Category: Recreation and Popular Culture

The AGORA/AGORA BALLROOM has been an innovative dance club and concert hall since the 1960s. Its support of local bands, new music styles, and upcoming national recording acts helped create a strong local club scene. The Agora was opened at 2175 Cornell Rd. by Henry J. LoConti and partners as a college dance club.

The ALLEN THEATRE, 1501 Euclid Ave., opened on 1 Apr. 1921. It joined the Ohio, State, and Hanna theaters, which had debuted only weeks before. The Allen was constructed in conjunction with the Bulkley Bldg., an 8-story office building on Euclid Ave., just east of E. 14th St. Designed by architect C. Howard Crane, the $1 million showplace was developed by 2 Canadian theater impresarios, Jules and Jay Allen of Toronto.

ALTA HOUSE, one of the city's oldest SETTLEMENT HOUSES, was established in 1895 as a day nursery for working Italian immigrant women in LITTLE ITALY.

The AMERICAN AND CANADIAN SPORT, TRAVEL, AND OUTDOOR SHOW, an annual event in Cleveland, was first held in 1927 at the PUBLIC AUDITORIUM and ran until 1930, when it was discontinued due to the Depression. Commonly referred to as the Sportman's Show, it resumed in 1937 and has taken place every year since then. The original event was the idea of Clevelanders Aaron W.

AMUSEMENT PARKS. The amusement park, a concept that originated in Europe, debuted in the U.S. at Coney Island, Brooklyn, NY. The island began as a summer resort for the wealthy of New York City; gradually the middle and working classes expropriated it and its expanding attractions for their use and entertainment. It became the prototype for amusement parks throughout the U.S.

ANDERSON, ERNIE (12 November 1923 - 6 February 1997) was a nationally known television announcer, most familiar to network audiences as the voice of ABC-TV, and to Cleveland audiences as the late night horror-movie host, Ghoulardi, on WJW-TV from 1963 until 1966.

ANSON, ROBERT SAM (12 Mar. 1945 – 2 Nov. 2020) was a Cleveland-born journalist and author who penned six non-fiction books and scores of articles for magazines such as Vanity Fair, Time, Esquire, Life, and The Atlantic. His pieces focused on wars, politics, and complicated people. His main employer was Vanity Fair, where he was a contributing editor for more than two decades. 

The ANVIL REVUE is a satirical production presented annually by the CITY CLUB OF CLEVELAND, in which members and others poke fun at politics, institutions, and people in the news.

The ARAGON was Cleveland's last surviving ballroom from the big-band era. Opened by Lloyd Harry Meyers in October 1930, it was located in a former roller rink at 3139 W. 25 St., near Clark Ave. Among the entertainers who played there to crowds of up to 2,000 were Glenn Miller, the Dorseys, Freddy Martin, Harry James, Guy Lombardo, and the Andrews Sisters.

ARENA. See CLEVELAND ARENA.

BACKUS, JAMES, GILMORE "JIM" (25 February, 1913 - July 3, 1989), was a prolific actor and writer who made a name in television, film, and radio, and later authored books bringing awareness to Parkinson’s disease.

The BALDWIN BIRD RESEARCH LABORATORY, a pioneering ornithological research facility, was established in 1914 by SAMUEL PRENTISS BALDWIN at his estate in GATES MILLS.

"BALLOONFEST ‘86" was held on September 27, 1986 as a fundraiser for UNITED WAY.  Its intent was to break the world record for the simultaneous release of small helium filled balloons.

BALTO was the sled dog who became a national hero, symbolizing rescue efforts to get supplies of diphtheria antitoxin serum to Nome, Alaska. When diphtheria threatened Nome in Jan. 1925, the city found itself without a supply of antitoxin and, almost completely isolated by the arctic winter, the only means of travel being by dog-sled over the frozen tundra.

BROOKSIDE RESERVATION, located in the southwestern part of the city at Fulton Road and Denison Avenue, is one of Cleveland's oldest municipal parks. Purchased in 1894 by the Second Park Board, and initially named Brooklyn Park, the 81-acre site in wooded Big Creek Valley provided a natural setting for a playground.

The CADILLAC LOUNGE was one of Cleveland’s first gay-friendly bars. It was opened in 1946 by Gloria Lenihan, who owned a number of other night clubs in the city with her husband, Charlie Lenihan. The bar was housed at the corner of East Ninth Street and Euclid Avenue at the Schofield Building in a space that was formerly a shoe repair shop. 

CAMP ZEKE provided a place for relaxation and a medium for reminiscence for Cleveland-area veterans of the SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR. The camp existed from the late 1890s until the late 1950s.

The CASTALIA SPORTING CLUB served as a center of social activity from 1878 through 1936 for some of Cleveland's most prominent business and civic leaders, including Lee McBride, JOHN HAY, JAMES FORD RHODES, AMASA STONE, and JEPTHA WADE