Browse Interviews

In this 2005 interview, Susie Guiliano, Manager Media Relations for the Cleveland Indians, discusses her live long love of baseball as well as her job with the Cleveland Indians for the past 22 years. Mrs. Guiliano is a native of the west side of Cleveland and recalls attending baseball games at Cleveland Municipal Stadium as a young girl in the 1970s with her mother. She attributes to her mother her love for baseball. In 1972, she and her mother struck up a friendship with Buddy Bell and his…

George Havens grew up in East Cleveland. He wrote a book about living in the area so much of this interview focuses on his childhood. The YMCA, Big Band era music, dancing and dating were important to Havens. He grew up during the Depression era and he explains how his family was affected. He highlights how fads that many thought would be around forever always seemed to fade like talkies, streetcars and Big Band dance music. He served in World War II and had his own advertising firm. Later in…

Carolyn Peskin grew up in Cleveland Heights and was a dedicated student. She holds numerous graduate degrees ranging from chemistry to music therapy. She describes the integration of Shaker Heights. She briefly discusses how the role women played in society changed and developed. After having a short career as a teacher, Peskin devoted much of her adult life to the care of her children and traveling with her environmentalist husband. She touches on some of the environmental issues the Great…

Ruth Thompson, originally from Pennsylvania, is an avid baseball fan. She discusses how important the Cleveland Indians have been in her life. The evolution of gender roles in the healthcare field and in general are expressed throughout the interview. A proponent of racial diversity, Thompson describes the integration of baseball teams and her neighborhood of Shaker Heights. Thompson describes the advances in healthcare especially in the genital biology field and women's health.

Baseball historian Jim Egan discusses the history of baseball in Cleveland. He discusses the early architectural features in the city, including horse hitching posts, flat-roofed housing, and chimneys. He discusses the creation of the modern game, baseball clubs (both locally and nationally), amateur baseball, and the formation of city leagues. He also discusses the connections between baseball and ethnicity, civic boosterism, local ballparks, and labor unions. Other topics include the…

Scott Longert is the sports archivist at the Western Reserve Historical Society. In this interview he discusses the history of the Cleveland Indians, through the team's name changes, park changes and changes in baseball's rules. Longert also discusses his work at WRHS.

Bob DiBiasio is works in public relations for the Cleveland Indians. In this 2005 interview he discusses his personal love of baseball and the Cleveland Indians' history. He also discusses the team's interaction with the city and some of the minor league teams associated with the Indians.

In this 2005 interview, Jacob Rosenheim, a retired copy editor in the sports department of the Plain Dealer, talks about growing up in Cleveland's Hough neighborhood in the 1940s and 1950s. Rosenheim recalls when, in the 1950s, one white family sold its house to a black family, how the "for sale" signs popped up immediately thereafter. He also recalls attending Indians' ball games in both the old League Park as well as the old Municipal Stadium, and has many memories of the 1948 and 1954…