Abstract
Oral history interview with Robert Cavano, a lifelong Cleveland resident born in the 1920s. Cavano served as City Club president in 1976 and was a member from 1970-2004. The interview documents his observations of the club's evolution from its original Short Vincent location through major institutional changes including the admission of women's in 1972, notable speakers and controversial forums, and the City Club's role in Cleveland's political discourse during periods of significant social change including school desegregation, mayoral elections featuring Carl Stokes and Dennis Kucinich, and the city's economic transformation from industrial manufacturing to medical and educational sectors. Cavano provides firsthand accounts of the club's famous "Soviet Table" and "Sanhedrin Table" political discussions, memorable speakers including Dr. Helen Caldicott and Dr. William Shockley, and reflects on the club's historical function as an inclusive forum for free speech in contrast to Cleveland's more exclusive social clubs that practiced religious and racial discrimination.
Loading...
Interviewee
Cavano, Robert (interviewee)
Interviewer
Humphrey, Tom (interviewer); Estrin, Rachel (participant)
Project
City Club - Civil Rights
Date
8-3-2004
Document Type
Oral History
Duration
67 minutes
Recommended Citation
"Robert Cavano interview, 03 August 2004" (2004). Cleveland Regional Oral History Collection. Interview 807003.
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/crohc000/804
Transcript
Tom Humphrey [00:00:01] And now we’re recording. So I’m gonna start off by saying that we’re at the City Club with Robert Cavano. It is August 3, 2004, and this is part of the City Club Oral History Project in which me, Tom Humphrey, and Rachel Estrin, are interviewing longtime members of the City club for its 100th anniversary. Okay, so I think we’re ready to go. We’ll get to the- I think some issues about the City Club in a little bit, but- Did you grow up in Cleveland?
Robert Cavano [00:00:37] Yes, I was born in Cleveland more than 80 years ago. Lived here all of my life, except three years traveling, no expense, tour of the world with the U.S. Army in World War II and two years doing graduate work at Columbia. So in the five years I’ve been in Cleveland, all my life.
Tom Humphrey [00:01:04] And when were you in New York? Were you in New York after, right after World War II?
Robert Cavano [00:01:09] Yes. Thanks to the World War II veterans’ benefits.
Tom Humphrey [00:01:14] Yeah. They made you earn that, though, right?
Robert Cavano [00:01:17] Yeah. You took a few risks, but that was a good war, at least from our point of view.
Tom Humphrey [00:01:24] Right, right. They just don’t hand out those GI Bills. So I guess I’ll ask the eternal question that separates Clevelanders. Did you grow up on the east side or the west side?
Robert Cavano [00:01:36] I grew up on the east side in the League Park - Hough area. And then my father was a real estate broker, and his business took him more and more to the west side, so we moved to the West Park area of Cleveland.
Tom Humphrey [00:01:53] What kind of work did you do? You went to Columbia Graduate School for a degree in.
Robert Cavano [00:01:58] I went to Columbia for a graduate study in mathematical statistics and had none other than a probability professor named Jack Wolfowitz, whose son Paul took different directions than his father. But then I ran out of money and needed a job, and I took a job in the chemical industry, and I stayed in that all my life as a manufacturer of water treatment chemicals.
Tom Humphrey [00:02:35] Okay. And you worked for somebody in Cleveland?
Robert Cavano [00:02:38] I worked for someone and then later started my own company.
Tom Humphrey [00:02:42] Okay. Okay. The probability. That course is the downfall of many math majors.
Robert Cavano [00:02:48] Yes. Had I remained in the field, I might have become an actuary. And then when you would say to me, should I have my chairs reupholstered? How many years do I have left? Will I get the wear out of them? I would have to say, maybe you should, because on the average. But some of us were looking for more certainty in the harder scientific fields.
Tom Humphrey [00:03:18] Right, Right. When you moved back to Cleveland, it was in the late 40s, early 50s.
Robert Cavano [00:03:25] Moved back to Cleveland in 1951.
Tom Humphrey [00:03:28] Can you kind of describe the city a little bit for us at the. At that time? Can you remember what it was like in the immediate post War? I guess it would have been during the Korean War as well.
Robert Cavano [00:03:38] Yes, things had, as a result of FHA programs, post war programs, which allowed people to buy houses in outlying areas. The downtown area had become less vital than it originally was. Playhouse Square was not, but there were still stores. You could walk along Euclid Avenue, right across the street from where we are now, and there might be, in this stretch of two blocks, four men’s shoe stores. So you could at lunchtime walk along and look at the same pair of shoes for a month or two before you had the money to buy them. But now there don’t seem to be any stores you can walk to. And so much of the shopping is in suburban areas. But it’s changed quite a bit. And in those same days, people would walk from their law offices or banking or accounting offices to lunch at the City Club or the Athletic Club or the Union Club. And you don’t seem to see those groups of people moving back and forth anymore. They either have their lunches in their offices or they go to a food court in the Terminal or dining club at Bank One Building. And we’ve seen that in the City Club in the old days, there were the common tables, the Soviet Table, named because it was allegedly liberal, and the Sanhedrin Table, because these were the wise men who thought carefully and conservatively. And each day people would come and sit around and have general discussions. And I don’t think there’s as much of that going on as there used to be. I think the City Club is more a Friday lunch and special forum type of thing. So it’s a destination choice rather than a habitual regular choice.
Tom Humphrey [00:05:51] Did the two tables square off? The Sanhedrin Table and the Soviet Table?
Robert Cavano [00:05:56] Not exactly, but they were politically different. But a lot of the people at the Sanhedrin Table, as things got so quiet and boring and they fell into their soup, they decided they would move over to the Soviet table for a little more excitement. And some of the other people who came to the Soviet Table who just wanted a lunch and a little peace and quiet, found it too noisy and tendentious. So there was a little interchange.
Tom Humphrey [00:06:27] So there was more eating at the Sanhedrin Table and more talking at the Soviet Table?
Robert Cavano [00:06:31] Yes, yes, indeed. And this was the beginning of the farce about the City Club being liberal, right? City Club was never liberal. It was an awful Lot of angry, difficult, argumentative people. But in the good old days, it never had a point of view, and I don’t think it does today.
Tom Humphrey [00:06:54] Right.
Robert Cavano [00:06:54] It’s just a judgmental call as to who shall speak and who shall be available on a particular time or what issue is interesting.
Tom Humphrey [00:07:03] Right. That’s funny. The Sanhedrin Table. I’ve not heard of the Sanhedrin Table. Of course, the Soviet Table is commemorated, slammed up on the wall, replete with names.
Robert Cavano [00:07:17] Well, I think there was also an educator’s table, because much of the time the City Club was fairly close to the Cleveland Board of Education. So that was, of course, a much quieter table than either one of the others because they had to come up for school every once in a while.
Tom Humphrey [00:07:40] That’s right. That’s right. They’re not going to. And they know who the voter base is. That’s right. Well, I’ve not heard of the Sanhedrin table. The Soviet table gets a lot of press, and that’s probably why the City Club, or at least for a while, maybe still does have somewhat of a. A reputation as being a little left of center. Although the City Club tries to.
Robert Cavano [00:08:04] Well, of course, the early years, you must recognize that the City Club was a haven for people who were rejected by other clubs. Anti-Semitism, happily a little less than it used to be. But if you were Jewish, you couldn’t join the Union Club or the Cleveland Athletic Club, and I don’t know how many other clubs. So the City Club was for people who didn’t want to join the Commerce Club. So it had that feeling of a little, let’s say, resentment or wanting to take on the establishment and challenge it.
Tom Humphrey [00:08:57] The City Club has been interracial for a long time, or I think almost right from the beginning.
Robert Cavano [00:09:02] Yes, it has. I don’t think it ever had any problems of that type. But let’s see. When were women admitted to the City Club?
Rachel Estrin [00:09:10] 1972.
Robert Cavano [00:09:12] 1972? That was rather an embarrassment to many of us. The Citadel of Free Speech.
Tom Humphrey [00:09:18] And you were president in ’76. So when did you join? We’ll go right back to that.
Robert Cavano [00:09:24] I joined in 1970.
Tom Humphrey [00:09:26] Okay. Had you thought about joining the City Club before then?
Robert Cavano [00:09:31] I had earlier, but most of my working career, my place of business was on Scranton Road in the Tremont area of Cleveland. So every time I came to the City Club, I had to drive. So I didn’t get around to it, though I was long in admiration of it.
Tom Humphrey [00:09:54] So what was it like when you joined in 1970?
Robert Cavano [00:09:59] Well, we had Our headquarters were in a building on Short Vincent, right across from the Theatrical Grill. And I had the pleasure of sometimes waiting for my car, standing next to Shondor Burns, the illustrious Cleveland alleged.
Tom Humphrey [00:10:22] Yeah, this is on tape, right.
Robert Cavano [00:10:23] And hoping that someone would not have a bomb in his car while I was standing next to him. But it was a very rundown facility and later taken by the New National City bank. And what was the City Club then is now an entrance to their parking garage. And it was a two-floor establishment, the second floor even more decrepit than the first floor, and was a hangout for some of the Short Vincent lowlife. And they used to have card games there going on which were allegedly for high stakes. Being a mathematician, I’m not a gambler, so I did not partake. But the crowds were smaller and it had a certain vitality and coziness of that smallness. And I don’t think anyone ever, I can’t be sure of this, but I don’t think there was ever a thought of taking a forum out to another place. It was for the members and there were some pretty exciting times there.
Tom Humphrey [00:11:49] Do you remember who the first speaker was that you saw after you joined?
Robert Cavano [00:11:54] I’m not sure if it was the first speaker, but at that time in Cleveland, there was an ongoing strong controversy on public housing and subsidized housing and whether those should be supported, whether they should be extended into the suburbs or to all white areas, such as the West Park area, of course, Cleveland. And there was a group called path, Program of Action towards Housing or something, very fine people. And there were a number of advocates of the improvement and extension of public housing. And a number- There were two or three important speakers there. I remember one was Jim Houston, who spoke in favor of a reasonable, compassionate, intelligent approach to housing. And then what was the other? Well, even if I could remember his name, I don’t think I’d mention it because I’d use the wrong adjectives in regard to it. But anyhow, there were really knocked down shouting matches at that old City Club. And I remember them because when they tore the building down, I took a little chunk of the stone doorway and I have it in my shrine at home.
Tom Humphrey [00:13:27] Yeah, yeah.
Robert Cavano [00:13:29] And then when the City Club came here, they took the famous mural, see on the wall, And I was having lunch one day and I saw a rubbish barrel with a lot of pieces of hardboard there. And I said to the construction worker, what are you doing with this? He said, I’m hauling it out to the rubbish. And I said, well, I’M taking this piece. So I took one big chunk and took it home.
Tom Humphrey [00:13:57] So you have a panel of.
Robert Cavano [00:13:59] So I have a panel. I heard that story. And I have the stone from the building, and that’s my shrine to the City Club. Boy, that’s cool. Now, when the. When the mural was being reconstructed, no one knew that I had that panel. And I didn’t know what the exact plans were, so I didn’t volunteer it. So it may be said that I’m more a city club in my shrine than the facility at ninth and Euclid, but that would be presumptuous to say that.
Tom Humphrey [00:14:32] Well, it’s a great piece of WPA artwork.
Robert Cavano [00:14:34] Yes, it is.
Tom Humphrey [00:14:36] And I think maybe to some extent it perpetuates the myth of. Or maybe not the myth of, but the liberal slant of this or the charges of the City Club being more left of center than not. Some of the old WPA artwork contains some kind of coded messages in it.
Robert Cavano [00:14:59] Well, we should be looking at that mural now because I don’t recall all the details, but think about it. When you look at it next, aren’t most. Well, aren’t they all men?
Tom Humphrey [00:15:09] I think they are all men. They’re all men.
Robert Cavano [00:15:11] And there’s only one African American man, and he’s in the very center. Exactly. That’s just what I wanted to say. And the men are all wearing coats and ties. Yes. In fact, I’m going to draw a little picture of it. Yeah. Okay. And even though the artist was African American himself, he was being paid to do a job that wouldn’t rattle the establishment and the membership too much.
Tom Humphrey [00:15:41] They had to submit sketches. Pretty detailed sketches, as a matter of fact.
Robert Cavano [00:15:45] Yeah. So this is, to some extent, in the tradition of the Mexican American muralists, but not completely.
Tom Humphrey [00:15:56] Right? That’s right. That’s right.
Robert Cavano [00:16:05] Now, the piece I have is the one. If you look to the far left and you see the very Arnold Schwarzenegger holding the scarf there.
Tom Humphrey [00:16:15] Yes.
Robert Cavano [00:16:16] And a strip going from his fist down through the scarf and into the fire burning up the world is the strip I have.
Rachel Estrin [00:16:28] I can tell- [inaudible]
Robert Cavano [00:16:32] You can probably see the seam in it.
Rachel Estrin [00:16:34] Yes, I can see.
Tom Humphrey [00:16:36] That’s great.
Robert Cavano [00:16:38] So I say all of these nasty things about the mural because any group should be continually in a process of re-examination. Self- Re-examination. I don’t know how you- Re-examination and anything other than- Well, anyhow. And I think that’s a problem that every organization must deal with and must continue to look at itself.
Tom Humphrey [00:17:03] And kind of along those lines, kind of getting into the City club in the ’70s. The ’70s in Cleveland were tumultuous. Maybe not quite as much as the ’60s, easily. In 1972, two years after you join the City Club, they start admitting women. There had been a Women’s City Club for a long time. The minutes of the Women’s City Club, like the minutes for the City Club or the meeting notes and things like that, or the Western Reserve Historical Society, and occupy a considerable chunk of shelf space, or as do the City club. But in 1972, they become one. Well, they start to admit women. They don’t necessarily become the same. Although I think the Women’s City Club is now defunct.
Robert Cavano [00:17:53] It still has a phone number.
Tom Humphrey [00:17:55] Right.
Robert Cavano [00:17:56] The Women’s City Club had joined in this facility prior to the City Club admitting women. I think it was Maybe, what, about 1970 or ’68? The Women’s City Club had been located at Playhouse Square, and they were in a different concept of women. The Women’s City Club was a place that women came for programs. It might be yoga or investment or whatever, and meetings. And it was a very active, fine organization. They had very good furniture and art and so on. But then as more women became employed, they found they couldn’t give all of the time to the Women’s City Club, which they formerly had. And I think there was. Their membership declined, and for economic reasons, the two clubs joined. But still they maintained their own directions, both good directions. And Women’s City Club had regular art shows with the City Club, and it was a good arrangement. And then they saw fit to move out. But the move to women membership in the City Club was almost independent of their affiliation with the Women’s City Club and very belated in coming. And some of the people, I think Kylie and Nancy Cronin were important in getting that thing going. And Larry Robinson was president when the actual thing took place. And surprisingly for an allegedly liberal free speech citadel, there was resistance to the admission of women. People I had never seen got up at some of the meetings discussing the issue and said, well, you know, take away from our comradely neighbor neighborliness, and I wouldn’t feel the same if women were sitting at the table and they might even be using the same restrooms. And I said, well, we do that at home, which gained me no favor.
Tom Humphrey [00:20:31] Two years into the membership and already.
Robert Cavano [00:20:35] They’Re writing down. Yeah, but I had a running start.
Tom Humphrey [00:20:37] Bob Cavano. Yeah. What was it like to join the City Club as an Italian American?
Robert Cavano [00:20:45] Oh, there was no problem with that. I’m only half Italian. American, half Irish American, Both very combative races when necessary.
Tom Humphrey [00:21:01] And so when you joined in 1970 and women become members or the first woman becomes a member in 1972, what were those two years like? Was there a lot of discussion about this? Were there specific forums held to discuss this?
Robert Cavano [00:21:22] There were a lot of meetings to discuss it after the thing got going. But typical of human nature, people accept things for a long time. The civil rights movement, why did it take so long to get going? Everyone knew this was abominable. In this case, somehow a lot of us were floating around not thinking enough about it. And I recall one meeting I was involved with some fair housing group, and a group of us decided to have lunch at the City Club. And the secretary called and said, bob, I’ve got a problem. I think they didn’t give me the right answer. At the City Club, I called to make a reservation for our group, and they said women couldn’t come for lunch during the week. And I said, I guess you’re right. And, you know, I had been abiding this abomination as well as everyone else. But then people such as Nancy and Kylie Cronin got the ball moving, and people with can do good ideas, such as Larry Robinson carried it through. And the rest of the membership, once they were alerted, they were all receptive to it in general. There were a few exceptions, which is typical of the City Club, because otherwise, how could you have a debate at the Soviet table if you didn’t have someone against?
Tom Humphrey [00:22:58] Right, right. So what was it like in ’72 when you come to a meeting to, say, a Friday forum or a meeting at the City Club or lunch at the City Club even, and it’s the first time you see a woman member in the club.
Robert Cavano [00:23:17] I don’t think once it was done, people just kind of thought almost silently, why hadn’t it been done before? There were no dislocations. I mean, most of us were comfortable with women, and most women were comfortable with men.
Tom Humphrey [00:23:31] Right.
Robert Cavano [00:23:31] I mean, that is how we married. After all, there were a few citadels that they were not allowed to mix in a normal way.
Tom Humphrey [00:23:39] Yeah. Also in the ’70s, I guess, from at much the same time that people are talking about getting women into the City Club, and women were becoming somewhat more outspoken politically in Cleveland and nationally. In Cleveland and nationally, which is what’s great about Cleveland. It’s just a slice of what’s going on everywhere else, almost. City school systems were starting to desegregate or were being forced to desegregate by a variety of in a variety of ways. You were president of the city club in 76, correct? I think 1976, between ’75 and ’77 at least, was the same period in which Judge Battisti ordered the desegregation of the Cleveland city schools. And I wondered if you could talk about that a little bit, both kind of as somebody in the city, as somebody who’s playing a major role in the economic development of the city and the political development and as kind of your other role as president of the City Club during all of this.
Robert Cavano [00:25:01] Well, you must, as president of the City Club or acting on the board of directors, maintain a fairness in the speakers you choose in not expressing your own point of view. So that was pretty clearly the function I had to do. But as a private citizen, of course, I was very pleased with Judge Battisti’s ruling and very pleased with the Brown versus Board of Education ruling that said separate is not equal. And the steps, the long distance between that ruling and the school busing Cleveland is a donut ruling of Judge Battisti took a long time to get there, fighting its way through the courts. It was pretty clear that something had to be done to implement that. Now, all the consequences and how well that worked and all that are not for me to judge. But it did introduce some very exciting topics. And the City Club had many discussions of this both on Fridays and its special forums and at the Soviet Table and even at the Sanhedrin Table. Though some people say the discussions at each of those tables was predictable. And you might even as an educator, you might even say that the discussion at the educators table was predictable. But those were exciting times. And in a way this predated the Sunday morning talk shows and all in the 24-hour news. And I think issues were the City Club was starting to see its influence as an issue oriented establishment declining because there were so many other venues for that, which meant there had to be flexibility to it. And there was always a resistance to if we can’t get enough attention to the issues, can we do it by the celebrities? Such as this big event that happened yesterday in Cleveland, the motivational thing where you pay a fair amount of money to see an important person. And the City Club, I think with moderate success, had has resisted that effort to be just a showcase for celebrities. Not always, but most of the time. But in those days the issues were hotter and people weren’t afraid to tangle with them. So the other day I heard the president of the City Club introduce a speaker and said to the audience, give Mr. So and So a warm City Club welcome. And I questioned him about that later. I said, do we have a warm City club welcome? Because I recalled most of the forums, people were sitting there and they were not necessarily warmly welcoming the speaker. They were. Sometimes they were there to support him and applaud him, but other times they were there to get at him during the question period, and they did not like that speaker. And that was the essence. It was not a glorification temple for the leaders of big business or celebrities. It was a place where issues were fought out. And of course, this is the old fogey approach. You know, things were never as good as they used to be.
Tom Humphrey [00:29:08] Who were some of the. When you were president, who were some of the speakers that you had? Presumably 52 speakers or 50 speakers or so, at least.
Robert Cavano [00:29:18] Yeah, I don’t always break them down into my time period because it was. It was like a temple. You know, I would be here during many years, five days a week, almost never missed Friday forums. And so some of the great speakers. One of the. There was an Australian pediatrician named Dr. Helen Caldicott, and she traveled the world speaking against nuclear warfare. And she said, how can the world expect us as physicians and pediatricians to take care of all the people and all the children that will be injured in nuclear war? We can’t do that. It’s impossible. So we all have to do something to prevent it from happening. She started to speak and I for one, and I think the rest of the audience did not draw a breath until she finished. She was spell binding. And we should have known all these things, but it was stunning and other exciting ones. Patrick Gray was the head of the FBI. That’s a big issue now. And Patrick Gray was an appointee of Richard Nixon and was a pal of his. So during some of the troublesome times in that administration, he was sent to the City Club to discuss the administration point of view. We didn’t know all this until later. Presumably he should have been an independent head of an agency. But anyhow, the administration point of view was not real interesting. We’d all heard it before and it was turning out to be rather a dull form, except Larry Robinson was presiding and we had one of those stands, I don’t see them much anymore. Like a metal thing where you snubbed out your cigar. And Larry had his legs crossed and was sitting there and he dozed off and he responded and he kicked that metal thing and made quite a noise. And with that, about 18 guys in heavy black shoes and black suits stood up in the audience, the FBI that was there to protect Patrick Gray. So we wondered why we got such good attendance at that forum. And now later we learn why. That was an exciting one. But I think Helen Caldecott was the best that I can ever remember. But it’s hard to make names. So many were so good. Philip Berrigan and William Sloan Coffin. All those other people. But probably in my book, the most important, the speaker who best reflected the true issues of the City Club was none other than Dr. William Shockley. Now, Dr. Shockley, after receiving the Nobel Prize for his work on the transistor, decided, as many people do in academia, to move into the softer social sciences. History and sociology and all those things. He decided to do research. And his research seemed, to put it bluntly, to indicate that blacks were inferior to whites. He also was recommending voluntary sterilization to improve the race. And he also set up a sperm bank in California for Nobel Prize winners should you want artificial insemination. He had been traveling all over the country, going to the best universities. And everywhere he went, he was shouted down and prevented from speaking. When he came to the City Club, the audience was extremely polite, considerate. And Dr. Shockley found he did not have a speech. He was expecting to get shouted down. So he was a complete flop. And the questions were perceptive and good. And he alleged there was a conspiracy to prevent his ideas from being published in learned journals. And then he went to this wonderful part of the City Club, and that was the interviews with the students. The students were doing this as part of their club. They were better prepared than the members. So they knew a lot about Dr. Shockley. As it turns out, there were 27 students, of which 20 were African Americans. So they asked some rather perceptive questions, such as one young man said, Dr. Shockley, I think what you’re saying is white people are better than black people. Seemed to me a very direct, brief statement. Better than I can do. I talk at length. But Dr. Shockley said, no, no, no, you don’t understand. You don’t understand. So he came out of that meeting with the students very unhappy. Alan Davis, the executive director, said, is Everything all right, Dr. Shockley? And he said, terrible, terrible. They didn’t understand. And Alan said, well, were they polite? He said, yeah, they were polite enough, but they don’t understand. They don’t understand. So then he started explaining to Alan. He said, what I should have said in the speech was this, that, and the other. And Alan said, Dr. Shockley, all I do is arrange the speaker for Friday, you have your chance to say what you want. You respond to questions after that hour, it’s all over. I’m not the judge. I think Dr. Shockley wanted to revamp the tape to get his ideas in. Alan was not philosophically linked to Dr. Shockley by a long shot, I can tell you. So Alan said, it’s all over. I’m working on next Friday.
Tom Humphrey [00:36:29] The bell has sounded.
Robert Cavano [00:36:30] But that was a place where free speech prevailed. And I don’t think Dr. Shockley was shouted off any campuses after that because I don’t think anyone invited him anywhere. Free speech had been given its trial and it had prevailed. What he had to say was nonsense, and nobody wanted to listen to it anymore.
Tom Humphrey [00:36:56] Yeah, sometimes letting people. Well, sometimes the free speech. The focus on free speech in the City Club means that some people with less popular views get to have their.
Robert Cavano [00:37:17] That’s the ideal.
Tom Humphrey [00:37:19] Sometimes you get people often very close together at very different points of view. So I wondered if you might remember what it was like when, say, George Bush, and. I don’t know how to refer to him, George I - George I, that’s right - spoke- I think he would have been the director of the CIA in 1930. And I think Jimmy Carter also spoke in the same year.
Robert Cavano [00:37:44] Yes. Well, when George Bush spoke, I think he had a number of important government positions or quasi government. One, he was head of the CIA, I believe, and on another occasion, he was head of the Republican National Committee. Maybe he was. He was the one authorized to help local candidates financially. So I don’t think there was anything controversial in his points of view or not necessarily heavily political. It was- It was a- They were good speeches and so on. And since he had played on the Yale baseball team with Alan Davis, Alan got him back a couple of times. And I said to Alan one time, tell me what kind of a person was he? And you’ll probably edit this out. But he said, good feel, no hit.
Tom Humphrey [00:38:55] Well, I won’t edit that out.
Robert Cavano [00:38:59] But anyhow, his appearances were welcome and good. And Jimmy Carter. When Jimmy Carter came, I was president that year, and we had the meeting at what used to be the Cleveland Hotel on the Square. And he was very good. It was pretty clear in most of our minds that he would be the nominee and probably the president. His presentation was well received and well attended. But he is such a dignified, elegant person. He didn’t have a whole lot of people making noise and stirring. Stirring up things. He just walked in quietly, greeted people, gave a wonderful message, in a way, with the intensity and intelligence that he addressed the Democratic National Convention recently. I thought his presentation was the best because it had an internal dedication and a kind of a feeling of, I’m sorry things haven’t gone as well as I would like them to have gone.
Tom Humphrey [00:40:17] Right, right. Yeah. I was watching the Democratic National Convention. I always. I thought I wouldn’t want to be the last person to speak.
Robert Cavano [00:40:25] Oh, there are so many of them are so good. But his intensity was quiet. Intensity was exciting to me.
Tom Humphrey [00:40:38] I’d like to shift gears a little bit, but stay with kind of the same time period. You were a member of the City Club when Dennis Kucinich was running for mayor and then mayor, and then, I guess, when the city went into default. I know he spoke at the City Club maybe a couple times during that period. And I wondered if you could talk about the mood of the city at the time. Dennis Kucinich in the club, and kind of how people reacted to. Without naming names, of course, of how.
Robert Cavano [00:41:11] People reacted to the best part. Yeah. During my most active years there, I remember the mayors Carl Stokes and Dennis Kucinich and Ralph Perk, and they were probably the ones. Mayor Locher was there, too, but- Well, Dennis was never the mainstream establishment darling, I’m putting it mildly when you say establishment.
Tom Humphrey [00:41:45] I wonder if you could clarify that a little bit.
Robert Cavano [00:41:49] Well, the establishment would be primarily business, corporate, even cultural, people that have a stake in the. You know, if you sought to remove tax exemptions from churches or museums or hospitals, you would find those people had become establishment very quickly and wanted to maintain status quo. If you have businesses and banks and the law firms and accounting firms that represent them, they want favorable tax structures, and they want a mayor they can speak to. They don’t want a mayor who’s more aligned with the residents and with the labor unions as they do one that is aligned with the establishment. I don’t think this is anything controversial or surprising. It’s in their best interest. But the establishment, the banks and commercial and industrial organizations, realize that in addition to their great wealth, they have to get the votes to elect someone, councilman, a mayor. And so they work at doing that. And they like to strike alliances with political leaders, and they don’t like political leaders to confront them. And they don’t like political leaders to suggest an alternate power source, which Dennis, in his radical ideas, has been vindicated as being completely correct. And some of the people who opposed him, who are, may the Lord bless their souls, no longer residing or left residence in Cleveland and are an early date, were alleged to be Emotionally, unrealistically, sentimentally, selfishly involved in issues and caused the city to degree default. And if you will look at it, you’re a historian, look at the amounts of money that were involved in that default. They were trivial. And look at the loans that were in the basement of the bank. They were major. So it was all political economics was present in it. And Dennis was and is a fine public servant. I’m not supporting him for president, but almost anything up to that.
Tom Humphrey [00:44:42] Some decisions have to be more realistic than others.
Robert Cavano [00:44:44] Sorry, Dennis.
Tom Humphrey [00:44:47] Well, there must have, there might have been. Was there some disagreement in the City Club? I know that some City Club members worked hard to actually get Kucinich recalled.
Robert Cavano [00:44:57] Oh, I’m sure there were, but it was, it would never have had anything to do with the organization as an organization. These were individuals who sincerely felt that he was not good for the city and we all know it’s nice to get along. Bill Clinton was extremely popular with the national establishment, banks and industry and he realized that jobs and good working arrangements are important. So there were people who didn’t like Dennis, but the one thing about him was there were very few undecided voters.
Tom Humphrey [00:45:44] No, that’s right.
Robert Cavano [00:45:45] I mean people were committed one way or the other.
Tom Humphrey [00:45:48] Yeah, yeah. Nobody sat on the fence for long and with him they rarely sit on the fence.
Robert Cavano [00:45:54] But any of those turmoils did focus around the City Club because that was the place. And it sometimes is hard to air these critical issues well enough. For example, the problems in the Catholic Church, it’s a sensitive issue. I don’t know how you deal with it in a public forum. And the same-sex marriage issues, they’re important, but they’re hard to get to handle correctly. And you don’t want some kind of a circus atmosphere in regard to these issues or right to life issues. They should be discussed. Or maybe some of them shouldn’t be discussed. Maybe some of them should be reserved to private decisions. But anyhow, I think the City Club is always looking for the hot issues, but they’re not always able to get a grip on them. And sometimes it’s better to duck something than to confront it.
Tom Humphrey [00:47:04] Emotions sometimes cloud more reasonable discussion.
Robert Cavano [00:47:08] For example, you know, somebody might say some of the universities are using too many part time instructors and not giving tenure and benefits to their establishment established professors. Well, you know, could you head up a committee to examine that? Not very well.
Tom Humphrey [00:47:29] Right, right.
Robert Cavano [00:47:30] So you know, they’re, we’ve all sold out in one way or another a.
Tom Humphrey [00:47:35] Little bit at a time.
Robert Cavano [00:47:36] City Club members Less than others, I hope.
Tom Humphrey [00:47:43] So. You mentioned Carl Stokes and we talked with Seth Taft last week. You weren’t a member, but maybe. I wonder if you could describe the mood of the city when Seth Taft and Carl Stokes were dueling for the mayor’s seat.
Robert Cavano [00:48:04] It was pretty exciting because you had two people of superb qualifications. Seth Taft is one of the finest people. I mean, he would have my vote for President of the United States or any other position would have made a wonderful mayor. But Carl Stokes was an outstanding person who came at a particular time when there was a feeling, a very strong sentiment towards breaking the barriers and having an African American mayor. So there was so much talent, twice as much talent as we needed for that position is what it amounted to. And it was a very stressful thing. Both persons highly qualified to be mayors, both persons with fantastic people, skills and talents. And Carl Stokes would often, when he was mayor, would stand at the corner of 6th and Superior. He might have been in the Hollenden Hotel or he might have been at the City Club, and he would almost hold court there. And everybody that came by had something to say to him and he listened and he heard and he amassed a cabinet. It was some very dedicated, wonderful people.
Tom Humphrey [00:49:46] Including Seth Taft.
Robert Cavano [00:49:49] Seth worked with him. And Kylie Cronin was another cabinet member. And it was a pretty exciting time. But those political decisions were so difficult, difficult for the people of Cleveland to make. I didn’t have to make that decision because, as with most Clevelanders, I had moved to the suburbs. So I lived in Rocky river, where you didn’t have to make a choice as to political party. There was only one. It didn’t happen to be mine.
Tom Humphrey [00:50:33] It’s nice to know that some things have remained the same on the west side.
Robert Cavano [00:50:39] There are a few Democrats now.
Tom Humphrey [00:50:42] I had them all over for dinner the other night.
Robert Cavano [00:50:45] All the west side Democrats. You have a small dining room, right?
Tom Humphrey [00:50:48] Yeah, right. Just six seats. Well, it is interesting that they both ran at the same time. They had very similar views and were both very issue oriented.
Robert Cavano [00:51:07] Extremely capable. And of course, then Carl went to New York for a television job and did not really enter into politics again. When he came back with practicing law, was a judge, I guess. But his brother, Lou Stokes, became one of the brilliant public servants in Cleveland and a dear friend of the City Club and spoke whenever. Several. At least one occasion, we really needed a speaker and he came and you knew he would always be good and always draw a crowd.
Tom Humphrey [00:51:52] Yeah.
Robert Cavano [00:51:53] Yeah.
Tom Humphrey [00:51:55] I guess we have a couple minutes left. We have about eight or Nine minutes left. And I guess I’d like to ask you how you feel the direction or what you think about the direction of the city itself from say, 1951 through 2000. I’m looking at my watches. If I have a year on here, 2004, how you think the city has changed and what direction you think it’s-
Robert Cavano [00:52:18] Going in, starting in what year?
Tom Humphrey [00:52:21] Say, in the ’50s, when you came back to the city, was it a very different place than it is now?
Robert Cavano [00:52:29] Well, we’ve lost so much of the steel fabricating foundry businesses and we must find a way to recapture them. Well, you don’t recapture them by saying we want to build an industry in biotechnology, we want to build an industry in computer software. There have been some things that I think look to me to be good. There’s been activity at the universities in Cleveland and in athletes Akron in polymer science. And this reflects a lot of the work in polymers done by companies that started in the rubber business, such as B.F. Goodrich. I think that’s good to build on something that’s already existing rather than a concept of what might be good. And then to me, one of the great sadnesses has been the rivalry that occurred in certain areas of our community, such as the fact of the rivalry between university hospitals and the clinic. This is unimaginable, that institutions dedicated to the best medical care for its the citizens of the community in the world should not cooperate to improve that care. And that went on for many years, fortunately, thanks to a lot of really wise people and a superb new president of Case Western Reserve University, who I suspect in the quiet rooms has knocked a few heads and said, you bozos better get your act together or we and you are all going down the drain. And now I believe that Cleveland has an opportunity to grow as a center of medical excellence. I served on the board at Metro Health for 12 years, one of the fine, fine institutions which will become a part of the same thing with the Clinic and University Hospitals, Case Western Reserve Medical School and together, and all the other fine institutions and professionals working in that field. But that’s something I think ought to be promoted because you can’t recapture the old days, the foundries and steel mills. And I’m not. Maybe not. I may be a liberal, but I’m not a revolutionary. I believe you should build on what you have rather than destroying and trying to start a new something, our educational system. If people in your department aren’t in regular communication with the other fine educational institutions, shame on you. How do you build? Only by learning from others that are knowledgeable about the same fields.
Tom Humphrey [00:55:49] I guess. Let me ask you about the City Club itself. I think one of the most contentious issues over the last. I guess I’ve been affiliated with the club for a couple years. The most contentious issue that I’ve noticed or that I’ve been aware of in the last couple years is the award given to Antonin Scalia for the Free Speech Award. Some people have said that that represents a turn in the City Club, that the City Club has made a shift. I’m not necessarily sure I agree with that. Not that I agree with Antonin Scalia. I’m not necessarily sure that giving him the award represents a dramatic shift. But I wonder if you notice or have detected a shift in maybe where the City Club is going, where you think it should go in the next. You’ve been a member for over 50 years.
Robert Cavano [00:56:43] Yeah, I think your analysis is correct. It isn’t necessarily a turn. Organizations fluctuate. For example, if you get a president and members of the board who are very involved in neighborhoods and social programs, you’ll have a period of the president will select the program chairman. You’ll have a period of rather enlightened points of view. If you have president and board members who are commercial, business oriented, who put a great value on someone who is the president of a major institution and feel that what he has to say influences the way the community will move and so on, then you’ll have that. I don’t think it marked a change. I think it was a. I would picture it as a disastrous, horrible mistake, but not a change in voice philosophy. I think it was not considered adequately. Here was a man who was too controversial, idolized by the ultra conservatives, hated by the ultra liberals, a man of presumably good legal talents, somewhat of a performer, an attention getter, a celebrity. He is exactly the person I would love to have as a speaker so that people could go at him with their points of view on legal issues or any other issues. But to be a speaker, he must subject himself to the time constraints of the City Club being willing to answer questions. He must meet with the students. He must not run over and preempt too much of the question time. And when I objected to his receiving this award as soon as it was announced, I had no idea that he would be that he would shut off the recording devices for the reporters and the television cameramen. I mean, this is unbelievable. Had I been president, I would have gone to the board and suggested we cancel his appearance. I mean, this is not the City Club it was a horrible mistake, and I will not point any fingers at who did it because I haven’t gotten a full answer yet to my complaints. It was terrible. So because it was such a partisan person that was selected, somebody said, well, maybe another time we’ll get someone who will have a different point of view. I believe that the whole thing should be forgotten. It should never be done again. It was only done one other time. That was for John Glenn, and everybody loves John Glenn. But this was a bad, bad mistake. I can’t say that often enough.
Tom Humphrey [01:00:14] I noticed that you have a fair amount of notes. So we have a few minutes. If there’s anything you want to talk about. About if you feel like we missed something. I assuredly missed something that you, I’m sure, want to talk about with me.
Robert Cavano [01:00:29] I do go on. So I think we’ve covered most of the things. Well, some of the memorable forums, there was a- The widow of Salvador Allende spoke one time, and I recall this very well. She had been in the hands of handlers who had been moving her to different places, and they had some kind of a political agenda, which I wasn’t able to fully understand, but they were directed people. Anyhow, they arrived and she was very tired, so she spoke. And then a question came, and I was holding the microphone, and this person asked a question in Spanish. This question related to some controversy between Chile and Bolivia that had been going on for generations. And she got very frustrated, and she said something like, shove it or I’ve had enough of this. And she said, I’m very tired. And she left the podium at 10 minutes after 120 minutes of airspace. So we all remember that very much. And I decided if I ever held the microphone again, I would not accept Spanish questions. The other memorable one was the gossip columnist Jack Anderson, who replaced. Who was it that preceded him around the world or something. We’re all too old to remember that. But anyhow, Jack Anderson came to speak and he mainly did an anti Jimmy Carter diatribe. And he said, you know, here we’ve got a president in the White House, and the people he turns to are all his old pals from Georgia, as though people from Georgia are not Americans or something. And then when he really needs advice, when he goes to bed, he talks to another person from Georgia, his wife. And I thought it was a very offensive presentation because I think it’s nice if husbands talk to their wives. But anyhow, he then went on and on well beyond his time period, which meant that any other members of the audience who had similar sentiments to mind who might have wanted to say something challenging his point of view didn’t have a chance. And he just went on, in spite of the imprecations of the chairman, to sit down. I think it was only five minutes. There was one question allowed and anyhow, I felt maybe we should learn from that. And when someone runs over their time, tell them very clearly that they have a half hour and that the whole essence of the City Club is that half hour question period. And if they don’t abide by it, you kind of keep bumping them until they get the idea. Of course, the president at that time said that I had bigger hips than she did and I was better able to bump the speaker. [crosstalk] Annette Butler. Annette Butler. [laughs]
Rachel Estrin [01:04:28] Did you know her very well? Do you know her very well?
Robert Cavan [01:04:30] Oh, sure, sure. But anyhow, I don’t have too many other- Well, I have thousands of memories. But I think one of the fun things was in 1976 we took the City Club to London for its first forum outside the United States. And we had a wonderful time. And we had a gentleman from the cabinet, Roy Hattersley, spoke to our group and it was broadcast from London back to the States and so on. And we visited the residents of. The American ambassador had absolutely wonderful time. It was a charter flight in the early days when charters were just starting, and for $276 per person we had a round trip flight to London and a hotel room.
Tom Humphrey [01:05:28] That’s great.
Robert Cavano [01:05:30] If we could do that today, I’d recommend the City Club again get to Pittsburgh. But other than that, and of course the Soviet Table had all the- Did have controversy and lots of outspoken people. And some, some of us would sometimes say things that were outrageous just to see if we could stimulate a little argument. And premier during my years at doing that was Peter De Leon, who was one of the great members of the City Club, loyal and true, and helped to pull us through the tough years of the Depression. And he and David Warshawski, if a bill came due and there wasn’t enough money in the treasury, they would reach in their pockets. In those days they probably didn’t have a whole lot in there, but it was enough to pay the expenses for another week or so. So those were the days when it was less a. I hate to use the word establishment, but less a comfortable facility and more of a-
Tom Humphrey [01:06:42] Familiar one.
Robert Cavano [01:06:43] Familiar and modest financially. And we were always in imbalance in our budgets. And it’s only when we moved into these palatial surroundings and got the heavy hitters in Cleveland to support the activities that we’ve been this lush now, did we lose anything in the process? Each person has to judge for himself.
Tom Humphrey [01:07:14] Well, I think we’ll end, if that’s all right. I don’t want to run you too much. I want to thank you for coming.
Robert Cavano [01:07:20] And I’m sorry if I’ve been too reticent.
Tom Humphrey [01:07:23] No, you’ve been great. You’ve been great. I’ll turn everything off.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.
