Side A: Civil unrest rocked the Hough neighborhood for five nights during the summer of 1966. When the white owners of the Seventy-Niners Cafe refused to serve a Black customer a glass of water, a sign bearing a racial epithet subsequently appeared outside the bar. Decades of institutionalized racial practices that had caused Hough’s substandard and overcrowded housing, high unemployment, economic exploitation, lack of access to quality education, and systemic police harassment sparked an urban uprising in response on July 18. Angry crowds gathered outside the bar only to be confronted by the owners brandishing firearms. When the police belatedly responded, tensions escalated into targeted firebombing, looting, and vandalism. On Tuesday night, July 19, Cleveland’s Mayor Ralph Locher requested that the Ohio National Guard restore order. (Continued on other side)
Side B: (Continued from other side) Four African Americans—Joyce Arnett, Percy Giles, Samuel Winchester, and Benoris Toney—lost their lives during the violence. An additional 30 men, women, and children were injured and close to 300 arrested. No police were injured by bullets but fires set during the uprising resulted in an estimated $1-2 million in property damage. In the aftermath, little was done by city leaders. This failure caused the Hough community and business leaders to begin to address race relations and to back the election of Carl Stokes as the first Black mayor of Cleveland. Additionally, redevelopment of the Hough neighborhood under the leadership of the Hough Area Development Corporation, Councilwoman Fannie Lewis, and others resulted in the creation of Lexington Village, Beacon Place, Renaissance Village, and Church Square.
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