My sister and I running by the dunes at Ipperwash, on Lake Huron in Canada. It was 1960. I was 14 and would start Northwestern High School in September. Pearl was 12 and would start McMicheal Junior High School. The lake is in the background but the strange distortions at the top make it difficult to tell what is there.
My mother and Uncle Henry had been trying to find a place to spend weekends and vacations out of Detroit. That weekend we had driven through various towns and country to reach Ipperwash. There was a wide beach and cars could drive on it. The beach itself was all open to the public. I remember the house we looked at was like a big farm house and had beds all over, in the attic and in the several bedrooms. We spent the night at a cabin the realtor had and left early the next morning. They decided not to buy there because of the cars on the beach and the public.
I remember driving either there or home through a rainy day, looking through the window at the towns we drove through, everything summer green, but grayed by the gloomy day.
Lake Huron Ipperwash beach – a Wikie Commons photo.
The Ipperwash Crisis – While looking for photo of the beach, I found that during WW 2 the Canadian Federal Government expropriated the land of the Stoney Point First Nation with promises to return it after the war. The war ended, the land wasn’t returned. In 1995 members of the Stoney Point First Nation occupied the land in protest. There was a cemetery located in what was now called the Ipperwash Camp. During the protests an unarmed member of the protesters was shot and killed. The land was to be returned to the Stoney Point First Nation but it hasn’t been completed yet. You can read more about it at the link above.
I found this postcard in my Cleage family photographs. She is not a relative. Her family lived down Balch street from my Grandparents while they lived in Kalamazoo. Her father and my grandfather also belonged to some of the same groups. The Dunbar group for the uplift of the Race was one of them. My grandparents moved to Detroit in 1915 but must have kept in touch with the Pettifords.
Marion was the third child of Joseph Pettiford and the first child of Joseph and his second wife, Mary A. Brown Pettiford. All of the children were born in Kalamazoo. I was able to fill in some of the questions using Ancestry.com but it was when I started looking through historical newspapers that I found out much to flesh out the bare bones of the family.
Joseph Wilson Pettiford was the son of Young Pettiford who was the son of Edmund Pettiford, born in 1795 in North Carolina into a community of free people of color. The family moved to Ohio, where Joseph was born, and later to Indiana, where Edmund died.
By the 1890s, Joseph and his family were living in Kalamazoo, MI. Located in the SW corner of the state in Berrien County. He worked as a custodian (not a janitor, he informed the local paper) in the county Courthouse for over 20 years. It was an elected position. He was very active in the Masons, holding local and state posts. Both he and his wife were active in 2nd Baptist Church. He could cook up a good possum dinner, according to the local paper, The Kalamazoo Gazette.
In 1922 Mary Pettiford suffered a fatal stroke while out fishing with her husband near South Haven. Her funeral was well attended. Marion was listed among the children and that is the last I can find of her. In 1928 Joseph died. Unfortunately the obituaries after 1922 are not online for the Kalamazoo Gazette. I’m sure it was a long one after all his years at the courthouse and perhaps it mentioned what happened to Marion.
I checked the 1930 census, the 1940 census. All of her siblings in the 1930 and 1940 census. The marriage records online at Ancestry.com and FamilySearch.com. I checked newspaper articles at Ancestry and at GenealogyBank.com. So far, no luck. I will continue to check back now and then and report any new findings.
Eighth Grade Graduates Exercises at Vine School
The eighth grade graduates of the city schools will hold their graduating exercises at the Vine Street school auditorium, Friday morning at 9:15.
The program will include:
“Star Spangled Banner” – Francis Scott Key
“Keep the Home Fires Burning”- Ivor Novello
Prayer – Rev. Thomas Hollaway
“Winter Song” – Thomas Facer – Class
“Sabre and Spurs” – Hohn Phillip Sousa – Junior High Orchestra
“Rockin’ Time”, Gertrude L. Knox – Girls’ Chorus
Address – Rev. I.J. Hansen
“Hym of Peace ” (Arr. from Fifth Symphony) – Beethoven – Class
Violin solo, Mazurka Charles Allen – Mary Brooks
“Cowboy Song” – Frank Kotte – Boys’ Chorus
Presentation of Certificates
“The Union Jack” Stephen Adams – Class
“America”
Lake Street School, from which Marion Lucy Pettiford graduated in 1919.
For more information and photos of the early Pettifords, Weavers and other free people of color visit – The Weaver Settlement
This is the modern dance group at Northwestern High School in Detroit in 1964. The photo is from my year book. There is my sister Pearl, 3rd from the left, first row leaning back. She was in the dance group all through high school and also participated in the All City dance group and even contemplated a career in dance but writing won out. Ms. Carty was their advisor/teacher.
Pearl remembers “I remember this number. It was to “Elijah Rock” and we thought the costumes were so cool. Choreography was great, too. We had a whole Martha Graham thing going!
“I think Craig Carter took it from the track that ran around the gym so he was looking down at us“
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.
For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I blogged everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z”. I even managed 2 bonus posts on Sundays that were related to the theme. Doing them out of chronological order to meet the necessary letter bothered me until someone pointed out that I would have overlooked some of the words that gave the letters more context, as in H is for Henry Hummons or Q is for Questions.
This year was much easier for me than last year. I think having a theme and material that was already there, did it. It probably helped that I did little else everyday this month besides work on the blog. I managed to visit quite a few new to me blogs and got some new visitors. Now, if I can just use May to put these letters into a print ready form, I will be happy. The header for this post is a picture of just some of the descendents of Albert and Pearl Cleage taken in 2012.
My grandfather Albert B. Cleage Sr and me in 1948.
Pearl and Albert with their children and 3 of the grandchildren. My sister and I were at our other grandparents and the youngest 4 were not yet born. Their backyard at 2270 Atkinson, Detroit, MI – 1952.
Dr. Albert B. Cleage Sr and son Albert Jr – about 1912. For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I am blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.
My grandfather did go to the Zoo in 1909 when he was traveling between Detroit and Buffalo while working on the Steamer Eastern States.
July 3, 1909 (Enroute to Buffalo, Steamer Eastern States)
My Dear Pearl:
…Yesterday while Lewis and I were walking up the street in Buffalo, whom did we see standing on the corner (as if lost) but Miss Berry of Indianapolis, her brother and his wife and a Miss Stuart an Indianapolis teacher. Well to be sure we were surprised and they too seemed agreeably so. We spent the day with them taking in the zoo and other points of interest. They visited our boat and we showed them through it…
However, it is KalamaZOO that I am more interested in as this is the last letter in the A – Z Challenge and also the last letter my grandfather mailed back to Pearl, now his wife, and little Albert, in Indianapolis as they planned their relocation. My grandfather calls my father “Toddie” in the letter. This is a nickname he kept among family and friends for the rest of his life. This letter is addressed to a house on N. West Street, several blocks from the one on Fayette Street.
June 10, 1912 (From Kalamazoo, MI to Indianapolis)
My dear Sweetheart
I am awfully tired and lonesome. Have not as yet been able to find a suitable place for either office or residence. I am trying to find a place to suit both purposes but so far have been unable to find either. However by the time the things get here I’ll find some place to put them and just as soon as a find how much I am going to have to pay for rent will send you some money so that if you get the things all ready you can leave any time the first of next week. Hope ere this reaches you are much rested and feeling fine. Please do not worry and fret yourself sick about what some people may say. Take care of yourself and baby and get some man to pack and fix the things for you. I expect to secure a place tomorrow if possible.
Did Mamma and Ed leave Wednesday? Did Richard go with them? Tell Toddie to give you whole lots of bites for daddie. I would give five dollars to hear him say: – “Ite man” tonight
Remember I’ll try to send you some money by Monday. How are the people paying you, I want to see you all awfully bad.
Write often to your Albert.
___________________
From Michigan Manual of Freedmen’s Progress. Published in 1915. Page 53.
Albert B. Cleage was born in Loudon County, Tennessee, May 15, 1883. He graduated from the Henderson Normal and Industrial College in 1902, from Knoxville College in 1906, and the Indiana School of Medicine in 1910. He was appointed as intern at the city dispensary at Indianapolis and served there as house physician and ambulance surgeon. He began private practice in Kalamazoo in 1912 as the first African American doctor and practiced and lived at 306 Balch Street.
For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I am blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.
7/11/1911
Did not forget you were 4 weeks old yesterday and tomorrow you will be 1 month. My but you are getting old fast.
Papa
Below is the birth announcement that appeared in the column “Society Gossip”
Pearl Reed Cleage and baby Albert. 1911 Indianapolis, IN
For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I am blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.
As I tried to figure out an X word to use for this post, I wondered if an x-ray machine was in use during 1910 when my grandfather finished medical school. Yes, they were. Wilhelm Conrad Rontgen discovered them in 1895 and by 1910 there were various early versions of x-ray machines. Here is a photo of Rontgen’s wife’s hand, with ring.
Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen with x-ray of wife’s hand.
Since this information was not included in one of my grandfather’s letters or cards, I am also including this postcard of the log cabin in Palmer Park, Detroit. It was built for eX-senator Palmer and still stands. This card was postmarked Buffalo N.Y. July 21, 1911. My father, Albert B. Cleage Jr, was just over 1 month old. I don’t know what the purpose of the trip was. On July 12, my grandfather sent a 1 month birthday card to my father, which was postmarked Detroit. I remember being called “nigger” by some white children in this same log cabin one long ago summer day in Detroit while on a family outing to Palmer Park.
“Log Cabin, Palmer Park, – Built on land donated to the city by Ex-Senator Thomas W. Palmer in 1893 and situated north of the city at the extreme terminal of the Woodward Avenue car line, is one of the city’s favorite breathing spots. Its center piece is a log cabin which is an exact reproduction of the home in which Senator Palmer resided when Detroit was a little more than a trading post”
7/21/11
Dear Pearl – I am lonesome for you and baby. Want to see you all awful bad. Hope you are well and happy.
July 12, 1911 and grandparents had now been married a year and the first of their 7 children, my father, was about 1 month old. I’m not sure why Albert is in Detroit. Perhaps trying to figure out where to establish his medical practice. The card is addressed to the house on Fayette so they were still living with Albert’s brothers, Henry and Jacob and Jacob’s wife Gertrude.
My grandparents – Albert B. Cleage & Pearl D. Reed in 1909.
7/14/’11
Just got back to Detroit, Hope you all are well and happy. Will feel better where I hear from you.
My grandparents – Albert B. Cleage & Pearl D. Reed in 1909.
8/30/10
My dear Pearl,
The contents of your letter were very carefully noted and I shall endeavor to answer it in detail. Am sorry that such a letter was necessary but you did perfectly right in asking the questions you did, I had no idea that such thoughts were troubling your mind. You must forgive me dear for mistakes oversights etc. – I have never attempted anything like this before, – I realize now that I have taken too much for granted and have not talked with you over the matter as perhaps I should have done. Now don’t get from what I say that I do not realize the seriousness of what I am about to do – my responsibilities etc.- You know I spoke to you sometime ago about not staying with Gertrude and I thought I go from your reply that it did not matter much about where we stayed and neither was I very choisey about places, just so I could be with you knowing that in time we would be somewhere. Since we did not want our marrying to be general gossip I have refrained for a time asking the people whom I had in mind about rooming. However this morning I talked the matter over with Gertrude and she is more than willing – is rather anxious to have you live with her – and I convinced that it will be just about as congenial a place as will be possible for you to stay now, if agreeable to you, you may plan to live at 910 Lafayette – We’ll talk it all over. – again – you may plan definitely on going to visit my mother.
You ask about a wedding ring- I believe it is the conventional thing, in conventional weddings. – not by any means in my mind, a necessity.
Do you distinguish between an engagement ring and a wedding ring? I confess that I have never thought of an engagement ring for I thought you want that kept quiet – I had planned giving you a wedding ring after the wedding – but sweetheart it makes no difference to me. If you prefer it before or after you may have your choice. You must tell me all of this when I see you and anything else you must feel free to talk to me about, just as a wife talks to her husband- Now I hope everything is clear.
10 We shall live at 910 Lafayette (if you are willing)
2) We shall go to Athens, Tenn., on a honeymoon.
3) We shall have a ring – when you desire it.
Will let you know when you are to ? meeting when I see you Sunday. Hope you will get to come to choir practice. Your Albert
“In the presence of relatives and immediate friends of the two families Dr. Albert B. Cleage, Interne at the City Dispensary and Miss Pearl D. Reed, 1730 Kenwood avenue, were married at noon Thursday. The Rev. D.F. White of the Witherspoon United Presbyterian church officiated. Immediately after the cremony Dr. and Mrs. Cleage left on their wedding tour, during which they will visit the Appalachian Exposition at Knoxville, Tenn., and points farther south.”
My grandparents – Albert B. Cleage & Pearl D. Reed in 1909.
For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I am blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.
This letter was sent while Albert was on the Steamer Eastern States during the summer of 1909 on July 15. Pearl had left Indianapolis to visit her sisters in Benton Harbor, Michigan for the summer. The hard times that he mentions were the result of her mother’s objection to their relationship. At the end he mentions a Vaudeville he attended. Click images to enlarge.
On Board the Steamer Eastern States July 15/’09
My dear Pearl-
Words are inadequate for me to express the pleasure that was mine on going to the office today and receiving two letters from you, both of which I read and re-read.
The description you gave of your surroundings was fine and it certainly made me long to be with you and enjoy with you the pleasures which such condition must afford one.
You say you are unhappy, and though that man part of me appreciates that feeling entertained by you that you cannot be quite happy without me – I beg of you, for a few short weeks (for your own sake) forget me in the sense of longing to be with me and fill each moment of your life with such thoughts and activities that will mean most to you in the way of health & happiness. After such a strenuous life as yours last winter – filled with anxiety, fear etc, such a needed rest as is your privilege now to enjoy – should be greatly welcomed and your pleasures not marred by anxious thoughts of him who has brought naught but sorrow and discontent into your home and hardships into your life. For all of which dear, forgive me. I could not do differently. I would not if I could and could not if I would.
These little things are but the trifling price we pay for love – I believe with someone who wrote: – to fully enjoy and appreciate the blessings of heaven, it is well to have spent a few moments in H___.
You say you love me more than I will ever know. Is it possible? Remember that the part that I’ll never know of will do no one any good.
In thinking that you probably had forgotten me, I was not judging you by myself “for if thinking be forgetting, then dear, I have forgotten you long ago.”
When you spoke of being out in the country I was reminded of your rustic hero of whom you told me the Sabbath we went to Meridian Heights. Did you see him again? You must be careful of snakes and men, both are dangerous. But the old man who was kind enough to entertain you with funny stories will not bite, I guess. You see, I am trying to make you afraid of men so none of those country chaps will steal you from me.
The flowers were beautiful and I appreciated them as reminders of the fact that I am not forgotten. I hope it will be possible for me someday to see all of those beautiful places you speak of, with you.
Now about that skin disease you speak of – it is a disease known to medical science as Vitilligo or Leukoderma. It is incurable and peculiar to the Negro race. Its cause is not definitely known. Miss Locklear whom you met has a brother so afflicted.
It is now very late sweetheart. Most everyone is asleep and I too am tired and sleepy.
I attended a vaudeville in Buffalo today – Two colored women singers were features of the program.
Good night Sweetheart. Your Albert
Maybe he saw the famous Griffin sisters. I found their picture while searching Indianapolis newspapers for news items about my family and found it again online in goggle news archives. There are links to several news articles below.
“Emma GRIFFIN DEAD; Ellis avenue. Miss Griffin died a Christian. Emma Griffin was born in Louisville, Ky., and was 44 years of age. She made her first appearance on the stage with her sister at Kohl and Middleton’s Museum, Chicago, when they were girls. Their first appearance as regular professionals was with John W. Isham’s original octoroon company, headed by Fred J. Piper and Madam Flower. When they had gained fame with the octoroons they entered into vaudeville and remained in that field and made money. When Mabel Griffin was taken ill at Youngstown, O., eleven weeks ago and had to return home ill, Emma took Margie Lorraine as a partner and opened at the Star Theatre, Pittsburgh, ten weeks ago, but broke down and returned home ill. Both sisters were bedridden in separate rooms during a period in which a benefit was given for them at the States Theatre of special pictures by Theda Bara. No performers appeared and the occasion marked the first theatrical “movie” benefit in history. Elizabeth Hart and Cassie Burch Slaughter conducted the benefit Miss Griffin was well educated, having been a student of the State University of Louisville. As an actress she was a comedienne of the May Irwin type and was a clever mirth provoker despite her avoirdupois. As an orator she had recognized ability, recently demonstrated in politics as a suffragette. The stand she took on behalf of the rights of performers against managers was well known. The deceased was a charitable woman and always interested in the welfare of her profession. Miss Griffin was the oldest child of Henry Griffin, deceased, and Blandina Duncan. The funeral was held Tuesday, September 3, and was largely attended.”
I found this postcard in my Cleage family photographs. She is not a relative. Her family lived down Balch street from my Grandparents while they lived in Kalamazoo. Her father and my grandfather also belonged to some of the same groups. The Dunbar group for the uplift of the Race was one of them. My grandparents moved to Detroit in 1915 but must have kept in touch with the Pettifords.
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