Cleveland is a city that gets a lot of crap. Cleveland has sustained the careers of many middling comedians. I spent a week in Cleveland–last week, in fact–and though it appears much of what the comedians say is true, it is a unique and surprisingly dramatic place. At least the weather was dramatic.
As the storm raged offshore in Lake Erie, my coworker and I explored the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Christmas Story House, a late night comedy club, and tried to find the brighter side of this gritty, industrial city on the northern edge of the United States.
Now there’s a lamp. If you remember the cult classic movie “A Christmas Story”, which followed the adventures of a blond boy named Ralphie pursuing his dream of a Red Ryder BB Gun, then you remember this lamp. And this house. A fellow from San Diego purchased the home used in the movie–it’s in central Cleveland in a run-down neighborhood called Old Brooklyn–and turned it into a museum to the film. Eventually he had to buy a nearby house to hold the actual museum, while restoring the movie house to look as much like the film as possible. For $5 a guide will take you through the house and tell you what’s what. An attraction like this probably wouldn’t last long in LA or San Francisco, but here in Cleveland, what else are you gonna do? During peak months, the guide tells us, 2,000 people a day went through the house. The nearby neighborhood is obviously struggling; a few houses down, an HUD auction notice is taped to a door. Other houses are boarded up. A few are nicely kept, and the neighborhood bar is still in business, but this neighborhood is as good an example of northern Ohio’s economic struggles as any. Still, the buildings are historic, and distinct.
The lakeshore was empty and cold and from our spot in a suburb southwest of Cleveland we could see the skyscrapers rise over the lake a few miles away. The wind ripped through at thirty miles per hour, driving the windchill into the teens and blowing snow all around us.
A fellow in a green jacket disappeared into the blowing snow.
More Cleveland tomorrow…Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.