| Repository: | Western Reserve Historical Society |
| Creator: | Krawcheck, Julian |
| Title: | Julian Krawcheck Papers |
| Dates: | 1930-1980 |
| Extent: | 6.43 linear feet (7 containers and 3 oversize folders) |
| Abstract: | Julian I. Krawcheck (1911-1999) was once described as "the conscience of Cleveland" by Dick McLaughlin. This collection contains personal papers relating to Krawcheck's career as a reporter and columnist in Cleveland, Ohio, including research notes, records of interviews, memoranda, column mail, newspaper clippings and scrapbooks. Krawcheck, a commentary columnist and reporter for the Cleveland Press from 1941 to 1977, was born in Charleston, South Carolina. He attended the University of South Carolina for two years. In college, he was an avid saxophone player and jazz buff, which contributed to his coverage of jazz events during his journalism career. The collection consists of correspondence, memos, articles, interview records, scrapbooks, photographs, and research notes pertaining to articles written by Krawcheck. |
| MS Number | MS 4984 |
| Location: | closed stacks |
| Language: | The records are in English |
Julian I. Krawcheck (July 9, 1911- June 12, 1999) was once described as "the conscience of Cleveland" by Dick McLaughlin. This collection contains personal papers relating to Krawcheck's career as a reporter and columnist in Cleveland, Ohio, including research notes, records of interviews, memoranda, column mail, newspaper clippings and scrapbooks. Krawcheck, a commentary columnist and reporter for the Cleveland Press from 1941 to 1977, was born in Charleston, South Carolina. He attended the University of South Carolina for two years. In college, he was an avid saxophone player and jazz buff, which contributed to his coverage of jazz events during his journalism career.
In 1930, as a result of the Great Depression, Krawcheck left college and joined the staff of the Charlotte Observer as a sports reporter. Krawcheck accompanied his older brother to Cleveland for an exterminator's convention in 1936. While in Cleveland, he applied at the local newspapers and was hired as a copy editor for the Cleveland News in 1937. He became a member of the Cleveland Press staff in 1941. As a Liberal, Krawcheck fit into the political view of the Press better than the Conservative Cleveland News.
During World War II, Krawcheck served as a public information noncommissioned officer of the Army. During his three years in the army, he served in Verdun, France, as a special services and pubic relations noncommissioned officer for the 201st General Hospital for four months. In Reims, France, Krawcheck spent eight months as the News Section Chief for the Oise Intermediate Section. He concluded his time in the army in Paris, France as News Section Chief for the Western Base Section for three months. The highest rank Krawcheck achieved was Master Sergeant.
As one of the most respected reporters of Cleveland, Krawcheck's journalism career focused on social issues such as race relations, blockbusting, home building costs, school desegregation, and the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. He interviewed influential national figures such as Richard Nixon, Harry Truman, Eleanor Roosevelt, Martin Lurther King, Jr., Louis Armstrong, and Dizzie Gillespie. In 1964, he was sent to Mississippi to cover the voter registration drive which seven local ministers attended. One of his most noteworthy moments was covering the civil rights march in Alabama from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. Even though he was refused credentials that would protect him as a reporter during the march, Krawcheck joined the event. Krawcheck also covered the City Club Forums, and lectured at universities such as Oberlin, Hiram, John Carroll, Western Reserve, Ursuline, and Kent. He taught America's first jazz appreciation class at the Cleveland College of Western Reserve University in 1949 and 1950 as well.
Krawcheck received numerous awards. The Cleveland Newspaper Guild presented him with nine awards, and the Cleveland Press gave him three. He was nominated twice for a Pulitzer Prize for housing integration and civil rights articles. Krawcheck received the Paul Tobenkin Memorial Award, the Distinguished Service Award from the Cleveland chapter of the Sigma Delta Chi, the Community Service Award from the Cleveland Urban League, and the Spencer Irwin Award of the Cleveland Jewish Community.
Furthermore, Krawcheck participated in many organizations. He was the Newspaper Guild's unit chairman at the Press and the forum chairman of the City Club. Krawcheck founded the Cleveland Newspaper Guild Institute that trained journalists. He was the president of the Mount Pleasant Community Council and the first president of the Middleburg Heights Kiwanis Club as well. He was a trustee of the Early Settlers Association and the Cleveland Restoration Society. Also, Krawcheck was a member of the Rowfant Club, the Civil War Roundtable, the Cleveland Professional Chapter of the Sigma Delta Chi, the Cleveland Urban League, and the Western Reserve Historical Society.
Krawcheck lived in Cleveland Heights and Brecksville with his wife, Marie Wood. They had one son and two grandchildren. Krawcheck and his wife crossed the Atlantic forty-eight times. In 1960, he suffered a heart attack that was followed by heart surgery in 1977 and 1986. Krawcheck died on June 12, 1999 at the Judson Retirement Community in Cleveland.
The Julian Krawcheck Papers, 1930-1980 and undated, consist of correspondence, memos, articles, interview records, scrapbooks, photographs, and research notes pertaining to articles written by Krawcheck.
Series I: Research Notes, (1941-1980), consists of correspondence, memos, articles, interview records and photographs that deal with research subjects for his articles. Series II: Newspaper Articles,(1930-1977), consists of scrapbooks and newspaper clippings of articles written by Krawcheck.
This collection is of value to researchers studying the history of Cleveland, Ohio. Scholars interested in Cleveland news of the day from the 1940s to the 1970s will find this collection helpful. Issues such as block busting, inflation, immigration, integration, and interracial marriage were researched and addressed by Krawcheck in his articles. Also of note, there is a substantial amount of feedback from Krawcheck's readers, thus providing individuals looking into this collection valuable insight into what public opinion was at this time.
A note to researchers: Due to the fact that a large portion of the collection concerns race relations some of the written reactions to Krawcheck's articles on this subject can be quite candid, and may contain racially insensitive and graphic language.
None.
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.
[Container ___, Folder ___ ] MS 4984 Julian Krawcheck Papers, Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland, Ohio
Gift of Julian Krawcheck in 1991.
Processed by Jenna Ogden, Alicia Pavelecky, and Ashley Taylor in 2007.
Series I: Research Notes 1941-1980 undated |
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| Box | Folder | ||||||||||
| 1 | 1 | Auto Industry 1961-1965 | |||||||||
| 1 | 2 | Auto Service Centers 1968 | |||||||||
| 1 | 3 | Benesch, Alfred A. 1965-1969 | |||||||||
| 1 | 4 | Black Muslims 1963 | |||||||||
| 1 | 5 | Black Power 1966 | |||||||||
| 1 | 6 | Blacks, Background Data 1961-1967 | |||||||||
| 1 | 7 | Blacks, History in Cleveland 1963 | |||||||||
| 1 | 8-9 | Block Busting 1960-1963 | |||||||||
| 1 | 10 | Brown, James 1966 | |||||||||
| 1 | 11-12 | Building Costs 1952 1957 | |||||||||
| 1 | 13 | City Club 1952 | |||||||||
| 1 | 14 | Cleveland History 1971 | |||||||||
| 1 | 15 | Cleveland Super Sequi Section 1971 | |||||||||
| 1 | 16 | Cleveland's Growth Through the 1960s ca. 1960s | |||||||||
| 1 | 17-25 | Column Mail 1956-1972 | |||||||||
| Box | Folder | ||||||||||
| 2 | 1-10 | Column Mail 1973-1977 | |||||||||
| 2 | 11 | Conrad, Ted (The Crown Affair) 1969 | |||||||||
| 2 | 12-14 | Cost of Living 1951-1957 | |||||||||
| 2 | 15 | Credit Cards 1969 | |||||||||
| 2 | 16 | Drug Cost Data 1966-1967 | |||||||||
| 2 | 17 | Dying, High Cost of 1964 1973-1974 | |||||||||
| 2 | 18 | Eaton, Cyrus 1960 1969 | |||||||||
| 2 | 19 | Ethnic Data 1970-1977 | |||||||||
| 2 | 20 | Future of Cleveland 1972 | |||||||||
| 2 | 21 | Golden Decade Notes-Cleveland History 1911-1921 undated | |||||||||
| 2 | 22 | Guild (Newspaper) Institute 1951-1955 | |||||||||
| 2 | 23 | Heights High School Racial Situation Notes 1975 | |||||||||
| 2 | 24 | Heights Temple History at Centennial 1966 | |||||||||
| 2 | 25 | Hillbillies in Cleveland 1957-1958 | |||||||||
| 2 | 26 | Hillbillies at Home 1959 | |||||||||
| 2 | 27 | Humbard, Rex (Cathedral of Tomorrow) 1971- 1972 | |||||||||
| 2 | 28 | Industry Migration to Suburbs 1973 | |||||||||
| 2 | 29 | Inflation Series Notes ca. late 1960s | |||||||||
| Box | Folder | ||||||||||
| 3 | 1 | Interracial Cleveland Schools ca. early 1950s | |||||||||
| 3 | 2 | Interracial Marriages 1964 | |||||||||
| 3 | 3 | Israel Series 1967 | |||||||||
| 3 | 4 | Jazz 1949 | |||||||||
| 3 | 5 | Jewish Population in Cleveland 1971 | |||||||||
| 3 | 6 | King, Martin Luther and March from Selma to Montgomery 1965 | |||||||||
| 3 | 7 | Mississippi: The Changing South 1964 | |||||||||
| 3 | 8 | Mercy Flight to Aid Hungarian Refugees 1956 | |||||||||
| 3 | 9 | Memoranda to Press Editors 1941-1976 undated | |||||||||
| 3 | 10 | NAACP, History in Cleveland 1962 | |||||||||
| 3 | 11 | Negro: A Better Life 1959 | |||||||||
| 3 | 12 | Negro Neighbors 1956 | |||||||||
| 3 | 13 | Oberlin: History of the Town and College 1978 | |||||||||
| 3 | 14 | Obscene School Books Series 1975 | |||||||||
| 3 | 15 | Photographs undated | |||||||||
| 3 | 16 | Population Movements and Shifts in Cleveland 1975 | |||||||||
| 3 | 17 | Rape: Cleveland Press Series 1972 | |||||||||
| 3 | 18 | Redding, Edward S. Data 1973 | |||||||||
| 3 | 19 | Retirement: "Pinch or Plenty" 1962 | |||||||||
| 3 | 20 | Sales Tax Fraud 1950 | |||||||||
| 3 | 21 | Seltzer, Louis B.: Retirement as Editor of The Press 1968 | |||||||||
| 3 | 22 | Seltzer: Correspondence 1971-1980 | |||||||||
| 3 | 23 | State of Civil Rights 1975 | |||||||||
| 3 | 24 | Stokes, Carl: "The Stokes Years" 1971 | |||||||||
| 3 | 25 | Vintage Homes 1976 | |||||||||
| 3 | 26 | Virginia School Integration Data 1958 | |||||||||
| 3 | 27 | White, Walter C.: The Chagrin Set 1977 | |||||||||
| 3 | 28 | Wooten, John 1968 | |||||||||
Series II: Newspaper Articles 1930-1977 undated |
|||||||||||
| Box | volume | ||||||||||
| 4 | 1 | Articles from The Charlotte Observer ca. 1930- 1937 | |||||||||
| 4 | 2-6 | Krawcheck News Stories and Series, Cleveland Press October 1949-September 1962 | |||||||||
| Box | volume | ||||||||||
| 5 | 1-4 | Krawcheck News Stories and Series, Cleveland Press September 1962-December 1968 | |||||||||
| 5 | 5 | Krawcheck Commentary Columns, Cleveland Press December 1967-December 1971 | |||||||||
| Box | volume | ||||||||||
| 6 | 1-2 | Krawcheck News Stories and Series, Cleveland Press January 1969-January 1974 | |||||||||
| 6 | 3 | Krawcheck Commentary Columns, Cleveland Press January 1972-February 1976 | |||||||||
| 6 | 4 | Krawcheck News Stories and Series, Cleveland Press ca. early 1974-August 1976 | |||||||||
| 6 | 5 | Krawcheck Commentary Columns, Cleveland Press February 1976-October 1977 | |||||||||
| 6 | 6 | Krawcheck News Stories and Series, Cleveland Press August 1976-October 1977 | |||||||||
| Box | Folder | ||||||||||
| 7 | 1 | Scrapbook of newspaper clippings undated | |||||||||
| 7 | 2-3 | Contest submissions 1951-1976 | |||||||||
| 7 | 4 | Reprints 1959-1964 | |||||||||
| Folder | |||||||||||
| Oversize 1 | Scrapbook ca. 1930-1937 | ||||||||||
| Folder | |||||||||||
| Oversize 2 | Newspaper Clippings August 1950-September 1963 | ||||||||||
| Folder | |||||||||||
| Oversize 3 | Newspaper Clippings July 1964-October 1977 | ||||||||||