Abstract
In this 2025 interview, Gifted Garrett discusses his early life growing up in the Cleveland neighborhoods of Miles, Tremont, St. Clair-Superior, and Kinsman in the 1980s and 1990s. He describes how the Miles neighborhood has changed throughout the years. At the end of the interview, Garrett details his path to owning Kyrie’s Kafe, a restaurant located on Kinsman Road.
Interviewee
Garrett, Gifted (interviewee)
Interviewer
Carubia, Ava (interviewer)
Project
Union-Miles
Date
1-13-2025
Document Type
Oral History
Duration
32 minutes
Recommended Citation
"Gifted Garrett interview, 13 January 2025" (2025). Cleveland Regional Oral History Collection. Interview 483007.
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/crohc000/1355
Transcript
Ava Carubia [00:00:00] I’m recording now. My phone on do not disturb. All right, so today is January 13th, 2025. My name is Ava Carubia, and I’m here at NuPoint Development Corporation interviewing Gifted Garrett for the Cleveland Regional Oral History Project. Thank you for agreeing to be interviewed.
Gifted Garrett [00:00:20] No problem.
Ava Carubia [00:00:21] We’re at NuPoint Development Corporation in Cleveland, Ohio. And can you please state your name, your birth date, and where you were born for the record?
Gifted Garrett [00:00:29] My name is Gifted Garrett. I was born on […].
Ava Carubia [00:00:34] And where were you born?
Gifted Garrett [00:00:35] Born in Cleveland, Ohio.
Ava Carubia [00:00:36] What part in particular?
Gifted Garrett [00:00:38] The hospital that I was born at?
Ava Carubia [00:00:40] Yeah.
Gifted Garrett [00:00:40] Metro Hospital.
Ava Carubia [00:00:41] Okay. And what’s the cross streets for that. Do you remember?
Gifted Garrett [00:00:44] West 25th.
Ava Carubia [00:00:46] Okay. So what neighborhood did you grow up in?
Gifted Garrett [00:00:52] Miles. 131st. Kinsman, 116th.
Ava Carubia [00:00:58] So a lot of different places. You’ve moved around a lot.
Gifted Garrett [00:01:02] W 7th. Yeah
Ava Carubia [00:01:03] Wow. So can you talk a little bit about your early life?
Gifted Garrett [00:01:09] Well, my mom, we raised. I was. We was moving from, you know, as you said, house to house, you know, different places. So I stayed on 114th and Miles for a little while. I stayed on 131st and Cornell for a little while. I also stayed on 116th and Cromwell for a little while and 145th and Kinsman. So, and West 7th Projects, as well. So, I mean, each place where I stayed at was different times of my life. So I’m not sure what part you want to, you know, you’re interested in.
Ava Carubia [00:01:51] Well, I guess we can go before you were born, can you talk a little bit about how your family got to Cleveland?
Gifted Garrett [00:01:58] Okay. Born and raised. My family was born and raised in Cleveland. Well, of course not. My grandmother. My grandma’s from, I think, Alabama. So I guess my grandma came up here and she created the family with my grandfather. My mom has five siblings. My grandma has three girls and two boys. I think my mom is like the middle child. Second oldest? No, Third oldest. Middle child.
Ava Carubia [00:02:27] Okay. And then I guess talk about just like, really early, like, elementary school.
Gifted Garrett [00:02:33] My grandma was a, my grandma was a single parent. Mother separated from my grandfather, so she raised five kids. My mom is definitely a mama’s girl. So where my grandma go, she, you know, went. So the elementary school that I went to was Miles Elementary right down the street. Miles Wlementary was from far as back from I can remember. It was wild. You know, I was bad, very bad.
Ava Carubia [00:03:14] What year did you start school there?
Gifted Garrett [00:03:17] I was born in ’85, so ’90, 1990. I went to Miles Elementary, and it was fun. You know, I do remember, you know, kids still remember. I was so bad Everybody, they got pictures. Like, you remember when that guy in that picture–they like posting pictures on Instagram, like, old pictures. Like, “The guy in a blue shirt, his mom came to the school and whooped him in front of the class.” So they still remember that. But that’s just crazy. Like, he used to be real bad, so. Yeah, I really used to be bad. Yeah. So elementary was. I got, like. I remember it was. It was fun. So as a kid, it was fun. So, I mean, which I don’t think is a bad thing for schools, you know, I think you supposed to make schools fun. So I don’t remember as far as the control that they had or not, but I remember I was out of control. So that’s the part I remember.
Ava Carubia [00:04:12] Can you talk about any memories you have from elementary school?
Gifted Garrett [00:04:15] Of course. My mom whooping me in front of the class. That’s a memory for sure. I remember, like, during the winter times at Miles Elementary, that hole used to be like. It’s different now, but it used to be a dip in there. So during winter times, we used to come to school early just to, you know, play or play in the snow and, you know, do that.
Ava Carubia [00:04:44] [Recording pauses] All right, so you said that you would sled?
Gifted Garrett [00:04:46] Yeah, we would go, like, sledding and just play around and mess around outside. I also stayed on, like, where was we at on 106th? Yeah, that’s where we stayed at 116th and Miles. Yeah. So I used to walk to school. The neighborhood was friendly, you know, for the most part. You know, everybody took care of each other. So neighbors really was neighbors to each other. It wasn’t like how it is now, saturated type. Like, okay, this is your side, this is my side. I’m in my house. I’m minding my own business. People used to really look out for each other. So, you know, kids always protected at all times. Because even though it was adults around, whether it’s your mom or dad, they still protected the neighborhood because you see this particular. You see me every day and I see you every day. So they used to look out for adults. Used to look out for their neighborhoods a lot more back growing up.
Ava Carubia [00:05:57] So then where’d you go to middle school?
Gifted Garrett [00:05:59] Middle school I went to. I was staying on St. Clair across town, so I went to Spellacy. Margaret Spellacy. Margaret Spellacy. And that was a wild school. So it was crazy. Yeah, that school was wild. Yeah. So I went to my. I mean, Margaret Spellacy by the time. Yeah. I got to middle school. Yeah. My mom had moved from where? West 7th. I also went to Tremont as well. Elementary, that’s on West 7th. And then moved to around, across town, St. Clair on Rudyard. And I went to Margaret Spellacy. And middle school was pretty wild as well.
Ava Carubia [00:06:58] So since you moved around a lot, how would you compare Miles to the other areas that you lived in?
Gifted Garrett [00:07:10] Meaning?
Ava Carubia [00:07:12] Like, I don’t know, was there kind of a different feeling in each neighborhood that you lived in? Like, were the people who live there different?
Gifted Garrett [00:07:19] It was all, you know, because I. It was not suburban, so it was Cleveland. So it was all really the same. You set the environment, to be honest, you know, so I always made friends no matter where I went, and I set the stage. For the most part. I’m not sure everybody got the capability of doing that, but that was a gift that I had to be able to captivate whatever environment I was in and adapt to whatever environment I was in, make the best out of whatever environment I was in. So it really wasn’t, “Oh, I went to this neighborhood and,” like, West 7 Projects was. It was really bad. So I went to Miles and West 7 Projects was, I ain’t gonna say 100% different, but it was definitely a different type of mark of survival because I went from living in the house to stand-in projects. So now you gotta deal with different type of people, People really next door to you. Like, you know, it’s completely different. So. But honestly, I mean, that was fun as well. I made the best. I mean, I be making the best out of, you know, I was making the best out of bad situations. Well, I’m not gonna say bad situation. I’m just gonna say less common situations for the average individual. You get what I’m saying? So I can’t say less because sometimes people have to do what they have to do. So. And you got to make it and make the best out of it. So. So definitely, Miles was always, like I said. What I remember about Miles is everybody really took care of each other. Everybody. I don’t know what’s going on now, far as if that’s really going on, but, like, literally, I remember even on, right there on 114th and Miles, they used to have a hall. And every year, I used to. Used to be, like, on, on Easter, they used to have a dance contest for all the kids, you know, And I remember years going to, years of when me and my female cousin. So, like, stuff like that, you know, they threw things like that that the neighborhood was looking forward to. People in the neighborhood look forward to every Easter, bringing all the kids together, people eat and have fun in the dance contest, and you know. And that was every year. I remember that as well. Yeah.
Ava Carubia [00:10:08] Can you talk more about the places you go in the neighborhood or other events that were held for residents
Gifted Garrett [00:10:15] One more time?
Ava Carubia [00:10:17] Like talk about the businesses that were in the neighborhood growing up. That’s the first question I had.
Gifted Garrett [00:10:22] Okay. The businesses that was in the neighborhood when I was growing up was. It was a store, a corner store right on 114th and Miles. It was, of course, that gas station was always there. And they had a store called Poochie’s. It’s right across the street from Miles Elementary School. They also had an arcade, too. They had an arcade like right across the street from the school.
Ava Carubia [00:11:02] Would y’all go there?
Gifted Garrett [00:11:03] Yeah, we would leave there after school, go to the arcade. It’s like a candy store. That’s what I think it was. Like a candy store. We go to the candy store and buy like $0.01 pieces of candy, you know, like. So it was. And that’s not, you know, going on right now, you know, it was. It was kid friendly. Miles was definitely kid friendly. Now you, you. You really won’t want your kids walking up and down Miles. Cause anything could happen anytime. So like I said, people just looked out for each other, you know, versus now.
Ava Carubia [00:11:38] And then the second part of that question, what other events were going on besides the Easter thing you talked about? Were there other big celebrations like that that people went to or not really?
Gifted Garrett [00:11:51] Not that I can recall. But I’m sure that it’s definitely like festivals and things of that nature. I’m not sure if they did like a parade or something on that Miles that I can recall and that I can remember.
Ava Carubia [00:12:09] Thanks. So you started elementary school in 1990, you said, and you’ve talked a little bit about the changes you experienced. About what time did you feel like the neighborhood was changing?
Gifted Garrett [00:12:26] Of course, I was adult at the time, so I would probably say maybe around. Between. Maybe 2000. Okay, around 2000. I would say around 2000. Yeah, around 2000.
Ava Carubia [00:13:02] And could you specify exactly what those changes were?
Gifted Garrett [00:13:07] Just the unity disappeared in the neighborhood. And you have people that really don’t live in the neighborhood coming to the neighborhood and not respecting the neighborhood, which led to the people in the neighborhood not respecting their own neighborhood, you know, so that would be the only thing that I could possibly say, the reasoning for, you know, the change, you know. Cause you know, at the time you have homeowners owning their homes and families, you know, it was real family-oriented. So, like, we stayed in the front and then we had another family, our cousins that stayed in the back. So it was more family, you know, the person on the side, you know, the person. Family across the street. It was more family-oriented. So I was like, are these the Garrett’s? These the [unclear]? These the Joneses? You know, it was more family. So now it’s like you got people looking for homes and they’re just renting. So that’s what I think the part of the difference is. It’s a difference from people owning homes and people coming to rent home. So you got people that’s coming to rent homes in the midst of people coming to rent a home. They’re there for a temporary time rather than a year lease or two year lease. They’re there for two years, so they’re gonna make the best out of their two years, they don’t care if they’re coming to stay. And that’s just that versus a person who’s gonna sign the 30 year mortgage. This is our house forever, you know, till I die or, you know, so that’s part of the difference. The dynamics, the reasoning behind the outcome of how things was to how they are now.
Ava Carubia [00:15:01] So you were, for middle school you weren’t in the neighborhood, then. When did you come back?
Gifted Garrett [00:15:08] Probably like when I was maybe like 16. Okay, yeah, 16. But I got incarcerated when I was maybe like 13, so I did like three and a half years. But I accomplished my GED when I was incarcerated, so I didn’t have to go to school no more. I was, you know, so. Yeah.
Ava Carubia [00:15:33] And then, I mean, now you work at Kyrie’s. Can you talk a little bit about how-
Gifted Garett [00:15:37] I own it. I own it.
Ava Carubia [00:15:38] Oh, you own it? I didn’t even know that. I’m so embarrassed. But-
Gifted Garett [00:15:42] That’s okay.
Ava Carubia [00:15:43] But you own Kyrie’s. Can you talk a little bit about your pathway to that, how you got there?
Gifted Garrett [00:15:48] I actually, I’m just a serial entrepreneur, so I’m just into this independently, making my own money. And one of. This young man, that used to cut my hair, actually owned the building. And he told me that it was opportunity. He had a salon in a restaurant, but somebody took the restaurant. So I let him know, like, you know, once the restaurant is available, I would love to take advantage of that. I know nothing about cooking or anything. I just. I’m a serial entrepreneur. So I was like, all right, is this food? I’m selling food. I’ll figure it out. And it’s a salon next door. So it’s two for one. So people that’s getting their hair done, they could come next door and get food as well. So it was like a winning situation. But to make a long story short, I had put a lot of money into the main building. In the midst of putting money into the main building, he actually pulled some stuff where we had got into a debate or argument. In the midst of us getting into a debate or argument, he tried to tell me to leave his building, but. But I had signed a 10 year lease with the man, though. So he. I don’t know what he used to. Or what he was. I don’t know, but I’m like, I can’t. I’m never gonna. I did put all this money into your building. I’m never gonna get out the building. So it’s legal stuff happened. I ended it had to be like $15,000 in lawyer fees. Had to sue him. I ended up winning the lawsuit, you know, so that was my first project. But it was literally like right down the street from where the restaurant is now. So that was a complete loss for the most part. But it wasn’t. Because I got experience on what I wanted to do to the next location. So it was a help. So I was blessed to be able to, an opportunity came my way from where I’m at now. Chef Tony, he had. Was gone, he was leaving. He didn’t, moving to Orlando. And he told me that opportunity was coming. A young man, Akin, owned a building. And he said, you know, when it opened up, he was going to allow me to, you know, take, Take advantage of it and rent it out. So I end up renting out from him, put a lot of money into that building as well. And I definitely. It was an honor to me to have, to have that location because actually I was raised on 145th and Kinsman as well, from 16 on up. And I used to be very, you know, I used to be in the streets doing stuff that I shouldn’t be doing. And it was an honor to be able to show people and give people hope, you know, that’s probably going down the same path that I have went down to let them know that, you know, it’s possible, you know, we don’t have to break our neighborhoods down here. We can build our neighborhoods up. And it’s as simple as just having the idea and creating a business, whatever the business may be. So again, that opportunity came. I took advantage of it. We’ve been open almost three years now in June. Of course, the rest of my business is really, really hard, but I’ve been able to maintain and keep things, stand afloat, keep things going.
Ava Carubia [00:19:16] Can you speak more to, I guess, the challenges of owning a business and then also the things you really like about it?
Gifted Garrett [00:19:26] The challenges of owning a restaurant is like, for example, I’ll go into detail. When I first opened up, I didn’t know how to cook, not one thing. I was just going into it like, all right, I’m gonna pay everybody to do everything. Give a person a position to play, which in reality, I learned through trial and error that when owning a business, you have to do everything and you have to know how to do everything, and then you have to hire people to do it the way that you want them to do it. What I did was, I did it backwards. I hired people who to do things that I didn’t know how to do. So the reality of it is, if that person leave, my business is gone. It’s really not my business. Now I gotta find somebody, I gotta recreate. So I’ve been through trial and error. When I first opened up hiring, I was paying a cook like twelve hundred dollars a week. So all my money, my profit, all that stuff was really going to him. I didn’t even know he wasn’t even a cook. He was prepping my food. So he wasn’t even in there pitching the food. He was going there, just preparing all the food and leaving. And then I had to pay two other people, three other people, one person in the front, two people in the back, to serve the food. So it’s like I learned from that. Now I only got two people, got one in the front, one in the back. At the time, I didn’t know. So I was paying four people at the time. When I first opened up, I had people stealing from me because I didn’t have a system on how to process the orders. So she would actually ring, not ring the food up, but write the ticket, send it in the back, and keep my money. She would ring up what she wanted to ring up and keep what she wanted to keep. You know, if they was paying cards, she had to ring it up, of course. But if they was paying cash, she never had to ring it up. One thing she had to do was send the ticket back. But through the process of that, I caught her on camera. I figured it out, you know. But through that process, I was able to come up with a system. And the system is you ring the food up, you write it down on paper, you ring it up, just receipt, you staple it, and you send it in the back. And then I gave my kitchen instructions: you do not prepare no food or send no food out unless it has a white receipt attached to it. So that’s how I calculated, you know, my. My money coming in was. But I learned that. I learned the system. I figured out a system through her stealing from me. So if she never stole from me, I would have never had the system. So, I mean, trial and error is put in place. The same thing with the cook that I had in the beginning. If I wouldn’t have had him make me go through all that, I wouldn’t have been able to learn how to cook and do everything that I do. Because literally now I do everything, but I do it my way. So everybody that my staff that I employ now, I teach them how to do it my way, and they do it my way. So. So I got 100% control over my business, versus before. I didn’t have 100%. I didn’t even have zero percent control over, because another man was cooking my food and doing stuff his way. And then I had another young lady stealing from me, you know, So I literally had no control. I had a business, it was running, you know, And I literally made, like my first six months, un unknown business, unknown name in the hood. Made like $104,000 my first six months. So that was great money, but I didn’t make it. It was being taken from me, but I did make it, so. And that’s what was accounted for in record. So imagine how much money that she stole from that she didn’t bring up. That’s just $106,000, $104,000 rung up. So imagine, you know, what wasn’t rung up, the money that I was, you know. So I’m grateful for that. I’m definitely grateful for everything that I went through. [phone rings] Sorry about that. Yeah.
Ava Carubia [00:24:03] So then even through all of that, you’re still doing it. So there’s obviously good things. Can you talk about that?
Gifted Garrett [00:24:09] Oh, good things. Now I’m able to do everything on my own. I literally. I go in, I cook my own food. That’s the dude, he delivering the wood because I smoke my food. I used to pay somebody to smoke my food. I got a smoker, I own a smoker, but don’t even know how to use a smoker. So now. But then what happened with him? He ended up not being able to smoke my meat. But now I was like, I gotta do it, so I gotta figure it out. So. So I figured out how to prepare the wood, light the wood, how to smoke the meat, how to do everything. I didn’t know how to do none of this stuff. So the good things about it, the pros is that I’m really hands on 100% and know how to learn how to do everything. And I not only know how to do everything, I’m capable because I messed up so much during it. I learned how what not to do. So I know how to teach properly and teach everybody that’s under me or that I employ what not to do because of the things, the mess ups that I made. The community love, the food they’re grateful for, you know, the quality of business that I brought to the neighborhood. I just get an enjoyment out of seeing people from the neighborhood happy that we got something nice in the neighborhood. They don’t have to go outside the neighborhood to experience a quality food or quality dine-in restaurant.
Ava Carubia [00:26:01] Yeah, thank you. I have a couple more questions. I mean it’s. So you really grew up all around Cleveland.
Gifted Garett [00:26:10] Yeah.
Ava Carubia [00:26:12] I guess my question is how would you say Cleveland has impacted you, like, and also your path to doing business?
Gifted Garrett [00:26:21] How has it impact me?
Ava Carubia [00:26:23] Yeah.
Gifted Garrett [00:26:32] The rough times, you know, the rough times built me. The rough times built my character, to be honest. And without the rough times, I wouldn’t be, you know, who I am today, you know, also used to, like, I haven’t did it in since 2021, but I used to feed the community as well. So every Thanksgiving, so maybe for like six or seven years straight, I used to go on 145th and Kinsman and pay people to pay for the tent. Of course, the first year I didn’t start off like that. We used to walk around, we used to have, we had crates and stuff. I mean, have a table, you know, because God has put something in me as far as to give back, you know what I’m saying? So, yeah, I used to feed the community for like seven years, like literally every Thanksgiving. But how Cleveland has impacted me was allowing me to go through the trial and error, to become the impactful individual that I am now and to have a heart to want to not want the up and coming young men and young women to go through the experiences that I experienced. So I guess that will be something. How one of the main source of how Cleveland impacted me is based, the trials. You know, it’s not always bad. It seems like it’s bad, but it’s, you know, you won’t know fire hot unless you stick your hand on there and feel it’s hot. But guess what? You would never stick your hand on there again, you know, versus you know, you not understanding so, you know, Cleveland has allowed me to go through my experiences to teach me how to become a productive, successful man.
Ava Carubia [00:28:51] My next question kind of relates to that. What message would you leave for future generations?
Gifted Garrett [00:28:59] I would say that put God first. That’s the key to everything, is God. I would say accept trial and error, you know, because things is not working, Things is not happening to you, Things are working for you. I would tell them to understand that no matter what they going through is really working for you. It’s not really happening to you. So just accept it and understand that it’s for the better. Because if I was to take back anything that I’ve been through, I wouldn’t be the person that I am today. I wouldn’t have the heart that I have. I wouldn’t. You know, it’s a lot of things that took to happen to me in order for me to go through that, in order for me to be exactly who I am today. So I would just tell them just to again, put God first, stay consistent in whatever it is that they want to do. Tunnel in and lock-in to whatever they want to do. Of course things will change, but whatever it is they want to do at that particular time, just do it. And if something else end up happening in the midst of it, focus on that. Don’t try to focus on multiple things at a time because it won’t work. So, yeah, I would just tell them again, put God first. Stay consistent in whatever they doing. Lock-in to whatever they doing. Don’t allow their environment to control their thoughts and how far they’re capable of going. You know, because, you know, it’s a lot of minorities that’s really rich and famous right now. And believe it or not, it ain’t always the ones that’s fortunate that really make it. It’s the most, the one, the minorities that really make it because it’s the hunger that builds them up to get them there. So, yeah, I’m gonna just say, yeah, just continue to, continue to just, you know, put God first and just, you know, understand the sky’s the limit. Don’t let you know nobody put a roof on, you know, your dreams or your goals or whatever it may be. You don’t allow situations, bad situations to happen to discourage you. Always stay encouraged and understand that everything working again for you, not to you. So don’t look at as like you being victimized because you’re really not being victimized. You’re really just being built up, you know, to take it to your next level.
Ava Carubia [00:31:42] Well, those are all the questions I have today. And I really appreciate you being so open. Do you have anything else you want to add that I didn’t ask you about?
Gifted Garrett [00:31:54] I’m here for you, so.
Ava Carubia [00:31:56] And I appreciate it. Yeah, well, that’s all I have, so I’m going to end this interview.
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