More on Shaker Square and the Shaker Schools

This page of exhibits related to Virginia P. Dawson's explanation of why the Shaker Square area is in the City of Cleveland and the Shaker Heights School District was created by webmaster Arnold Berger with Dr. Dawson's help.  
 
Newburg City
At the time of the September 1912 agreement what would become
the Shaker Square area was in Newburg City.
Newburg City children attended Cleveland schools
under an arrangement made in 1905.
Newburg City paid tuition for its children.		 Newburg City was moving to being annexed to Cleveland.
It would be approved in the November 1912 election
with 90 percent voting for annexation.
That made the Shaker Square area part of Cleveland.

Cleveland Plain Dealer  July 11. 1905
 

Cleveland Plain Dealer August 17, 1912
 
   

Harvey Rice Elementary School

Source" Cleveland Memory CSU

Source: Google book

Cleveland's Harvey Rice Elementary School
Opened in December 1904 with eight rooms, at East 116th Street and Buckeye Road, nearly a mile east of the city border, and expanded twice. perhaps because in 1905 the Cleveland schools took over the education of Newburg City children, and then two Shaker neighborhoods. Named for Harvey Rice (1800 - 1891) who helped create Ohio's public education system. Demolished in 2007. In 2009 a new Rice Elementary School opened at East 116th and Shaker Blvd (website)

Language spoken at home, by Cleveland students, by school.
Leonard Ayres directed a 1916 study on the public schools, funded by the Cleveland Foundation. In Rice School, its 1,000 students making it one of Cleveland's largest elementary schools, more than 70 percent of students came from homes where English wasn't the primary language. Bohemian (Czech) and Hungarian (Magyar) were the leading languages spoken. Our pages of 1910 US Census data for the western end of Shaker Village confirm this finding for the parental country of origin.
 
         

September 4, 1912  The tax valuation of the school areas being exchanged


Copied by permission: Archives of the Shaker Heights Board of Education


Copy of part of the Shaker Heights Board of Education minutes of September 4, 1912

On September 4, 1912, five days before it approved the resolution exchanging school areas with Cleveland, the Shaker Heights Board of Education met. Mr. John L. Cannon, a Village trustee (who was also an attorney for the Van Sweringens), reported that the tax valuation of the territory the Shaker Heights schools would be giving up to the Cleveland school district was $308,200. Though the Shaker Square area was farmland, there must have been developments nearby, as he also reported that the tax valuation of the area they would be receiving from the Cleveland school district was $309,790. Thus, neither district's tax receipts would be affected by the exchange. The minutes made no mention of how many students would be transferring into and out of Shaker's schools through this "swap."

The minutes also recorded the hiring of the Shaker Heights Village school's teachers:for1912-13:
      - May Chapman, Principal and teacher of seventh and eighth grades, $1,000: :
      - Mary A. Litzel, teacher of fifth and sixth grades, $700
      - Suzie V. Sweeney, teacher of third and fourth grades, $750
      - Nellie Holt, teacher of first and second grades, $850
 
   

The September 9, 1912 agreement between the school districts

"Shaker Square and the Shaker Schools" by Virginia Dawson, PhD, explains what led to the agreement made on September 9, 1912 between the Shaker Heights Board of Education and the Board of Education of the Cleveland City Schools, She has furnished the text of that agreement, which we display below. Source: Archives of the Shaker Heights Board of Education.

Minutes of the Board of Education of the Village of Shaker Heights, Sept. 9, 1912.

 It was moved by Mr. Evans and seconded by Dr. Wasser,

WHEREAS, the Board of Education of Cleveland City School District has signified its desire to change the boundaries of its District by attaching certain territory hereinafter described in said City School District to the Shaker Heights Village School District, and to obtain from said Shaker Heights Village School District certain territory hereinafter described, which territory should be attached to said City School District,

NOW, THEREFORE, be it Resolved that the following described territory located in said City School District shall, with the consent of the Board of Education of said City School District, be attached to Shaker Heights Village School District:

Situated in the Township of Newburg, now the City of Newburg, being part of Original Lots Nos. 422, 430, and 438 of said Newburg Township, and further described as follows:

Beginning at the intersection of the centerline of North Woodland Road with the westerly line of said Original Lot No. 422;
Thence from said point of beginning easterly along said center line of North Woodland Road to the intersection of said center line with the easterly line of Lot No. 422;
Thence from said point of beginning easterly along said center line of North Woodland Road to the intersection of said center line with the easterly line of Lot No. 422;
Thence southerly along the easterly line of said Original Lot Nos. 422, 430, and 438 to the southeast corner of said Original Lot no. 438;
Thence westerly along the southerly line of said Original Lot No. 438 to the easterly line of the Lorenz Sanda Subdivision No. 2 proposed;
Thence northerly and westerly along said subdivision line to the westerly line of said Original Lot No. 438;
Thence northerly along the westerly line of said Original Lots Nos. 438, 430 and 422 to the place of beginning.

Be if [sic] further Resolved that in consideration of the attachment of said Village School District of the above described property, this Board hereby assents to the transfer of the following described territory from said Village School District to said City School District:

Situated in the Township of Newburg, now the village of Shaker Heights, being parts of Original Lots Nos. 412, 413, 420, 421 and 422 of said Newburg Township, and is further described as follows:

Beginning at a point in the center line of North Woodland Road, which is in a line parallel with and distant 265.0 feet easterly, measured at right angles from the center line of East Boulevard, formerly called Rice Avenue;
Thence from said point of beginning northerly parallel with and distant 265.0 feet easterly from said center line of East Boulevard to the intersection of said center line with the center line of Fairmount Road, as altered;
Thence westerly along said center line to the intersection of said center line with the westerly line of said Original Lot No. 412;
Thence northerly along said westerly line of Original Lot no. 412;
Thence southerly along said easterly line of said Original Lot no. 421 to the center line of North Woodland Road;
Thence westerly along said center line of North Woodland Road to place of beginning.

Be it further Resolved that a map of the territory above described to be attached to said Village School District, together with a map of the territory heretofore described to be attached to the City School District, shall be made a part of the records of this Board, and that a copy of said map, together with a certified copy of this resolution, signed by the President and Clerk of this Board, shall be filed with the Auditor of Cuyahoga County.

Be it further Resolved that in consideration of the transfer of the territories as herein above describe, said Village School District shall assume no part of the indebtedness, either bonded or otherwise, or funds, of said City School District, and that said City School District shall not be obliged for any indebtedness, either bonded or otherwise, or funds, of said Village School District, by the transfer of the territory above described to said City School District.

Roll Call: Ayes; Evans, Petrequin, Wasser.  Nays: None

Resolution adopted September 9, 1912.

 
   

November 1912  Cleveland grows through annexation


Source: Plain Dealer online archive


From the November 8, 1912 Cleveland Plain Dealer

This story appeared two days after election day in 1912. Already the nation's sixth-largest city, Cleveland was growing rapidly. It had good schools, good government (Mayor Tom L. Johnson, followed by Newton D. Baker), many street-car lines, a municipal water system, and the financial strength to sell bonds to fund road building and sewers. Smaller suburbs adjacent to Cleveland were voting to annex themselves to Cleveland. In Newburgh City the vote was 90 percent in favor of annexation.

Shaker Township, formed out of Cleveland Heights Township in 1911, had already become Shaker Heights Township. Its most western area, north of Newburg City, had joined Cleveland and it would soon lose the next western neighborhood to Cleveland. Soon Shaker Heights would start to grow, annexing areas to its south and east.
 
    

1953  John W Main's  letter to the Board of Education

John W. Main, Clerk-Treasurer of the Shaker Heights Board of Education, had held that position since 1920. In 1953 he was asked by School Board members how the arrangement had come about that enabled Shaker Square area children, who live in Cleveland, to attend Shaker Heights schools. He replied in the form a letter to the Board dated January 30, 1953.

We show the paragraph in which he describes what led to the 1912 agreement. The word "allotted" refers to the division of land into smaller plots for sale. His comment that the Shaker Schools were getting "cow pasture" is not supported by the September 4, 1912 Board of Education minutes (above) showing that the areas being exchanged were of equal valuation. The New York University study he mentions is the 1916 study by the Cleveland Foundation, (The study's director, Leonard P Ayres, had been affiliated with NYU.)

John Main;s previously unpublished memorandum, of great importance in explaining the 1912 agreement, was found by Virginia Dawson in the course of her research.
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Source: local history collection of the Shaker Heights Public Library
 
   

Today's streets affected by the September 9, 1912 agreement

Source: City of Shaker Heights
 

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