My Life As a Muckracker As told to Dr. Freud (part seven)

Funny, Doc., how life goes on even in the worst of times. Like the 60’s, for example. I know, people listened to the news and read their papers, thank goodness! But for our generation who had emerged from the war, we looked ahead to a family, a home, ordinary stuff. Maybe we were in denial. 

DENIAL. Good word, Doc?

The Goff Estate, Bratenahl

For me, getting ahead in my chosen profession and getting married were my priorities, and of course, building a family. I rented a very nice three bedroom cottage on an estate on the shores of Lake Erie in Bratenahl. Our home was the gardener’s cottage of the Goff Estate on nine acres, with a beach and a barbeque.

Frederick Goff had been the president of Cleveland Trust, Mayor of Glenville, and helped to establish the Cleveland Foundation. When he and his wife died, it was directed that his estate be torn down, and the property sold. We lasted about six months in that little slice of paradise. We loved to show it off to baffled out of town friends and relatives. We tried to sell them on the idea that this was typical Cleveland living. It may have worked.

By 1960 it was clear that my wife Grace, was physically unable to bear children. After consulting some top docs in town we decided to adopt. We had purchased a lovely little 1917 house on Coleridge Rd. in Cleveland Heights. It was a wonderful tree lined street of older homes, that began at Lee Rd. and ended at Coventry at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church.

We went through the adoption process, applying to the Jewish Children’s Bureau. After we passed through the interview questions I met with the director.   

“I think we have the perfect child for you!” he whispered.

And he was right!  But “perfect” was an understatement. The moment we met, we stared into each other's eyes and knew we were soul mates. Our little girl, Susan. Our gift for the sixties.

We still joke today that she was so perfect, she could change her own diaper. If there was ever a poster child for the perfect adoption, Susan was it.

A moment or two about my professional life, Doc. After all, I had to make enough money to send Susan to best the journalism school. I fantasized her as the first female editor of the New York Times. I, of course, was well ahead of my time.

One of the joys of being a journalist in the prime moments of life, Doctor, is that you not only learn about history, but you live it, observe it up close, and write about it as best you can, without malice to one side or the other. It wasn’t easy to do that in those turbulent times.

We were expected to be impartial observers, and to the extent that my restraint allowed me, I kept the faith. That, in my mind, is journalism. In the midst of a war and later the nation and a world in turmoil, I think about that sometimes when I watch FOX or NBC news on TV today.

It was a turn-on, and almost every day was a new adventure. I was often in the right place at the right time. After I was married, I begged off the 5 a.m. shift at the Press, and turned my focus to covering education, cultural development and University Circle, Cleveland’s cultural hub.

Cleveland’s schools, colleges and universities were exploding, so to speak, both figuratively and literally. I had hit the news jackpot. 

The Supreme Court ruling in Brown vs. Board of Education (separate but equal is not equal) had set the stage for upheaval in urban education, first in the south, and then in Boston, and inevitably in Cleveland. The result was a five-year battle in federal court over what the Supreme Court language really meant, and what was going on in Cleveland. The school board, with them attorneys from Squire Sanders fought it every inch of the way, arguing that Cleveland had not intentionally segregated its schools. 

Eventually Federal Judge Frank Battisti, a really tough guy who I never quite figured out, ruled in favor of the NAACP’s claim that Cleveland had violated the edict of the court.

I had researched and prepared a series of articles attempting to explain as simply as I could, how and why the judge could order cross town bussing of thousands of students as a remedy, In hopes that it might calm the reaction. Much understandable frustration followed, but not the brutal battles that were waged in Boston where another judge, had rendered the same remedy. It was done peacefully and perhaps with some positive results. A plus for The Press.

The rape and murder of a Louise Winbigler near Wade Park Lagoon as she walked to Cleveland Orchestra chorus practice, set the stage for enormous change and the creation University Circle Inc. I was on the beat, and the Press led the way in calling for change in that scattered, disconnected array of cultural, musical, and educational organizations. Change that included creating a separate police force, improved lighting, and a plan that would make sense without destroying the surrounding residential areas.       

When students at the Sorbonne University erupted in revolt, in Paris in 1968 I was there. That’s a chapter in itself, Doc. Perhaps I will save for later. I think we are running out of time.

Forgot to mention my coverage of the killings of Kent State students by the National Guard..…the bizarre incidents at Case Western Reserve University, including head bashing on campus by Mayor Stokes’ mounted police. The bombing by student radicals of the Rodin Statue, The Thinker, in front of the art museum, the heavy guns mounted on top of the museum to prevent further incidents, the machine guns mounted on the railroad bridge at the entrance to Little Italy during the Hough and Glenville riots…

Oh yes, there was a war in Vietnam, and Richard Nixon was president.

It was a busy time, Doc. 

Hope you got it all down in your notes.

See ya next week, okay?

Saying Kaddish for Grace

We were talking about Grace, my wife of 47 years who died seven years ago last April. It was a broad ranging discussion about this very special human being when he unexpectedly snapped the question.
“But Did You Love Her”?
I stopped short, stunned and a bit surprised. Didn’t expect it.
"Did I what?," I stammered.
“Grace, your wife, did you LOVE her?”
Funny. I had to think about that. My mind whirled a bit. It’s a lifetime, we’re talking about. There were the ups and downs that come with the territory. But for 47 years, we shared our home, shared our bed, she cooked for me…took care of me when I was sick, cheered me after tough days at the office. She did the laundry. Did the shopping, helped with the bills, kept the check book. Shared our love for our little girl… raised her sent her off to school and then to college.
A woman ahead of her time, she got her Masters, worked as a high school guidance counselor in poor, rough neighborhoods. And later as a volunteer counselor to released offenders who were eligible for community service jobs.
She loved the work and from what I know, this little woman was respected by those huge guys getting her help in staying out of jail.
But that’s a different kind of love. More like respect, admiration.
Did you really love her? He was persistent. When she got sick with a fatal chronic lung disease, she was tethered to an oxygen canister that she couldn’t live without. It was awkward. Heavy. Yet that gutsy little gal pulled that device around for more than three years to that job downtown on the seventh floor of the county sheriff’s building three days a week. There were days when she couldn't drive and I picked her up.
I watched this brave little gal, walking out the door with a broad smile on her face...talking with sensitivity and enthusiasm telling about these parolees she was helping.
The day before she died was a relatively good day. She had shopped in the nursing home store, sat in the dining room with a bevy of friends and our daughter. I had left early that day and called her from our daughter’s house. We talked for a short time about the Cavaliers in the playoffs. About LeBron James.
And just before we hung up Grace said "Bud, I love you.”
“I love you, too,” I responded, fully expecting to be with her the next morning.
At 2:00 am she died.
Did I love her? Did I really love her? Of course I did…
And by the way, thanks for asking.
For nearly half a century, Grace, this tough, tender little lady, was my wife, my life that we shared together. Maybe we didn’t talk about it enough. Maybe we were too busy dealing with the vicissitudes of life. Whatever it was, thanks for asking.
On the chilly December day before I left Cleveland for Texas, I stopped by her little gravesite in Mayfield Cemetery to place a couple of small stones on her marker, as is our custom. Took a deep breath and repeated quietly the words etched in the marble.
Simple words:
“As long as we live you too will live, as we remember you.” I swallowed hard and once again said good night.
And murmured loud enough for her to hear,
“I love you, really. And I always will."