Abstract
Kay Fuller, a founding member of the Shaker Lakes Nature Center, discusses the "Shaker Freeway Fight," in which a coalition of local activists successfully stopped the construction of a new highway through Shaker Lakes during the 1960s. This experience laid the groundwork for the creation of the Nature Center. Fuller discusses many changes over the years at the Nature Center, including alteration of the landscape, educational programming, and an abandoned plan to build an $8.5 million Shakespearean theater in the park (the money was later redirected to development of the North Coast Harbor district in downtown Cleveland).
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Interviewee
Fuller, Kay (interviewee)
Interviewer
Smith, Nancy King (interviewer)
Project
Shaker Lakes Nature Center
Date
9-27-2006
Document Type
Oral History
Duration
38 minutes
Recommended Citation
"Kay Fuller Interview, 27 September 2006" (2006). Cleveland Regional Oral History Collection. Interview 902012.
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/crohc000/229
Transcript
Nancy King Smith [00:00:01] This is Kathryn Fuller. I’m Nancy King Smith and Emma is the technical person on this on September 27, 2006. We’re interviewing at the Nature Center. And Kay, I know you’re from this area. Could you tell a little bit about where you grew up and sort of your beginnings in life?
Kay Fuller [00:00:30] Oh my. Well, I’m very proudly a fifth-generation Clevelander, and I grew up in Cleveland Heights in the wintertime and Bay Village in the summertime. We were very fortunate to have a big old cottage right on the bank of the lake in Bay Village, where we spent about five months of the year. And then we had the advantages of the Cleveland Heights educational system to go through school.
Nancy King Smith [00:01:04] Mm hmm. Sounds like a great combination.
Kay Fuller [00:01:05] It was.
Nancy King Smith [00:01:07] Do you have any particular memory of perhaps either Cleveland Heights or Bay Village, of something that impressed you about the outdoors?
Kay Fuller [00:01:17] Well, of course, we were impressed when the Lower Shaker Lake froze over because we were hoping that we would get a chance to ice skate. And we did, occasionally, especially on New Year’s Day, if we convinced our parents we really wanted to go. And then we were glad when we were allowed to ride our bikes up this way. My family rented mainly and we went to the Roxboro Schools. So we were very aware of the Doan creek and the brook and probably visited down below there more often than our parents knew.
Nancy King Smith [00:02:01] Do you remember any of those adventures of exploring or what things looked like or what you did?
Kay Fuller [00:02:11] Well, I remember I was fascinated with the rocks and also the water. And we were interested in how the stream maneuvered and went around the rocks because we had had a stream near the cottage at Bay Village, and we tried to divert the waters in various ways there. So that was mainly it.
Nancy King Smith [00:02:44] So moving back and forth, you had both [the lake] and the park and brook experience.
Kay Fuller [00:02:53] And of course, that way we also knew the lakefront because we would ride back and forth as near to the lakefront in those days as we could get. So we appreciated all the wild outside attributes of the city of Cleveland.
Nancy King Smith [00:03:16] What year were you born?
Kay Fuller [00:03:18] I was born in 1918. I was the last person. Well, my mother was the last person admitted to the Lakeside Hospital because of the flu epidemic. So we felt very lucky that way.
Nancy King Smith [00:03:37] That’s interesting. Well, then, from growing up in this area and being very familiar with the Doan Brook or creek, tell us about how you stayed involved or got re involved.
Kay Fuller [00:03:54] Well, I always, of course, cared about nature, and so it was easy to care about the outdoors and that sort of thing. And then I took all the science courses that I could find that dealt with the outdoors and geology and that sort of thing. Then I, of course, became interested in the garden club. And my mother was a member of the garden club, Village Garden Club, which was formed to plant cherry trees at Horseshoe Lake as a memorial, so that I had Horseshoe Lake familiarity too. And from there I got interested in, of course, gardening myself and then, therefore, the environment. And that led to the garden club meeting that Mrs. Croxton called. Well, not just the Village Garden Club. She had eleven persons from various garden clubs. And she told us then about the threat of the freeway. And that was the time at which we decided that we better do something about fighting it.
Nancy King Smith [00:05:25] Go ahead and tell us more about your involvement in all of that.
Kay Fuller [00:05:29] Oh, gracious. Well, we formed what we called the Park Conservation Committee of Greater Cleveland. We didn’t want to be designated just with the Shaker Lakes area. We decided very early on that it meant talking about this problem to every group that we could find. So we designated PTAs and all sorts of clubs, church groups. I can remember giving a geology lecture to, I guess it was a Calvary Church group, which was down at 79th and Euclid. But still there were people very much from the Heights who cared about it. And when they heard that there would be a freeway through here, they were aghast because everyone enjoyed the lake. And the reason we drove back and forth along Lower Lake and on up to Horseshoe was because they were so beautiful. So the threat of a freeway and obliterating them was just more than people could bear. It was amazing that practically no group would turn us down if we wanted to tell about the threat so that we were able to reach many people. And then, of course, the big meeting at Byron Junior High was dramatic. And about that time I started going to the NOACA meetings, Northern Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency, and there Albert Porter was the reigning person. And he used to speak about how beautiful the highway would be and how effective it would be. And then somehow, I don’t know where I got the nerve to get up and refute his activities in his remarks and tell him how desecrating it would be to the beauty that everybody else enjoyed.
Nancy King Smith [00:08:00] On the way over, you were mentioning that your family’s reaction, say a little bit more about that.
Kay Fuller [00:08:08] Well, my family always had thought of me as a very quiet, shy person. So they were very much surprised when I did stand up and speak against things. My husband used to say before each party, Do you have your soapbox with you? Because he always expected me to buttonhole somebody about the- And I did because I met people who were influential citizens who hadn’t heard about it, and it was my pleasure to inform them and have them aware what was going on.
Nancy King Smith [00:08:51] Now, the big meeting at Bayer in which so many people turned out for. Do you have any specific memories of that you could share?
Kay Fuller [00:09:03] I really don’t remember the program all that thoroughly. I do remember that people were quiet and attentive and really very respectful and listened carefully to those who spoke. And it was not a long meeting, but it was very effective. I can just remember many cars and people.
Nancy King Smith [00:09:30] Apparently it was overflowing.
Kay Fuller [00:09:32] Yes.
Nancy King Smith [00:09:33] Well, the Park Conservation Committee continued. Why don’t you tell us a little more about some of the other projects that the committee worked on?
Kay Fuller [00:09:45] Well, we worked on many projects. It was called the Park Conservation Committee of Greater Cleveland because we wanted people to realize that we weren’t just focusing on the Shaker Lakes alone. And so if there was a park threatened and we found out about it, we made our voices heard about opposition to the threat. The one particular one that again stands out in my mind was the threat of a Shakespeare Theater in the upper area of Edgewater Park. It would have taken one third of the whole upper acreage of the park there. There was a plan to have a large ornate restaurant as part of the theater. They couldn’t figure out what they would do about the parking, so they were talking about underground parking. Well, of course, that amused me because it’s shale cliffs and not conducive to building underground construction of any kind. And then also the fact that the only persons who would enjoy the views, the beautiful views of the lake and of the city from that area, would be the director, Vincent Dowling, and the people who were working on the plays themselves. So we were, again, fortunate enough to learn about meetings that were being held on the west side. And I would carefully go, or I asked Roger White and some other committee members to accompany me, and we would talk again against desecrating that park. So we were delighted when they took the $8.5 million off of the state budget which they had designated for the theater. And it was enough of a blow, apparently, that Vincent Dowling very quickly left Cleveland. He’d given up on the Shakespeare Theater here at all. But my husband then had the bright idea that that $8.5 million could go to constructing the North Coast Harbor. So he suggested I give a letter to Richard Celeste, who was then the governor, and who was coming to break ground for a bathing edifice. So I did, I suggest eight and a half being taken off the agenda of the state. And it was done, which was very gratifying. And then that was used to build the North Coast Harbor.
Nancy King Smith [00:13:04] Well, in terms of raising your family around here, let’s come back to the Shaker parklands and any memories you have where you lived and sort of your contact with the parklands as the years wore on.
Kay Fuller [00:13:22] As the years went on, of course, bringing up the children, we had to always caution them not to cross North Park Boulevard by themselves and certainly not even with other young people to always have an adult along because we were afraid of them falling down some precipitous cliffs that were right there near Roxboro School. But later on, they all loved the park. And my daughter, particularly when we lived in Shaker Heights, used to take her books over to Horseshoe Lake and study. And I wasn’t sure whether I thought that was the safest thing to do, but she said, oh, yes, I’m fine. We had, the Village Garden Club, had big rocks moved by the cities of Cleveland Heights and Shaker Heights to the parks so that people could sit on something. We didn’t want to have benches all around because that looks too civilized. So the cities had a couple big boulders or more than that that they agreed to set, and some of them are still where they were placed, which was interesting.
Nancy King Smith [00:14:47] Yeah. And along with having the freeway stopped, the Nature Center got going.
Kay Fuller [00:14:54] Oh, yes.
Nancy King Smith [00:14:54] What was your involvement with the Nature Center early on?
Kay Fuller [00:14:57] Well, to begin with, Jean Eakin and Mary Elizabeth Croxton and I felt that we would have to involve Cleveland, Cleveland Heights, and Shaker Heights in the park and the jurisdiction thereof, because it was in all three cities and we wanted them to share equally so that that park was edifying. And therefore it just led to the fact that people were teaching their children about the park and the flora and fauna, so it really made sense to have a nature center, to have a place where the focal point could be the instruction of nature areas.
Nancy King Smith [00:15:58] And were you involved in any of the planning for the Nature Center or anything else after it got going?
Kay Fuller [00:16:06] Oh, yes, along with everyone else. We wanted, of course, it to be an unobtrusive building and not any larger than necessary to do what it had to do. We were interested in that point in getting rid of the boat club, because the canoe club had been very shoutingly commercial, it seemed to us. So that was demolished because it was failing and would have had to have a lot of reconstruction.
Nancy King Smith [00:16:59] And were your children grown by the time the Nature Center got going, or did they participate at all?
Kay Fuller [00:17:08] Oh, they participated, and I can’t remember that they were the right age for the classes. But they would come over here often on their own and ride their bikes particularly. And of course they were interested in the adding of the fish to the Lower Lake and the nature care because they cared about keeping things going as long as possible.
Nancy King Smith [00:17:48] Do you have a favorite memory of activities at the Nature Center from any period of time?
Kay Fuller [00:17:59] Gracious.
Nancy King Smith [00:18:01] Or one or two or three.
Kay Fuller [00:18:04] Of course, I enjoyed the first Party in the Park. We thought that was stupendous. Other than that, it’s just been interesting to find out what the Nature Center has focused on in the way of nature study around the area as compared to what we knew about and the effort to keep the creeks in the Doan Brook as natural as possible.
Nancy King Smith [00:18:43] You participated on the Joint Committee on Doan Brook for all those years. Anything, you’d like to share about that experience?
Kay Fuller [00:18:55] I can’t think of anything.
Nancy King Smith [00:18:56] That’s right. Is there anything that sort of surprised or disappointed you about how the Nature Center evolved and the things that happened here?
Kay Fuller [00:19:10] Oh, no. I have been delighted that it’s been so successful. Once in a while. It seemed to me that it was becoming more civilized than I would have cared for. But on the other hand, I understood because it was being used year round, that it had to meet all sorts of weather and activities, and I can’t think of anything that perturbed me particularly.
Nancy King Smith [00:19:46] I know your family has continued to be involved in nature, enjoying the outdoors. Can you tell us a little bit about National Wildlife and some of the things you what your children and grandchildren relationship to nature has been?
Kay Fuller [00:20:02] Well, of course, the National Wildlife Federation camp experiences were wonderful for me, and the children took me along. And actually my husband too, when he was around, we were very impressed with the lectures that would be given at those group meetings because they would have college professors. And the children loved the experiences. And of course, it was all the way from babes in arms to elderly people. And we sometimes ate together and we often ate separately. And the children each year, teenagers particularly, would look forward to going again to the Wildlife Federation and meeting their old friends from the year before. And that was a wonderful experience. Also, one particular time impressed me. One of my grandsons came up to me and he said, we just heard the most wonderful talk about Indians, Grandma. And we heard oh so many things about them. We hope that you will have a chance too. You know, you’ve got to have that. Well, fortunately, it was scheduled on our program also, so we heard about it.
Nancy King Smith [00:21:38] How have you seen the flora and fauna change in the many years that you’ve been around the parklands?
Kay Fuller [00:21:47] Well, of course the trees keep growing and growing and growing [laughs] and it’s stupendous how big they get. And of course it hurts when we lose a favorite one, but that’s understandable. I’m of course concerned about pollution and the water quality of the lake and the area particularly, and have been involved in urging people to take it easy on pesticides and chemicals that would harm the environment.
Nancy King Smith [00:22:33] If you had a wish going forward for the Nature Center and/or the parklands, what would it be?
Kay Fuller [00:22:44] Well, I think that I would wish that they could easily help many, many more Clevelanders enjoy the parks or maybe inspire some far suburbs to erect their own nature centers and have programs that would help the children because I know it’s a long way for some of them to come here.
Nancy King Smith [00:23:19] Emma, do you have some things that you want to-
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:23:23] I have a couple of questions. When you were talking about Edgewater Park and the plans for the Shakespeare Theatre, do you remember what year that was, or generally what, when, who?
Kay Fuller [00:23:35] Ho, ho, ho. Isn’t that terrible? I can’t right offhand. Well, the North Coast Harbor was dug when?
Nancy King Smith [00:23:48] In the ’80s, late ’80s, I think. But I’m not positive it was after I was here and I didn’t come until ’81.
Kay Fuller [00:23:59] It would have been early on, long before 2000.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:24:08] Now. And you’re talking about the kind of evolution of the Nature Center and how it started off more rustic and then they did some winter modifications and things for it to be used all year round. Can you just describe for me what the building physically looked like when it first started?
Kay Fuller [00:24:37] Can you remember?
Nancy King Smith [00:24:39] I wasn’t here. But what are some of the changes that you noted?
Kay Fuller [00:24:46] Well, it seemed to me that they had more rustic logs around and- Of course not so many well groomed walks and areas.
Nancy King Smith [00:25:05] Did you think building the All People’s Trail was a good thing or not?
Kay Fuller [00:25:11] Oh, absolutely, absolutely. Because I’ve had many friends who could only go on that, who enjoyed the area, but they weren’t able to go on the other walks. It’s been a while since I’ve gone on the other walks. Will you take me sometime?
Nancy King Smith [00:25:30] Yes, yes.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:25:34] Can you share with us maybe a very special wildlife encounter or something that you’ve sighted here that, just kind of, that you were excited about?
Kay Fuller [00:25:48] It’s going to take a little thought. Well, one thing I remember was the diversity of some of the frogs that I’d seen around the area, and occasionally a snake that I had never seen before would turn up.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:26:20] Have you seen a change in terms of, like, frog diversity or things like that throughout the years? I mean, they’re one of the most, I guess, you know, species that feels pollution.
Kay Fuller [00:26:34] Well, I’ve just noticed there are fewer, many fewer frogs and little animals like that along the trails and edges of the lake.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:27:03] Just, when you were talking about the beginning of the Village Garden Club and the planting of the cherry trees at Horseshoe Lake and you said that they were being planted to commemorate something, what were they in commemoration of?
Kay Fuller [00:27:17] People’s lives. If a member died, in May we had a special meeting and at that time we would dedicate the tree to that person’s memory.
Nancy King Smith [00:27:30] And that’s still happening, isn’t it?
Kay Fuller [00:27:31] Oh, yes. Oh, yes, absolutely.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:27:40] Has it branched out to areas other than around Horseshoe Lake, or are they still primarily-
Kay Fuller [00:27:45] It still isn’t mainly there. We didn’t want to become too civilized all over the park, so we picked that south side, particularly, of Horseshoe Lake, to put our efforts in.
Nancy King Smith [00:28:07] We didn’t talk about the Women’s Committee and Friends. Were you involved in those activities?
Kay Fuller [00:28:16] Well, I was involved somewhat. That was a time when I was also very involved with family, not emergencies, but necessities. And I had in-laws and my own parents to help care for so that I didn’t have opportunity to spend the time that I would have. But I enjoyed the Friends meetings when I could make them.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:28:50] What are the Friends meetings? I don’t know.
Nancy King Smith [00:28:55] Go ahead. You can describe. The Friends originally was the Women’s Committee, and then a number of years ago became Friends, and they put on informational programs, slideshows and presentations on a whole variety of wildlife and places to visit and all kinds of things, as well as helped run various fundraisers over the years. Squirrel’s Nest was a sale and helped with parties in the park and those things. Are there things that we haven’t touched on either in the freeway fight or your memories of living in the area or with the nature center that come to mind that you’d like to share?
Kay Fuller [00:29:55] Isn’t that terrible? Not right off hand.
Nancy King Smith [00:29:57] It’s alright. Not terrible. You’ve said a lot.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:30:01] I just have one other. Just thought of it, thinking about Doan Brook and not. Not just specifically around the lakes, but have you seen what changes have you seen the brook itself as it passes through the area?
Kay Fuller [00:30:19] Of course, we deplored the building of the channels, the concrete barriers along the edges, because I still feel that that’s naturally a floodplain. It’s the end of the Appalachian Mountains and therefore the water should be allowed to disperse as it needs when the creek overflows. Of course, I realize that that impedes the traffic along MLK, but that’s something they should have realized way back.
Nancy King Smith [00:31:03] Did you feel you could let your kids- Well, you played in the creek, and did you feel comfortable enough with it that your kids could play in it?
Kay Fuller [00:31:14] Well, we never were close enough at the right time. See, we were in Bay Village, and there they were playing in the creek. So, that’s where they had their experience.
Nancy King Smith [00:31:29] In your married life, you lived in Bay Village originally, after you were married?
Kay Fuller [00:31:37] No.
Nancy King Smith [00:31:37] Okay.
Kay Fuller [00:31:38] No. We moved to Shaker Heights, and we lived 32 years in Shaker, first in the upper half of a double house on Kenyon, and then we moved to Kenmore, bought a house, and then we moved to Morley when I inherited more in-laws. And we kept the syllable, as you notice, of the street name each time, which tickled me. But the only syllable left was Lee. And I said, john, I don’t think I want to move to Lee Road. But we went back to Denton, which was where my mother and father had built. And of course, that was just across the street from the park. So, we were very close to the park. In fact, I used to take walks occasionally once in a while with Walter Kelly because he was in an apartment down there.
Nancy King Smith [00:32:48] Oh really? I didn’t know that.
Kay Fuller [00:32:49] And I used to say, Walter, you know, if you have an interesting walk that you’re going on, let me know. And so we enjoyed the park that way.
Emma Yanoshik-Wing [00:33:03] Who is Walter Kelly?
Kay Fuller [00:33:05] Ex-Mayor of Shaker Heights. And he was very active on the committee, the joint committee.
Nancy King Smith [00:33:19] And with- He was a lawyer, so he did a lot with the leases and legal work. Just thinking of some other things. Who are some of the people along the way that have influenced you or made, felt you enjoyed having contact with?
Kay Fuller [00:33:53] You really got me.
Nancy King Smith [00:33:55] Okay. That’s alright. I mean, you worked with Mary Elizabeth Croxley.
Kay Fuller [00:34:01] Oh, yes. Well, I enjoyed it.
Nancy King Smith [00:34:03] Tell us a little about her, because she obviously is no longer living to talk to.
Kay Fuller [00:34:06] And she was a very small woman who was married late in life, but did build her house with her husband. Right, not on the bank, but across North Park from the Lower Shaker Lake. So she learned to love the lake early. She had no children. She was interesting in that she could talk with people, but speaking in front of a large group, she wasn’t so comfortable because she didn’t have much of a voice. So she would let me do her speaking for you and also write letters. I had to write all the letters because she didn’t care to do it. That’s why you have so many notebooks out there. And then of course, Jean Eakin was just very enthusiastic and vociferous about the wildlife and the birds and hands-on nature.
Nancy King Smith [00:35:29] Well, we have covered a lot of ground.
Kay Fuller [00:35:31] Of course I told you about my son-in-law, what he does.
Nancy King Smith [00:35:35] Talk about him.
Kay Fuller [00:35:36] I should?
Nancy King Smith [00:35:37] Yes, I think you should.
Kay Fuller [00:35:39] Oh. Well, my daughter is thrilled to be married to a man who is employed by the County of Larimer in Colorado. And his job is to find open space or to talk the farmer, the ranchers, out of acreage so that Larimer County can acquire open space. He has $44 million a year to spend on purchasing this land from the ranchers. And then he and my daughter go out every weekend and hike on some of the open land that he has found, discovered. And he also took me out there too, when I was visiting them. I had a chance to go and see the- And this land that’s not only Larimer County, it’s all over the state. So it’s very interesting.
Nancy King Smith [00:36:49] That is. Have any of your grandchildren gone into environmental work of any kind? Nature?
Kay Fuller [00:36:57] Well, let’s see, right this minute- Of course Carolyn is involved with her husband, and her children, of course, reap the benefits of that too. But I can’t say specifically. They’re sailors, they love to sail and love the outdoors. Carol lives in Fort Collins and their home overlooks a lake and the mountains beyond. So it’s just a gorgeous spot. The sun sets over the mountains and the moon sets over the mountains.
Nancy King Smith [00:38:01] Okay, well, I thank you.
Kay Fuller [00:38:04] I hope-
Nancy King Smith [00:38:05] You’ve been wonderful, talked about so many things, and so really appreciate it.
Kay Fuller [00:38:11] Well, thank you.
Nancy King Smith [00:38:13] Emma, thank you.
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