The Chocolate City Cleveland Map seeks to recreate the vibes of the street scene (past + present) by highlighting some of the people, places + cultural artifacts throughout time that have made East 105th Street  one of the most important streets on the East Side. 

As a work of public history + narrative change, this project deliberately balances traditional research methods with the lived experiences of our neighbors. This project owes its emerging conceptual framework for organizing the historical content to many sources. In their book Chocolate Cities: The Black Map of the United States, sociologists Marcus Anthony Hunter + Zandria Robinson introduce the concept of a Chocolate Map. In short, this way of looking at the places in a city where black people live in significant numbers reveals crucial insights into the political, economic + social dynamics that impact the life of that city. 

Chocolate City Maps are a way of knowing and critically examining the socioeconomic + political dimensions of black life in a particular geographic context: the urban cities that received millions of black migrants fleeing terror + seeking opportunity outside of The American South during the 20th Century. As Cleveland’s black population surged with the influx of migrants from the South after WWII, Glenville would become a predominantly black neighborhood within the span of a decade. This racial transition facilitated by racist and predatory real estate practices–such as blockbusting, which accelerated white flight to the suburbs; and redlining, which severely limited residential options for black homebuyers outside of established black neighborhoods–presented new opportunities. Black entrepreneurs opened new businesses to meet the demands of an increasingly cosmopolitan clientele. Black professionals (e.g. doctors, lawyers, architects, etc) shut out of mainstream institutions moved their practice to The Gold Coast to serve their patients + clients with the dignity they themselves were being denied.

Further, this project is inspired by the author’s aspirations to deploy an assets-based approach to research on the historical + contemporary conditions of black life in The City. While it is important for our society to confront structural racism and deepen our understanding of the complex problems facing black communities, racial inequity is only part of the story. A structural analysis alone (i.e. interlocking systems of oppression) obscures and/or diminishes the importance of Agency (i.e., individual or collective decision-making) in the emergence of aspirational black neighborhoods like Glenville. Glenville did not become “The Gold Coast” for black Clevelanders because it was once home to robber barons and then a thriving Jewish cultural enclave and commercial center. Glenville became The Gold Coast in the hearts and minds of upwardly-mobile black residents, because it seemed to be a place where The American Dream (i.e. house, car, lawn, Boy Scout meetings, etc.) was within reach. Despite the opposition of white residents–using both clandestine/litigious (e.g. restrictive covenants) and violent means (e.g. fire bombs) to make their points known--black people chose to live in Glenville.