Everybody knows about Cleveland, the city with a river so polluted
it once caught on fire. You remember the story. Some guy was walking
along the river, flicked his cigarette into the water, and phoom
the whole thing went up like a line of gasoline.
See, this is the kind of nonsense we Clevelanders have to put
up with. The lies, I mean. We also are cursed on the order of
Job or Sisyphus or Charlie Brown. More about that in a bit. First,
the lies, one whopper in particular.
The incident described, erroneously, above took place in 1969.
Here's what really happened: One June day around noon, a clump
of debris floating in an oil slick in a bend of the Cuyahoga River
caught fire under a railroad trestle. In all likelihood, a spark
from wheels rolling over the tracks ignited the flotsam below.
The flames eventually reached high enough to scorch the timbers
of the trestle, but the whole thing was over in 23 minutes. By
the time the newspaper photographers arrived, there was nothing
left to shoot but firemen hosing down the bridge timbers. And
yet . . .
"I will never forget a photograph of flames, fire, shooting
right out of the water in downtown Cleveland. It was the summer
of 1969 and the Cuyahoga River was burning."
That's former Environmental Protection Agency Administrator
Carol Browner reminiscing. The photograph she can't forget appeared
in Time magazine and showed arcs of water shooting from
fireboats and landing in an impressive ring of fire on the water's
surface.
Trouble is, that picture had been taken in 1952 (read the caption,
lady). Back then, an oil slick igniting on a polluted urban waterway
was, regrettably, a pretty common occurrence, or so I've read.
Remember, this was about a decade before the birth of the environmental
movement.
But by 1969, a river ablaze in an old industrial city just fit
the prophesies of eco-apocalypse so perfectly that Mr. and Mrs.
Elsewhere in America must have imagined the Cuyahoga to be more
butane than water.
In reality, the water quality of the Cuyahoga (an Indian word
meaning "crooked" or "twisted") River, which divides Cleveland
into east and west sides before emptying into Lake Erie, had improved
considerably by the late 1960s. There were fish swimming in it,
or so I've read (at the time I was 10 and living in a far-flung
suburb). Plenty of other urban waterways were just as polluted
or worse. But "the river that burned" became the poster child
for water pollution, and Cleveland became shorthand for "awful
place to live."
Which it wasn't.
And it isn't. With its "emerald necklace" of beautifully maintained
Metropolitan Parks, ever-moving freeways, affordable housing and
abundant friendly, sensible people, Cleveland is a great place
to live. Just ask the editor of The Economist's magazine
who earlier this year published the results of a survey naming
Cleveland as the most livable city in the United States. Or forget
The Economist, which had Cleveland in a tie for first
with (gasp) Pittsburgh. Just ask anyone who, like me, doesn't
live in Cleveland anymore.
We ex-pats actually constitute a distinguished diaspora: Phil
Donahue '57, Paul Newman, Molly Shannon, Toni Morrison, Halle
Berry. And those are only some of the living ex-Clevelanders.
Those who have gone on to the great Northeast Ohio in the Sky
include Bob Hope, Jesse Owens, John D. Rockefeller, Langston Hughes
and Henry Mancini. There's also James A. Garfield, who was president
of the United States for four months. Six, if you count the time
he lingered with an assassin's bullet in his back.
Cleveland likes to claim Superman as one of its own because
the creators of the comic, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, were
born there, but the Man of Steel was actually an immigrant from
the exploding planet Krypton.
A Cleveland deejay, Alan Freed, popularized the term rock 'n'
roll, and local stations still refer to Cleveland as the Rock
'n' Roll Capital of the World. This is a dubious claim, considering
how few rock acts Cleveland has produced. The choice of Cleveland
as site of the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame and Museum resulted
mostly from an organized effort to win a USA Today call-in
poll in the 1980s, when sites were being considered, and from
community organizers raising the money to build the hall.
After his success in Cleveland, Freed moved his radio show to
New York City, following in a long tradition of the talented and
successful leaving town. Which begs a question: If Cleveland is
so great, why do so many people move away? Same reason people
have always gone in search of new horizons, I think: You can't
be a prophet in your home village.
The 'Mistake on the Lake'
This is not to pronounce myself a prophet or even talented or
successful. But I will tell you that just about any ex-Clevelander
you talk to will speak warmly about the city that those envious
slanderers in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati term "The Mistake on the
Lake."
Actually, you're likely to hear a Clevelander occasionally invoke
that nickname. This is because: 1. We have an inferiority complex
(thank you, Carol Browner, Rowan & Martin, et al.); and 2.
Contrary to what one might surmise from an episode of the dreadful
Drew Carey Show, we have a sense of humor.
As evidence, I present the song "Have Another Laugh on Cleveland
Blues," written in the late 1970s by a Cleveland singer-songwriter,
Alex Bevan. This jumpy little number recounts a string of embarrassing
events in the city's then-recent history. Like how the mayor set
his hair on fire twice while trying to cut a ribbon with
a blowtorch at a bridge dedication. And how the same mayor's wife
turned down an invitation to dinner at the White House because
it conflicted with her bowling night.
The main impetus for the song, though, was the City of Cleveland
having just defaulted on its municipal bonds, becoming the first
major American city to go broke. It didn't have to go broke. The
mayor -- not the one with the twice-singed hair but his successor
-- had the opportunity to raise cash by selling the city's aged
electrical generating plant to a local utility. Instead, he put
the blame for the default on the utility, more or less portraying
the proposed purchase as a scheme to: 1. take over the city; 2.
jack up electric rates; and 3. enslave the populace.
The mayor in question, who barely survived a recall vote, was
Dennis Kucinich, known from that point forward as Dennis the Menace.
This was a doubly appropriate because: 1. He was a menace; and
2. He looked like he was 7. After a prolonged exile, said menace
was elected to Congress in 1996 by voters on the west side of
Cleveland. (Author's note: I grew up in the eastern suburbs.)
So, Cleveland has endured some hard times and consequently has
been the butt of many jokes. Here's one:
"What's the difference between Cleveland and the Titanic?"
"Cleveland has the better orchestra."
I actually like this joke, because it assumes knowledge of one
of our most prized possessions, the Cleveland Orchestra. Children
reared in greater Cleveland are taught from an early age that
the Cleveland Orchestra is considered by Europe to be America's
best orchestra. This is saying a lot because, as we all presume,
Europeans can really spot a good orchestra. So don't be dissin'
our orchestra.
But the fact is, the typical Clevelander would trade the orchestra's
musical director and brass section and all 57 Picassos in the
Cleveland Museum of Art for one thing: a major sports championship.
The Sporting Blues
This is because those of us much younger than about 50 cannot
remember seeing one. Cleveland's last major sports title came
41 years ago, when the Browns won the 1964 NFL championship over
the Baltimore Colts.
Last year ESPN pronounced Cleveland the "most tortured sports
city" in America. The judging cannot have been close. Consider:
The National Basketball Association's Cleveland Cavaliers have
existed for 35 years and have never appeared in a championship
series. Their first year in the playoffs they won a scintillating
first-round series by pulling out three games in the final seconds.
While practicing for the next series, the team's star center broke
his foot. The Cavs were eliminated in the next round. So lacking
in success is the team's history that this tragically ended season
is fondly recalled as the "Miracle of Richfield," rural
Richfield, Ohio, being the site of the team's arena at the time.
The 40th Super Bowl will be held this month. The Browns have
not appeared in any of the first 39, and coming off a 4-12 record
in 2004, they aren't likely to make it this year.
In 1954 the Cleveland Indians went 111-43, setting a league
record for wins that would stand for 44 years. In the first game
of the World Series, the New York Giants' Willie
Mays made his
famous over-the-shoulder catch of Vic Wertz's 460-foot blast to
center field. The Giants went on to win that game in extra innings
and sweep the next three.
This was disappointing,
I'm sure, but nothing compared to the suffering of biblical proportions
that awaited. When the Israelites were unable to obey God's Law,
they were made to wander in the desert for 40 years. It is unclear
what sins Cleveland baseball fans committed to have to endure
41 almost uniformly dismal seasons between the last out of the
'54 Series and the Indians' next appearance in postseason
play, 1995. In that strike-shortened '95 season, the Indians compiled
the best record in baseball, 100 wins and 44 losses. They then
lost the World Series to Atlanta, a team with superior starting
pitching. Two seasons later, the Tribe was just two outs away
from winning the deciding seventh game of the World Series, but
the team's closer couldn't hold a one-run lead.
The Indians haven't been back to the World Series since. But
that 41 years of pent-up yearning for a contending baseball team
did produce 455 consecutive home sellouts from 1995 to 2001, a
major league record.
There have been other
tragic moments in Cleveland sports history -- too numerous and
painful to mention, really -- along with one act of unforgivable
villainy. The owner of the Browns fled with the franchise to Baltimore
in 1996 because he had amassed huge debts despite persistent sellouts
and near-sellouts. And because he was too selfish to sell the
team to local interests.
In an uprising of
a ferocity recalling the last reformulation of Coca-Cola, Browns
fans from all corners of the globe pressured the league into something
that has never happened in major pro sports history: Cuckolded
Cleveland was allowed to keep its team name and colors and apply
them to an expansion franchise, which began play in 1999.
Alas, the resurrected Browns have mostly stunk, compiling the
worst home record in the league since their return. Typical of
truehearted Clevelanders, however, every home game has been a
sellout, and earlier this year it was reported that the waiting
list for Browns season tickets is 10,000 names long.
"Have Another Laugh"
concludes with Alex Bevan singing, "We can laugh at ourselves,
how 'bout you? How 'bout that, America?"
America: "We prefer
to laugh at Cleveland."
Suit yourself. You're
only missing out on "the best things in life," which "are right
here in Cleveland," as a long-ago promotional slogan for the city
declared.
One of them must
be agony.
Ed Cohen is an associate editor of this magazine.
(January 2006)
