There are many mysteries surrounding the history of the Bradford House at 11715 Miles Avenue, but the question of whether it was built in 1801 is not one of them. While the house is indeed one of Cleveland's oldest, it was clearly not built in that year. Lot 468 in Newburgh Township, the 100-acre lot upon which the house at a later date was built, was as yet undeveloped and unoccupied. It may have still been owned in that year by the Connecticut Land Company which later, before the formation of Cuyahoga County in 1810, apparently sold it to Oliver Ellsworth, one of America's founding fathers. Ellsworth, who lived in Connecticut and was a delegate to both the 1776 Continental Congress and the 1787 Constitutional Convention, served as one of Connecticut's first two senators and, perhaps most notably, was appointed in 1796 by President George Washington to serve as the third Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court.

Oliver Ellsworth died in 1807, and in 1816, according to Cuyahoga County deed records, his heirs and their spouses conveyed to Ellsworth's oldest son Martin all of the interest they held in Western Reserve lands which they had inherited from Ellsworth's estate, including Lot 468 in Newburgh Township. In 1833, Martin Ellsworth, who lived in Windsor, Connecticut, sold Lot 468 to Alvin and Grafton Bradford, two cousins from Williamsburg, Massachusetts, a small town in western Massachusetts that was located only 50 miles from Windsor.

In the spring of 1833, Alvin and Grafton Bradford, and their wives—all of them under 30 years of age—left Williamsburg and set out for Newburgh Township, Ohio—some 500 miles away—with the intent to settle and start new lives on Lot 468. They built a house there that year, which a review of county tax records suggests is likely the main section of the house that still stands today at 11715 Miles. Unfortunately, in October 1833, Abigail Bradford, the wife of Alvin, died from a disease she had contracted in Newburgh, according to an obituary appearing in a Boston newspaper. It was possibly cholera which took many lives in northeast Ohio during the Great Cholera Pandemic of 1829-1837. Alvin Bradford departed Newburgh and returned home to Williamsburg to bury his wife. Afterwards, apparently concluding the "West" was no longer for him, he deeded his half interest in Lot 468 to his cousin Grafton.

Grafton Bradford and his wife Charlaine stayed, living in the house the Bradford cousins and their wives had built on Lot 468, farming the land and raising four children there. Tax records also suggest that, in 1846 or 1847, they built the addition still joined to the east side of the house, perhaps in response to the needs of their growing family.

The one and one-half story house built by the Bradfords has been described by some as Greek Revival in architectural style, and indeed houses of that style were being designed and constructed in the United States in the 1830s. However, local architectural historian Craig Bobby has noted that houses as old as this one often lack a "style" and that some would therefore describe this house as "vernacular" rather than Greek Revival. Bobby also indicated that the Ohio Preservation Office considers houses like this one to be examples of a "type" called "Hall and Parlor."  Another architectural historian of note, Gary Stretar, who focuses on the architecture of early nineteenth century houses, believes the house is a "classic example of an early 'Western Reserve' style house of possibly the second wave of settlers, maybe 1835-1845."  Stretar also noted that such story and a half houses have Greek Revival features and a wing that often contained the work rooms, including a kitchen.  He finally noted that "[r]arely does a house of this period survive in an urban setting."

In addition to farming the land he owned in Newburgh Township, Grafton Bradford was active in the Cuyahoga County Total Abstinence Society and also served one year (1841) as a trustee of Newburgh Township. In 1850, perhaps because of increased traffic on the new Cleveland and Chagrin Falls Plank Road which their house fronted, or perhaps because of news that the Cleveland and Mahoning Railroad was planning to soon lay tracks through their farmland, Grafton and Charlaine Bradford sold Lot 468 and moved to Ravenna, in more rural Portage County, where they purchased new farm land and lived out their lives.

The Bradford House and the 100 acre lot upon which it then stood passed through several hands before it was purchased in 1863 by Jesse Bishop, a Cleveland lawyer, judge and real estate speculator. In 1874, Bishop entered into a land development partnership with real estate developer James M. Hoyt and in 1876 they platted a residential subdivision on a portion of Lot 468 which included the land upon which the Bradford House stood. The old house could have been razed or moved by the developers, but instead it, and a little more than one and one-half acres of the land upon which it stood, were purchased by Ransom C. Putnam, a Newburgh farmer, who very possibly wanted to preserve the historic house that his family later referred to as the Bradford Mansion.

Ransom Putnam, who was already fifty-nine years old when he purchased the Bradford House, lived in it until his death in 1896. Less than a year before his death, according to an article appearing in the Cleveland Leader on December 1, 1895, the house was the site of a grand Putnam family reunion, attended by four generations of the Putnam family. Upon Ransom Putnam's death, the house passed to his daughter Harriet Putnam who lived in it for a time with various siblings and nieces and nephews. One of them was Charles Putnam who was living in the house in October 1904 when the reporter from the Cleveland Leader came to visit. Unlike his grandfather and his father William H. Putnam, Charles was not a farmer but instead worked at one of the rolling mills that had come to Newburgh in the second half of the nineteenth century as the area industrialized.

Harriet Putnam owned the Bradford House until her death in 1921, the house then passing to her nephew Ransom Waldeck. All in all, members of the extended Putnam family owned the house from 1874 until 1933, with three generations of the family living there as adults. Over the years, Ransom, and later his daughter Harriet, subdivided the one and one-half acre lot upon which the Bradford House was standing, creating four additional lots on the north side of Miles upon which houses were built. All of these houses were initially occupied by members of the extended Putnam family, as was another adjacent to the west. Other members of the Putnam family lived in several houses across the street from these houses. During the last decade of the nineteenth and first two decades of the twentieth century, there were so many members of the extended Putnam family living on Miles Avenue between East 116th and East 119th Streets that this block could easily have been known—and perhaps locally it was—as Putnam Place.

In 1933, the same year in which the Bradford House likely was becoming a century home, the Ransom family sold it to Anton and Mary Salamon, Slovenian immigrants. The Salamon family owned the house for the next 45 years, and it likely benefited from this family's care, especially while Anton Salamon, a building contractor who was a carpenter by trade, still lived. Over the course of the next two decades, following the Salamon family's sale of the house in 1978, the Bradford House changed owners 12 times before it was purchased in 1997 by Senique Pearl, who still owns the house as of the writing of this story in 2023.With a little bit of luck, and continued care from its current owner, the Bradford House, one of the Corlett neighborhood's most historic houses, may well make it to its 200th birthday in 2033.

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Anna M. Edwards dreamed of a career in music. Born in the Dayton, Ohio, area in 1849, she was the daughter of a Presbyterian minister who had moved his family to Cleveland near the end of the Civil War. Here, she attended local schools and then studied music at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. By 1870, she was teaching music at the Lake Erie Seminary (today, Lake Erie College). However, when she was just 25 years old, her music career came to an end as a result of her involvement in the Women's Crusade (1873-1874), a national protest movement by women against America's saloon keepers. Edwards, according to her friend Edith Stivers, was persuaded by Frances Willard, legendary temperance reformer and women's suffragist, to give up her music career and go to work for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), a national organization led entirely by women that grew out of the Crusade and which was formally organized here in Cleveland in 1874.  

Edwards became the WCTU's Superintendent of Scientific Temperance Instruction for Ohio. This position required her to travel around the state, and later around the country, giving temperance lectures wherever she went. After a decade or so of this exhausting work, she began spending more of her time working at the non-partisan WCTU mission on St. Clair Street (St. Clair Avenue) near Willson Avenue (East 55th Street). The mission was located in a neighborhood that was brimming with saloons and home to many Eastern European immigrants, especially Slovenians. One day, according to accounts by several of her contemporaries, Edwards saw several young boys making a delivery of beer to a local saloon. They were drinking the "dregs" of the beer they were delivering and appeared to be intoxicated. Witnessing this was an epiphany for her. She decided then and there to devote the rest of her life to keeping boys like these away from saloons.

In 1888, Edwards took over the chairmanship of a WCTU reading room located on Willson Avenue, re-energized the neighborhood "Band of Hope" (a temperance pledge youth group), and opened the Flag Coffee House (so-called because of the flags she placed in its windows). The coffee house openly and actively competed with nearby saloons by offering boys a full dinner and a cup of coffee for just ten cents. Her work with the boys of this neighborhood eventually caught the attention of Eleanor B. Rainey, the widow of a wealthy Cleveland industrialist, who offered to provide Edwards with a larger and better facility for her work.  Rainey purchased a lot on the northeast corner of Willson and Dibble Avenues and built on it a three-story, 9,000-square-foot building, designed in the Tudor style by architects Badgley and Nicklas to resemble a large house. Officially called the Willson Avenue Industrial Institute, it opened in 1904. It had offices, and reading and game rooms, on the first floor; classrooms and a gymnasium on the second floor; and a custodian's apartment on the third floor. (Walfred and Anna Danielson, immigrants from Sweden and Canada respectively, and their son Harold, lived in that apartment and worked for the Institute for much of the period 1904-1940.)  

Just one year after the Institute opened, it was faced with a crisis that threatened its continued existence. Eleanor Rainey, its benefactor, suddenly died. The crisis was resolved when her heirs stepped in and agreed to continue their mother's support of the Institute's work, and the non-partisan WCTU (later known as the Women's Philanthropic Union) agreed to rename the Institute the "Eleanor B. Rainey Memorial Institute."  For the next half-century, the operations of Rainey as a settlement house were funded by Eleanor Rainey's heirs, particularly by her daughter Grace Rainey Rogers, who became sole owner of the building on East 55th Street and Dibble Avenues in 1931 and the sole surviving child of Eleanor Rainey in 1938. During this period, Rainey Institute functioned as a traditional settlement house, offering instruction in industrial trades for boys, home economics instruction (and also stenography and bookkeeping) for girls, and youth recreational activities. One of the young Slovenian boys who benefitted from these programs was Frank Lausche. He grew up to become Cleveland mayor (1942-1944), Ohio governor (1949-1957), and one of Ohio's United States Senators (1957-1969).

Anna Edwards served as superintendent of Rainey Institute until her death in 1923. She was succeeded by her younger sister, Flora, who served until her death in 1949. Upon her death, Flora Edwards was succeeded by Jessie Peloubet, whose mother was a close friend and associate of the Edwards sisters. Already 67 years old when she became superintendent, Peloubet faced many challenges during the decade of the 1950s. In 1957, the Goodrich settlement house moved from E. 31st Street to a location on E. 55th Street just up the street from Rainey Institute. The new Goodrich-Gannett neighborhood center, and several local organizations that provided funding to Cleveland settlement houses, put pressure on Rainey to either close, merge with Goodrich-Gannett, or move elsewhere.

Additionally, the decade of the 1950s saw the Hough neighborhood in which Rainey was located undergo racial transition, changing from primarily white and middle or working class in 1950 to primarily African American and working or lower class by 1960. Finally, the estate of Grace Rainey Rogers, Rainey's benefactor, who died in 1943, remained in administration well into the 1950s, forcing Peloubet to deal with estate executors and trustees in New York for the Institute's operational expenses. In 1955, pursuant to the terms of Rogers' will, the Rainey Institute land and building were finally conveyed from the estate to a newly formed non-profit corporation and a board of trustees was appointed that was charged with the financial management of an endowment left by Rogers for the continuing operating expenses of Rainey. 

The record is silent as to how well Peloubet addressed these challenges, but by the end of 1959 she was no longer Rainey's superintendent, and, for a six-month period, Rainey was administered by League Park Center, Inc., a social services agency that was located, like Rainey, in the Hough neighborhood. According to an article which appeared later in the Cleveland Press on May 19, 1964, Rainey almost closed during this period. Shirley Lautenschlager, a social worker with a degree from Western Reserve University's School of Applied Social Sciences, was hired by the board of trustees in June 1960 to become the new director, of Rainey--the title of "superintendent" apparently having been discarded. Lautenschlager, who noted that, when she arrived, Rainey was functioning as little more than a recreation center, instituted a number of new social programs at Rainey that were intended to serve Hough's current population, including after school care for seven to twelve year olds; activities for teenagers including game rooms, clubs, and dances; and gardening, cake decorating and sewing classes. Several years later, in 1964, following the taking of a survey in the Hough neighborhood, Rainey also began offering piano lessons to the children of Hough. These and other music classes proved so popular with the neighborhood's parents and children that two years later Rainey Institute decided to concentrate its efforts solely in the field of music, becoming an affiliate of Cleveland Music Settlement in 1966. The institute also appointed a new Director that year who had a background in both music and social work.

For Rainey Institute, Zandra Richardson, the new Director hired in 1966, was like the second coming of founder Anna Edwards. Like Edwards, Richardson came to Cleveland from the Dayton area, and like Edwards, Richardson's first love was music. Both Edwards and Richardson became involved in social services because of their desire to help children in need and both ultimately worked for more than four decades helping children in what is today Cleveland's Hough neighborhood. Zandra Richardson, who served as Director from 1966 until 2008, left a deep imprint on the history and evolution of Rainey Institute as an arts center for underprivileged children. During her tenure, many new music and other arts programs were introduced at Rainey. One of the earliest new programs was a summer camp program promoted by Cleveland Music Settlement and Karamu House in 1967, the first summer following the 1966 Hough Riots. At summer camp, African American children were introduced to art, drama, African drumming, vocal music and dance. Several years later, Rainey expanded the summer camp program to include drama, art and music, and dance. Kids attending also received instruction in reading, math, and creative writing, and participated in recreational activities.

As time passed, Rainey's focus as a music and arts center gradually changed as theater and dance became more popular than music instruction. As a result, in 1997 Rainey severed its affiliate status with Cleveland Music Settlement. During first half of Richardson's directorship, she and Rainey's Board of Trustees, anchored by long-time trustee Theodore Horvath who worked tirelessly to preserve Rainey Institute's endowment, also initiated a long-term plan to build a new and larger facility so that more children in Hough and other nearby neighborhoods could be introduced to the visual and performing arts. In 2011, just three years after Richardson retired as Director, and with the guidance of new Director, Lee Lazar, many Cleveland businesses and charitable organizations, and Cleveland Councilwoman Fannie Lewis, Rainey Institute opened its new 27,500-square-foot Arts Center, just down the street from the old Rainey Institute building. In the same year as the new Arts Center opened, Isabel Trautwein, a violinist with the Cleveland Orchestra, established an El Sistema string orchestra program at Rainey. El Sistema, one of the most notable programs at Rainey today, promotes peaceful social change through music.

Under the directorship of Richardson and her successors, there have been many success stories at Rainey, of students who went on to have fulfilling careers in many different fields of endeavor ranging from music to government service to teaching to the business world. One of those former Rainey students is Stephanie D. Howse, an African American woman who had a successful career as an environmental engineer, before turning to public service and becoming State Representative from Ohio's 11th District. Today, Rainey Institute is a thriving art center, each year serving more than 2,500 children like Howse who hail from the Hough and other nearby neighborhoods of the City of Cleveland.

And the old Rainey Institute Building? It has not been forgotten by the City of Cleveland, which made it a Cleveland Landmark in 2018. From an early twentieth-century settlement house founded by a woman who gave up a career in music to help immigrant children threatened by saloons to a twenty-first century arts center, which uses music and other visual and performing arts to cultivate self-expression and promote social emotional growth in a new demographic of disadvantaged children in the neighborhood, Rainey Institute has come full circle, a statement with which Anna M. Edwards would certainly agree, even if she did find it ironic.

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Jožef Turk arrived in Cleveland from Slovenia on October 25, 1881, and was soon followed by so many of his fellow countrymen that by the early 20th century Cleveland could be considered the third largest ‘Slovenian’ city in the world. These staunchly Catholic Eastern European immigrants began settling on the northeastern outskirts of the city, working, like Turk, in local industries such as the Otis Steel Company located on nearby Lakeside Avenue. As Turk’s wealth and influence expanded, he opened a saloon, a grocery and boardinghouses along St. Clair Avenue, but the growing Slovenian community also demanded a church of its own. In 1893 he arranged for a young priest named Vitus Hribar to be sent from Kamnik, Slovenia, to minister to this burgeoning community in their mother tongue. Hribar initially held services at the old St Peter’s Church located further west on East 17th and Superior while Turk raised $6,000 to acquire suitable land within the neighborhood. On October 4, 1894, taking less than a month to construct, a small wooden church was opened on the corner of Norwood and Glass (now Lausche) Avenues. It was named St. Vitus Church after the namesake of its founding priest, and was the first Slovenian Roman Catholic parish in Ohio. In the ten years that followed, however, the congregation began growing less pleased with their priest. By June of 1904 several conflicts arose between Hribar and a segment of his parishioners that would splinter the community and lead to the formation of a breakaway church. Hribar maintained that the dispute stemmed from his refusal to allow beer sales at a lunchtime fundraiser to take place on church grounds—a charge vehemently denied by his opponents. Instead, the disgruntled faction complained that Hribar used the church treasury as his own personal account, further enriched himself by overcharging for such things as weddings and christenings, and refused to make badly needed renovations to the church. Anton Grdina, who was the most prominent member of the congregation, was removed as treasurer of the church after he confronted Hribar over these financial concerns. Together with Louis Lausche, whose son Frank would later become mayor of Cleveland and governor of Ohio, and a group of at least 300 parishioners, Grdina petitioned Bishop Ignatz Horstmann for the removal of Hribar. This conflict would continue to boil for the next four years. Many incidents required police intervention and legal action during this period. Right from the start Hribar feared for his life and was eventually granted round-the-clock police protection from August 5, 1905. Later that month he stood before a church tribunal of twelve fellow priests, after being charged with the misadministration of church affairs. The day before the trial was set to begin, Hribar arrived at St. Vitus on Sunday August 23 to discover that the door of the church was nailed shut and he was unable to enter. A belligerent mob soon surrounded him and the police arrested 11 men, though Hribar ‘forgave’ them and refused to press charges. Hribar was admonished by the church council regarding his financial improprieties, but returned to his duties while tensions continued to percolate over the next year. Bishop Horstmann finally recognized the situation was untenable, and on January 5, 1907 he called for a separate, though un-funded, church to be formed for the anti-Hribar coalition. Father Kasimir Zakrajšek had recently arrived in the United States from Ljubljana and was brought to Cleveland to head the new breakaway church—fittingly named Our Lady of Sorrows. It operated out of Ulmann’s Hall, which was attached to a saloon just down the street from St. Vitus on the corner of Stanard and East 55th. Zakrajšek was immediately popular with the new congregation, and they continued to push the Bishop to replace Hribar with him and reunite the church. These protests intensified, culminating with large marches involving thousands of people in the spring of 1907—first to Hortsmann’s residence, and then to Mayor Tom Johnson’s after the Bishop successfully eluded them. As they returned from one such march on June 6, they approached Hribar sitting on the porch of his house beside the church. Angry words were exchanged until a firecracker exploded near his chair. The protesters claimed that Hribar had fired upon them and a melee ensued, which was further fueled by hundreds of interested bystanders flooding from the nearby bars and dance halls. Dozens of arrests followed. Finally, on August 2, Hribar was transferred to a church in Barberton. Unfortunately, he was replaced, not by the beloved Zakrajšek, but by Father Bartholomew Ponikvar, which initially did little to quell the turmoil. That winter Horstmann attempted to further defuse the situation, this time by removing the popular Zakrajšek, who would go on to become an influential Franciscan monk serving a diocese outside Chicago. He was replaced at Our Lady of Sorrows by Father Casimir Stefanic, but his appointment split that troublesome congregation in half again when 500 members, including Grdina and Lausche, refused to recognize him and demanded the return of Zakrajšek. One of Stefanic’s first actions was to move Our Lady of Sorrows out of Ulmann’s saloon and into a storefront that previously served as a Greek church on East 41st and St Clair. This new church was immediately vandalized on January 16, 1908, with Stefanic accusing the Zakrajšek faction, while they blamed St. Vitus parishioners. The steady and capable influence of Ponikvar at St. Vitus, along with the realization that Zakrajšek was not coming back, eventually led to a reconciliation beginning later in 1908. By 1930 Ponikvar was leading the largest Slovenian congregation in the United States, and the small wooden church was bursting at the seams. He arranged for the construction of a new church to begin a block away on East 61st and Glass. The new Byzantine-style church made of yellow Falston brick was designed by William Jansen, a prodigious architect responsible for over two dozen Catholic churches in the area, for the cost of $350,000. When it was completed just two years later, it was, and still is, the largest Slovenian Roman Catholic church in America. Despite the shaky origins of St. Vitus Church, it has ever since served as the heart and soul of Cleveland’s vibrant Slovenian community—through good times and bad.

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Funeral homes are necessary to every functioning community, but they are generally not the sexiest and most popular businesses in town. Successful ones, however, provide more than just rudimentary mortuary services to their neighbors, and are staunch and dependable cornerstones locals know they can rely on in times of need. The St. Clair-Superior neighborhood has been a close-knit, self-contained community ever since it began to develop in the mid-19th century. Central European immigrants initially built this area of Cleveland in the image of the small Germanic towns they left behind for the enticing opportunities and freedoms America promised. They opened businesses offering jobs, goods and services of every description that supplied the growing neighborhood with everything it needed. There has been a funeral home stationed at 6016 St Clair Avenue since 1871, which has been operated by just two families during that entire period. To be a successful entity for that length of time takes more than just hanging a shingle and setting up shop. Because of their devotion to, and belief in their community, the Ziehm, and following them, the Zakrajsek families have operated an integral and well-rooted funeral home that has faithfully served the neighborhood for nearly 150 years.

The funeral parlor on St Clair between Norwood Avenue and East 60th Street has long sat at the epicenter of Cleveland’s Slovenian community, but it was first owned by Frederick Ziehm, a German immigrant that would head a large, prosperous and industrious family. Cabinetry and the funeral business seemed to go hand in hand in the 19th century, and Frederick opened the business in 1871 as a cabinetmaker/undertaker. Eventually an efficient horse-drawn ambulance service and livery was operated from the business as well, and on July 16, 1907, a record-breaking ambulance run was made to Lakewood and back to Glenville Hospital to aid a worker who had fallen 50 feet from a scaffold—covering the 16 miles in a maniacal 76 minutes. The business continually expanded in the early 20th century as Frederick’s sons opened up similar shops of their own. All seemed to be capable, well-respected and confident men. One such son, William, was working out of the shop on St Clair in late January of 1901. As he left a nearby saloon, he was accosted by a ‘highwayman’ who pressed a gun to his head. Ziehm calmly shoved the gun aside and proceeded to beat the man bloody saying, “If I had hit the man twice more I would have had to embalm him.” Instead, he judged the beating punishment enough and sent the man home to his family without bothering the police.

In 1890, as the Ziehms established themselves on St Clair, Frank Zakrajsek, another carpenter/undertaker, opened a similar shop only a short walk away at 1105 Norwood Avenue. Although the neighborhood residents from a range of Central European backgrounds seemed to have mixed well in the area, there were inevitable misunderstandings, and there is even evidence of possible competition between the two strong-willed, neighboring undertakers. A battle over the body of a young Slovenian painter, Frank Alic, took place in the basement of Zakrajsek’s establishment on November 11, 1907. The young painter had no relatives in America and was suspiciously well-off when he passed away. Being Slovenian and a member of St Vitus church, which particularly catered to area Slovenes, it was not unusual that Frank Zakrajsek would rush over and bring the man’s body to his funeral home. Apparently, arrangements had already been made with Ziehm, however, and an overly-aggressive deputy burst into Zakrajsek’s shop and proceeded to crack heads with “chairs and casket lids” until he was able to throw the unfortunate Alic’s body over his shoulder and carry him out to the waiting Ziehm ambulance.

Things have calmed down considerably these days. In 1932, the current St. Vitus Church was built on East 61st Street and Glass Avenue (now Lausche), and, despite struggling through the hard-times of depression era America, the Zakrajseks decided it would be wise to move the short distance right along with it, and bought the Ziehm property that sat on the opposite side of the block from it. They rebuilt the structure in 1937 creating the current red-brick Colonial Revival-style building with the four sets of distinctive white double-pillars that has been a familiar landmark in the area ever since. As the neighborhood evolved and became ever more Americanized, the unwieldly Slovenian name was shortened to Zak in the 1950s to make it easier on non-Slovenian tongues. The Zak Funeral Home has served the community loyally for four generations through all of the ups and downs that the neighborhood has experienced. This service was especially evident after the East Ohio Gas explosion in 1944, when desperate families who lost everything in the disaster, suddenly needed funerals for the hundreds of victims. Funerals are always going to be a sad business, but perhaps the saddest occurred when George Voinovich, at the time running for what would soon be his first term as Cleveland mayor, lost his 9 year old daughter Molly when she was hit and killed by a van while walking back to school in 1979. The line of mourners stretched nearly to the Hofbrau House on the corner of East 55th Street for the service.

The St. Clair-Superior neighborhood has been evolving for well-over a century and a funeral home has been a crucial support for this ever-changing community all along. What began as a self-contained neighborhood made up primarily of Slovenian and German immigrants who made their way in their new country with hard work and help from their neighbors, has become an even more diverse area. The Zak Funeral Home prides itself on being a responsible and committed member of the community and plans to continue supplying strong and dependable support for this proud and rebuilding neighborhood.

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Some masters of craft may work in paints, and others, wood. Frank Azman III, however, worked in meats for over four decades. An afternoon spent in Azman & Sons Market over a sausage sandwich revealed in one bite why the shop was a staple of the neighborhood for generations. Similarly, customers who were greeted by first name upon arrival added to the charm of Azman's, harkening back to an era when businesses more commonly knew their customers personally and corner markets stood as epicenters of activity in communities.

The Azman family first began working in the sausage business in the village of Ig, a small town in their native country of Slovenia. Frank Azman relocated his family and business to America during World War I, a period which saw the greatest recorded emigration of Slovenians to the United States in history. Settling in Cleveland, Azman reestablished his sausage shop in 1924 at 6501 St. Clair Avenue amidst the largest Slovenian community in the country.

As not only business owners but, also, residents, the Azman name quickly became recognizable in the St. Clair neighborhood and soon began to spread throughout the city of Cleveland. Proud of their community and eager to participate in local events, Azman son’s, Frank II and Louis, refurbished their father’s old Model T to be used in parades to promote Azman & Sons Market. During its arguably most memorable ride, a Miss World pageant winner once joined the Azmans in the Model T when she arrived late to an event and her scheduled parade float had already set off.

Besides assisting beauty pageant winners in times of distress, the Azman family also helped those looking for the familiarity of a home-cooked meal. In 1968, a crew of Yugoslavian volunteer servicemen were docked in Cleveland and hoped to find a dinner reminiscent of their homeland. After sampling an Azman sausage at a local restaurant, the restauranteur contacted Azman & Sons Market to see if the servicemen could have some sausages to take with them upon their departure. Although already closed for the day, the shop was reopened and the crew was treated to more food for their journey.

What had really kept Azman & Sons in business for over nine decades, though, was the family’s dedication to their local customer base and quality of their products. When asked what the most important ingredient to the Azman sausage recipe was, third-generation owner Frank Azman III pointed without hesitation to the original brick smokehouse. Located behind the shop, the small, unassuming brick structure had been smoking sausages since 1924. Modern-day smokehouses are primarily stainless steel and Azman III argued that they cannot match the flavor of a sausage slowly smoked over cherry wood.

In addition to the smokehouse, the store had also kept the original butcher block table in the center of the kitchen, worn down by years of cleaning. Likewise, the store had continued to use the original cooler, which was first chilled by large overhead ice blocks but was eventually updated to run on electricity. These pieces remained in use as operable parts of the shop’s longstanding history.

Azman & Sons Market once served the community as a full -service grocery store offering patrons produce and pantry items in addition to the three hundred pounds of meat they processed and sold weekly. As the needs of the neighborhood changed, however, Azman & Sons Market scaled back its operations to focus on meats. Azman & Sons closed permanently in December 2021 with the passing of the store’s owner Frank Azman. The Azman legacy continues, however, with Frank’s brother Bill Azman. Bill runs a similar store called Azman Quality Meats located at 610 East 200th Street in Euclid.

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In a city with a history as rich as Cleveland, one would have no problem finding a building, landscape, or district recognized either nationally or locally for its historical significance. Places like the Terminal Tower, Rockefeller Park, or the West Side Market might quickly come to the minds of locals listing significant places in the area, or they may be found on the lists of tourists traveling to Cleveland. When driving down St. Clair Avenue on the city’s near-east side, these same individuals would undoubtedly notice the Slovenian National Home, the largest such cultural center of its kind in the United States. However, locals and tourists alike may be unaware that lurking behind this iconic cultural center is a mansion that has stood on the property for over a century. Built around 1870, the Diemer Mansion was constructed for Peter Diemer, a German immigrant who relocated to Cleveland with his parents in 1840. Peter Diemer’s personal wealth was amassed thanks to his entrepreneurial spirit and business savvy. He began Cleveland’s first artificial ice company capitalizing on a growing national industry that would eventually lead to the downfall of the global Ice Trade of the nineteenth century. As owner of the company, Diemer's success allowed him to become one of the first individuals to purchase and develop land east of East 55th Street where his family would live for almost fifty years. Though not as grand as the sprawling homesteads that would have been found along Euclid Avenue on Millionaire’s Row in Cleveland around the same time, the Diemer Mansion had a dominating presence along the St. Clair corridor. Situated on a sprawling estate, the two story home boasted many unique features which included an access road running along side it, known as Diemer Street, that provided direct access to Lake Erie for the family, now renamed East 64th Street. The exterior of the home is derivative of the Colonial style with Italianate influences. Constructed of red brick, the front facade is perfectly symmetrical around the main entryway with two windows flanking the front door on either side. Four ionic columns support a one story portico and each window on the first and second story are accented with terra cotta keystones. Along the roof line is an ornamental wooden cornice supported by modillions which wrap around the entire structure. The triangular pediment in the center of the facade above the second story windows is surpassed in height on the home only by the cupola in the center of the roof. Immediately inside the front door is the grand foyer with a staircase opened to the second floor. On either side of the staircase stands the parlor and dining room with two matching carved marble fireplaces. Arguably the most unique feature of the interior, though, is the second floor ballroom. To accentuate its grandeur, the ceiling of the ballroom was raised into the attic to match the room heights of the spaces located downstairs. Aside from its significance to the house, the ballroom is also a meaningful space in regards to the Diemer family’s history with the home. In 1918, the ballroom was host to the family’s last social event held there for the marriage of Alma Diemer. Shortly thereafter in the same year, the Diemer family sold the home to the Slovenian National Home Organization. After purchasing the site, the group converted the upstairs bedrooms into classrooms where English classes were offered to immigrants from Slovenia who settled in Cleveland. The organization also excavated the basement to be converted into a private bar for members of the organization. Today, the mansion remains surprisingly unaltered for a structure of its age, both inside and out. The Slovenian National Home did little to the home aside from the reconfiguration of the basement and the shortening of the first floor windows on the front facade. The home was also originally built with wooden shutters which the Slovenian National Home removed but have kept stored in the attic. In 1924, rather than demolish the mansion to make way for a much-needed expansion of the center, the Slovenian National Home had a new structure erected around the house, simultaneously preserving and hiding it away from the streetscape. Traces of the Diemer family near the site are most readily observed by the renaming of an alley behind the Slovenian National Home now recognized as Diemer Court. In 1974, the city of Cleveland designated the mansion a historic landmark with the Slovenian National Home being identified as such a decade late in 1984.

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Slovenian migrants have built National Homes at the center of their communities wherever they have moved throughout the world. Cleveland's Slovenian National Home is the cultural center for Cleveland's Slovenian community and the largest facility of its type in the United States. Constructed around the old Diemer mansion, the Slovenian National Home has a 1,000-seat auditorium that has been used for educational, social, and recreational events. In conjunction with St. Vitus Catholic Church, it remains an anchor for the Slovenian community in the region, now serving as the Slovenian Museum & Archives. Although the majority of Slovenians have moved to Cleveland's suburbs, the "old neighborhood" is still a destination for religious and cultural activities.

Cleveland is home to the largest population of Slovenians in the world outside of Slovenia. Slovenians began to settle in the city in the 1880s, with a large Slovenian community developing along St. Clair Avenue between E. 30th and E. 79th Streets. Cleveland originally attracted Slovenians because of its industrial base and its need for unskilled and semi-skilled laborers. The first wave of Slovenian immigrants to come to Cleveland therefore tended to be young, unmarried men seeking economic opportunities. The post-World War II Slovenian immigrants, on the other hand, were political refugees escaping the Communist regime of Josip Broz Tito and were often older and better educated than had been the first group of immigrants when they first arrived in Cleveland.

St. Vitus, the first Cleveland Slovenian Catholic parish, began in 1893 when the city's Slovenians wanted to attend services in their native language. By 1932, the parish had constructed a church on E. 61st Street and Glass Avenue, and it is still an active Slovenian parish today. In addition to religious activities, St. Vitus provided the community with social services and cultural events, and it continues, along with the Slovenian National Home, to serve as a central organization for Slovenians today.

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The National Cleveland-Style Polka Hall of Fame Museum--located at 605 East 222nd Street, Euclid, Ohio, is filled with artifacts and memorabilia from polka stars of yesterday and today. Some of the highlights include "America's Polka King" Frank Yankovic's accordion and stage outfits, as well as memorabilia and awards from Tony Petkovsek's 50 years in polka radio and promotion. Within these walls you will find items dating back to the turn of the century, as well as information on the polka stars who have been inducted into the Hall of Fame.

So what is Cleveland-Style Polka? Polka originated in Bohemia, but many different nationalities have embraced the lively music and adapted it to their own customs. Cleveland-style polka has its roots in Slovenian culture, and as such is sometimes referred to as Slovenian-style polka. It took off in Cleveland thanks to the tens of thousands of Slovenian immigrants that flooded Cleveland in the late 19th and early 20th-centuries. The Cleveland-Style Polka is characterized by fluid moves and a slower pace than other ethnic polkas. It became most popular in the post-World War II era, with Frankie Yankovic leading the way as its most recognizable star. The style was perhaps most beloved by second and third generation Slovenian Americans looking for a reminder of their youth and heritage (the songs were based on Old World, Slovene-language folk music), while still wanting to dance and swing to a fresher form of music with English lyrics. The music appealed to all types of Americans, however, and became commercially successful, with Polka bands touring the nation and radio stations from coast to coast playing Cleveland-style polkas.

Within the walls of the Cleveland-Style Polka Hall of Fame, one can trace the development of Cleveland-style polka beginning in 1900 and through each decade to the present. There is a special place dedicated to Lifetime Achievement Honorees, the Trustee's Honor Roll and the Greatest All-Time Hits. The museum has also established an archival library and video collection of polka history.

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Originally named the Yugoslav Cultural Garden, the Slovenian Garden is located near the intersection of St. Clair Avenue and East Boulevard, adjacent to the Polish Garden.

Over 100,000 people paraded in support of the Yugoslav Garden's dedication on a rainy morning in May 1938. Dignitaries included Mayor Harold Burton, Governor Martin Davey, Senator Robert Bulkley, Judge Frank J. Lausche (later a United States Senator), United States Representatives Martin L. Sweeney, Robert Crosser and Anthony Fleger, Chief Ohio Supreme Court Justice Carl V. Weygandt, WPA Director Colonel Joseph H. Alexander, and Dr. Konstantin Fotic, the Yugoslavian Envoy in Washington. The garden reflected the culture of Cleveland's Croatians, Serbians, and Slovenians and their sometimes conflicted past. As Yugoslavia dissolved in the 1980s and 1990s, so too did the ideal of a unified Yugoslavian Cultural Garden. In 1991, the garden was rechristened the Slovenian Cultural Garden, and separate Serbian and Croatian Garden Delegations emerged.

In "The Paths Are Peace", Clare Lederer describes the Yugoslav Cultural Garden's design: "A circular fountain and pool are the central features of a paved court. Two stately linden trees, the typical Slovenian "lipa", whose sweet-scented, delicate blossoms are used in the brewing of a delightful tea, tower at either side of the garden entrance. The Jugoslav Garden slopes in three levels between the upper and lower boulevards. To the left of the entrance is a reposeful, formal, sunken garden to the right, a semi-circular section. A semi-circular stairway leads to the halfway lower level, and a wide stairway from the mid-level to the lower level, where there extends a spacious, stage-like paved court. Encircling this setting is a beautiful, natural amphitheatre formed of massive shade trees and the cooling stream of Doan Brook."

Over the years, statuary in the Garden has included Bishop Frederick Barago, a missionary to the Ottawa and Ojibway Native American tribes (1797-1868); Ivan Cankar, a poet and political activist (1876-1918); Simon Gregorcic, a priest and poet (1844-1906); General Rudolph Maister, a poet and political activist (1874-1934); Prince-Bishop Petar II Petrovic-Njegos, poet and ruler of Montenegro (1813-1851); and Ivan Zorman, a poet and composer (1885-1957).

Slovenians began settling in Cleveland in the 1880s. The first to arrive settled in the Newburgh area. By the late 1880s and early 1890s a much larger community began to form along St. Clair Avenue. At its peak in the 1920s and 30s, the community ran from E. 30th to E. 79th Streets between the lake and Superior Avenue. The Slovenians kept moving east until the 1980s, eventually establishing a sizable presence in Lake County. Few Slovenians settled on the west side of Cleveland. The two small communities that developed in the West Park and Denison neighborhoods later moved to Maple Heights and Garfield Heights.

U.S. Census data for 1910 lists 14,332 Slovenians already living in Cleveland. By 1970, the number had risen to include 46,000 foreign-born or mixed-parentage Slovenians living in Greater Cleveland area. In the 1990s, the community in the Cleveland area numbered well over 50,000.

After the establishment of an independent Slovenia in 1991, its government opened an Honorary Consulate and appointed a local Slovenian, Dr. Karl B. Bonutti, honorary consul. While the use of the Slovenian language has all but disappeared in large parts of the community, many Slovenians still support organizations and attend performances that reflect their ethnic heritage and traditions.

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Frank Sterle, an immigrant from Ljubljana, Slovenia, founded his Slovenian Country House in 1954. With a small building on East 55th Street, a few picnic tables, and only one waitress - who had to memorize the small menu since none had been printed - Sterle managed to create a successful and lasting business. As the restaurant became well-known throughout Cleveland for its world-class polka performances, Sterle decided to add onto the building until it looked much like the alpine mountain lodge that Sterle lived in when he was a young child. The building had a pitched tongue and groove ceiling. A deer head hung over the entrance, and its walls were adorned with murals of Slovenia, giving the restaurant an atmosphere that was distinct in Cleveland.

After Frank's death in 1986, the restaurant was taken over by Mike Longo and Margot Glinski; immigrants from Italy and Germany, respectively. Despite the change in ownership, the restaurant continued to serve traditional Slovenian dishes and had weekly polka performances and dancing. Favorite menu items included wiener schnitzel, chicken paprikash, stuffed cabbage, klobase and sauerkraut. Among the notable artists who performed at Sterle's were Joey Miskulin, Johnnie Vadnal, “Waltz King” Lou Trebar, and "King of Polka" Frankie Yankovic.

In 2012, Rick Semersky bought the building and promised that he would use Sterle’s Country House “as a catalyst to revive the neighborhood.” Semersky kept using the building as a restaurant until he could no longer keep up with changing times and was failing to fill the large restaurant nightly. In 2016, Semersky opened Goldhorn Brewery next to Sterle’s Country House. The following year, he stopped serving lunch and dinner and converted the restaurant into a special events center. Although Goldhorn Brewery stayed open and was profitable, Sterle’s Country House closed for good in 2020. On November 22, 2022, a fire broke out in the vacant building, leading to the collapse of large sections of its roof and walls. The remainder of the building was demolished the following spring.

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