Public events are back… somewhat. We attended last weekend’s Cle Photo Fest opening, and CoolCleveland correspondent Bruce Checefsky was in the room for the second Urban Land Institute public listening session on art & real estate in the Hough neighborhood. The first had an overwhelming energy; the second, less so. Read and view for yourself below.There’s no arguing that drag performance is generating the kind of healthy frisson and positive spirit that our region sorely needs. And there’s no doubt that this week’s Drag Pride Weekend will spark enthusiasm on all sides. In fact, a bill has been introduced in the Ohio House that would effectively ban drag performance. So if you’re inclined, feel free to come out this weekend, catch the buzz and lend support; if not, feel free to move on.
There’s plenty more to get energized about this week. Two months of celebration marking the 85th anniversary of the creation of Superman in Glenville will kick off this week; two newly archived artists, Dale Goode & Terry Klausman, are honored with solo shows at Artist Archives of the Western Reserve; Akron launches the Rubber City Blues & Jazz Fest; the Berea Arts Fest is back for a full day of art, music, food and fun; the Cultural Gardens World On Stage celebrates Asia.
CoolCleveland Columnist C. Ellen Connally offers a review of Laura Meckler’s new book, Dream Town: Shaker Heights and the Quest for Racial Equality, and along the way offers a fascinating autobiographical sketch of her own girlhood growing up in Shaker and the East side of Cleveland.
There’s no shortage of energy you can align yourself with this week. Charge your batteries and blast off.
On September 1, a ban on drag performances where a minor might be present is set to go into effect in Texas. Don’t think Ohio is far behind. A bill has been introduced in the Ohio legislature that would eliminate Ohio’s entire drag scene by requiring that all drag performances take place only in “adult cabarets” (strip clubs), where drag performances rarely, if ever, take place. It would abolish a form of entertainment that goes back many decades and has created its own thriving economy.
Cleveland has never had such a large and active community of talented drag artists of all types as it does now. This weekend, many of them will be part of Drag Pride Weekend, with five events at five venues (none of them strip clubs), showing legislators down in Columbus proposing to put them out of work what they’ve got going on — and won’t give up. Read more.
The Urban Land Institute Cleveland (ULI) presented the second of two public Art in Place community listening sessions at League Park’s Baseball Heritage Museum on Wednesday August 30. While the event was interesting to some people, it provided little useful information. Those wishing to find out more about artists and real estate in the Hough neighborhood might want to look elsewhere.
ULI could not define the boundaries even though it is the central area of their study. The question was followed by a disproportionate amount of time spent debating the geographic parameters of Hough, with no mention of its social makeup, including median age and annual income, childhood poverty levels, crime, unemployment, diversity and ancestry… Read more.
Four Cleveland neighborhoods are installing colorful painted crosswalks and curbs to enhance cyclist and pedestrian safety. They need help and you don’t need experience. Join the fun! Read more.
Since 1998, the Cleveland duo Midnight Syndicate has been providing the music and sound effects for Cedar Point’s HalloWeekends, as well as other haunted attractions around the country. HalloWeekends start again September 14 but you can hear Midnight Syndicate’s new album The Brimstone Club, their 15th, right now. Read more.
MON 9/11 Bar Food Celebrated All this week the Cleveland Wing Week gives lovers of chicken wings the chance to try them at three dozen area bars, breweries and eateries.
TUE 9/12 Last Strains of Summer Summit Metro Parks is hosting one more Music in the Park concert at its Himelright Lodge, which means it can go indoors if the weather doesn’t cooperate.
In 1944, the year before I was born, my parents bought their first house in Cleveland’s Glenville neighborhood. The sellers were Jewish. By the time I had any recollection, our entire street was Black, mostly middle-class workers and some professionals. By the time I graduated from high school in 1963, all the Jewish businesses and houses of worship were gone. The temples were converted to Black churches.
Laura Meckler tells of her experiences and the experiences of residents of Shaker Heights, Ohio, during the same time period in her new book Dream Town — Shaker Heights and The Quest for Racial Equity. Hers is the story of an affluent suburb of about 29,000 people just east of Cleveland.
It was the brainchild of the Van Sweringen brothers who, in the early part of the 20th century, sought to set up a model community with no bars, no multiple family dwellings, and no industry, with restrictive covenants that barred Jews and Catholics and, of course, Blacks… Read more.
