A photograph of my aunt Mary Virginia Graham standing on the front steps of the house on Theodore in Detroit. She was named for both of her grandmothers. The writing on the photo says “13 yrs Mary Virginia 1934”. A double exposure shows my mother sideways, overlapping.
My mother Doris with her sister Mary Virginia aka M.V. at Belle Isle.
This photo looks like it was taken the same day at Belle Isle, which was 5 miles from the house. The dresses are the same. My mother is standing the same way that she in in the double exposure.
One of my uncle Henry Cleage’s photographs from the porch of our house at 5397 Oregon in Detroit. Below is a photo of the house and porch from which he took the photos. They were developed at Cleage printers, where Henry and Hugh had a full dark room.
I do not know who the little girls are. I have memories of riding bikes when I lived here, but no photographs. I remember going bike riding all around the neighborhood with my cousins, Dee Dee and Barbara. We rode in the street, which I wasn’t supposed to do. My sister and I used to go bike riding too but we usually had a destination – the library or my grandmother’s house. I lost that bike when I left it unchained outside of a store on W. Grand Blvd. We were on the way home from the Main Library.
View of the porch. My mother and I are sitting on the porch. Henry took this photo too. About 1962.
Albert B. Cleage Sr. This photo was enclosed in the letter.
This was the house where Pearl’s aunt lived. She received mail there sometimes because her mother disliked Albert. The two houses were on opposite streets and shared a yard
3/18/10
My dear Sweetheart:-
How did you spend St. Patrick’s day? It was a lovely day sure and also has today been beautiful. How are you? Have you gotten entirely well. I hope that pains and aches with you are now “past history.”Does your mother seem to be improving?
These are busy days with me. Examinations for the close of the winter term begin Monday and will last one week after which comes a ten or twelve day’s vacation.- What can I do with so much time all by my lone self.
Do you remember that last year we planned a day’s outing in the country and I thinking the day appointed, too bad did not show up? And also how you got angry with me? See how well I remember. That has been one year ago but it to me certainly does not seem so long. You did go to Brookside with me, which was the beginning of several very pleasant trips which will always be sweet sweet memories to me. My vacation is about 10 days off and it may be yet that you will be able to take that trip which we planned last year.
Mrs. White, I believe goes to Lincoln Hospital tomorrow to be operated upon Monday. Mrs. Brady – Little Marcum Mitchell’s grandmother died at the City Hospital this morning.
Of course I selected that negative which you liked better, others whose opinion I asked were about equally divided. I send you the other which is fast fading.
Be careful for yourself. The things you said in your last letter were surely the product of a melancholie mind – such moods are not good for you. Cheer up!! Of course, God in His wise providence might call your mother home, and ’tis he alone who can cause me to cease loving you. So wake up from your dream – you shall nurse, not patients for someone else, but (__?__) for yourself – Won’t you like that better. Yes, I believe you will – Ha! ha!
Your Albert
{Had better burn this letter up}
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My grandparents, Pearl Reed and Albert Cleage, exchanged letters for several years while they were courting. The letters go from 1907 when they met to 1912 when they were married, my father had been born and they were moving from Indianapolis, IN to Kalamazoo, MI. Unfortunately I do not have copies of my grandmother’s letters, just my grandfather’s. You can read more of Albert’s letters to Pearl and what else was going on when he wrote them, by looking at the Index of blog posts I wrote for the A to Z Challenge in 2014. Scroll down past the posts for 2017, 2016 and 2015 until you reach 2014. Perhaps I should give each year’s index a separate page.
At one point, this letter refers back to a letter from a year ago. You can read it here at K is for Kenwood.
Pearl Reed Cleage. Photo taken in the 1940 at her home on Scotten in Detroit.
Thinking about my grandmother Cleage today. She would have been 133 if she were still living. Pearl Doris Reed Cleage, born in 1884 in Lebanon, Kentucky and died in 1982 in Idlewild, Michigan.
The Cleage family about 1930 in front of their house on Scotten. From L to R Henry, Louis, (My grandmother) Pearl, Barbara, Hugh, Gladys, Anna, Albert Jr (My father) and (My grandfather) Albert Sr.
This photograph is from my Cleage photos and is unlabeled. I do not know which one of the Cleage photographers took the photo. I would date it in the 1940s.
This photo may have been taken from the same event. The paper the same thick texture. Unfortunately the people are also unidentified.
In 1892 my great grandfather Howard Turner was shot to death at a bar-b-que. This is a photograph of his wife and children in mourning. Twenty six year old Jennie Allen Turner holds two year old Daisy Pearl Turner while four year old Fannie Mae Turner stands beside her. Fannie was my maternal grandmother.
Jennie and daughters in Montgomery, Alabama. Fannie, Jennie and Alice in the front. Daisy in the back. About 1916.
Daisy Turner, Jennie Turner and Fannie Turner Graham standing outside of my grandparent’s fence for a photograph, probably on a Sunday after attending service at Plymouth Congregational Church.
My grandmother, Fannie Turner Graham and my oldest daughter, Jilo. Detroit, 1972.
In 1951 our family moved from Springfield, MA to Detroit, where my father, Rev. Albert B. Cleage, Jr., was called as pastor of St. Marks United Presbyterian Community Church at Twelfth and Atkinson. My paternal grandparents lived several blocks up Atkinson. The parsonage was right down the block from them. He was there until 1953 when there was a church split. My father and 300 members started a new church that became Central Congregational Church and finally The Shrine of the Black Madonna.
Below are some then and now photographs of St. Mark’s and the parsonage at 2212 Atkinson.
My son James in 2016. My father and Mr. Lindsey Johnson from Springfield, Massachusetts in 1953. Photograph by Paul Lee. Moving Day Revisited has more information about Lindsey B. Johnson.
After church at St. Mark’s Community United Presbyterian Church in 1953 combined with a 2011 photograph taken by Benjamin Smith. In the group near the door I see myself, my sister Pearl, my mother Doris Graham Cleage, my uncle Henry Cleage and Choir director Oscar Hand leaning out of the door.
In front of St. Marks 1953. I see my mother in the dark suit and part of my little sister Pearl behind her in a light colored dress. Combined with another photograph by Benjamin Smith. This photo and the one below first appeared in the blog post “A Sunday After Church About 1953“
The parsonage now and us back in 1953 before the church split. This photograph first appeared in the blog post “Then and Now – Atkinson About 1953″.
My son James sitting on the porch of our house as it is now in 2016. My mother and I sitting next to him in 1963.
Recently my son James was in Detroit and visited many of the sites that were important in my life and my family’s life. He was lucky enough to have historian Paul Lee and Sala Adams as guides. I have matched photographs from the 1960s with some of the photos that they took last week.
Today’s photographs were taken at 5397 Oregon, on the West Side of Detroit. Ten years ago when I went around taking photos of places I had lived, there were people living here. Today the house and many in the area are wrecks. In one photo not shown here, I could see holes in the roof. The house on the left still has someone living there. The two houses to the right are also falling to pieces. It’s tragic.
I would never have imagined that this area would look like this when I lived there some 48 years ago. Today I’ve been looking at the house I live in right now and thinking about which parts would fall apart first if it were vacant for a decade. I doubt it would be in as good a shape as this one because it was built with much cheaper materials.
You can read about my life in this house here “O” is for Oregon Street. This is the first of a series.
My father and I sitting in the living room in 1966 while Paul Lee takes a photograph in 2016.
Around the dining room table in 1963 amidst the crumbling house of 2016.
My mother in the kitchen in 1963, with the present day shambles around her.
Me looking over the railing in 1963 while James walks across the room in 2016
My sister and I looking out of the living room window. 1963
