Tag Archives: #Doris Graham Cleage

Getting An Education – Fearless Females

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What education did your mother receive? Your grandmothers? Great-grandmothers? Note any advanced degrees or special achievements.

On My Maternal Side
My 3X great grandmother, Annie Williams,  was born about 1820 in Virginia into slavery. According to the 1880 Census, when she was about 60, she spoke English and could not read or write.

Eliza - my 2x great grandmother

Her daughter, my 2X great grandmother, Eliza Williams Allen, was born in Alabama about 1839 into slavery. She was freed by 1860. According to the 1910 census, she was about 67, spoke English and could not read or write

"Jennie Allen Turner in hat"
Jennie - my greatgrandmother

Her daughter, my great grandmother, Jennie Allen Turner was born free in Montgomery, Alabama in 1866. According to the 1880 Census, she was 13 years old, had attended school in the past year, spoke English and was literate.  I found one of my favorite books at her house “Lydia of the Pines.”

Fannie - my maternal grandmother

 Her daughter, my Grandmother Fannie Mae Turner Graham, was born in 1888 in Lowndes County, Alabama. She grew up in Montgomery. According to the 1900 census, she was 11 years old, at school, spoke English and was literate. My mother told me that when Fannie graduated from high school – State Normal, was offered a scholarship to Fisk but refused it and took a job in her uncles store, which she managed until she married in 1918. Also according to my mother, Fannie could quickly add long columns of numbers in her head.

Doris - my mother

My mother , Doris Graham Cleage,  was born in Detroit in 1923. She graduated from Eastern High School in Detroit and received a full scholarship to Wayne State  where she earned a BA with distinction as a Sociology major in June/1944. She returned to school in 1951 and earned teaching certification. In 1958 she became a masters candidate in education, completing her Master’s of Education Degree in the fall of 1958.  She took postmasters classes in education during a sabbatical in 1963. She also took evening classes  in 1968, when I was a senior at Wayne State.

My great grandmother, Emma Jones Turner (My grandmother Fannie’s paternal grandmother) was born about 1840 in South Carolina into slavery.  According to the 1880, 1900 and 1910 census she spoke English and was literate. I wish I knew more about her. I never heard a story about her. After my grandmother’s father was killed when she was 4 years old, her mother broke all ties with her husband’s family.

On My Paternal Side

Celia - my great grandmother

My great grandmother Celia Rice Cleage Sherman was my grandfather’s mother. She was born about 1855 into slavery in Virginia and brought to Tennessee as a child. She was about 10 when freedom came. In the 1880 census she could neither read nor write. By the 1930 census she spoke English and could read but could not write.  I wonder if my grandfather or his siblings taught her to read when they went to school.

My 2X great grandmother, Clara Green was born into slavery about 1829 in Kentucky. She was my grandmother Pearl Reed Cleage’s grandmother. In the 1880 census she was listed as about 55, spoke English and could not read or write.

Her daughter, my great grandmother Anna Allen Reed  was born  about 1849 in Kentucky into slavery.   According to the 1910 Census she spoke English but could not read or write. Anna’s four older children were illiterate while the four youngest were literate.

Pearl - my paternal grandmother

Her youngest daughter, my grandmother Pearl Reed Cleage was born in Lebanon, Kentucky in 1886. In the 1900 census she was 16 and where it says if you were or were not in school it says “Book 1” I don’t know what that means.  At any rate she was literate and spoke English. My Aunt Barbara told me she finished high school. I remember my grandparent’s house being full of books.

 

 

Going Out – 1937

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Mary Virginia, Mershell and Doris Graham

This photograph was taken in the alley beside my  grandparent’s house on Theodore in Detroit in 1937.  My grandfather, Mershell, was 47.  He stands here with his daughters dressed for church. He worked at the Ford Rouge Plant, taking the street car to work everyday and saving the car for going to church and other weekend activities.  Mary Virginia, my mother’s older sister, was 17 and a senior at Eastern High School, on East Grand Blvd within walking distance of the house.  She graduated in June and in September went to Business College where she excelled in typing.  My mother was 14. She graduated from Barbour Intermediate School that year and joined her sister at Eastern High School.  Here are their report cards from that year.

Meanwhile, a lot going on in the world in 1937. The montage below contains photographs of some. The Memorial Day Massacre when Chicago police shot and beat union marchers who were organizing at Republic Steel Plant. Ten workers died. Amelia Earhart flew off and disappeared. The German Luftwaffe bombed Guernica, Spain during the Spanish Civil War in support of Franco and inspired the painting of the same name by Picasso .  The Japanese invaded China, killing and raping thousands. Roosevelt was re-elected. The Hobbit was published. Gone With the Wind won the Pulitzer prize for Margaret Mitchell. The first animated full length film, Snow White came out. An anti-lynching law was passed.  The Golden Gate Bridge was completed and opened with a day for pedestrians to walk across.  Buchenwald concentration camp was build. The Hindenburg exploded and burned. King George VI’s coronation took place.  Auto workers in Flint, Michigan won recognition for the UAW after a prolonged sit down strike.  The Mississippi and Ohio Rivers flooded leaving devastation and death behind.  Ethiopia was now in the hands of fascist Italy.

"Events of 1937"
What was going on in 1937
"sepia saturday 118"
For more outgoing posts at Sepia Saturday, click  here.

My Social Butterflies

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My mother and my grandmother turned out to be more sociable in their youth than they were by the time I knew them. Here are a couple of photographs I found of them being social butterflies.

Progressive Twelve Club – Montgomery, Alabama – 1911

Some of the young women in the Progressive Twelve Club were relatives. My grandmother, Fannie Mae Turner wrote the song. Daisy Turner was her sister. Naomi Tulane and Jennette McCall were first cousins. Some of them are also in the photo below. The information on the back of the photo was stuck to the album page so I’m not sure who is who.  The purpose of the Progressive Twelve Club seemed to be sewing. I wish I could have heard them sing this song.

"Fannie and friends"
Fannie and friends at Holly Springs, MS

Progressive Twelve Club Song
Composed by F.M.T. 1911

 (1)

It was a bright September day
In dear old 1911;
our club of 12 was organized
An hour to needlework given
We hear the name “Progressive 12”,
As you’ve already seen;
the Kilarney rose adorns us
Our colors are pink and green.

(2)

Chorus
We’re loyal to our motto
with it we like to delve;
See…hear..speak no evil
as do the Progressive Twelve!
We’re loyal to our motto.
With it we like to delve
see no–hear no–speak no evil,
Oh you! Progressive Twelve!

(2)

On Thursdays to our meetings
In sunshine or in rain:
We go to greet our hostess,
and new inspiration gain.
We’ve carried a record high and fair
on which we look with pride
Not only in art but in music,
we’re noted far and wide.

Chorus

(3)

Mesdames Campbell and Dungee sing,
Washington and Miller too,
McCall and Tulane join in,
(while) Laurence and Wilson sew.
Mayberry makes the music
Jones and the Turners two
just work and think of our motto,
with hopeful hearts and true.

Chorus-

_____________________________________________

 The Social Sixteen – 1937 – Detroit, Michigan

My mother, Doris Graham is in the back row center with the flowered dress on.  Her sister, Mary V. is seated in the very front. First man in the back right is Frank “Buddy” Elkins who Mary V. would later marry. My father’s sister, Barbara Cleage is seated on the far right, front. I don’t know what exactly the Social Sixteen did but my Aunt Barbara told me that the only reason they had her in the club was because of her 4 older brothers.  The young woman at the other end of the couch was my mother’s best friend, Connie Stowers. We used to go visit her once a year. Which I still don’t understand because she lived across town, not in another city.

"The Social Sixteen"
The Social Sixteen – 1937

A Sunday Morning in 1953 merges with a day in 2011.

Cleages, Photographs,

"St Marks, Detroit 1953"
After church on a Sunday afternoon in 1953. My mother, Pearl and me on steps. Henry with hand on hip.

In the fall of 2011,  my friend, Ben,  went down to old 12th Street in Detroit and took some photographs so that I could combine them with old photographs from 1953.  I finally got around to doing it.

"Close-up St. Marks"
Close-up of Sunday morning 1953 - my mother in the dark suit.

 

My Mother in the News

Biography, Grahams,

My mother, Doris Graham, was in the news quite a bit during her years at Eastern High School in Detroit. Some were from the school paper, “The Indian”. Some were from “The Detroit Tribune”, a weekly black newspaper published by my mother’s cousins, James McCall and his wife Margaret.  I have other articles “starring” my mother but I am just using those from 1937 – 1940.  The others will appear later.  The articles were saved by my grandmother Fannie, Doris’ mother. The writing on them is hers.

"Doris Graham"
An article written my mother for the Eastern High School paper, “The Indian”.
My mother sitting alone on the right front of the picture. From Eastern High Yearbook, “The Arrow”.
The same photograph was used from her Junior High graduation article.
From “The Detroit Tribune.”
From the Eastern High paper “The Indian.”
1 Year Scholarships to Wayne State University – from one of the Detroit daily papers.
From “The Detroit Tribune.”

My mother was a teacher

Biography, Cleages, Grahams
Mrs. Cleage in her classroom - 1959.
Doris Graham Cleage in her classroom at Roosevelt Elementary School – 1959. 36 years old.

My mother was 36 years old and had been teaching for six years at Roosevelt Elementary school when it was taken.  My sister and I attended Roosevelt. I had my mother for a Social Studies teacher when she first began teaching.  We pretty much read the book, “Someday Soon.” and answered questions. It was not very interesting.  She improved a LOT as she went through twenty years of teaching.

"Duffield Elementary Distar"
With class at Duffield Elementary School. Distar on the board. September 1969.

Her last teaching assignment was at Duffield Elementary school, where she taught reading using the Distar method. She loved it and taught it to me and I used it to teach all of my children to read.

I found the writing below in one of my mother’s notebooks. It isn’t dated and I don’t know if she wrote it after retirement or before or what she was planning to do with it.

Each year when school begins I see again the many ways in which my children are alike. I am equally impressed with their differences. Close on the heels of these feelings comes the realization that once more I must try to build with each child the kind of relationships that will make it possible for me to teach him.

Children ask themselves many questions about a new adult. Is she friendly? does she smile often? Does she really mean what she says? What does she expect of me? Too much? Too little? Can I be myself with her? Or must I pretend to be what she has already decided I must be?  Will she listen when I am happy or in trouble or need help? Or will she always be too busy?

Satisfactory answers to these questions will mean satisfactory learning experiences for a child.  Unsatisfactory answers will mean no learning – or even worse the learning of things that must later be unlearned.

It was a warm afternoon.  The sounds of children at play came in through our open windows along with the good smell of newly cut grass.

My forty odd second-graders, (who come to me for two distressingly brief forty minute periods each week), were eagerly writing with crayons on small pieces of lined paper. Rough desks and clumsy crayons made writing difficult, but they settled to their pleasant task of writing for me their first and second choice for group work.  We had been studying transportation as groups.  Now according to our plan, we were dividing ourselves into groups of seven or eight to paint, draw write plays, poems, or stories, or create in clay about airplanes, boats, subways, cars or trains – whatever appealed the most to us. We had decided to use crayons instead of pencils because it took less time to pass crayons from a large box than it took to pass each one his own pencil.

As I walked among the crowded seats helping when I could, I came upon a small boy in a front seat.  His paper was empty. His small fists were clenched on his desk.  Leaning down to keep from disturbing others I asked, May I help you Julie?”

His close-set blue eyes were intense and unblinking as he raised them to me and said between clenched teeth, “I can’t do it.”

Thinking that he wanted a neat paper and knew that this was well-nigh impossible with crayon and rough desks, I said reassuringly, “Don’t worry about how it looks this time. Do the best you can.”

His hands did not move as he stared as his paper.

“I’ll never help him on the playground if he is in a fight – I don’t care if he is getting beaten, I’ll never help him.”

Work had stopped and forty pairs of eyes watched us unwaveringly.

“Who is it that you won’t help, Julie?”

He pointed silently to the boy who had passed a crayon to each child from a box of assorted colors.  Julie’s jaw was set – his face moist, “I hate purple. He gave me a purple crayon I can’t stand it.”

Here was a child who brought to school a brilliant mind (At 7 he could read on a fifth-grade level) burdened by countless problems at home – over-worked parents building a small business, a senile grandmother, constant competition for recognition and affection with her as well as with older and younger brothers.

I stooped beside his desk.  “We didn’t know that you don’t like purple. What color would you like to have?”

“I don’t care – but not this one! He opened his fist and showed a purple crayon moist from a small hand’s clenching.

All eyes were fixed on me as I rose from Julie’s desk.  Their tension now was almost as great as his. I walked to the cupboard and returned with a green crayon. “Will this one do?”

He took it without a word and began to write his choices.

I looked over his head at the children. They smiled gently and I smiled back.  We had taken another step on the road to good learning.

_______________________________________________

The inspiration for this post came from reading “Fearless Females Blog Post: March 12: Working Girl” on the blog The Accidental Genealogist.

 

Picking beans – Old Plank 1963

Cleages, Grahams,

Doris Graham Cleage picking green beans at Old Plank 1963

I’ve been thinking about my mother these last few days. My mother, Doris Graham Cleage, was picking vegetables in the garden at Old Plank. I wrote about the farm in my post  Playing Poker. What else was my mother doing in 1963, aside from maintaining a large, organic garden?  She turned 40 February 12 that year and lived on the west side of Detroit at 5397 Oregon  with her second husband, Henry Cleage and her two daughters Kris, 17  and my sister Pearl, 14.  Both of us were students at Northwestern High School.  Henry was printing in those days and putting out the Illustrated News.

She was in her 5th year of teaching Social Studies at Roosevelt Elementary School.  She took two post masters degree classes at Wayne State University that year, Urban Geography in the winter quarter and Constitutional Law in the fall quarter.

There was a lot going on in those days and my family was involved in a lot of it. To see what was going on in the news in 1963 click here –> Politics

To read about the March To Freedom in Detroit, when over 100,000 people walked down Woodward Avenue to protest the violence in Birmingham, Alabama, in July 1963 click here –> Walk to Freedom.

To see Henry and the press at Cleage Printers click here –>  Henry printing

 

My Father’s Album – Camp Atwater – Nov. 1945

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My mother in the bottom/right photo. Click to enlarge.

“Camp Atwater is a cultural, educational, and recreational camp designed for the children of African American professionals.  The camp, founded in 1921 by Dr. William De Berry, was located in North Brookfield, Massachusetts. Initially named St. John’s Camp, in 1926 the name was officially changed to Camp Atwater when Ms. Mary Atwater donated $25,000 with the stipulation that the camp’s name honor her late father, Dr. David Fisher, a well-known and distinguished physician in the town. The camp is the oldest American Camp Association (ACA) accredited African American owned and operated camp in the nation.”

Click for more information about Camp Atwater

Idlewild 1945 – En route to Springfield

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My Aunt Gladys sent word this weekend that my parents did, indeed, spend some time in Michigan before moving on to Springfield.  These photographs are in an album and labeled “En Route to Springfield.” Most of them were taken in Idlewild, at my Uncle Louis’ cottage. There were only a couple taken in Detroit, all of my cousin Dee Dee and her mother, Mary Vee in my Graham grandparents yard. My father may have been taking the photographs in Idlewild, because he doesn’t appear in any of them. Henry and Hugh are not in the photos because, I suppose, they were still on the farm.

Grandfather Dr. Albert B. Cleage Sr.

Grandmother Pearl Reed Cleage

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My mother Doris, Aunt Gladys, Lillian Payne (family friend), Aunt Barbara, Aunt Anna

Uncle Louis, Aunt Gladys, my mother Doris in the boat “Sassy Suzy”

Idlewild, Mich. 1945 Anna, Doris, Gladys, Louis, Paul, Barbara

Idlewild, Mich. 1945 Doris, Anna, Lillian Payne. Lillian was Paul and George Payne’s sister.

My mother, Doris

The Idlewild Clubhouse

In Detroit my cousin Dee Dee reads to her mother Aunt Mary Vee Elkins

Thanks for the Springfield information

Cleages, ,

2130 S. Hobart Blvd. #4
Los Angeles 7, California
January 13, 1945

Hi Folks:

We received your letters… Daddy’s and Mama’s.  Thanks for the Springfield information … even though there ain’t no Springfield church. (Guess you-all have received my Special by this time and have finished laughing) I hasten to tell you-all that the Dean called me into the office the other day to inform me that the United Presbyterians have contacted him regarding me (Knoxville!) He had letters from Rev. Ritzer or whatever his name is that Uncle Henry corresponded with from Pennsylvania and Rev. W.E. McCulloch (name sounds familiar) out here.  I’m supposed to go and see McCulloch for an interview when I get around to it. I suppose I’ll go see him although I’d rather not go to Knoxville!!!! I’ve EXHAUSTED everyone in the Congregational Church who has influence or MIGHT know of something and to no avail.  Since the United Presbyterians seem determined to make a point of this Knoxville thing I suppose it would be in poor taste or something to mention something entirely different, a church in Detroit. So, knowing that, you-all can use your own judgement about the thing.

I’m still in the process of exhausting possibilities … I’ve gotten down to some pretty long chances at present … but so long as the typewriter holds out and we can keep in stamps we’re goin’ to keep a pesterin’ everybody. (Ain’t wrote to Mrs. Roosevelt yet!) I ain’t as panicky as I sound (I hope) but our present set-up ain’t tolerable for long…We can’t live in the manner to which we aint accustomed on $30.00 a week.  We’d like to figure out something semi-practical soon! (See, Louis, we are too a-tryin’) (and registration just around the corner!)

I wasn’t laughin’ at those shirts and ties, Mama! They just looked like Pee-Wee and Gladys rather than you.  I could just see you a-tellin’ them that a PREACHER shouldn’t wear such sporty attire.  Pee-Wee:  That there tie-clasp of your-n is the only way I can really tell that I’m dressed up now… When I got it on I’m “ON”… and when I got my everyday piece-of-one on I’m rough-sharp. (Everything else remains the same!)

Well, so long…got to go to bed now. Doris is stretched out on the bed (with all her clothes on … just like Pee Wee on the couch (mouth open … droolin’ and everything). 

Did I ever mention, Doris is a perfect combination of Louis and Pee-Wee (Evil as a snake sweet like Louis and triflin’ industrious like Pee-Wee!) We received Gladys’ letters too, in case I didn’t mention them in the last letter.

Doris made me change this!