Abstract
Walter Ratcliffe grew up in Shaker Heights and spent most of his life as a member of the Moreland community. He discusses his life growing up in Shaker playing basketball, going to parties, and his time moving around throughout the community.
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Interviewee
Ratcliffe, Walter (interviewee)
Interviewer
Lewis, Kamla (interviewer)
Project
Moreland History Project
Date
10-17-2017
Document Type
Oral History
Duration
51 minutes
Recommended Citation
"Walter Ratcliffe interview, 17 October 2017" (2017). Cleveland Regional Oral History Collection. Interview 904002.
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/crohc000/1132
Transcript
Kamla Lewis [00:00:01] Good morning.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:00:01] Good morning.
Kamla Lewis [00:00:03] This is Kamala Lewis, and I am interviewing Walter Ratcliffe. Good morning, Walter.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:00:09] Good morning. How are you?
Kamla Lewis [00:00:11] I am wonderful. Thank you. Thank you for doing this, this morning.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:00:14] My pleasure.
Kamla Lewis [00:00:15] So let’s start with, were you actually born in Shaker Heights or did you move here?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:00:20] No, we moved here. I was born on a street called Parkview, and it’s in Cleveland. I grew up my first five years off of 105th on a street called Gooding. And then in, I think it was 1960 is when we moved to Shaker Heights. My mother was a nurse at that time, registered nurse. And my father was working for several of the schools as a custodian and off and on for the, I think he worked for one of the auto manufacturing companies for a while. I can’t remember if it was General Motors or Ford, but it was one of those out in Parma.
Kamla Lewis [00:01:13] So what caused them to decide to move to Shaker Heights?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:01:17] My mother was a very educated person. She was the first one out of our family to go to college and come out. And so, Shaker school systems were number two in the entire nation at that time, and she wanted me to have an opportunity to grow up and go to one of the best schools there were. And then, plus, at that time, the neighborhood over there on Gooding was starting to decline some.
Kamla Lewis [00:01:48] Now, are you aware of this as a 5 year old?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:01:51] Absolutely not. Absolutely not.
Kamla Lewis [00:01:54] So when you moved here, did it, I mean, what was it like to move from Gooding to Shaker? And where did you move into Shaker?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:02:03] First of all, it was a little, as a kid, you don’t know about grieving, but it kind of was a grieving situation for me, because my first cousins, we lived on one end of Gooding, my first cousins lived on the other end. And so I would run up and down the street to play with them. We own the block, so to speak. But when we moved here to Shaker, I didn’t know anybody here. We moved on a street called Ashby. Ashby is, when it crosses over into Cleveland, it turns into 154th. So we lived three houses from the border of 154th. So we were actually in , we were actually in Shaker on Ashby.
Kamla Lewis [00:02:48] Were you an only child?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:02:50] Yes. Yes, I was an only child of my mother and father. I have some other brothers and sisters from my father’s first marriage, but they all lived in Indianapolis, Indiana, because that’s where my father was from. My mother was from Memphis, Tennessee, So I would see them during the summers or a couple of times during the year when my father would drive to Indianapolis and we would go visit them. But all in all, I was an only child here, so.
Kamla Lewis [00:03:17] Do you remember why your parents told you you were moving? Because I’m sure they didn’t explain that.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:03:22] No, I don’t. I just know that one day we were living in Shaker Heights.
Kamla Lewis [00:03:28] So from a child’s perspective, other than not knowing anybody, what was Ashby like? Were there other kids on the street? How did it feel same or different to you?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:03:41] It felt different. There weren’t any other African Americans on that street at the time, other than myself. I think within probably a year or so, Paula Wright, her and her mother moved on the street. Her mother, Paula, was actually a former teacher for the Shaker Heights High School. She passed away several years ago from cancer, but they moved on the street. But for most intents and purposes, I was the only Black child on the street for the first year.
Kamla Lewis [00:04:17] Were you aware of that?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:04:20] You became aware of it kind of quickly, and probably from a negative perspective. I just remember a couple of incidents, but they happened when I got a little bit older, when I was probably closer to 7, 8, 9 years old. Just some of the comments that were made. I can remember my mother and father having conversations and talking about how a lot of the white residents were beginning to starting to move off the street. And you saw the For Sale signs go up. And then at some point, I think Shaker passed some type of an ordinance where you couldn’t put a For sale sign up. So he started seeing things of that nature. A young man who, during the summers, for a couple of years, I went to Gilmore Day Camp, and I met a guy there, a white guy, and we were like best friends at camp. And he lived one street over from me on Westbury. And so we would only see each other at camp during the summer. So then when we were going to Moreland, we ran into each other a little bit more. And he invited me to his house, and I went to his house to play. And we had a great play day. It was on a Saturday. Then on Monday, when I came back to school, he told me that I could no longer come over and visit and play with him because I was black. That’s what his parents had told him. And then within a few months, they moved from Westbury and they moved further out in Shaker. And so that was the first, you know, real kind of like, wow, you know.
Kamla Lewis [00:06:01] I mean, that’s a heavy load for a young kid process. Did you talk to your family about it?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:06:09] You know what? I don’t remember. What I do remember, it was that I was hurt. And then, you know, you again, you started seeing and hearing more of that. I think that when you’re kids and you’re young, you don’t recognize all of that. You’re just kids. You’re just playing, you’re just having fun. You’re just enjoying each other. But, you know, that was then, you know, ’60, ’61, ’62, ’63. And I think a lot of kids back then were hearing the voices of their parents in that day and age.
Kamla Lewis [00:06:39] So when you moved here, did you start kindergarten right away at Moreland School or…
Walter Ratcliffe [00:06:45] I remember there was a woman on Ashby who babysitted me for a while. And I can’t remember, you know, exactly how long it was. But then I started, you know, at kindergarten at Moreland.
Kamla Lewis [00:07:02] And can you remember what first day of school was like?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:07:05] No, no.
Kamla Lewis [00:07:07] Only parents remember.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:07:08] No, but you know what? It is interesting because I remember, like, looking in this room right here. You see these pastel colors? Those were kind of like the colors of Moreland. The walls were either a pastel yellow, a pastel green, or a pastel kind of blue. And I can remember as I, as I got older, every time I would walk into a school in these pastel colors, I’d see, my stomach would turn. I think it was anxiety or something. I’m not into these kind of pastels.
Kamla Lewis [00:07:42] So we are conducting this interview in what used to be the Moreland School and now the main library.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:07:49] Right, Right.
Kamla Lewis [00:07:50] So how did you get to school?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:07:53] Let me think. When I was young, I can remember my sister, for a time, my sister from Indianapolis was living up here, would come up here, and they would walk me back and forth to school. And I can’t remember necessarily back that far. I’m assuming my mother probably brought me because I don’t ever remember riding a school bus.
Kamla Lewis [00:08:26] I was wondering if you started with school buses. So tell me about some of your best memories of school.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:08:32] Moreland was very interesting. As I was walking up the walkway to go into the library, I looked at, we’re in this room right here. On the outside of this room, we used to use chalk to put squares up, and we used to play strikeout up against these walls right here.
Kamla Lewis [00:08:54] Was this the back of the school?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:08:55] Yes, this was the back of the school.
Kamla Lewis [00:08:57] So you would enter from Van Aken?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:08:58] No, you could still enter, yeah, we would enter in, absolutely. You would enter in from Van Aken. This was the back of the school. There was a driveway. There was a parking lot in the front also, and then down a little bit further to the left of the back entrance of the library. Now, where you see kind of like the little kiddie area, play area, that was actually a basketball court area. And they used to have this gigantic steel gray backboard. And we used to play basketball there. We used to call the backboard the gray monster. And we just had great times. And then, right, if you come a little bit closer toward the library interest, There were two kickball fields.
Kamla Lewis [00:09:55] Okay, so where are the assisted living is right now it was kickball fields.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:09:59] There was kickball there and there was kickball.
Kamla Lewis [00:10:01] And there were soccer fields?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:10:02] No, no, on the other side. On the other side of the play area, there was kickball. There was a kickball field there. And I remember there was, back here also was kind of like the service department.
Kamla Lewis [00:10:16] So, where the parking lot now and the other assisted living, that was the service department.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:10:21] Okay, that was, that was the service department. And they had a big fence up, a big green fence that was going up. And so when we would play kickball every year, we would keep a record of who was able to kick the ball over the fence. And I mean, people, I mean, I think the most anybody ever did. It was like 35 times. I think I might have done it 30 times, but that was the contest. Playing kickball. Who could kick the ball over the fence for a home run.
Kamla Lewis [00:10:50] So is that the real story, why the service center eventually had to move?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:10:53] Yeah, they got tired of the balls coming over.
Kamla Lewis [00:10:58] Now, was the library over where the community building is now?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:11:01] I don’t think so. I don’t think so.
Kamla Lewis [00:11:03] Was there a building there?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:11:04] I don’t believe that there was. I may be mistaken. I’m just kind of thinking back that far. I’m not sure there was. I don’t think so. I think I remember when they built that, but I could be mistaken. It’s been a long time. I just don’t remember as I’m thinking. Let me think. I don’t think there was. I don’t think there was.
Kamla Lewis [00:11:23] Did you have a favorite class or teacher at Moreland?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:11:28] Ms. Newman in the fifth grade. She was my math teacher. A lot of people had her as homeroom teacher, but I only had her for math. And I always wanted to be in her class because Ms. Newman was just so funny and she was just so nice to the kids. She really was. Everybody loved Ms. Newman.
Kamla Lewis [00:11:48] Do you maintain any friendships with people who you were in elementary school with?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:11:52] Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, I sure do.
Kamla Lewis [00:12:00] Now, you’ve remained living in Shaker Heights ever since, have you thought of moving?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:12:06] Well, you know what When I graduated from college, I lived still in the Cleveland area. First year at home with my mother. Then I got an apartment off of Milverton, but in the Cleveland side of Milverton. But then we moved to Houston, my wife and I, our first two kids were born in Houston, and then we moved back to Shaker. And that would have been probably in 1984. One of the reasons that I wanted to move back to Shaker was twofold. First of all, they still had what was recognized as having a good education system. But more importantly to me was my mother was getting older, she was beginning to start suffering from dementia and I wanted her to have an opportunity to spend some time with her grandchildren. So we moved back here from Houston in 84. And then we had one more child after that and my mother, we lived in the same house. It’s a duplex. In 1968 we were on Ashby, but the city bought three houses that were on Ashby. They tore down two of the houses. In one house next to us was the Chins, Jimmy Chin’s parents. Jimmy and Rose Chin’s parents, the Chins owned a restaurant and laundry on around 153rd and Kinsman, which was right around the corner from where we lived on 154th or Ashby. So they, the city bought those three houses. They tore two of them down. They moved our house on an 18 wheeler over on Glendale. They went straight up 154th Street. I don’t know how they made that right on Glendale. And the house is still there. If you go down Glendale around 149th, 48th, you’ll see a ugly looking maroon colored house on the left hand side of the street. That’s our house. It was white when it was up here, but they must have painted it when it got over there. But it’s horrible.
Kamla Lewis [00:14:19] So let me get this right. They bought your house as one of the houses and relocated the house.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:14:25] Absolutely.
Kamla Lewis [00:14:26] But without you in it?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:14:29] Right. Absolutely.
Kamla Lewis [00:14:30] And so, where did you guys move it?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:14:32] At that point, we’re at where we are now, which is on a street called Dorchester, around Dorchester and Avalon. We moved there in 1968. It was a duplex and my mother bought the, the city bought the house on Ashby. So she used the money to buy the Dorchester side of this duplex. Well, you know, again we’re talking ’68. So the people who lived on the Avalon side of the Dorchester, I mean of the duplex, didn’t want to live next to African Americans. So they moved. And as soon as they moved, my mother bought the Avalon side of the duplex. And so for years my mother lived on one side, we lived on the other. And after my mother passed and that, we had some renters for a while. But now as it stands, my wife and I live on the Dorchester side and my children, adult children, live on the Avalon side.
Kamla Lewis [00:15:28] That’s the great thing about duplexes.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:15:30] Absolutely, absolutely. Well, two of my adult kids, one’s in Alaska right now, but the other two live there. One of my children, my son, actually works for Lomond as an aide, a teacher’s aide. And he, he was doing some coaching for the Muni League team last year and now he’s doing some coaching for Beachwood. So we’re all still kind of in the neighborhood. Absolutely.
Kamla Lewis [00:15:58] Absolutely. Now, your mother strikes me as a really far-sighted, amazing woman. Can you tell us a little bit more about her?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:16:04] Absolutely. My mother was born in Memphis, Tennessee. When she graduated from high school, she went to Kansas City. Her name was Rose Peebles at the time. And she went to Kansas City, went to nursing school, she became a nurse and then a registered nurse, came to Ohio. And in the ’50s she was working at some of the hospitals because she was one of the few registered African American nurses. During that time, African American nurses were having a hard time getting employment at some of these hospitals. So my mother started something called the Peebles, what was the name of it? Basically she would wind up, she was her own little company and she wound up placing nurses. So. And there was a writeup in the Call & Post. Actually I have some pictures in my phone, I could show you a little bit later.
Kamla Lewis [00:17:01] Thank you.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:17:03] And so she, it was, she called it a nursing registry, a people’s nursing registry. And she was placing African American nurses at some of these hospitals. And that was in like the 50s. Then In the ’50s, at some point in time, or maybe it was the early ’60s, the Call & Post, and a lot of, of the African American agencies or what have you, were starting to pressure the Ohio’s Nurses association because they didn’t have any African American nurses on the Ohio Nurses Association. So they brought my mother in as the first African American nurse of the Ohio Nurses Association in the Northern District of Ohio. So she was a trendsetter. And then I remember as we were growing up, when a lot of things were going on, there were turbulent times in the ’40s, excuse me, in around ’64, ’63, that they would have street club meetings at my mother’s house, at our house on Ashby, and a lot of some of your movers and shakers in the area who were trying to do a lot to promote equality for African Americans. They would have meetings at our houses, in our house.
Kamla Lewis [00:18:23] You’re talking about turbulent times. Can you explain a little bit more what was going on?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:18:29] Oh, well, it was just the whole thing of segregation in certain areas. African Americans being the last to get hired and get jobs, things of that nature. And then, when I was a child, for one year, we moved from, we kept the house, but we moved to Los Angeles from ’64 to ’65. So I missed one year , of coming up in Moreland. But we were in Los Angeles during the Watts riot. And then it was around that time where you started seeing more of those riots breaking out all over the country, even here in Cleveland. And so that’s what I mean, like, the times were kind of very turbulent. The Civil Rights movement was really pushing a lot of things.
Kamla Lewis [00:19:16] So were your parents politically active?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:19:20] Not out front, I would say, but just kind of in the background they were.
Kamla Lewis [00:19:26] Now, you showed us a picture of your kindergarten class at Moreland, and you were the only African American student.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:19:34] Yes. Yes, ma’am.
Kamla Lewis [00:19:36] How long before there was another African American student?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:19:40] Okay, well, I’ll show you this picture here. This young lady in this picture right here, her name is Sherry Baker.
Kamla Lewis [00:19:52] This is 1961–62 Moreland school first grade.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:19:56] This is first grade. But she came, I think, the second half, because her and I had that conversation. She came the second half of kindergarten. So about six months after I was at Moreland, she came, but she was in a different class than I was.
Kamla Lewis [00:20:11] I see. And do you guys have reunions with your classmates?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:20:19] No, we had high school reunions, but we don’t have Moreland reunions, and I really wish we did. Some of the guys, there’s a gentleman. I don’t see him. He was probably in one of the other pictures. His name is John Smith. When we had our Shaker Heights Class of 73 high school reunion, he came. He did not, he went to Moreland. I don’t think he, I’m not sure if he went to Woodbury. I know he didn’t go to Shaker, but he still felt, feels connected. So when we had our class reunion, John showed up and he and I talked about the Moreland days.
Kamla Lewis [00:20:54] So, you know, you have yourself gone through the Shaker schools. You’ve had your kids go through schools. One of your sons still is working for the Shaker schools.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:21:03] Yes.
Kamla Lewis [00:21:04] What would you say are some of the changes that you have seen?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:21:08] Oh, my goodness. I don’t think that the Shaker schools, of course, I don’t think they’re rated nationally as they were back then. And then I think what has impacted them, and this is just from a layman’s point of view, is that a lot of your wealthier parents are able to send their children to some of the neighboring private schools. Hathaway Brown, Laurel, University School. So I think that has kind of impacted. And then again, when, and just, you know, that has. From the racial perspective, it has grown. When I was in Shaker High School, I think the ratio was 70–30. 70% White, 30% Black. I’m sure it’s different now.
Kamla Lewis [00:22:02] And that was in the ’70s?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:22:03] That would have been ’73.
Kamla Lewis [00:22:06] And what about the neighborhood? We are really trying to get a good handle on what was the neighborhood like at the time. Where did you hang out? What were the kind of things that you did?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:22:15] In the Moreland area, there were more whites living in the Moreland area than there are now. The neighborhood has definitely changed. I told you, I lived on Ashby. And then if you went three houses further, it turned into 154th. On that corner of 154th, you had a Franklin’s Ice Cream on one corner, a Lawson’s on the other corner, Gateway Drugs on one corner, and Sally’s delicatessen on the other corner. And they eventually moved down here on Chagrin, near Avalon, there was B & K bike shop that was a little bit further down or next to where the Lawsons was. There was a car dealership on around the Chagrin, I’m gonna say Pennington or area.
Kamla Lewis [00:23:17] Was it the Ganley?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:23:18] I can’t remember which- I can’t remember which dealership it was, but there was a car dealership there where the Shaker service department was. It wasn’t there. So both Menlo and Pennington came all the way to Chagrin. And then there was, like, strips of little stores. There was a barbershop where I used to get my hair cut there, and there were just other little stores in that area.
Kamla Lewis [00:23:48] And could you walk from Ashby? You’d walk over there?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:23:51] Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. By the time I was in, I’m going to say by the time I was in fifth grade or so, fourth or fifth grade, we were walking to school. Sometimes where I lived, I could either come up straight up Van Aken, or I could come down Chagrin.
Kamla Lewis [00:24:09] Would you take the rapid?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:24:11] Mm-mm. I would just walk. It was just walk.
Kamla Lewis [00:24:13] What about bicycling? Did kids those days do bicycle?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:24:19] More so I think I remember bicycling more by the time I got into junior high school, more so than back then. I mean, we had bikes, but I don’t remember a lot of people riding their bikes to school. They would just walk or get dropped off. And one of the things I do remember was I can’t remember what grade I was in. Maybe, because we left at the beginning of the middle of the fourth grade and came back in the middle of the fifth grade. But I do remember walking down Van Aken, coming from school, going home, and a little kid ran up to me and said, did you hear? Did you hear? And I said what? Hear what they said, President Kennedy was assassinated. You know how they tell you, you will always remember where you were when certain events happened or when you heard about a certain event. I was leaving. I was coming from Moreland, coming down Van Aken when I heard that the President had been assassinated.
Kamla Lewis [00:25:15] Do you recall if it meant anything to you at the time?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:25:18] Well, I mean, as a kid, I was in shock to hear something like that happen. But I just, I will always remember that day.
Kamla Lewis [00:25:28] Now, I know that Dr. Martin Luther King came to Shaker at one point. Do you recall that?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:25:33] No, I don’t. I don’t. I don’t.
Kamla Lewis [00:25:36] And talking about the types of businesses that work in the area, what sort of stores were on Lee Road? Did you ever go down Lee Road?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:25:48] Okay, well, let’s start here for a minute. You know where you’re saying the service department is? And these, what is this building here?
Kamla Lewis [00:25:55] This is the assisted living.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:25:56] The assisted living. Well, the service department here was here, but on the other side of it, there were a few stores. And one of the stores was Al’s. Al’s Sandwich Shop. And when we were in fifth and sixth grade, we would go to Al’s Sandwich Shop for lunch. And I remember you could get a hot dog, a order of French fries, and a Cherry Coke for 55 cents. And we would be in Al’s and we’d be cut up. And we had some, couple times, a couple of our friends got kicked out of Al’s for cutting up a little bit too much. But that’s where we were then, where Lee Road and Chagrin is. We’re on the Lee Road in where Heinen’s is at. There was another strip there and strip mall. And for years there was a Perkins there. Perkins is one of those. Pancake house. There was a Perkins Pancakes. And I can’t remember what day, if it was Wednesday or Friday. But one of those days was like all the pancakes you could eat for like 50 cents. The Perkins, and then next to the Perkins was upstairs office buildings. And there was a dentist, Dr. Johnson. He had an office building up there. And then there was a Baskin Robbins. The Baskin Robbins that’s way down there. There was the Baskin Robbins. When you turned the corner on Chagrin from Lee, there was, there was a bowling alley over there.
Kamla Lewis [00:27:33] I’ve hear a lot about this bowling alley over there. Was this a popular place for young people? Or was this adults who went there?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:27:36] I think, I was not, I went there one time. I went there one time to bowl, but I was never really a bowling person. But yeah, people went there.
Kamla Lewis [00:27:44] Was there a theatre in the area?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:27:45] Yeah. On caddy corner to where the Heinen’s is. What’s over there? Now, the building on the corner
Kamla Lewis [00:27:55] Where the bank is?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:27:56] Uh uh. On the other side, it was a car dealership for a minute. Now it’s something else. And right next to it is this little Shaker, oh, I can’t think of it. But right there on that corner, there was a theater. Shaker Movie Theater. And there was also. Oh, what is the name of that restaurant? A Brown Derby. There was a Brown Derby there.
Kamla Lewis [00:28:26] So you had a lot of eating choices.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:28:28] Right.
Kamla Lewis [00:28:30] Now, I understand there were also two synagogues at one point in the neighborhood. Do you recall those?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:28:36] The one, there was the smaller one, if I’m not mistaken, on the corner of Chagrin and Ludgate, which is now like the credit union. The other one, I can’t recall.
Kamla Lewis [00:28:49] I think it’s on Lee Road.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:28:50] Okay. I can’t recall that one. There were some other things on there I wanted to tell you.
Kamla Lewis [00:28:59] I think you mentioned there was a Chinese restaurant in the area as well?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:29:03] That was the Chin’s Restaurant. And next door to it, it was the laundromat. And so Mr. And Mrs. Chin rotated, she worked more so in the laundromat, and he worked more so in the restaurant. And I grew up with their son Jimmy, and their daughter Rose. Jimmy was probably four years, maybe older than I. Rose was a couple of years older than I. Jimmy is an attorney now in Cleveland. I don’t know where Rose is the last time. I think she was in Columbus or something of that nature, but absolutely.
Kamla Lewis [00:29:52] Now they were local, so their local owners of the business. Were the other, most of the other businesses locally owned?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:29:56] I wouldn’t, I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t tell you.
Kamla Lewis [00:29:59] And another one of the pictures you shared with us was of you in the Cub Scouts.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:30:04] Yes.
Kamla Lewis [00:30:04] Tell us about Cub Scouts and what kind of things you all did in it.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:30:08] You know, they, you had to make certain things, you had to do certain achievements to get to move further in your Cub Scout book. And the picture I showed you was actually. What is the parade? We have the Memorial Day Parade and we all got together right on the corner of, probably it’s Lee and Chelton. There was a Pick ’n Pay. There was two grocery stores, There was a Pick and Pay there. And a little further down on Chagrin, there was a Buy Rite, Davita Buy Rite. So we would all meet at the Pick ’n Pay and then we would do the parade tour.
Kamla Lewis [00:30:48] And where would the parade go because…?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:30:50] I can’t remember. I can’t remember where the parade, I just remember all of us being in our Cub Scout uniforms and a little band playing and we’re walking up proud, proudly walking up the street.
Kamla Lewis [00:31:03] What were the other- Did you guys do camping? What sort of other-
Walter Ratcliffe [00:31:08] I don’t think, no, we met weekly. I don’t ever remember us doing the camping. I think that probably took place more so when you became a Boy Scout. But just in the Cub Scout they just had activities for you to do and things of that nature. And you get your little medals and your little honors and your little awards and little marks in your book.
Kamla Lewis [00:31:30] So what can you tell us, that the public can hear, about your teenage years in Shaker?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:31:36] It was great. I think about when we were 15, 16, 17 years old, 18, how we used to have parties. And back then, you know, most of the parties, you know, because a lot of us were still, a lot of people were still living. My friends on Ludgate, Hildena, Shelton, Menlo. And we had basement parties and you know, you had a little record player and in the basement they’d have little colored lights. It’d be real dark, but you’d have like a little green light in one area, a little red light or a little blue light. And you had the little 45s that were playing. And I can remember you always had to tape recorder on the arm of the record player so that the records wouldn’t skip. And there was always a pole in the basement. You had to dance around.
Kamla Lewis [00:32:35] I’m not sure that’s why the poles are in there.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:32:38] That’s how I learned to hand dance. My first dancing partner was the pole. I learned how to hand dance dancing to the pole. But I remember those were fun times. You know, you would go to the parties and most of the parties were, you know, were done by 12 o’clock. So you’re headed home and your parents say, you better be home by such and such time. And then there is a school, there’s a church on Coventry and Shaker Boulevard. I can’t remember the name of it. Is it…
Kamla Lewis [00:33:14] Is it Cortland and Shaker Boulevard? You mean Hathway Brown or?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:33:17] No, Shaker Boulevard and Coventry. I think it’s a Presbyterian church.
Kamla Lewis [00:33:21] Oh a church.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:33:22] But they would have a, they call it canteens. And so every Friday night we would walk from all the way over here to the canteen, to the dance in the basement of that church. And I can remember sometimes it would be the dead of winter, it would be real cold. But nothing was going to stop us from getting to the canteen and dancing. And you’re dancing, then you’re all sweaty. Then you got to walk back home, and the next thing you know, you got a cold, you’re sick and all of that. But those were some of the greatest times I can remember. Just, you know, a bunch of us all together walking up and down the street, going to the little canteens. Also they used to have them, where East View Churches used to have canteens on Friday nights in the basement there.
Kamla Lewis [00:34:15] Now, did Thornton Park exist as a recreation center?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:34:19] I don’t, what I remember more about Thornton Park, was the ice skating. They had an ice- You know, you have your ice skating rink there. But most of us didn’t go, excuse me, that far up. We just kind of stayed in our little area here of Moreland. Except when we, by the time we got to junior high, then we started traveling out a little more. We would go over to the Ludlow area. Because there were a lot of African Americans starting to move over there also, or who had been there. And so we would go to parties over at the Ludlow area. And then because we were all in junior high school together, we built relationships. So, you know, before then, we didn’t, you know, didn’t kind of hang out with the Ludlow folks so much. Just because it was, you know, didn’t know them. And it was a little distance to get over there. But by the time we were in junior high school, then we started building relationships there.
Kamla Lewis [00:35:11] Did you guys ever take the Rapid and go downtown? Is that something people did at the time? And how about Shaker Square?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:35:16] Yeah, I didn’t. I know a lot of the guys who I talked to who lived more so on the Ludlow area, hung out in the Shaker Square area, myself and a couple of friends, every now and then. We would, especially when I was, like, in the elementary school and I was around in the fifth and sixth grade, we would jump on the Rapid, go all the way downtown. And there was on the street called Prospect, there was Kay’s Bookstore. So would go and buy DC comic books and Marvel comic books down at Kay’s Bookstore. And then we would get to, we would get to Terminal Tower. And in Terminal Tower there was like a Hough Bakery. And a buddy of mine and I, we would get a Boston cream pie and we’d be at the back of the Rapid eating this Boston cream pie with our bare hands.
Kamla Lewis [00:36:11] Despite the sign that says no eating.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:36:12] I don’t even know if there was a sign on the Rapid back then, or getting the Frosties that, they were famous for having Frosties down there. But yeah, we would every now occasionally catch the Rapid downtown.
Kamla Lewis [00:36:25] So now where Shaker Town Center is, was there a shopping center there?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:36:32] Well, that’s where I said that’s where, that’s where the Perkins Pancake House was, that’s where the-
Kamla Lewis [00:36:39] This one right here is Shaker Town Center. I meant the One Van Aken Center. Sorry.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:36:43] Oh, Van Aken.
Kamla Lewis [00:36:42] Yeah, Van Aken, was there a shopping center there?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:36:43] Yeah, there was a shopping center there. There was a movie theater there, too.
Kamla Lewis [00:36:48] The Vogue.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:36:49] The Vogue, right. I remember going there just a couple of times, but that was when I was younger. I mean, older. That’s like when I was coming home from college or something like that. If there was a movie, but didn’t travel that far up there. Mostly, like I said, the Moreland area kids, we probably stayed in this area. Now, the kids that lived, grew up in the Lomond area, probably spent more time up there. But no, we just kind of hung in our little part of the world here in Moreland.
Kamla Lewis [00:37:20] So now talking about the service center, and you remember when it used to be here by the library, it’s moved over. And do you recall that and any, the controversy that was associated with it?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:37:34] What I recall was some of my friends lived in the houses that they took. So they, and it’s so funny because three of them all moved on the same street, which was Daleford. And it was around the same time that the city bought our house and we moved on Dorchester. So that was kind of good for me because all of my friends who were down here were now just a block or two from where I was living now. So that was great for me. I don’t remember much of the controversy there. I remember more of the controversy when they blocked off Avalon and Linfield from going into Cleveland. I remember hearing a lot more about that, but not so much about the, the building of the service department.
Kamla Lewis [00:38:31] So what do you recall about the reasons behind the blocking off of Avalon and Linfield?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:38:41] What I was told growing up was that since crime was kind of increasing in certain areas that they were blocking off those two streets, because that was the direct route to get out of Shaker into Cleveland. That was the, what was being told. But most people thought that it was to separate Shaker from Cleveland. And even if you look at the areas over there by Colwyn, Sutton, Westbury, they built apartment areas and they blocked off Shaker from Cleveland there too. So I think many people felt that Shaker was trying to isolate themselves from Cleveland.
Kamla Lewis [00:39:37] Do you recall how the people on Colwyn, Westbury, on those border streets themselves, the Shaker residents, were they supportive of it?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:39:44] I don’t remember. I know that there was a lot of people just all over, whether it was the area up here, Avalon and Linfield, or the Sutton, Colwyn area over there. Just, you know, not being real happy about what was happening because it was closing up the streets. It was becoming, it was interfering with how you know your route home and now you had to go a different route to get around and you couldn’t have the access that you used to have. I think, though, in the back of many people’s minds, it was about just trying to separate that area, Cleveland from Shaker. [Ratcliffe’s phone rings] I’m sorry.
Kamla Lewis [00:40:32] What time was this? Was this the late ’60s? Was this the ’70s?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:40:39] I’m going to say from my memory it was probably because we moved in, we moved on Dorchester in ’68. So this started happening about a couple years after. So I’m going to say it was the early ’70s.
Kamla Lewis [00:40:58] And going back to the service center, when the city decided to relocate, you indicated they bought people’s houses, including an Ashby. They bought your house and turned that into a little park. Did they help you find a new home? How did you guys end up in Dorchester? How did your friends end up on Daleford?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:41:20] I don’t know how that happened. I really, I just, my mother was looking for a house. What they did with our street when they bought our three, the three houses where we lived, what they did was they looped Westbury all the way around and then now, where Westbury ends at Ashby, then across the street is where you have the park. But where that loop was, those were the houses that they bought.
Kamla Lewis [00:41:48] Fascinating. I’ve never heard that part of history as to how we got those. And the service center itself.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:41:55] Right.
Kamla Lewis [00:41:56] So once it moved over, what happened to the building where the service center was?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:42:04] It was torn down. And I think that a lot of people probably felt maybe, well, why are you putting the service to center in the Moreland area? You know, as big as Shaker Heights is why Moreland? Why in the area where it’s more populated with African Americans.
Kamla Lewis [00:42:26] I believe the next Shaker Life magazine will have an issue on the plan that was around that.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:42:32] Okay.
Kamla Lewis [00:42:30] And the neighborhood pushback around it.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:42:32] Right, yeah.
Kamla Lewis [00:42:36] One the things that we find, the most interesting stories about that. What about Shelton Park? Did it exist at the time?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:42:43] There was just a field.
Kamla Lewis [00:42:45] Just a field.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:42:46] Just, it was just a field. And didn’t, we didn’t, by the time they built Shelton Park, I was a little older and because they’re, they had, they may have had basketball courts up for like 24 hours. And then when all of the kids from all over came over, then the basketball courts disappeared and they made them real small. See, at every elementary school there was basketball courts. There was a basketball court here. I remember if the basketball courts were too full, we would drive over. And this again was by the time I’m 17, 16, 17, 18 years old, we would drive over and play at the basketball court at Lomond School or the basketball court at Ludlow. Or at Onaway, all of the elementary schools had outdoor basketball courts. And that’s one of the things that I think we kind of miss now. I’m saying I’m sure the rationale was that as things were going on, they were having a lot of kids that lived outside of Shaker coming to the courts and fights were breaking out and things of that nature. So that’s why they took the basketball courts down. But the only problem was is that, you know, for the most part that’s where a lot of us hung out. That’s where we played basketball and it kept us out of trouble. I have made my case with literally every, with the exception of this last mayor, but that we need some type of recreation center for these young people. I went to one of the, the former mayor had one of those, what do they call those, where she would meet-
Kamla Lewis [00:44:37] Town hall.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:44:38] Town hall and she was talking about how some people felt intimidated by going to Shaker Town center because they had all of these young kids, primarily African Americans, hanging out up at Shaker Town Center. And my response to her is, well, at the point that you took all of the. Not her personally, but at the point that the city took all of these things down for the kids to do and gave them nothing in return, what else are they supposed to do? But I mean, it’s funny, I have, my sister in law lives on Hildana, and so one day she was telling me that there were a bunch of kids hanging out on the corner of Hildana and Chagrin because there’s nothing to do and so the police were called to kind of get them off the street. And they were saying, well, parents were complaining that the kids were just hanging out on the street doing nothing. But then other parents were complaining, why are you bothering our kids? And my contention is that if you don’t give these kids something to do, if you don’t build something, something to do, a place for them to expend their energy and have a good time and stay out of trouble, then they’re going to find something to do. And oftentimes it’s going to be problematic. And the mayor made a, when I brought that up, she said, well, just because we build a recreational center doesn’t mean that they’ll go. And I totally disagree. If you build it, they’ll come. And then the thing was, well, we’ll have more usage of Woodbury. We’ll have more usage of Byron. Well, a lot of these kids who live in the Moreland area, they’re not going to walk all the way up to Byron. They’re not going to walk necessarily all the way over to Woodbury. They need something in this community.
Kamla Lewis [00:46:54] So, you know, you raised an interesting point about how the school, of course, was in the neighborhood, all these amenities were in the neighborhood, businesses that you guys could walk to, etc. So the Moreland School was one of the schools that closed.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:47:08] Yeah.
Kamla Lewis [00:47:09] At what point in your career did the school close?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:47:12] I can’t remember but I was heartbroken because, understand something, like I said, there was two kickball fields here, there was where we played strikeout here, there was the basketball court here. So even when kids weren’t playing kickball, they could still play softball there, they could still play baseball there, they could still play strikeout over here, you could still play basketball. There were things for the young people to do that was positive. And so when they closed the school and took away a lot of the things that were here, I just think that it did have an impact on our young people and what you could do in the community.
Kamla Lewis [00:47:55] Walter, could you talk a little bit about how you feel that your growing up in Shaker has shaped who you are and the career choices you yourself ended up making?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:48:08] I think growing up in Shaker afforded me a very good education. I probably didn’t take as much advantage, the most advantage of it as I could have back then, but because I had an education from Shaker Heights High School, it helped me. It really did. My first year in college, it just came so easy because I was so, I mean, and even though, like I said, even though I didn’t take advantage of it fully here, I wasn’t a scholar student, so to speak. The education that I had made, you know, when I really buckled down to college, it made it easier for me. I think, from the position of just dealing with people from other races. Growing up in a multicultural kind of area, that has been a positive thing in my life because I’ve seen both worlds, so to speak. I’ve seen how it is to live in an African American world with all of us who were together. By the time we were in high school, we were, you know, and through things like sports, through things like wrestling and playing football together and basketball, things of that nature, you just build a camaraderie with people from all different cultures and all different races. So it’s just helped me from that perspective. I think I’m a little more open minded from that perspective. I probably should be a little more radical. But, I just think, yeah, I just think I’ve met people in my lifetime who are white, who never grew up around black people at all, have no idea, no concept of how we think, what we’ve really been through as African Americans in this country. So I think that that was a blessing for me. Yeah, absolutely.
Kamla Lewis [00:50:26] Thank you very much for spending some time with us. Is there anything else you’d like to share that I haven’t asked you about?
Walter Ratcliffe [00:50:34] No, I’m just honored to have an opportunity to share some things with you. And again, I do hold this community and the school with respect because one of the reasons we moved back from Houston, like I said, was I wanted my kids to afford them the opportunity to go to Shaker School Systems, because I just thought it was a good school system, was a better, it was one of the best. I feel bad that it’s not what it was, but it’s still good.
Kamla Lewis [00:51:04] Thank you so very much.
Walter Ratcliffe [00:51:06] Okay.
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