A photo of my grandfather, Dr. Albert B. Cleage jr. standing in a very heavy looking row boat. It was taken at Idlewild, Michigan in the early 1920s. Because my grandfather has the same tie and the same tired expression in both photographs, I believe they were taken on the same day. My aunt Gladys appears in the group photo and appears to be 2 or 3 years old so that would place it at 1925 or 1926.
I recognize my father in the back row with the cap on the far left. Next to him is his cousin Helen Mullins, and my grandmother Pearl Reed Cleage, two people I don’t know and my grandfather is at the end of that row holding a cigar. My aunt Barbara stands next to him. My aunt Gladys appears to be brushing her teeth and my Uncle Henry is chewing tobacco.
The three photos below were taken earlier. My father and Henry look several years younger than they do in the photograph above. These two were part of a batch of photos all with the number 671 written on the back.
Henry, Louis, Helen Mullins , Evelyn Dougles, Cornelius Henderson (who appeared in last weeks post), Toddy (my father) I don’t know who Helen Mullins is holding. Maybe my aunt Barbara? Neither can I identify the dog.
I recognize Henry with his arms over his head, standing on the left and I see my grandmother peeking around another ladies hat. The dog in the boat photo also appears as a blur on the far left.
This post continues a series using the Alphabet to go through streets that were significant in my life as part of the Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge. Back to Springfield, Massachusetts for 643 Union Street. During the first 4 years of my life, my father, Rev. Albert B. Cleage, Jr, was pastor of the St. John’s Congregational church in Springfield, Massachusetts. After my father convinced the church to sell the parsonage to pay debts, we lived in the back of the church community house. Rooms upstairs were rented out. The church offices were in the front of the building down a long hall. When I was 22 we went back to visit. Everything seemed so much smaller.
The house as it looks today on Google Maps.
Memories: Laying on a blanket in the yard looking up at the clouds with my mother. Holding my sister, Pearl, on the way home from the hospital. Sitting on the basement steps while my grandmother washed newborn Pearl’s diapers. Making Halloween cupcakes with orange icing. Looking at the clearing evening sky after rain. Going to the ice cream parlor down the street with my sister and parents. Leafless trees against the winter sky. Huge statues going past the house in a religious procession. Yellow leaves on fall trees, a stream and a dog in the park. Watching the milkman and his horse from my bedroom window. Watching my mother being taken to the hospital on a stretcher down the long hall. A friend of my mother cutting her hair. Ribbon candy at Christmas.
Cousins visit – Dee Dee, me, Barbara, Pearl. Is Pearl holding a little book?
Me looking a lot like Pearl in the snow. I remember once the snow came to the top of the porch steps.
Pearl and Kris listening to a little plastic record.
Just got back from a flying trip to Detroit for my aunt Gladys’ 90th birthday party. I saw relatives I haven’t seen since we moved from Michigan and some I hadn’t seen since they joined the family! A wonderful trip. Wish it could have been longer and I could have seen more family.
Gladys is my father’s younger sister and the 6th of the 7 children of Albert B. Cleage Sr and Pearl (Reed) Cleage. Click on both photographs to enlarge.
Most of the family that attended. Photo by Blair Evans, my cousin who isn’t in the photo because he was facilitating.
The two photographs below were taken in 1918 and feature my father, two of his younger brothers and a family friend. The water in the background of the second photo made me think they were taken on Belle Isle or perhaps across the Detroit River in Canada. I thought that I would be able to place the photos by using the cannon in the second picture. I was able to find several cannons in the Detroit area, unfortunately none looked like the one in the photo. The presence of a family friend makes me think it was taken in Detroit and not on a family trip to another state. At least it was labeled with names and dates.
Henry Cleage, Cornelius Henderson, Louis Cleage, Albert Cleage. 1918 Detroit.
Louis Cleage, Cornelius Henderson, Albert Cleage, Henry Cleage.
The prompt for this weeks Sepia Saturday is a photograph of a boy in front of a theater next a sign advertising a movie about an ex-convict. Standing on the far right side is a man with his head cut off by the photographer. I looked through my photos and was disappointed to find no sepia headless ones. I thought I had seen some in a box of photographs that came from my uncle Henry Cleage.
I came across this photograph in the box. Most of the photographs are of Henry’s first wife, Alice Stanton. She is the one in the front holding the purse. I noticed Doris Graham, my mother and Henry’s second wife, dancing in the background. I do not know who either of the men are. The photo was taken in 1939 or 1940 in Detroit. Henry and Alice were married on 3 September, 1941 in Detroit and divorced not too many years later. At first I thought that this photograph was taken the same day as the one below, but when I compared them, the news photo was of a much posher affair.
“Oh, Mr. Photographer! That’s what pretty Doris Graham (left) probably said as she glided by in the arms of Robert Douglass … Chesterfield club…” The incomplete caption at the bottom of this photo from my grandmother Fannie Graham’s scrapbook. Doris Graham, my mother. The newspaper was the Detroit Tribune which was published by my grandmother’s cousin, Edward McCall. The date was added by my grandmother.
For some reason, at this point, I noticed the address on the box that the photographs were kept in. It was addressed to Dr. L. J. Cleage at Homer Phillips Hospital in St.Louis.
The box.
Had my Uncle Louis done his medical internship at Homer Phillips Hospital? If so, it was probably around 1940. Although both Louis and my father were enumerated with their parents on Scotten Ave. in Detroit, both were listed as absent from the home. You can see them here in the 1940 Census. I went to Ancestry.com and looked for records for Louis Jacob Cleage. In the 1940 census he was indexed with his parents but there was also a Dr. Louis Cleage in St. Louis, MO. There he was, living in the doctor’s housing at Homer G. Phillips, as a Jr. intern.
Homer G. Phillips Hospital and surrounding area 1940.
The story of Homer G. Phillips hospital is a familiar one – black citizens tired of second class health care, black doctors tired of not being able to hospitalize and care for their own patients, of being unable to practice in the hospitals in their city. Click this link to read more about Homer G. Phillips Hospital’s interesting history. My husband’s younger siblings were born in St. Louis. He thought some of them might have been born at Homer G. Phillips. As luck would have it, his sister called right about then and confirmed that she and all of the youngest five Williams’ were born there from 1950 to 1963.
I seemed to be on a roll, so I decided to see if my father was enumerated in 1940 as a student at Oberlin where he attended Seminary. He did not turn up anywhere else outside of his parents home in the 1940 census. However, he was listed in the 1940 Oberlin Student Directory. His birth date is off by 9 years, but the home address is his parent’s Scotten Ave. address in Detroit.
After all this it was an anti-climax to find one photo with half a head missing – Henry holding up some fish while standing by Lake Idlewild. Since the focus is on the fish, perhaps this doesn’t really count. My family photographers seemed to have been more likely to leave lots of space with everybody crowded to the center than they were to chop off a head. Or maybe they just tossed all of those headless photographs.
This post continues a series using the Alphabet to go through streets that were significant in my life as part of the Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge. I am remembering living at 160 Sixth Avenue, Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina. We lived there for one year, I was 29 and Jim was 30. We had two daughters – Jilo, four and Ife, almost two. Jim was hired as director of the South Carolina office of the Emergency Land Fund, a group trying to stem the lose of Black Land. We moved from Atlanta, GA to Mt. Pleasant, SC. in October, 1974. His office was in Charleston. We were less than ten minutes from the ocean. For the first time, I was a “housewife”. I was a volunteer teacher with the children’s art program at the Charleston Museum. I learned how to drive. Got pregnant with our third daughter, Ayanna. In early November of 1975 the office was closed and we moved to Simpson County, Mississippi.
Ife with puppies and cat. Jilo inside.
Memories: The man plowing the field next to our house with a mule. Spanish moss in the oak trees. The Angel Oak, over 1,000 years, with branches on the ground as big as tree trunks. The local people’s way of talking. Getting shrimp and flounder fresh off the fishing boats. Swimming in the Atlantic. Picking up a bucket of sand dollars. Celebrating Kwanzaa. The family with 5 daughters next door, and next to them, a family with 2 boys and 3 girls and all the children in the three houses playing together in spite of the age differences. Buying day old chicks and all of them dying within a month. My great garden in that silt. Having almost no outside of the house involvement. Feeling outside of the ‘world”. Jilo going to church with the kids next door. Jilo and Ife going trick or treating in their jackets because it was so cold. Taking the bus to Michigan to visit my family, with the kids. Going to St. Louis in the VW bug for our first William’s family reunion. Visitors from Atlanta and Detroit. The end of the War in Vietnam.
The Angel Oak.
October 8, 1974 Hello Mommy and Henry, Well, everything here is moving right along. Jim still likes his job. The house is pretty well cleaned up and unpacked, but I’ll be glad when we get the furniture from Nanny and Poppy’s. We would like the dining room stuff too, if it’s available. I have enclosed a layout of our house and some postcards of our scenic view (smile) The only bad part is – the car’s broken down. After Jim drove it from Atlanta, it broke down. He is going to get a used transmission for it. I hope that does it because nothing is within easy walking. There’s a bus into Charleston, but it’s a good walk. I hope you all will be able to get down to visit this winter before we’re back to our normal living conditions. (smile). I read this article in McCall’s telling parents not to worry about their weird kids because around 30 they settle down.. Can this be true???
I found where the people had their garden and plan to put some lettuce, greens etc. in next week. I will be glad when we can meet some people! More soon – WRITE! A note from Ife (scribble scrabble) P.S. I may come for a week early Nov. 21, more later.
Love, Kris
A layout of the house I drew for my mother. The backyard is at the bottom and the front of the house and the road are at the top.
A view of 160 6th Avenue in 2012. When we lived there, there were only trees and bushes across the street and at the end of the road. The road was not paved, it was dirt. Where the small house to the right of our house is, there was only an okra field.
My father standing across the street from the market. Courtesy Paul Lee, Best Efforts, Inc.
In 1965 the idea of the Black Star Co-op was born at Central United Church of Christ. In 1968, the year after the Detroit riot, a grocery store was opened a block from the church. Due to a variety of reasons – inexperience of management and staff, costs of keeping enough stock, high prices – the store did not last long. Later the church operated a long running food co-op. Several people would go down to Eastern Market early Saturday morning and buy produce which was shared by everybody who paid $5 that week. There was no overhead and no paid staff. Later the church had a farm in Belleville, Michigan and the food for the co-op came off of that farm. Below is a short photographic story of the Black Star Market.
Sign on window.
Edward Vaughn and Norman Burton with the information and sign up table for the cooperative set up after church service. The photograph in the background is of the 1963 ‘Walk to Freedom’ in Detroit. Over 100,000 people marched down Woodward Ave.
Flyer for church members hand cut by my father on one of those blue stencils and run off on the church mimeograph machine.
Future home of the Black Star Market. Misty church steeple in the background.
Renovated store, ready for business. Courtesy Paul Lee, Best Efforts, Inc.
My father with women who worked in the store and a customer soon after the opening. Courtesy Paul Lee, Best Efforts, Inc.
The block where the store stood is now vacant land. The church is still there.
This post continues a series using the Alphabet to go through streets that were significant in my life as part of the Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge. This week I remember living on St. John Road in Simpson County, Mississippi. However, since I already have an “S” street coming up and I needed an “R” street, I am using our mailing address, Route 1, Box 173 1/2, Braxton, MS. I don’t have a photo of our mailbox so I am using a return address from a letter I wrote back then.
We moved to Simpson County, Mississippi in the fall of 1975. I was pregnant with our third daughter who was born April 12, 1976 at the home of our midwife. We had never lived in the real country before this move. Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina, outside of Charleston, was the closest we had been. My husband was working as an organizer with the Emergency Land Fund (E.L.F.), a group to help black farmers save their land, which was being lost at an alarming rate. We first lived at Rt. 1 Box 38 where the Emergency Land Fund had a model farm. Maybe I should say we helped setting up a model farm, complete with rabbits in the pen and tomatoes in Green houses and our own milk goats and chickens. When the Emergency Land Fund wanted to move us to the Mississippi Delta to run a soy bean farm we opted to stay in Simpson County and Jim quit working for E.L.F. We had to move from the farm and so bought our first house and 5 acres several miles away. The house was a Jim Walters House that had been built by former volunteers to the Voice of Calvary Church in Mendenhall. You can buy the house in various stages of completion and the more you finish yourself, the cheaper the cost. It was from the plans in this picture. Unfortunately there was not a big lake in the yard and there was no danger of flooding. We were much more likely to have a tornado come through and that caused me many anxious nights as storms rolled through and we were 10 feet off the ground. There was indoor water for the bath and the kitchen sink but there was no indoor toilet. There was an outhouse outback. There was electricity and my husband, Jim, hooked up the washing machine. It wasn’t too hard to run pipes since they were all exposed under the house. That caused problems when we forgot to drip the water when temperatures dropped. Eventually we did get an inside toilet but it was several years coming. Three of my six children were born in Mississippi.
A letter I wrote home from Mississippi not too long after we moved in.
January 19, 1977
Dear Mommy and Henry,
Here’s your late gift box. I’m sending some books – not to keep but to read (smile). The Tatasaday book should be read with the Iks in mind. I hope the hats fit and the cake is o.k. It didn’t come out as god as the last but i figured i’d better send it on.
It snowed here – about 2 1/2 inches and it’s still on the ground! Boy oh boy – first time the temp went to 6 degrees here – ever and most snow since 1958. Jilo’s schools been closed 2 days. We went for a walk in the woods yesterday. it was nice. Jim’s been going out with a neighbor down the road to cut pulpwood. Do you have those big trucks up there? He likes it fine. But it keeps him busy and working nights.
The goats are fine. 1 month until 3 more are due. The chickens are giving us 6>9 eggs daily with 13 hens. Still 4 aren’t laying i think. The midwife’s parents came over and told me to keep them locked up until non and keep food and water there and they’d probably start up – and they did. The garden isn’t started – luckily for it.
Ife cut her hair in places so i just gave her an afro. She looks so grown up! It looks nice though. Ayanna has 4 teeth and crawls funny but gets wher she’s going and is still happy. I braided her hair last week in the front where it was long enough. it rounds her head up so she looks more like the other two round heads at that age. The sun just went down and it sure droped the temp in here. We have solar heat benefit of those 2 south facing double doors.
Jim’s fine and we both read and liked the book. We had his other one – Welcome to Hard Times – have you read it? I’m ok too. Not keeping a Betty Crocker house but at least keeping up with the dishes. Jilo’s fine too, has had a sub(stitute teacher) since Christmas vacation and seems to make them work a bit harder – the teacher who had that grade before.
Write soon – Love Kris
P.S. Ife did the farm picture. She did it by looking as at a picture in Jilo’s cook book. Isn’t that good perspective and stuff. I told her we’ll start doing from life soon.
Also, the pigs still alive in this cold. it’s a wonder.
Going to milk the goats.
For more about living in Mississippi, including goats, killing chickens, heating with a wood stove, midwives, friends and work shoes read these posts.
