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Over its 145 years, the Old Canal Winchester School building played a significant role in the community. The original four-room building opened in 1862 and its first high school class graduated seven in 1886. Canal Winchester’s growth is reflected in the school’s several additions, the first of which was in 1875. Other expansions include a separate high school building in 1909, a three-story connector in 1929 between the 1862 and the 1909 buildings, and elementary school wings in 1956 and 1967. The school was also the site of continuing education and vocational classes for adults in the 1930s and 1950s, agricultural programs for veterans after World War II, and a cannery from the time of that war to 1952. The school was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2017 and it remains the district’s administrative center and a community gathering space.
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In 1915, Congress formed the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) to coordinate aircraft research in the United States. The NACA built three research laboratories: Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, Ames Aeronautical Laboratory, and the Aircraft Engine Research Laboratory (AERL), now the Glenn Research Center. Construction for AERL’s Cleveland, Ohio location began in 1941 in a field next to the Cleveland Municipal Airport used for parking during the National Air Races of the 1930s. The research campus’ roads followed the semi-circular pattern of the air races’ parking roads. Operations began in 1942 with Edward Sharp as the first director. In 1948, AERL was renamed the Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory in honor of George Lewis, NACA’s Director of Aeronautical Research for over twenty years.
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2210 Summit Street once housed one of Ohio’s longest-running lesbian bars. In 1970, a lesbian bartender at Jack’s A Go Go recognized that while Columbus had bars for gay men, it needed one geared toward lesbian clientele. Patrons knew the bar as “Jack’s,” Logan’s Off Broadway, and Summit Station. Staff welcomed women from small towns, women working in trades, women of color, butch/femme lesbians, and transgender people. Regulars recall that stepping through the door felt like finally entering a place of true belonging. Women could dance, “get together,” break up, sing karaoke, party with friends, and celebrate birthdays and holidays. Summit Station remained a safe public space, despite ongoing police harassment of its gender non-conforming regulars. A sign posted outside declared: “Ladies Night, Every Night. Men $5.” (Continued on other side)
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Ludlow, a neighborhood straddling Shaker Heights and Cleveland, was developed in 1905 by Otis and Mantis Van Sweringen. By 1920, they imposed restrictive deed covenants that racially excluded Black home ownership in the community. In 1948, the Supreme Court ruled in Shelley v. Kraemer that such covenants violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. As a result, affluent African American professionals began to buy homes in Ludlow, seeking the suburban atmosphere and good schools for their families. While illegal, the Van Sweringen Company continued to require prospective African American buyers to gain approval from neighbors before they could purchase homes. Subsequently, the idea of African American families moving into Ludlow created white flight as realtors perpetuated unfounded fears that property values would decline in order to “blockbust” and purchase properties at depressed prices.
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Acquiring the African American Cultural Garden was a struggle for equitable access to public space in Cleveland during the Civil Rights era. Between 1961 and 1977, Black Clevelanders sought space to celebrate Black pride and culture within Cleveland’s Cultural Gardens. Activists lobbied the Cultural Garden Federation, City Council, and engaged the Black community to acquire a garden space. When the African American Cultural Garden was dedicated on October 23, 1977, dignitaries from Ghana, Togo, Kenya, and Tanzania, were joined by national, state, and city officials to celebrate the first garden space assigned to a community of color.
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