Abstract

Marian Garth-Saffold discusses her time living in Moreland, her involvement in the community, and reasons she moved to and from Shaker. The choice to move to Moreland was influencd by its good school system and its acceptance of blacks in the 1960s. Marian talks with the interviewer about her job as a lab technician and then working for the unions. She discusses her daughter's impact on life in Shaker and Warrensville, where she and her husband moved when her daughter became the city's mayor. She discusses the urban renewal movement in Moreland and the development of a playground, and the construction of the Service Center and Sutton Place.

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Interviewee

Garth Saffold, Marian (interviewee)

Interviewer

Dawson, Virginia (interviewer)

Project

Moreland History Project

Date

10-12-2017

Document Type

Oral History

Duration

32 minutes

Transcript

Virginia Dawson [00:00:01] Okay, this is an interview with Marion Garth Saffold. Could you spell your name please?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:00:13] M, A, R, I, A, N, G, A, R, T, H, hyphen, S, A, F, F, O, L, D.

Virginia Dawson [00:00:23] Great, and today is October 12, 2017, and we are at the Shaker Heights Library. I wanted to start with some of your memories of Moreland. When did you first move here? Who were your neighbors? Stuff like that.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:00:46] Oh well, we moved to Moreland in 1962. ’62, ’63 here. And, well, at that time, didn’t know my neighbors. But we have the Tidmores. I knew Sam Tidmore. We had Cesar and Clara Drake.

Virginia Dawson [00:01:15] Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:01:16] Eugene and Bertha Miller were my neighbors.

Virginia Dawson [00:01:25] Were they Black or White?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:01:30] Tidmores were Black. Drakes was Black. Millers, I’m not sure.

Virginia Dawson [00:01:38] Okay. But it was like a mixed-race neighborhood like you’re saying?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:01:43] Yeah, it was.

Virginia Dawson [00:01:44] When did you move there?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:01:45] In ’62. ’62.

Virginia Dawson [00:01:47] ’62. Okay, great. Why did you move there?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:01:53] Well, we moved to Shaker because of school. I have two children and we were trying to get schools, better schools for them to attend. So at that time we moved into this area because. Well, this is the area that was accepting us at that time. It was more. We were more comfortable there. Some of the other neighborhoods, you know, it wasn’t as acceptable of us as Moreland. So that’s why we moved there.

Virginia Dawson [00:02:31] Did you have to get financing for your house? Did you own your house or did you-

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:02:35] We did own. We did get financing for the house.

Virginia Dawson [00:02:38] Did you get it through Dunbar or Quincy or did you go to a, you know, a more established bank?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:02:50] It was through a mortgage company. It wasn’t either Dunbar. I can’t even think of the name of the- Leader Mortgage Company. And I don’t know what they used to finance it, but it was through them.

Virginia Dawson [00:03:10] Cool, cool.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:03:10] Yeah.

Virginia Dawson [00:03:11] And did you get involved in the PTA?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:03:15] I did get involved to a degree. I was working so wasn’t able to attend all the activities and everything, but did because of the kids. I did get involved with PTA and I was involved with, say, political. I was precinct committee person for that area. I was on Chelton Road. Chelton dead ends to here at that time, to the school. So I had that area and then over to Scottsdale and Hilton and some of the street signage as for precinct committee person. So I handled that.

Virginia Dawson [00:04:05] And that was Democratic, right?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:04:07] Yes.

Virginia Dawson [00:04:08] Alright.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:04:08] Yeah, Democratic. Of course, at that time, naturally, Marcia wasn’t involved politically, but we did get involved in the political stuff.

Virginia Dawson [00:04:24] How many children did you have?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:04:25] Two.

Virginia Dawson [00:04:26] Two. So it was Marcia and-

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:04:25] Tim. Timothy Fudge. He was the oldest. He’s now deceased, but I had the two.

Virginia Dawson [00:04:36] Okay, so Fudge was your married name at the time?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:04:39] Yes.

Virginia Dawson [00:04:40] Okay. Okay, great. So she didn’t change her name?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:04:47] No, she didn’t change her name. They both kept the same name, Fudge. Oh. They got teased about it a lot, but she did keep her name.

Virginia Dawson [00:04:58] Where does the Garth come from?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:05:00] That was my second marriage.

Virginia Dawson [00:05:01] Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:05:02] Because, you know, Fudge’s deceased and he was gone, so I got married again and that was Garth.

Virginia Dawson [00:05:11] Okay, well, what was the neighborhood like? Kind of give me your memories of, you know, way back when in the ’60s.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:05:21] My neighborhood was mostly two-family homes.

Virginia Dawson [00:05:26] Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:05:26] Over that whole area is mostly two-family. And it was, I think it was where most of, I won’t say most majority of Blacks that were moving in kind of came to that area. Most, like I said, for reasons of the fact that, that’s where they were accepted. So it was the majority, it got to be majority Black. And most of them had children, so they were most all going to here to more or less here. And at first we didn’t get too involved because everything was, this was during the time with the low and it’s all the Blacks and getting settled in that area. So it was spilling over into the Moreland area. So you had some problems, but not a lot. You just knew there’s some things you wouldn’t be able to do, so you know, just accepted it.

Virginia Dawson [00:06:31] What do you mean some things you wouldn’t be able to do?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:06:33] Well, you know, the Blacks were not able to, do every, get involved some places. Although we were comfortable in the area where we moved, there was still some. Some of the feelings anti-Black.

Virginia Dawson [00:06:47] Okay. Really?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:06:48] So, yeah, I’m trying to think of putting my hand on in the stores and in some of the buildings where you had to do business. It was, it still was a little. That little thing was there.

Virginia Dawson [00:07:06] Where did you shop?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:07:08] Mostly at, well, the stores that we shopped are not. What was it? A and P. We stopped at the regular general stores, but then we went out of the area to shop because, you know, even where we came from doing in Cleveland, in inner cities or wherever we had normally shopped, we still did shopping there.

Virginia Dawson [00:07:31] Okay, that’s interesting. Well, where did you come from in the inner city?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:07:37] We were down off of Woodland.

Virginia Dawson [00:07:41] Uh huh.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:07:42] Woodland and Quincy area.

Virginia Dawson [00:07:46] Okay. Alright, cool.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:07:50] Yeah. So you know that-

Virginia Dawson [00:07:53] So you went back, that you had felt ties and comfortable there and did you go to church there too?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:07:58] Yeah. And then continued to go.

Virginia Dawson [00:08:01] What was your church?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:08:02] My church was Glenville, and it. I guess it was in another. Back in the inner city. Glenville. That’s off of St. Clair and Superior.

Virginia Dawson [00:08:13] Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:08:13] And 105. So we continue to go to church there.

Virginia Dawson [00:08:21] That’s interesting.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:08:23] But. So we did not, I don’t think we ever, moved our- No, we did not move our membership from inner city churches that we attended. So we didn’t have church out here at all. So we continued to go down there. So the kids had a little problem also with the racial thing, which we had to deal with and take care of it.

Virginia Dawson [00:08:55] But would you mind talking about that?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:08:57] I can’t remember names and just exactly what it was.

Virginia Dawson [00:09:02] Well, maybe it’s good you don’t remember names.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:09:07] But the thing when Marcia came- Well, Marcia was in the fifth grade, just going to the sixth. Well, right away they moved them back, put them back, you know, and so that meant she had to do the fifth grade over. I guess the inner-city schools, and which I know it to be true, were not up to the standard of the Shaker schools. At that time. I don’t know how it is now, but at that time, Shaker was one of the best in the area. So either transcripts or whatever. But anyway, they didn’t feel that they had reached the level that they wanted her to be in Shaker. So she would move back a year, back to the fifth grade. So she had to do that over fifth and sixth. And my son was in Woodbury Junior High at the time, so he. He didn’t have the problems she had in the lower level. So I guess it was some of the things like that. And part of it, she felt was the teacher and part of it, you know, their relationships.

Virginia Dawson [00:10:25] Well, it’s tough. It’s a tough thing. But did she get adjusted?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:10:31] She did. And she went on. Yeah, she did get adjusted. It took a little while, through the fifth grade. And, you know, by the time she reached the sixth grade, she was pretty good.

Virginia Dawson [00:10:48] Yeah. Now, the kids came home for lunch. And I understand you worked. How did that work out? How did you handle that?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:10:58] Well, we had two-family. My father was downstairs.

Virginia Dawson [00:11:04] Oh, that’s good.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:11:05] And he was retired. So they kind of took care of the kids and they walked home because it wasn’t that far from here. So it worked out as far as…

Virginia Dawson [00:11:23] Wow. And what did you do? What was your job?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:11:26] I. Well, first, when I came out Here I was the laboratory technician at Highland, oh, Highland View Hospital. Highland View.

Virginia Dawson [00:11:35] Which? Oh, Highland View.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:11:36] Highland View across up there by Sunny Acres County Hospital. So I was laboratory technician.

Virginia Dawson [00:11:45] And I understand you got into labor. You know, tell me about that.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:11:52] Okay. While at, after I had been at Highland View for years, it was at the time when they were doing a lot of organizing with unions coming in, organizing hospitals in the cities. I got involved with the organizers that were coming out trying to organize our hospital. So once we got it organized, then they offered me the chance to work for the union, representing employees and everything. So we went through training. So I left the hospital and started working full time for the union, because I was with the union over 20 years and representing the employees with problems negotiating contracts and doing grievances and arbitration and that type of thing as far as representing the members that we represented. So that was good. And then I started traveling across the country to different states and cities who were having organizing drives working for the union. And I worked for that for a while. And then I was in education. We went around teaching steward training and how to chair meetings and that type of thing. So because all that was involved in our union growth and activities that we were doing.

Virginia Dawson [00:13:31] Well, that sounds very important. I guess that’s what your daughter kind of picked up was the organizing and reaching out.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:13:40] And that is one of the things that she states in her, when she does her bio, that working coming up in the house that she had growing up in a union household is what she said. Because my husband was a steel worker, but he, steel was union. So she grew up in a union household. I was with the public employers union and he was with the steel workers. So she would go out with us on organizing drives and just volunteering to do it, you know, pass out leaflets like you see it, see people standing out, passing out leaflets about organizing, about joining the union and stuff. So she would volunteer some of her friends, especially when she was at Ohio State, she would do this. They would get up early in the morning and go out with us and they enjoyed it. So. But she did. She does put that in her bio that she grew up in union household and that’s how she relate to people. And she’s sure that that’s what she learned from that experience helped her with what she’s doing now because she’s a people person.

Virginia Dawson [00:14:57] So that is so cool. You must be so proud.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:15:03] Yes. And we never, she never gave any indication that she would want to do anything political. She never was political. So we really was surprised when she got into it now. She was always. Well, this is getting off of that subject. But anyway, she was in school, you know, in the sororities and fraternities. So she was president. Ended up being president of the national 200,000-member Deltas. So she, I think that got her started because working with them and being over on that group, you know, a lot of different personalities, a lot of issues they were involved in. So she was in charge of that. And I think that’s what really got her involved in the political arena. And working with. Worked for Stephanie. Working with Stephanie and working down at the county. She was over the budget department down at the county for years. And then she was assistant to Stephanie, who was the prosecutor at that time. Stephanie Tubbs Jones.

Virginia Dawson [00:16:22] Yeah, sure.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:16:23] Yeah. So Marcia was her chief or assistant prosecutor down there. So.

Virginia Dawson [00:16:36] This is in case I totally screwed up the interview. I have to have a few notes. I’m sorry. You’re the first. Maybe I’ll get better at this.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:16:50] I was thinking. When Al told me, I was thinking that he had, you had already interviewed him or had interviewed him. Al Foster.

Virginia Dawson [00:17:01] He isn’t, he won’t be interviewed. He says he doesn’t want to be interviewed. Maybe I’ll get him.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:17:13] Okay.

Virginia Dawson [00:17:16] Let’s get back to Moreland. Yeah. So Moreland was mixed race when you got there. And as you indicated, it went more, it became more Black as time went on.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:17:32] Right.

Virginia Dawson [00:17:32] Now, didn’t that give you a certain amount of power, you know, like you were involved in politics in getting the vote out.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:17:45] Power as to?

Virginia Dawson [00:17:47] As to voting power to get what you wanted from the city or maybe you got what you wanted?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:17:52] Well, it wasn’t, it really wasn’t too much that we were asking for at the time. We just moved in. We knew what the rules and regulations were. We didn’t have any problem with the city.

Virginia Dawson [00:18:06] Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:18:07] It was just some, city as a whole or like needing something and not getting it. And when I said some of the problems we were having, it just was, I guess, people, regular people, but not like we were asking for something for our area or for our homes or whatever, and we were denied or didn’t get it.

Virginia Dawson [00:18:33] Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:18:34] So I didn’t have that type of a problem.

Virginia Dawson [00:18:36] Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:18:38] There were, later on, there were a few things that we had asked for with Moreland, but it wasn’t about the homes. We were trying to do things for the neighborhood, like the playgrounds and stuff like that when they got. But we didn’t really have problems like that with the city. As a matter of fact, my husband was very active with the mayors with the last three, I think, starting with. See, I can’t even remember her name.

Virginia Dawson [00:19:13] Oh, Pat Mearns.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:19:14] Yeah, Pat Mearns.

Virginia Dawson [00:19:15] And then there was Judy Rossen.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:19:17] You’re right.

Virginia Dawson [00:19:17] Yeah.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:19:18] He was more closer to Pat, but Judy, he knew he worked with her, but he wasn’t as close to her as was with Pat. And then now with…

Virginia Dawson [00:19:30] Lichen. Carl Lichen. Yeah.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:19:33] So he worked with them more than, I didn’t work that much with the city, but so we didn’t have any problems in that case.

Virginia Dawson [00:19:46] What about Chelton Park? I understand you were involved in that, you know, creating that.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:19:51] Well, not so much creating that. We were involved. We lived directly across the street from Moreland, I mean, from the park. It was just land out there. Land. And the kids would go there, they would play ball. Baseball, I think. And the different teams from around the city that was close around, they would play over there with the schools. So then later they decided to develop it into a playground. So before that, what they would do is with the land just being there, in the winter, they would flood it so the kids could ice skate. So it would freeze and the kids would ice skate over there. And in the winter and in the summer, like I said, they would play baseball. But then when they decided that we were talking about really doing something with the children over there, and they decided they put swings and sliding boards on a very small basis. And then as more people came into the area, more younger families with younger kids, they tore down a couple of houses over there and expanded that lot, fenced it in, I mean, brick the- Put a wall up there and kind of closed it in and expanded the things that they wanted to put in it and really develop it, developed it into a playground. And then some of they would have staff over there to staff the playground. So it turned out to be a really nice thing. So, yeah, so we would suggest things and we would. I never worked over there, but, you know, we were across the street. Anything that went on that, you know, we thought need to be reported, we would. But it got to be developed into a real nice playground.

Virginia Dawson [00:22:02] Wow.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:22:03] So the only thing we couldn’t get that my husband really was trying to get was a basketball court, because the kids loved to come over there and they would just try to shoot hoops and everything, but they never had really had basketball courts. But other than that, it was a real nice playground.

Virginia Dawson [00:22:26] Wow. I’m trying to think of other questions about Moreland. The one thing that occurs to me is you don’t live in Shaker anymore.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:22:39] Right.

Virginia Dawson [00:22:40] And so that must have been a decision. And maybe you could tell me why.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:22:44] I mean. Oh, sure. Okay. My son graduated in ’70 from high school. Marcia graduated in ’71. And then she went on to attend Ohio State. And when she graduated from Ohio State and got involved with Stephanie running for our representative for the 11th district, Marcia was a chief up in Washington. And after, when Stephanie passed, they were asking her to run for that office. So by then she had moved to Warrensville. She had moved to Warrensville and she had bought out there. And…

Virginia Dawson [00:23:56] It’S logical.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:23:57] Yeah. So when she, so then she was out there for a while now after she moved there and was working, and when Stephanie passed and she decided, decided, you know, she would take that position, we talked about moving out there because she was out there, you know, and so we didn’t move right away. So then she ran for mayor. After she left Stephanie, she ran for mayor of Warrensville. And when she won that position, we did move out there when she became mayor of Warrensville, and that was why we moved out there, because she had a house. We moved out there in her house, and she had gotten her another house. And to be out there with her made sense to us. So that’s why we moved out there. So we were here. We were in Shaker for, well, like 20 some years.

Virginia Dawson [00:24:59] Yeah, sure.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:25:00] So then we’ve been out there now nine years, going on 10 years. So all the while she was married, she was mayor for all, it was almost nine or ten years she was mayor out there. And then when she, she ran twice and won twice, and then it was during the next term that she took the position with the…

Virginia Dawson [00:25:28] Wow.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:25:29] Congress. So that was really the reason that we left.

Virginia Dawson [00:25:35] Well, can you think of anything else about Shaker? I think, I chatted with your husband last night and he said that he’d run for mayor.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:25:47] He did

Virginia Dawson [00:25:47] Here, in Shaker.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:25:48] He did run here before we left at the same time. Leiken. First time, I think that Leiken ran. He ran against her.

Virginia Dawson [00:25:59] Oh, that’s interesting.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:26:02] So he wasn’t as well known as Leiken, who had been here and been around. So anyway, you know, he didn’t win, but he did run at same time, like I ran at the first, the first time he ran for mayor.

Virginia Dawson [00:26:15] Yeah.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:26:15] Yeah. So and then like I said, then after that, she was, you know, mayor. So then after that, you know, we. Well, that wasn’t the reason we moved because she was there. But it was a couple years after that that he ran that we moved out to Warrensville, So.

Virginia Dawson [00:26:40] No, that’s good. I think we sort of covered it well.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:26:44] I think so. I can.

Virginia Dawson [00:26:47] Let me see. Yep, it recorded perfectly.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:26:52] Oh, all right.

Virginia Dawson [00:26:55] Okay, press to unlock.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:26:57] Let’s see.

Virginia Dawson [00:26:57] I’ve got. Unlock it. Press home to open. Okay. Now I have to figure out how to turn it off. Okay, press home to open. Okay. There. Now I see, done.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:27:14] So the other word on Shaker. It wasn’t like I say, it wasn’t too much else that, most of it was centered around kids anyway, in the schools, which is what I had wanted. You know, the main reason for being here was the kids in the school. So, we weren’t involved that much. I wasn’t, because, like I said, I was working. And my husband did get involved more with counsel and everything. So other than that, I can’t really think of anything else either. I had made some notes, and I think we’ve covered them.

Virginia Dawson [00:27:58] Moreland Association. Did you get involved in that?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:28:01] I did. We didn’t have- Some of the areas had clubs, you know, neighborhood clubs. And at first we did not have one. So I was involved with Moreland and Moreland on the move. So, yeah, attending their meetings and was involved with that. But they were, they weren’t doing an awful lot that we could have hands on. We’d have our meetings, decide what we wanted to do and how we wanted to do it. So then the actual work most time came from we would report to the city or whatever we wanted, but we would meet and discuss whatever needed to be with Moreland on the move to try to help get things done. But we didn’t actually physically do a lot of it. We reported to the city and then they would either take care of it or meet with us to say whether they could or not. But I was involved with the meetings and with the Moreland move group.

Virginia Dawson [00:29:12] Do you remember when they built the service center? And the other thing that I was interested in was Sutton Place. It seemed to me, what I read anyway is in late ’60s, like ’67, they had this big plan to do urban renewal. And the service center was part of the urban renewal, and so is Sutton Place. Do you remember any of that?

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:29:38] I remember when they did the service because actually it, it was almost like, it was off Chagrin there, which is like a couple of streets down from Chelton street we lived on. And I do remember. And they tore down some houses to build it back there. I do remember when they did build it, and they tore down houses there, and then they moved some houses, you know, it was interesting to see the houses really being moved slowly, slowly, slowly, inch by inch, it looked like. But to make room for the area, they wanted to do the service department.

Virginia Dawson [00:30:24] I see.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:30:25] I don’t remember what year you said.

Virginia Dawson [00:30:28] I don’t know, it was like, in the early 70s. Around 75, I think.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:30:35] Yeah. I do remember when they did that, as a matter of fact. Well, naturally you knew some of the service people because they would come and do your rubbish, but some of the supervisors and everything. My husband had a real relationship with some of the, we knew about it and knew how it was work, how it was working and everything. So it was. It was good. But I just remember it happening.

Virginia Dawson [00:31:01] We weren’t involved. Yeah. Okay.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:31:04] So.

Virginia Dawson [00:31:04] And Sutton Place, you didn’t have any, like- Yeah, that went up kind of. It’s far from where you lived.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:31:14] Yeah, so. But I remember when it was happening.

Virginia Dawson [00:31:18] Yeah. Well, cool. I think we’ve covered it. This has been wonderful. Look at your notes and see if we haven’t-

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:31:39] Wow. I think so.

Virginia Dawson [00:31:42] Great.

Marian Garth-Saffold [00:31:50] Yep.

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