The Passing of Marvin Helf, Euclid Homebuilder

There was an obituary in today's Plain Dealer for Marvin Helf, the man who built our family's home in Euclid in 1951. The obit says that Marvin Helf was 92 years old when he died, which means he was only 32 years old when he developed the subdivision in Euclid that extended from Zeman Avenue to Elinore Drive, and from E.272nd Street to E. 260th Street. There were hundreds of inexpensive tract homes built in this area by Helf. When my Mom and Dad had their house built, the cost was $11,900. The house was fairly small and was built on a small lot (maybe a tenth of an acre). The bottom floor of the bungalow had 2 bedrooms; the second floor was unfinished (later finished by my Dad); and there was no basement or garage or even finished driveway (we added those later).

Over the years we had a lot of petty complaints about the house and the small lot. But it did offer our family (and hundreds of families) a nice new place to live and raise  families--for a modest cost. The neighborhood attracted the vigorous World War II vets and their spouses, who populated the neighborhood with lots of children. The area had a neighborhood group called the "Forest Park Civic Association"--which I guess is as close as we came to having a name for our neighborhood. My Mom and Dad sometimes just called it the Marvin Helf homes. This was a wonderful place to grow up, and for that we have much to thank Marvin Helf.

Joy in Mudville/Willow Playground

My old neighborhood in Euclid, Ohio was developed in 1951 by a builder named Marvin Helf. I would guess that the neighborhood was about 1/2 mile north to south and 1/2 mile east to west. On the north side it began at East 266 Street and Zeman Avenue and ran south to Elinore. East to west, at the widest point, it extended from E. 260th to E.272nd Street. The streets were in straight line grids and the lots were very small (my guess is 1/10th of an acre). The homes were built as 2-story bungalows, but the top floor was originally unfinished. Colored asbestos shingles covered the homes. There was no garage, no basement, one bathroom, 2 bedrooms, a utility room, a very small kitchen, and a dinette. The finished living space might have been 800 square feet. The homes were priced at $11,900 when they first went on the market in 1951. Down the road about 1/2 mile was another neighborhood of brick ranch homes, the "F & S Homes." These were originally priced even less than the Marvin Helf homes. Between these two neighborhoods about 10 acres were left for a playground. When I first started playing there around 1956 or '57, it was a muddy mess, our muddy mess, and everyone called it "Mudville," Since that time, the City of Euclid gave it an official name--"Willow Playground. It was there, at Mudville, that I spent almost every minute of my life as a kid.


Some People I Played Ball With at Mudville/Willow Playground.

I remember playing baseball with Clay Lutch from Farringdon Avenue and Dave Kaprosy from Shirley Avenue. Clay was a terrific shortstop and Dave had tremendous athletic skills. I remember the size of his hands--gigantic compared with my small hands. There was Gary Czyzynski, Jay Neidermeyer, and Jim Allsip (I think these guys were from Drakefield Avenue). Wayne Starkey (full name might have been Starkweather) came to Mudville from E. 266 and Shoreview. Pat Mueller sometimes played (he lived on Farringdon at E. 272). There are others I'll mention in another posting.

Passing of Frank Calabro Jr.

In today's Plain Dealer I noticed an obituary for Frank L. Calabro, Jr., aged 64. This must be the fellow who was two or three years ahead of me at St. William's School in Euclid, Ohio, and St. Joe's High School in Cleveland. The obit states that Frank Jr. is the son of Frank and Elizabeth Calabro, and is survived by two children, a sister, and three grandchildren.

I clearly remember Frank and his father in our Euclid neighborhood. The family lived on Gary Avenue, between E. 266th Street and E. 272nd in the little bungalow homes built by Marvin Helf. These homes were constructed beginning around 1951 and first sold for around $11,900, give or take.

This was an amazingly mixed neighborhood. I would guess that mostly there were young families there--many of the dads were former GI's, back from World War II. A lot of the moms were stay-at-home housewives, with lots and lots of children. Probably 60 % of the residents of our neighborhood were Catholic (and as I think about it, all were white). There were some Jews in the neighbborhood, including 2 of our nextdoor neighbors, Abe and Ray Packer and their children, and the Eismann family. "Ner Tamid" temple was about a mile away, at E. 250th and Lake Shore Boulevard. The Catholics belonged to St. William's Parish, with a number of Byzantine Catholics near Lloyd Road belonging to St. Stephen's Byzantine Catholic Church.

The Catholics were an interesting ethnic mix of Irish, German, Slovenian, Polish, Italians, and many other heritages. The local Protestants, like the local Jews, must have felt somewhat marginalized in this heavily Catholic neighborhood.

There were some white-collar workers in the area, but most of the dads were blue-collar, unionized workers at the gigantic factories in Euclid and the northeastern neighborhoods of Cleveland (especially Collinwood and Glenville). This area of Euclid and Cleveland was one of the great industrial belts of the world, with Fisher Body, TRW, Addressograph-Multigraph, Chase Brass & Copper Company, Eaton Axle, the New York Central Railroad yards, and many many others.

Our neighborhood had a small park, which everyone called "Mudville," but the City of Euclid eventually called "Willow Playground." In the summer, tremendous softball games were played on Mudville's baseball field. Each street had its own team, and my Dad (and later I myself) played for Farringdon's team, while Frank Calabro Sr. and Frank Jr. played for the great Gary Avenue team. As a kid I loved sports, especially baseball, and these guys played a ferocious brand of ball. I remember the names of some of the Gary Avenue players. There were the Lynch brothers, the George brothers (John and Fred, I believe), and the Calabro's. I remember fierce games between Farringdon and Gary Avenue, with some personal clashes between my Dad and Frank Calabro Sr. One time it even came close to blows. We didn't hate the Calabro's by any means--we admired their baseball skill and their tremendous competitive spirits.

I played CYO baseball for a year or two with Frank Jr. We had a good team, and I looked up to the likes of Frank Calabro and John George and the Lynch brothers (Danny and ??). Frank seemed all grown up at age 12 or 13. He was about 5'6" and built like a tank, and I think he had to shave early on. The funny thing is that Frank never got much bigger, and I imagine that inhibited his football play for Bill Gutbrod's squad at St. Joe's (Frank would have been on the squad with the like of Tommy Schoen, Dick Moore, Tim Mullaney, Brian Stenger, and other great athletes, who probably towered over him).

After Frank's graduation from St. Joe's, I lost track of him. I guess he went into the army, and served during the Vietnam War. I was at the University of Notre Dame for 9 months of the year and had little contact with Euclid-St. William's-St. Joe's friends and acquaintances.

It was sad reading about Frank Calabro's passing, and I say a prayer for his wonderful mother and father, for his sister, children, grandchildren, and friends.

Joy in Mudville (Willow Playground in Euclid, Ohio)

"There is no joy in Mudville, Might Casey has struck out." So goes the famous poem "Casey at the Bat." But I am here to tell you that there was plenty of joy in Mudville when I was a kid. "Mudville" is what we called our playground, a small undeveloped area, perhaps 15 acres, bounded on the west by E. 272nd Street, and on all other sides by the semi-circular Willow Drive. To the west was the ticky-tacky bungalow homes built by Marvin Helf (homes that cost $11,900 in 1951 when my family moved in); and to the east, north, and south, by brick ranches, the "F & S Homes." The only thing I can figure is that they couldn't decide out how to develop this little semi-circle of land, and thought they would be "magnanimous" and donate it to the city of Euclid. We never ever heard any official name for this piece of land, and so we (and everyone!) called it Mudville--for the astonishing quantities of mud that covered part of the area.

I would guess that from about 1955, when I was 7 years old, until my mid teens, I spent most of my life at Mudville playing baseball. Much of the time the baseball involved pick-up games, and for 3 years I played organized Midget League baseball. Later, I played softball with the Farringdon Avenue men's team--an incredible spirited kind of ball.

I played with some great players in Mudville and learned to play a very high quality, very competitive (and at times ferocious) brand of baseball. Some of the great athletes I remember include the following: Tony Severino (for 25 years the head football coach at Rockhurst High School, the Jesuit Prep School in Kansas City; Rockhurst was state champs in football last year). Tony was the best young hitter I had ever seen. As a 12 year old, he could hit the ball over the fence--sometimes hitting the roofs of homes on Willow Drive. Tony was a dark-skinned, tall Italian. I'm pretty sure that Italian was spoken at his home on Briardale Avenue. Tony went to Cathedral Latin High School from St. William's and starred in many sports. He eventually got a football scholarship to Kansas State University, and afterwards made a career as a high school teacher and coach. I remember Tony vividly, admired his athletic skill tremendously.
[more coming very soon]