARGARET W. 
WALTON, JOHN WHITTLESEY 
WEIL, HELEN KAHN 
WEIL, JULIUS 
WELFARE/RELIEF 
WEST SIDE COMMUNITY HOUSE 
WEST SIDE ECUMENICAL MINISTRY 
WESTERN RESERVE CHILD WELFARE COUNCIL 
WESTERN SEAMEN’S FRIEND SOCIETY 
WHITE CONSOLIDATED INDUSTRIES FOUNDATION, INC. 
WHITE, THOMAS H. 
WHITMAN, SAMUEL 
WILLIAM BINGHAM FOUNDATION 
WILLIAM O. AND GERTRUDE LEWIS FROHRING FOUNDATION, INC. 
WILLIAMS, EDWARD MASON 
WILLIAMS, KATHERINE WITHROW 
WING, MARIE REMINGTON 
WISE, SAMUEL D. 
WITT, PETER 
WITT, STILLMAN 
WOLF, EDITH ANISFIELD 
WOLPERT FUND 
WOMAN’S CHRISTIAN TEMPERANCE UNION CONVENTION 
WOMAN’S CHRISTIAN TEMPERANCE UNION, NON-PARTISAN, OF CLEVELAND 
WOMAN’S GENERAL HOSPITAL 
WOMANKIND MATERNAL AND PRENATAL CENTER 
WOMEN SPEAK OUT FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE 
WOMEN’S CITY CLUB 
WOMEN’S COMMUNITY FOUNDATION 
WOMEN’S COUNCIL PEACE PARADE FOR THE PREVENTION OF FUTURE WARS 
WOMEN’S PHILANTHROPIC UNION 
WOMEN’S PROJECT FOUNDATION 
WOMEN’S PROTECTIVE ASSN. 
WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION 
YOUNG MEN’S CHRISTIAN ASSN. 
YOUNG WOMEN’S CHRISTIAN ASSN. (YWCA) 
ZUCKER, HENRY L. 

 

Philanthropy in NE Ohio Time Line

Philanthropy grows over the decades in Cleveland: a timeline. From the Plain Dealer

The link is here

Items in boldface indicate a national trend that began in Cleveland.

1830: Cleveland, a fledgling port city, gets its first relief agency — the Western Seamen’s Friend Society, founded to provide food, shelter and moral values to sailors. sails-in-silhouette.JPG
1851:  

Sisters of Charity of St. Augustine arrive in Cleveland to care for the poor and sick.

1853: B’nai B’rith is established; it later becomes nation’s first regional Jewish charitable institution. Opens orphanage in 1868 that evolves into Bellefaire/Jewish Children’s Bureau.
John D. Rockefeller moves to Cleveland area with his family, attends Central High School.
1861: Soldiers’ Aid Society raises nearly $1 million to meet medical, other needs of Union soldiers.
1866: Lakeside Hospital opens to provide medical care to Civil War refugees — an effort to care for the needy that evolved into University Hospitals.
1880: Regarding his wealth as a trust to be used for good, Leonard Case Jr. bequeathes part of his $15 million inheritance to found the Case School of Applied Science. leonard-case-jr.JPG
Leonard Case Jr.
1881:  

Cleveland contractor and railroad tycoon Amasa Stone donates $500,000 to move Western Reserve College from Hudson to University Circle. Contributors raised $100,000 to purchase 43 acres for both it and the Case school, so they could be located adjacent to each other.

1882: Cleveland Metroparks Zoo established with land and a herd of deer donated by Jeptha Wade.
1887: Oil baron John D. Rockefeller donates $250,000 to local charities — a foretaste of the more than $3 million he would later give away here, including acres of land for use as parks. Forest Hill Park, in Cleveland Heights and East Cleveland, is built on his former estate. john-d-rockefeller-in-1932.JPG
John D. Rockefeller in 1932
1895:  

Rockefeller gives funds to create Alta House, a support association for Italian immigrants that is named for his daughter. During his lifetime, he donated $308,429 to Alta House.

1903: Federation of Jewish Charities, now the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, is created to raise and distribute funds to Jewish agencies.
1904: A.M. McGregor Home for senior citizens opens, one of several enduring Cleveland institutions funded by families of Standard Oil executives who were influenced by Rockefeller’s strong interest in philanthropy.
1904: Rainey Institute opens, one of numerous settlement houses springing up to address increasing urbanization and poverty in Cleveland’s neighborhoods. It was funded by philanthropist Eleanor Rainey.
1911: Protestant leaders merge their wide-ranging philanthropic efforts, creating Federated Churches of Greater Cleveland, which later became the Interchurch Council. jane-edna-hunter.jpgJane Edna Hunter
 

Newly arrived from the South, Jane Edna Hunter raises $1,500 to open a Cleveland boarding house for black women after the YWCA refused to lodge her. Philanthropist Henry Sherwin, of Sherwin-Williams paint company, later donated funds to build Hunter’s dream, the nine-story Phillis Wheatley Association.

1912: A meeting at home of Mrs. Amasa Stone Mather leads to the creation of Cleveland’s Junior League, to promote volunteerism, develop women’s potential and improve communities.
1913: Federation of Charity and Philanthropy, created by Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, holds “Good Will Week,” the city’s first coordinated fund drive. It would give rise to what is now the United Way.
1914: One of Rockefeller’s lawyers, Frederick Goff, establishes the Cleveland Foundation, the nation’s first community foundation. The news is heralded in the New York Times; Boston and Chicago quickly follow Cleveland’s lead. cleveland-foundation-logo.JPGCleveland Foundation 2001 logo
1915:  

Cleveland Play House, the nation’s first permanently established professional theater company, is funded with gifts from philanthropists including industrialist Francis Drury.

1918: A “War Chest Campaign” raises nearly $12 million for the WWI effort and the needs of the Welfare Federation of Cleveland.
1919: Cleveland Community Chest, which evolved into United Way of Greater Cleveland, is created to raise funds for multiple charities. It is considered one of the first two modern-day United Ways nationally.
1919: Catholic Charities Corp. of Cleveland established to centralize fundraising for local Catholic community efforts.
1921: Cleveland Clinic Foundation created as a nonprofit entity. Founders said their aim was “better care of the sick; investigation of their problems; and more teaching of those who serve.”
1930: Industrialist John L. Severance donates $2.5 million to build a concert hall for the Cleveland Orchestra. Also a liberal benefactor of the Cleveland Museum of Art, he bequeathed it an art collection worth more than $3 million when he died in 1936. john-l-severance.JPG
John L. Severance breaks ground for Severance Hall in 1929.
1952: Local business executive George Gund, a member of Harvard Business School’s first graduating class, starts a private foundation — now the region’s biggest. Other wealthy residents followed in the 1950s, establishing foundations that live on today, including the Martha Holden Jennings Foundation and the Kelvin and Eleanor Smith Foundation.
1966: 13 fundraisers meet at the Cleveland Health Museum and create a local chapter — the nation’s fifth — of the National Society of Fundraising Executives. It’s now called the Association of Fundraising Professionals.
1973: Saint Ann Foundation is established by the Sisters of Charity of St. Augustine through the sale of Saint Ann Hospital to Kaiser Permanente, becomes nation’s first health care “conversion foundation.” Mt. Sinai and St. Luke’s hospitals later follow suit.
Three Clevelanders — Richard Baker, Morton Mandel and E. Mandell de Windt — create the Ten Plus club for United Way donors of $10,000 or more. The idea spread nationally and is known today as the Alexis de Tocqueville Society.
1977: Cleveland is one of five cities to land a Foundation Center, an office that tracks giving trends, confirming Cleveland’s reputation as a philanthropic hub.
1987: Neighborhood Progress Inc. debuts, a ground-breaking, foundation-led effort to unify and support the work of community development corporations.

Sources: The Plain Dealer, Western Reserve Historical SocietyFoundation Center-ClevelandOhio Grantmakers ForumAssociation of Fundraising ProfessionalsCase Western Reserve University History Professor David C. Hammack“The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History” (Indiana University; 1987)

 Northeast Ohio philanthropists’ gifts have helped
region weather economic storms

  Series index

Philanthropy in Cleveland from the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

Written by David Hammack

The link is here

PHILANTHROPY – The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

PHILANTHROPY. Philanthropy in Cleveland sprang from a strong basis in RELIGION. In the 20th century much (though by no means all) philanthropic activity has been devoted to building great nonprofit institutions run by professionals, not only in MEDICINE and social work but also in education and the fine arts; in keeping with the principle that philanthropy should help people help themselves, these institutions draw most of their income from payments (by individuals and by governments) for the services they offer. But 19th century philanthropy was almost always domestic in scale, and, with its strong emphasis on the views and members of particular religious denominations, was often as inward-looking as the work of a mutual-benefit society. Early Cleveland’s first relief agency, the WESTERN SEAMEN’S FRIEND SOCIETY, was organized in 1830 by BENJAMIN ROUSE, an agent of the American Sunday-School Union. Rouse’s desire to reach all who were in need and to promote moral values as well as to provide emergency food and shelter gave his efforts a broadly philanthropic, and not merely a charitable, purpose. The MARTHA WASHINGTON AND DORCAS SOCIETY (1843) was also organized for the broader purpose of “retarding intemperance” as well as the relief of poverty; its successors, including the Cleveland Women’s Temperance Union (1850) and the Ladies Bethel Aid Society (1867), all offered Protestant forms of “Christian philanthropy.” REBECCA CROMWELL ROUSEand several of the other Protestant churchwomen who led these organizations raised nearly $1 million through the SOLDIERS’ AID SOCIETY OF NORTHERN OHIO (1861-68), not only to meet the medical-care needs of Union soldiers but also to support the strict social and moral discipline advocated by the U.S. Sanitary Commission. The religious basis of philanthropy led to complementary and sometimes competing efforts, both among the Protestant denominations and among CATHOLICS, ROMAN and . To compete with the public schools Bp. LOUIS AMADEUS RAPPE called to Cleveland the URSULINE SISTERS OF CLEVELAND to provide PAROCHIAL EDUCATION (CATHOLIC) in 1850; to complement Protestant poor-relief efforts he called the SISTERS OF CHARITY OF ST. AUGUSTINE, who cared for the poor and the sick in a Catholic spirit, in 1852. As the Jewish population grew, a Hebrew Benevolent Society appeared in 1855. Although the city government provided a larger share of the meager assistance deemed necessary to sustain the very poor after 1855, religious participation in this field continued; as late as 1901, Mayor TOM L. JOHNSON appointed the pastor of the Cedar Ave. Church of Christ,HARRIS R. COOLEY, as the city’s director, of charities.

After the Civil War, private philanthropy emphasized the creation of more specialized institutions. Orphan asylums appeared first. Bp. Rappe established ST. VINCENT’S ORPHAN ASYLUM for boys and ST. MARY’S ORPHAN ASYLUM FOR FEMALES for girls as early as 1851; the Protestants who had created the SOCIETY FOR THE RELIEF OF THE POOR founded the Cleveland Orphan Asylum in 1852. The German Methodist Orphan Asylum and the Jewish Orphan Asylum (later BELLEFAIRE), originally intended in part for the children of soldiers killed in the Civil War, followed in 1864 and 1869. When hospitals and homes for “foundlings” (abandoned infants) appeared in the 1870s and 1880s, they, too, were allied with the major religions. The courts, which were the key government agencies of the period, supported this pattern by assigning foundlings and orphans according to their parents’ known or supposed religious affiliation. After 1876 the state government also empowered the Cleveland Humane Society to remove children from cruel or neglectful parents and to place them in ORPHANAGES or foster homes, but the society’s funds came from private contributions. Like the orphanages, new facilities intended to encourage morality and good health among the young people who flocked to the small but rapidly growing industrial city on the lake were also founded by wealthy merchants who acted through religious associations. Protestants started the YOUNG WOMEN’S CHRISTIAN ASSN. (YWCA) a year later. Benefactors quickly provided dormitory and recreation halls that were unusually large for a city of Cleveland’s size, but not large enough to discourage the WOMAN’S CHRISTIAN TEMPERANCE UNION, NON-PARTISAN, OF CLEVELAND from establishing a network of alcohol-free “friendly inns” in the 1870s and a Training Home for Friendless Girls in 1893.

Despite the best efforts of the YMCA and the WCTU, Cleveland had its full share of unwed mothers, prostitutes, alcoholics, and enfeebled old people who were unable to earn a living. Pious and wealthy citizens tried to meet the needs of these people through an ever more diverse array of special institutions. Homes for “unfortunate women” who had fallen into PROSTITUTION or become pregnant outside wedlock included the Catholic House of the Good Shepherd (1869) and the Stillman Witt Home attached to the Protestant Orphan Asylum (1873). The private, general-purpose relief organizations of the antebellum years were reorganized to provide employment advice and (largely religious) family counseling. The Catholic LITTLE SISTERS OF THE POOR (1870), the Protestant YWCA (1868), and the Jewish Home (1877) all provided OLD AGE/NURSING HOMES. Several Protestants, concerned about the living conditions, the educational opportunities, and the political, views of Cleveland’s rapidly expanding immigrant communities, established HIRAM HOUSE (1896), Goodrich House (1896) (see GOODRICH-GANNETT NEIGHBORHOOD CENTER), ALTA HOUSE (1898), and other SETTLEMENT HOUSES. The Jewish Council Educational Alliance, forerunner of the JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER, offered comparable facilities after 1897. During the 19th century, local governments played a much smaller role in these fields than in general relief. Individual towns did, on occasion, provide tuition and other support to private schools, ranging from the Methodist mission’s Cleveland City Industrial School (seeCLEVELAND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL) to EAST CLEVELAND‘s Presbyterian-sponsored Shaw Academy, but this practice came to an end as public school systems expanded. In a pattern that was to become much more common in the 20th century, kindergartens pioneered in the 1880s by the private Day Nursery & Free Kindergarten Assn. were adopted by public school districts in the 1890s.

Faced with the expanding population of a rapidly growing, polyglot industrial city and with a larger and ever more varied set of benevolent institutions, Cleveland’s philanthropists began to introduce new forms of organization after 1880. They established a CHARITY ORGANIZATION SOCIETY to discourage mendicancy and promote efficiency in 1881, just a year after Buffalo adapted the English Charity Organization Society idea to American conditions. Three years later, the Charity Organization Society merged with Cleveland’s leading Protestant counseling group to create the Bethel Associated Charities. But the charity organization movement emphasized efficiency and promoted a comprehensive concern for the region’s entire population, which included growing proportions of Catholics and Jews. For these reasons, it did not mix easily with traditional religious benevolence. “Charity cannot be organized like the Steel Trust, or run by paid clerks,” an evangelical Protestant wrote indignantly at the end of the century. “Charity means love; it is a personal thing. Can you picture Christ organizing love, card-indexing the good and the bad?”

Religious influence was less marked in the field of cultural philanthropy–a field that was little cultivated in 19th-century Cleveland. The private associations that brought the predecessors of CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY–Western Reserve Univ. of Hudson, OH, and the new Case School of Applied Science–to Cleveland at the beginning of the 1880s emphasized secular rather than religious purposes. They also received important support from the city government when they located on the attractive grounds of WADE PARK, created by JEPTHA H. WADE with private funds but developed and maintained by the city. Yet religious influence did, persist in the field of higher education. Case Institute and WRU were amply supplied with chapels, Protestants gave generously to a wide variety of denominational colleges in Ohio and elsewhere, and in Cleveland Catholics started several institutions of higher learning to complement their parochial elementary and diocesan secondary schools.

A more tightly organized, more professional, and in some ways less religious organization of philanthropy dominated Cleveland after 1900. By 1920 Greater Cleveland had taken advantage of the opportunities opened by its rapid growth into a modern metropolis and was earning a national reputation for the innovative and unusually efficient organization of its philanthropy. Early in the 20th century Cleveland’s business leaders created 3 new institutions, the charity federation, the community chest, and the community foundation, that transformed philanthropy not only in Cleveland but also throughout the U.S.

In 1900 a Committee on Benevolent Assns. of the Chamber of Commerce began to look for ways to rationalize the raising and distribution of funds and to evaluate and monitor the work of the many specialized institutions that had been created in the decades after the Civil War. Following the example of the Fed. for Jewish Charities (1903; later the JEWISH COMMUNITY FEDERATION), the suggestions of insurance executive MARTIN MARKS, and the advice of iron ore magnate SAMUEL MATHER, this committee proposed the creation of a Federation for Charity & Philanthropy. In 1913 the federation launched the first sustained campaign in the U.S. designed to raise funds for a large number of separate homes, clinics, and family services, regardless of Protestant, Catholic, or Jewish sponsorship. The campaign was so successful–it increased the number of contributors to these institutions from a few hundred to over 6,000–that it became the model for the Red Cross and Victory Chest drives carried out across the nation to meet the needs created by World War I. Cleveland’s Community Chest (which evolved into the UNITED WAY SERVICES), also the first in the U.S., continued to run unified fundraising campaigns after the war. In 1919 more than 148,000 donors responded to its appeal.

Four factors account for the success of Cleveland’s united fundraising campaigns. From the beginning they represented a truly united effort because the wealthy individuals who had traditionally supported particular institutions were willing to allow them to become part of a communitywide federation, evaluated and funded by a highly professional central agency. Also from the very beginning, the united campaigns were mounted by some of the most highly skilled fundraisers to be found in the U.S. These fundraisers worked in an unusually supportive environment. Cleveland, like Detroit, Pittsburgh, and other manufacturing cities that grew rapidly between 1890 and 1930 (and unlike New York, Boston, or, Philadelphia), had a small number of large integrated manufacturing corporations that employed a large portion of its labor force (see ECONOMY); these corporations strongly supported the Community Chest through their rapidly developing personnel departments. Finally, although the new organization of philanthropy reduced the influence of organized religion, religious leaders of all faiths wholeheartedly supported the unified drives.

Within the new philanthropic system, the Fed. for Charity & Philanthropy continued to evaluate individual institutions, study the city’s needs, and distribute the funds raised by the Community Chest. In studying the city’s needs, it was quickly joined by the CLEVELAND FOUNDATION. Organized by FREDERICK GOFF, president of the Cleveland Trust Co. (later AMERITRUST, now part of Society Bank), the Cleveland Foundation was the nation’s first community foundation. Between 1914-24, it made remarkably effective use of the survey idea originated in charity organization societies in England and New York and applied with great fanfare in the Pittsburgh Survey of 1909. The Cleveland Foundation hired prominent experts–Chicago welfare director Sherman C. Kingsley, LEONARD P. AYRES of New York City’s Russell Sage Foundation (which had pioneered the social survey), WRU’s RAYMOND A. MOLEY, Roscoe Pound and Felix Frankfurter of the Harvard Univ. Law School–to evaluate Cleveland’s provisions for welfare, education, criminal justice, and recreation. The resulting studies attracted widespread attention, and Cleveland’s community foundation, like its Community Chest, was copied in many other large cities.

The highly professional studies sponsored by the Cleveland Foundation effectively set priorities for the city’s private institutions. They played a role, for example, in WRU’s 1916 decision to raise funds to support a School of Applied Social Sciences to train the professional social workers who were rapidly replacing the pious, temperance-minded ladies who had carried out “friendly visits” to the homes of the Protestant and Jewish poor since the 1840s. They encouraged the creation of the Metropolitan Park System (see CLEVELAND METROPARKS) and, less effectively, called attention to the needs of the city’s rapidly expanding population of blacks (see AFRICAN AMERICANS). The foundation’s reports also influenced public policies in such fields as EDUCATION and criminal justice (see LAW). By increasing the influence of corporate leaders and of the distinguished professionals they admired, Cleveland’s new philanthropic institutions reduced the influence of religious congregations (and perhaps of women) on poor relief, family counseling, and youth-service activities. Protestants and Jews responded by creating new, more, centralized organizations to formulate and express their common views on social questions. Catholics joined Protestants and Jews in creating new centrally managed campaigns to raise funds for specifically religious educational, chaplaincy, and outreach activities.

A preliminary effort to create a Christian Fed. of Cleveland in 1900 had accompanied the decision of the Bethel Associated Charities to lay aside its traditional Protestant identity and change its name to Cleveland Associated Charities. By 1911 Cleveland’s Protestants had worked out a more permanent form of association, the Federated Churches of Cleveland (now known as the INTERCHURCH COUNCIL OF GREATER CLEVELAND). Its purpose was to “improve the social and religious life of the growing city,” in part by promoting “comity in religious work among the foreign populations of the city” and encouraging “united and aggressive action upon religious and social questions.” In the 1920s the Protestants added a concern for Christian education to its agenda, and in 1911 returned to the roots laid down by Benjamin and Rebecca Rouse in the 1830s when the Federated Churches merged with the Cuyahoga County Sunday School Assn. and undertook to train and equip Sunday school teachers in many Protestant churches. The JEWISH COMMUNITY FEDERATION, begun in 1903
and later expanded to accommodate Cleveland’s growing Orthodox community, was still more effective in raising and allocating funds for Jewish educational and cultural institutions, ranging from Hebrew schools to the Jewish Community Ctr., as well as for benevolent institutions that included Mt. Sinai Hospital and JEWISH FAMILY SERVICE ASSN.. In 1919 the CATHOLIC CHARITIES CORP. was organized to carry out a similar unified drive for funds for specifically Catholic agencies and institutions.

After 1920 Cleveland philanthropy also reorganized old charitable institutions to make use of the new expertise. As social workers, psychologists, and other child-development specialists gained prominence, for example, the old orphanages were reorganized to care for handicapped, retarded, and disturbed children. Most Catholic orphanages were consolidated into the expanding facilities of PARMADALE CHILDREN’S VILLAGE OF ST. VINCENT DE PAUL after 1925; the Protestant Orphan Asylum (BEECH BROOK, INC.) moved to Orange Twp. in 1926; and the Jewish Orphan Asylum moved into the new buildings of BELLEFAIRE in UNIVERSITY HEIGHTS in 1929. By the 1940s, most of these institutions were distinguished more for the particular character of their professional services, as evaluated by theFEDERATION FOR COMMUNITY PLANNING, than for their religious affiliations, and many of them accepted children regardless of religious background. Funds for CHILD CARE and counseling that had once gone to the (Protestant) Humane Society and the, Bethel Associated Charities, by 1940 went
to “nonsectarian” organizations that styled themselves Youth Services and the Family Service Assn. In this manner, explicitly religious and chaplaincy programs were separated from job training and family and individual counseling.

The Depression and the New Deal reinforced the continuing tendency toward the specialization and professionalization of charitable organizations. When the Depression threw over one-third of Cleveland’s labor force out of work, it was clearly impossible for private charity even to address the need for general relief. Municipal and state institutions had long supplemented the work of private orphanages and institutions for the mentally handicapped; these were considerably expanded after 1900, and again in the 1930s. Even more decisively, the New Deal established the policy of using government agencies, supplied with federal and state funds, to provide direct relief through Social Security, Aid to Dependent Children, and other programs. In 1935 over 1,000 of the social workers employed by the Family Service Society were moved in a body to the Cuyahoga County Welfare Dept., which now became responsible for administering Social Security, ADC, and other federally funded social-welfare programs. Private philanthropy’s long-dominant role in the management of poor relief was sharply curtailed. Many traditional charitable organizations were thus forced to define new, more specialized and professional roles for themselves. And the Fed. for Community Planning found itself working with union and political leaders as well as with major donors and professional social workers to coordinate the work of public as well as private social agencies.

“Since 1900,” one religious leader would observe in 1956, “the specialists have taken over, and the clergyman finds himself unable to communicate with the criminologist who runs the jail, the administrator who manages the hospital, the social worker who counsels. . . .” Cleveland philanthropy, thoroughly persuaded of the value of professional expertise, supported the triumph of the specialists in the professions and the arts as well as in what came to be known as the social services. It provided significant additional facilities and endowments for the private universities, both in Cleveland and elsewhere, whose graduate and professional faculties sought knowledge for the new professions and trained the new specialists. And it created, in UNIVERSITY CIRCLE, an extraordinary set of educational, medical, and cultural institutions that appealed particularly to the city’s managerial and professional workers. Because these institutions were increasingly supported by tuition, hospital charges, and ticket fees paid by their users, and by government funds, they relied increasingly on professional managers.

In Cleveland itself, philanthropy played an important role in the creation of unusually distinguished professional communities in the fields of medicine,, engineering, law, social work, and the fine arts. The VISITING NURSE ASSN. OF CLEVELAND played a pioneering role from its origins in 1901. Following the recommendations of the nationally influential Cleveland Hospital & Health Survey conducted under private auspices by Dr. Haven Emerson in 1920, the city’s major donors moved several private hospitals to Univ. Circle, built up the extraordinary facilities of UNIVERSITY HOSPITALS CASE MEDICAL CENTERMT. SINAI MEDICAL CENTERSAINT LUKE’S MEDICAL CENTER, andSAINT VINCENT CHARITY HOSPITAL AND HEALTH CENTER, and established a large endowment for WRU’s Medical School (begun in 1843; Univ. Circle buildings from 1924) and Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing (1923). These facilities in turn made for the rich medical environment that allowed the private, independent CLEVELAND CLINIC FOUNDATION to achieve great success by the 1960s. Private philanthropy also provided the funds needed to create the Case Institute of Technology and WRU’s schools of Law and of Applied Social Sciences, and later CWRU’s Weatherhead School of Management and Mandel Center for Nonprofit Organizations, created in 1985 to educate managers for nonprofits. Private philanthropy also established FENN COLLEGE, which later became CLEVELAND STATE UNIVERSITY, and helped establish CSU’s Cleveland-Marshall Law School, Maxine Goodman Levin College of Urban Affairs, and other professional schools,
as well as the professional programs of JOHN CARROLL UNIVERSITYBALDWIN-WALLACE COLLEGE, and the area’s other colleges. Many Clevelanders also made notable gifts to universities and colleges elsewhere in Ohio, the Midwest, and the Northeast. Philanthropy helped establish traditions of academic rigor and innovation at both WRU and Case Institute of Technology. In the 1980s and 1990s private philanthropy made a concerted effort to provide CWRU (created by merger in 1967) with sufficient endowment to allow it to realize its full potential as a major comprehensive private research university, serving both the metropolitan region and the nation at large.

Between 1880 and the 1960s, private philanthropy also sponsored nearly all HIGHER EDUCATION available in Greater Cleveland. Oberlin College enjoyed support from Congregationalists and others; Methodists maintained BALDWIN-WALLACE COLLEGE in suburbanBEREA, and Catholics supported the educational work that began in ST. JOHN COLLEGE and flowered into John Carroll Univ. andNOTRE DAME COLLEGE OF OHIO and URSULINE COLLEGE colleges. WRU sponsored a downtown branch, Cleveland College, and theYMCA set up Fenn College to provide night-school and business courses. With the transformation of Fenn, College into Cleveland State Univ. in the mid-1960s, and the creation of CUYAHOGA COMMUNITY COLLEGE, private philanthropy saw the management of many universities become the responsibility of government. Apart from supporting a nationally distinguished School of Library Science at WRU from 1903 until its closure in 1986, private philanthropy similarly left libraries to public agencies, notably the CLEVELAND PUBLIC LIBRARY, whose notable research collections were largely provided by private philanthropy.

In the cultural field, the highly organized character of Cleveland philanthropy is reflected in the extraordinary set of institutions gathered in Univ. Circle and in the successful efforts to develop PLAYHOUSE SQUARE and the North Coast Harbor. Cleveland philanthropy long gave priority to “high” culture, especially in music and art; the result is 2 of the best institutions in the U.S., the CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA and the CLEVELAND MUSEUM OF ART. The orchestra has been supported by endowments, by SEVERANCE HALL (on land made available by WRU), and by the Blossom Music Ctr. for summer concerts.
Its musicians, together with those of the OHIO CHAMBER ORCHESTRA (after 1972) and others who teach and study at the CLEVELAND INSTITUTE OF MUSIC, WRU’s Dept. of Music, Baldwin-Wallace College, Oberlin College, and the CLEVELAND MUSIC SCHOOL SETTLEMENT, give Cleveland an unusually large and distinguished musical community. Extraordinary gifts have also provided the Cleveland Museum of Art with one of the 3 or 4 most distinguished comprehensive collections of painting and sculpture–and, over the years, with one of the most highly professional curatorial staffs–in the U.S. Univ. Circle houses other cultural institutions, as well as CWRU and the Univ. Hospitals and Cleveland Clinic medical complexes. By the 1970s the CLEVELAND MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, the Cleveland Health Education Museum, and the CLEVELAND BOTANICAL GARDEN had established national reputations for excellence in their fields, and the WESTERN RESERVE HISTORICAL SOCIETY had put together unusually strong collections of books, manuscripts, and automobiles. In 1957 Cleveland philanthropy created still another centrally managed, innovative organization, the Univ. Circle Development Foundation, to provide land acquisition and real estate management. Later, parking and police services to all the private cultural and educational institutions located in the area were established. Supported entirely by private funds, Univ. Circle has carried out urban redevelopment and policing functions ordinarily assigned to public officials. Even more than its counterparts in the Hyde Park-Kenwood area near the Univ. of Chicago and the Morningside Hts., area around Columbia Univ. in New York, UNIVERSITY CIRCLE, INC. (UCI), has served as a model for university and cultural institutions in other cities.

Cleveland philanthropy also helped create notable cultural institutions in other fields. The THEATER, including most notably the GREAT LAKES THEATER FESTIVAL and the Cleveland Public Theater.

When new tax laws encouraged the possessors of large fortunes to make large gifts after 1949, most of them chose to add to the endowment of existing institutions or to create new general-purpose foundations. Cleveland saw the creation of an unusually large number of new foundations, of which the largest was the GEO. GUND FOUNDATION and one of the most adventurous was the WOMEN’S COMMUNITY FOUNDATION, joined with the Cleveland Foundation in a continuing effort to direct philanthropic funds to the areas of greatest current need. By 1995 the combined endowments of these foundations amounted to nearly $2 billion and provided the Cleveland area with one of the largest and most flexible sources of support for philanthropic activities available in any city in the U.S. Cleveland foundations also employed an unusually large community of professional grantmakers who worked together not only through the Cleveland Regional Assn. of Grantmakers but also played leading roles in creating such national networks as that of Women in Philanthropy.

The demand for funds from foundations and annual fund drives alike rose abruptly after the mid-1960s. In 1930 Cuyahoga County’s nonprofits spent, on wages, salaries, rent, utilities and supplies, an amount that equaled about 3% of all wages and salaries paid in the county: this number grew very little before 1960, but then grew rapidly (thanks mostly to federal medicare, medicaid funds) to more than 12% by 1990. The role for philanthropy grew with the growth of the nonprofit
sector. Medical advances created new needs for research and treatment facilities; medicare and medicaid allowed more people to receive treatment, creating a need for new facilities. Federal student aid and research funds allowed private colleges and universities to grow, but also increased their need for new buildings and for excellence. The federal “War on Poverty” actually increased the role of private counselling, family-service, and job-training agencies. In the arts, the desire for first-rate THEATER and dance organizations increased the competition for the funds available for cultural philanthropy. But new problems of the 1960s–overt racial conflict, suburbanization and the decline of the central city’s population, the decline of heavy industry, and economic stagnation in general–presented the most difficult new challenges. The city’s dramatically smaller and less affluent population left the city government incapable of meeting its established responsibilities. PARKS, fell into a sorry state for lack of routine maintenance; schools were disrupted by racial conflict and petty political squabbles; STREETSBRIDGES, and sewers began to disintegrate. The CLEVELAND PUBLIC SCHOOLS lost pupils and found themselves embroiled in continuing conflicts over race and money. The Cleveland Public Library found it increasingly difficult to maintain its great research collections or to support the branch libraries that struggled to meet the needs of increasingly impoverished neighborhoods. Pressure to move these activities into private hands, especially the hands of philanthropic agencies, mounted.

Many Cleveland institutions developed creative responses to these new challenges. The Protestant Fed. of Churches reorganized itself as the Greater Cleveland Interchurch Council and gave increasing emphasis to its efforts to promote interracial cooperation and to feed the hungry. The Fed. for Community Planning sought new ways to bring together the disparate agencies that were dealing with related problems, and to establish a common welfare agenda for the region. At its strong suggestion, several long-established agencies merged into the CENTER FOR FAMILIES AND CHILDREN in 1969. Several individual religious congregations and private social agencies undertook to carry out new programs established and funded by the federal government. The United Way, which had developed a large and highly professional staff of its own, took over many of the allocation and evaluation activities formerly carried out by the Fed. for Community Planning. The Catholic church made extraordinary–and remarkably successful–efforts to find resources for inner-city Catholic schools, even as Catholics moved in large numbers to the suburbs. Several of Cleveland’s major business corporations undertook new philanthropic initiatives in the late 1970s and 1980s, focusing their efforts on the development of Playhouse Square, on sustaining the major arts organizations, on housing (Neighborhood Progress, Inc.) and on an economic development agenda greatly expanded from the older job-training efforts mounted by GOODWILL INDUSTRIES and VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE SERVICES (ENTERPRISE DEVELOPMENT, INC., , Work in Northeast Ohio Council). Through the GREATER CLEVELAND ROUNDTABLE many of Cleveland’s largest business corporations also sought to bring their philanthropic resources to bear on the reform of Cleveland’s Public Schools; with $28 million in its first 3 rounds, the Cleveland Initiative for Education became one of the largest private efforts in the U.S.

In the 1980s new government policies posed still more urgent questions. Government funds had met more and more of the cost of social services, medical care, and education between 1964-75, freeing private funds for investment in, research, specialized care, higher education, and the arts. Government and private insurance funds came to cover most of the cost of providing medical and nursing home care: institutions in those fields refocused their activities in more entrepreneurial ways to take advantage of new these new funding streams, with the result that they seemed, to donors and regulators alike, less and less like charities. When federal expenditures for domestic social purposes were capped after 1976 and cut after 1980, private philanthropy was pressed to replace them. The private institutional pattern established between 1900-20, like the pattern of government support begun in the 1930s and greatly expanded in the 1960s, met with criticism. Once again philanthropic institutions, in Cleveland as throughout the U.S., were forced to reconsider priorities and their methods of operation.

David C. Hammack

Case Western Reserve Univ.


Kyong Ho Lee, Darry. “From a Puritan City to a Cosmopolitan City: Cleveland Protestants in the Changing Social Order, 1898-1940” (Ph.D. diss., Case Western Reserve Univ., 1994).

McTighe, Michael J. A Measure of Success: Protestants and Public Culture in Antebellum Cleveland (1994).

Ross, Brian. “The New Philanthropy: The Reorganization of Charity in Turn of the Century Cleveland” (Ph.D. dissertation, Case Western Reserve Univ., 1989).

Tittle, Diana. Rebuilding Cleveland: The Cleveland Foundation and Its Evolving Urban Strategy (1992).

Van Tassel, David and John Grabowski, eds. Cleveland: A Tradition of Reform (1986).

Waite, Florence T. A Warm Friend for the Spirit: A History of the Family Service Assn. of Cleveland and its Forbears (1960).

Last Modified: 13 May 1998 11:00:48 AM