Online Exhibits at Cleveland Memory: ETHNICITY, COMMUNITIES & NEIGHBORHOODS
subject list of exhibits | search for images only

Annals of Cleveland: A Depression-Era Project of the WPA
Annals of Cleveland staff summarized and indexed material in order to preserve and make readily accessible the detailed record of a city's life and culture as contained in its newspapers. The project provided jobs for unemployed white-collar workers during the Depression of the 1930s and created an important record of early life and thought in the city of Cleveland from 1818-1935.

Cleveland, Ohio Along the Nickel Plate Road
In 1926 the New York, Chicago, & St. Louis Railway (Nickel Plate or NKP) undertook a grade elimination project along its right-of-way in Cleveland. At the start of the project the NKP took a series of photographs that documented the conditions both along its right-of-way and the adjacent neighborhoods. In 1930 the NKP produced another series of photographs, this time along its right-of-way through Lakewood, Ohio, a western suburb of Cleveland. Each series of images form a rare photographic cross-section of a major American metropolitan area in the mid-1920's and early 1930's.

Cleveland's Architectural Past
Architectural images originating from the Cleveland Press Archives and historian Clay Herrick's slide collection. These special collections were donated to the Cleveland State University Library to support historical research related to the architecture of Cleveland, Ohio.

Mystery Photo Album from the 1890s
This is a small photo album that we recently acquired from a dealer. We know nothing about it, except what it discloses about itself: namely that it covers territory south of Cleveland, Ohio -- in the Kent/Akron area along the Cuyhoga River, Ohio & Erie Canal and nearby towns -- and that the photos were shot around 1897. If you know this area well, you might be able to help pinpoint the locations of the photos better and perhaps even solve the mystery of who the family is, shown in these photos. Any documented information will be added to the site.

Postcards of Cleveland
Dr. Walter C. Leedy, Jr. began his comprehensive collection of Cleveland postcards, now numbering nearly 8,000 in earnest in 1989. Leedy realized the unique value picture postcards could have to him as an architectural historian, permitting him to observe the changing urban environment, or to visually recreate what a neighborhood looked like. As Leedy puts it, "I don't really collect postcards-I collect images of life, moments in time. Nostalgia glues people to postcards. There is something intimate and direct about them. As an art historian, I think of postcards as a vehicle to introduce art to the millions-people aren't intimidated by postcards the way they might be by paintings or other "fine" art."

Yesterday's Lakewood
Lakewood, Ohio occupies 5.6 square miles along the southern shore of Lake Erie. Named for its natural setting along the lake, its development was closely tied with that of Cleveland. This illustrated history begins with photographs taken in 1930 along the Nickle Plate railroad tracks, and shows streetscapes north and south of the tracks through Lakewood.