School Conflict Creates a Martyr Ful of Neighborhood Residents
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THE PLAIN DEALER . SUNDAY, APRIL 25, 1999 5-D OURCENTURY 1964 ATA GLANCE School conflict creates a martyr ful of neighborhood residents. Among By Fred McGunagle them was the Rev. Bruce Klunder, 27, a staff member of the Student Chris- By January, the agreement that tian Union at Western Reserve Uni- had ended a sit-in at school board versity who also assisted at Church of PD FILE headquarters the previous September the Covenant, Locher’s church. was falling apart. The board had Art Model, a smiling Mayor Ralph Locher promised “fullest possible incorpora- With a crowd of several hundred and Lou Groza in the Browns’ locker room. tion” of black children into classes at watching, the pickets let the first four three white schools. trucks pass. Then the Rev. David Zuverink and two others ran into But what did that mean? Lakeview Rd. and dived under a The board’s answer — “diffusion” truck waiting to enter. The spectators The Browns win — didn’t go far enough for parents at pushed forward, despite the police overcrowded Hazeldell Elementary horses and the urging of picket lead- championship School in Glenville. It went too far for ers to stay back. parents of the three white schools to “And then,” the Press reported, It was the Browns’ seventh championship — which 830 Hazeldell pupils were be- third in the National Football League — but “while everyone was watching the ce- ing bused — William H. Brett and ment trucks at the site entrance, an this one was special. It was the first since Memorial in Collinwood and Murray 1955, and it came against the heavily favored agonizing scream came from the Hill in Little Italy. Baltimore Colts, stacked with future Hall of other end about 100 yards away. A Famers, before 79,544 freezing fans at the Sta- The United Freedom Movement an- slender, hysterical woman came run- dium. nounced it would picket the receiving ning at police, shouting ‘They’ve The Browns won the Eastern Division by a schools. At Brett on Jan. 29, the pick- killed Bruce! They’ve killed Bruce!’ half-game over the Cardinals, who had moved ets were confronted by 100 angry She fell limp into the arms of a the year before from Chicago to St. Louis. For whites, who crowded the sidewalk friend.” the title game, Blanton Collier came up with a and forced them to march in the Several pickets, including Klunder, new way to stop Johnny Unitas’ passes. It street. “Look at the Communists!” would later be called the “bump-and-run.” had taken advantage of the confusion they cried. “Minister, go back to your to run through back yards onto the The defenses — and a cold wind — produced pulpit!” a scoreless first half. Then the Browns took other side of the site. Three threw charge. The ageless Lou Groza kicked a 43- The situation was worse the next themselves in front of a bulldozer. yard field goal. Jim Brown broke loose for 46 day at Murray Hill. An angry crowd Klunder lay down behind it. Fearing yards and on the next play Frank Ryan passed of several hundred was waiting for his shovel would strike the demon- 18 yards to Gary Collins on the pitcher’s the pickets, and their resentment, strators in front, the driver backed mound, which had not been leveled after the The Plain Dealer reported, “centered up, crushing Klunder. baseball season. on three targets — Negroes, newsmen Police rescued the driver from the On the next possession, Ryan hit Collins on a and police.” When peacemakers tried angry crowd. The demonstrators told hook-and-go for a 42-yard touchdown and a to restrain them, they threw eggs, them he hadn’t seen Klunder and in 17-0 lead. In the fourth quarter, Groza kicked bottles and fruit at them over the the tumult couldn’t hear them yelling a 10-yard field goal and Collins scored his heads of police. Men with baseball at him not to back up. But the crowd third touchdown on a 51-yarder from Ryan. bats and pipes ran into Mayfield Rd., was out of control. The defense shut out the feared Colts, holding smashing windows in autos of passing Unitas to 95 yards passing. blacks. “It was a wild moment,” The Plain “Hail to the champs! How they did pour it on Dealer reported. “People running. those Colts of Baltimore!” rhymed James E. A group of priests, unable to calm Women screaming and crying, Doyle in his next morning’s “Sport Trail.” the crowd, hurried to the parking lot mounted police galloping to keep the Clevelanders celebrated. Little did they know where the pickets were assembling crowds back. Rocks began flying at how long it would be before another Cleveland and urged them “as a matter of life the mounted men — rocks and bottles pro team won a title in a major sport. In fact, and death” not to carry out the dem- and bricks. Now and then the PLAIN DEALER FILE they still don’t know. onstration. The NAACP sent word mounted men, when they got orders, A protester confronts police at the Lakeview School construction site. from downtown that leaders were charged the crowd and there was a • meeting with the school board and wild running here and there.” Below, the body of the Rev. Bruce W. Klunder lies in front of the bulldozer Clevelanders got a shock on July 16. Sam the pickets should hold off. that crushed him to death. Sheppard was ordered released from the Ohio That night saw the worst rioting The meeting got nowhere. The Cleveland had ever experienced. Penitentiary after serving 10 years for the UFM called for another sit-in at murder of his wife, Marilyn. Federal Judge board headquarters. Meanwhile, a Carl Weinman had granted F. Lee Bailey’s ha- delegation of white ministers came to beas corpus motion. Citing the headlines of ed- City Hall. The Rev. Charles Rawlings itorials in the Press, he wrote, “If ever there told Mayor Ralph Locher: “The police was a trial by newspaper, this is a perfect ex- were incompetent and did not fulfill ample.” The trial, he said, was “a mockery of justice.” their obligation.” Sheppard and his fiancee, Arianne Tebben- In 1962, Locher had defused crises johanns, immediately drove to Chicago with and worked out solutions that pleased Paul Holmes of the Chicago Tribune, which protesters. Now his political instincts had arranged for their wedding. The state were overruling his natural impulses. filed an appeal. In the previous 10 years, the He scolded the ministers. “You U.S. Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl started something,” he said. “You had Warren had recognized a string of new defen- a bull by the tail and then you asked dant rights. Nine years earlier, a different Su- us to stop it.” preme Court had refused even to hear Shep- pard’s appeal. What would the court do now? As before, the sit-in led to a board resolution that mollified the protest- • ers, though not until after 20 had been If the Browns hit the heights, the Indians arrested. On Feb. 4, the board prom- plumbed the depths. The team tied for sixth. ised full integration of the three President Gabe Paul reported that for the schools. The UFM called off plans for second straight year the club had lost more a school boycott by blacks. than $1 million. Directors sent him on a Then, on Feb. 28, the UFM called “scouting trip” to Oakland, Seattle and Dallas, for a moratorium on construction of all of which hoped to lure the Indians. On his three schools for which funds had return, Paul recommended the team sign a been voted in 1962. All were in Glen- new 10-year lease for the Stadium — but with ville; that, the UFM charged, further an escape clause allowing it to pull out on concentrated black children in “de short notice. facto” segregation. (That point would • be key in the systemwide desegrega- tion ordered by federal Judge Frank The Barons barely made the playoffs, with Battisti 13 years later.) a third-place finish in the Western Division. Then they put on their Cinderella slippers. In April, the board refused to dis- They beat the Rochester Americans two cuss a moratorium with a group of straight. Then they beat the Hershey Bears Protestant, Catholic and Jewish lead- three straight to take on the Quebec Aces, who ers. The Congress of Racial Equality had the best record in the league. They beat announced it would picket construc- them twice in Quebec and again in Cleveland. tion at Lakeview School beginning Fans lined up early the next morning, and Monday, April 6. 10,016 got into the Arena as fire marshals looked the other way. With player-coach Fred On Monday, 100 pickets blocked Glover, the league’s MVP, scoring the go- concrete trucks by lying down in ahead goal, they beat the Aces, 5-2, to become front of or under them. Some ran into the first team to win nine playoff games in a the work site and threw themselves Roaming gangs threw rocks at cars CORE staged a rally on the Mall at “for the first time in the history of the season. It was their eighth Calder Cup. And into trenches, forcing police to drag and shattered windows of stores in noon. When it ended, 250 demonstra- crisis, a public official was cheered their last. or carry them away through the mud. the area. Steel-helmeted police used tors marched to City Hall, where by a group of civil rights demonstra- Twenty were arrested.