I met Francis Payne Bolton in the Arcade on Euclid Avenue the other day. The daughter of the Binghams of Euclid Avenue, she married Chester Castle Bolton in 1907, seventeen years after the Arcade, then known as the “Crystal Palace,” was built. She started talking like a politician right away, explaining that she was the first Ohio woman elected to the U.S. Congress. Oh, she was quite chatty. And proud of becoming a nurse, which led to her sponsorship of a long-range bill for nursing education and advocacy for the conscription of women because women had a prominent role in World War II. Was she a ghost or an actor whose role was over when she disappeared?
The actor was part of the Take A Hike Euclid Avenue historic tour. When Mrs. Bolton was alive, the Arcade was a busy shopping and dining complex, the first indoor shopping center in the United States. It opened in May 1890 and is the city’s first building listed on the National Register of Historic Places. According to the Arcade’s website, designers John M. Eisenmann and George H. Smith modeled the building after Milan, Italy’s Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, and it was financed by prominent wealthy Clevelanders like John D. Rockefeller, Louis Severance, and Marcus Hanna. Today, people can spend the night on the upper floors of the complex at the Hyatt Regency Cleveland at the Arcade.
I remember eating Greek spanakopita at a table while enjoying lunchtime concerts on the bridge connecting the east and west corridors. My high school art teacher took his students to the Arcade to draw the atrium and capture the challenging perspective. Lunch or happy hour always feels special at the 1890 Restaurant, and once, while eating dinner there, my husband and I felt like we were wedding guests as the wedding party walked down the northside staircase right by where we were eating.
As we walked down the street, people reminisced about shopping in the art deco-designed W.T. Grant Building (1920) and buying Christmas gifts at F.W. Woolworth’s (the original building is now the entrance to House of Blues). The buildings featured five-and-dime storefronts on the ground floor while the upper floor shops sold fine jewelry, china and crystal. Across from the Arcade, the Colonial Arcade (1898) and the Euclid Arcade (1911) connected Euclid and Prospect Avenue, and they still do. Many of us “tourists” have fond memories of lunch in the Atrium Restaurant in the 668 building (the William Taylor & Son Company building built in 1915), where cinnamon rolls accompanied the salad bar. The building was also the site of WMMS’s studios when the address was still 666.
We passed the Fidelity (1921) and Schofield (1901) buildings, the Halle Building, the former Cleveland Athletic Club (now the Athlon), and the Huntington Bank (United Trust) building, which was once the largest office building in the country. The 1908 Cleveland Trust Building still has a Tiffany-glass ceiling in the atrium, which is always worth seeing again, even if your purpose is not to shop at Heinen’s. At Playhouse Square, we were reminded that the Loew’s theater (1921) was the beginning of today’s Playhouse Square.
Today, many historical buildings have been reborn as residential apartments and condominiums. Developers have done a great job preserving original design features while incorporating modern conveniences. Over 20,000 people now live downtown Cleveland near where Millionaire’s Row was at the end of the 19th and into the early 20th century, which seems fitting. The Euclid Avenue Take A Hike has been discontinued until next year, but a walk down the avenue from Public Square to Trinity Cathedral is interesting and exciting.
Take A Hike is promoting its fall strolls, including Italian and Polish Heritage tours and a walk along Franklin Avenue. An architecture tour of the Arcade is also planned before the holiday series begins. During the holidays, plan an evening out in conjunction with the Holiday Historic Hotels and Holiday Grand Department Stores tours. Take A Hike is also planning a heritage-inspired gifts shopping event during the WinterLand Holiday Tree Lighting festivities on November 29th. I hope to be there.