by Lynette Filips

     (Plain Press August 2024) This month we continue to look at the history of the northwest corner of Pearl Rd. and Memphis Ave. which the Old Brooklyn Community Development Corporation (OBCDC) is seeking to “revitalize” with a $31 million new construction project. It is the most historic section of Cleveland’s Old Brooklyn neighborhood and has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 2005. A picture of St. Luke’s United Church of Christ, one of the numerous commercial and institutional buildings on Pearl Rd. (and, also on Broadview Rd.) included in the Historic District designation, accompanies the online listing of the South Brooklyn Commercial District.

     While OBCDC pursues funding for a plan to tear down the major portion of this corner to erect a four-story building with commercial space on the first floor, residential space on the upper floors, and a brewery in the church proper portion of the former St. Luke’s, another group of people in the Old Brooklyn neighborhood is still hoping to Save Our Historic District.

     This eighth in a series of articles will shed additional light on the history of downtown Old Brooklyn in the hope that someone in authority will realize that adaptive reuse of the existing buildings is superior to tearing down most of them and replacing the demo-ed area with new construction. Adaptive reuse would accomplish the same goals of adding new residential space, updated commercial space and new socialization space to downtown Old Brooklyn, but it would do so by using the existing historic structures. It is the method which has been employed in downtown Cleveland to put new residential, hotel, retail and restaurant space in buildings which formerly housed department stores, banks and other businesses.

     In January, the first of seven previous articles, I wrote about the three generations – Jeremiah, Charles, and Howard — of the Gates family of millers in Old Brooklyn. 

     In February, the second of seven previous articles, I wrote about the precursor of Pearl Road United Methodist Church (which was on the north side of the Big Creek valley) — Brooklyn Methodist Episcopal Church. 

     In March, the third of seven previous articles, I wrote about Brighton Methodist Episcopal Church, the initial name of the first Methodist church south of the Big Creek valley. Today it is known as Pearl Road United Methodist Church. I also began to write about the (Old) Burying/Burial Ground at the corner of Pearl Rd. and Memphis Ave just south of the Methodists’ property.

     In April, the fourth of seven previous articles, I wrote additional information about the (Old) Burying/Burial Ground using research obtained from local cemetery author Bill Krejci. 

     In May, the fifth of seven previous articles, I wrote more about the (Old) Burying/Burial Ground, including Bill Krejci’s belief that the body of Revolutionary War veteran Richard Cooper remains interred there. 

     In June, the sixth of seven previous articles, I wrote about the history of St. Luke’s United Church of Christ, beginning with its precursor, the German United Evangelical Protestant Church of Parma, and then an off-shoot, the German United Evangelical Church of Brighton.

     In July, the seventh of seven previous articles, I wrote about the two doctors, Washington Emil Linden and his son, John Linden, who had once lived in the frame, late Victorian-era house at 3444 Memphis Ave.

     This month I’ll continue discussing some of St. Luke’s immediate neighbors, beginning with the Greenline Building(s), two separate commercial structures along the north side of Memphis Ave., the eastern most of which has a distinctive triangular shape. According to Constance (“Connie”) Ewazen, the president of the Historical Society of Old Brooklyn and a former owner of the buildings, they were named after the Greenline Trolley which once ended at that point, but I have not yet found anything official about that.  (I am hoping that a transit buff will read this article and contact the Plain Press to give us more information about it!)

     According to online Cuyahoga County tax records (www.myplace.cuyahogacounty.gov), the eastern section — closer to Pearl Rd. — of the Greenline Building was erected in 1910 and the building to the west of it was erected in 1930. But that information does not agree with the diagram on the 1912 Sanborn Fire Insurance Map which shows the outline of a two-story dwelling and a much smaller one-story structure on the property where the 1910 Greenline Building is supposed be. And the 1914 Cleveland City Directory clearly identifies Mary A. Gates as living in that dwelling. Research of property tax records at the Cuyahoga County Archives is obviously needed!

     The Greenline Building closer to Pearl Rd. has a basement and two floors, with a larger storefront at the tip, a more typical sized one to the left of it, and three office spaces upstairs. The Greenline Building to the west of it also has a basement, is just one story high and has three storefronts of varying sizes. As of May 28, 2021, the Old Brooklyn Community Development Corporation has owned the buildings. They purchased them for $160,000. from Greenline Building LLC after a previous owner, Randy Blake, repurchased them at a sheriff’s sale on January 22, 2020.

The addresses of the five street-level storefronts are 3434, 3432, 3430, 3428 and 3426 Memphis Ave.  At this time, the tenants in the building to the west are: Beauty Bliss at 3434 Memphis Ave.; Maria the Barberette at 3432 Memphis Ave.; and The Historical Society of Old Brooklyn Museum at 3430 Memphis Ave.

     The tenants in the building to the east are: Kay’s Heavenly Beauty at 3428 Memphis Ave. (where Tailoring by Mary used to be); and Botanica Abre Caminos (an organization which sells religious items blending Roman Catholicism with certain folk religions) at 3426 Memphis Ave. Before that, the storefront at 3426 was home to a ladies’ resale clothing and accessories shop called Sassy Silhouette.

Traditionally, however, that easternmost storefront with all the windows and the distinctive triangular shape housed a floral shop. My recollection of it (that of a kid growing up in Parma in the mid-1960s), was of windows filled with gorgeous, showy flower arrangements, especially the poinsettias at Christmas. At the time it was called The Flower Basket and the owners were Paul and Carol (Krause) Reik. After Paul died in an automobile accident during their family summer vacation in 1968, Carol continued to operate the shop for many years.

Before it was The Flower Basket, (according to a 1954 listing),a florist named Kenneth R. Booth, Jr., was in business in that storefront.

There are currently two tenants in the three offices above the older Greenline Building. One is A. Reliable Construction and the other is a recording studio called Bloc Burnaz Entertainment.  For about 20 years Old Brooklyn architect John Rakauskas had his offices there. He remembers that one of his “neighbors” down the hall was a specialty printer named Frank Matousek. And decades before that, the offices of The Brooklyn News (not to be confused with today’s Old Brooklyn News), were up those stairs, too.

Telling the stories of 100 — plus or minus — years of The Greenline Buildings merchants of yesteryear requires some degree of detective work, not only via the previously mentioned Cuyahoga County records and the Sanborn maps, but also in the crisscross section of the Cleveland City Directory — which were last published in 1974 — and the Haines Criss Cross Directory.  I hope to be sharing more insights from the Sanborn maps and the aforementioned directories in next month’s article. I am very grateful for the research help I’ve received from librarians at the Cleveland Public Library for this article, especially from Ray Cruz at the South Brooklyn Branch.

The previous articles in this series can be read online at www.plainpress.blog. and hardcopies at the Historical Society of Old Brooklyn Museum, 3430 Memphis Ave. It is usually open on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from noon to 5 p.m. but call (216)337-8200 before stopping by to be sure.