70 Fun Facts About Cleveland

Which Revolutionary War general founded Cleveland in 1796 while leading a land-company survey party?

He led a party of about 50 people west from Schenectady, New York, and his employees named the new town site in his honor.

Legend says the extra 'a' in the city's original name was dropped so it would fit where?

Another theory is simply that the surveying party misspelled the name on their original map, and the shorter spelling stuck.

How many times did the city's founder return to the settlement bearing his name after 1796?

He died and was buried in Canterbury, Connecticut, though a statue of him stands on Cleveland's Public Square.

Cleveland was laid out as the capital of which state's 'Western Reserve' lands in Ohio?

The land was reserved to that state by Congress and had initially been called New Connecticut before the Western Reserve name took hold.

What ignited the famous June 22, 1969 fire on the Cuyahoga River?

The blaze did about $50,000 in damage, mostly to a railroad bridge, and local media barely covered it at first.

Time magazine's influential 1969 story on the burning Cuyahoga was illustrated with a photograph of what?

No photos of the 1969 fire are known to exist because reporters arrived only after it was under control.

Which Cleveland brewery named its Burning River Pale Ale after the Cuyahoga's fires?

The same brewer sponsors the two-night Great Lakes Burning River Fest at Whiskey Island each year.

Who became the first African American mayor of a major US city, in Cleveland in 1967?

He beat Seth Taft, grandson of President William Howard Taft, by only about 1,600 votes.

Cleveland's pioneering first Black mayor was later appointed U.S. ambassador to which island nation?

He had served as a municipal judge in Cleveland before the appointment.

Which architect designed the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame building on Cleveland's lakefront?

He said he consciously used a bold, new architectural vocabulary to echo the energy of rock and roll.

The Rock Hall's tower had to be cut from a planned 200 feet to 162 feet because of its proximity to what?

Planners at one point considered putting the museum in the vacant May Company department store building instead.

Which figure joined Little Richard in cutting the ribbon at the Rock Hall's 1995 dedication?

An all-star concert followed the next night at Cleveland Stadium.

Which record-label chief established the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation in 1983?

Cleveland was not chosen as the museum's home until 1986, after a long search among several cities.

Alan Freed's 1952 Moondog Coronation Ball, called the first major rock concert, was held where?

The crowd far exceeded capacity and the show was shut down early amid a near-riot.

On which Cleveland radio station did Alan Freed start playing rhythm and blues records in July 1951?

He called the show The Moondog House and billed himself as the King of the Moondoggers.

Alan Freed's 2016 Lake View Cemetery memorial, which holds his ashes, is shaped like what?

His ashes had been kept at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame from 2002 until the museum asked for their removal in 2014.

The Cleveland Browns are named after whom?

The franchise began play in 1946 in the All-America Football Conference and won all four of that league's championships.

The Browns are unique among the NFL's 32 clubs for what reason?

The plain orange helmet with a brown-white-brown stripe serves as the team's official logo.

Which new franchise did Art Modell take his Browns roster to in 1996, leaving the name in Cleveland?

The Browns were treated as suspended and returned in 1999, restocked via an expansion draft.

In 2017 the Browns became only the second NFL team to finish a season 0–16. Which team was the first?

The 2016 and 2017 Browns went a combined 1–31, the worst two-year stretch in NFL history.

Which Browns cornerback named the defense 'The Dawgs' in the mid-1980s, giving the Dawg Pound its name?

He and teammates would bark at each other and at fans in the bleachers to fire them up.

The 2016 Cavaliers were the first team to win the NBA Finals after trailing by what margin?

More than 1.3 million people attended the victory parade in downtown Cleveland on June 22, 2016.

The Cavaliers' 2016 title ended a Cleveland championship drought dating back to which year?

That earlier title was the Browns' NFL championship, won under coach Blanton Collier.

The NBA rule barring trades of first-round picks in successive seasons is named after which Cavaliers owner?

The team went 66–180 during his three years as owner and cycled through six coaches.

In 2010's The Decision, LeBron James announced he was leaving Cleveland for which team?

The special raised $2.5 million for the Boys & Girls Club of Greenwich, Connecticut, where it was broadcast.

LeBron James, drafted first overall by the Cavaliers in 2003, was born and raised in which nearby city?

He went straight from high school to the NBA and won Rookie of the Year with the Cavaliers.

The Cleveland Guardians take their name from eight Art Deco statues on which bridge?

Each statue holds a different vehicle, from a hay wagon to a 1930s automobile.

From 1903, Cleveland's AL club was nicknamed the 'Naps' after which player-manager?

When he left after 1914, sportswriters were asked to pick a new name and chose Indians, which lasted until 2021.

The 1899 Cleveland Spiders finished with the worst record in major league history. How many games did they win?

Their owner had shipped the best players, including Cy Young, to his other club in St. Louis before the season.

Which Cleveland owner signed Larry Doby in 1947, breaking the American League's color barrier?

The following year he also signed the 42-year-old Satchel Paige, the oldest rookie in major league history.

Cleveland's 1974 Ten Cent Beer Night riot erupted during a game against which visiting team?

A bench-clearing brawl between the two teams six days earlier had primed the crowd for trouble, and the game was forfeited.

Which building surpassed Terminal Tower in 1964 as North America's tallest outside New York?

It also housed the studios of classical station WCLV for decades.

How fast were baseballs dropped from Terminal Tower estimated to be traveling in a 1938 publicity stunt?

The 708-foot drop broke a 30-year-old record set at the Washington Monument.

Which brothers built Terminal Tower atop the city's new Union Terminal rail station in the 1920s?

Originally planned at 14 stories, it grew to 52 floors and 708 feet.

Key Tower ended Terminal Tower's 60-year run as Ohio's tallest building in which year?

It was originally called Society Center and was the tallest building between New York and Chicago until 2007.

The West Side Market stands at West 25th Street and Lorain Avenue in which Cleveland neighborhood?

That neighborhood was once a rival municipality that Cleveland annexed in 1854.

The West Side Market building, with its landmark clock tower, was completed in which year?

The market did not add regular Sunday hours until 2016.

Superman's creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster met as students at which Cleveland high school?

A Cleveland street was renamed Jerry Siegel Lane in 2009.

In 1938, Siegel and Shuster sold all rights to Superman to Detective Comics for how much?

The character debuted in Action Comics #1, cover-dated June 1938.

Superman artist Joe Shuster moved to Cleveland as a boy from which city?

Clark Kent's newspaper was originally the Daily Star, named for the paper Shuster delivered as a boy.

Ralphie Parker's house from A Christmas Story is a museum in which Cleveland neighborhood?

The neighborhood was chosen partly for its views of the steel mills in the Cuyahoga valley.

Cleveland was chosen for A Christmas Story's exterior filming largely because of which department store?

The store appears in three scenes, including the famous Santa Claus slide.

In 2004, fan Brian Jones bought the A Christmas Story house on eBay for how much?

He funded the down payment with profits from selling replica leg lamps.

Cleveland Clinic was founded in which year?

It registered 42 patients on its first day open to the public.

A 1929 disaster at Cleveland Clinic killed 123 people, including one of its founders. What caused it?

Patient care resumed in temporary quarters across the street just five days later.

In 2015 the Cleveland Clinic opened an overseas hospital in which city?

The system later added a hospital in London that fully opened in 2022.

In August 1914 the first electric traffic light was installed at which Cleveland intersection?

The device itself had been developed two years earlier by a Salt Lake City policeman.

Cleveland Hopkins airport was the site of the world's first what, in 1929?

It was also the first U.S. airport linked directly to a rail transit line.

Which group allegedly bombed the Cleveland Museum of Art's cast of Rodin's The Thinker in 1970?

The damage makes it unique among the more than twenty original large castings of the sculpture.

Which institution displays the mounted body of Balto, the famous 1925 Alaska serum-run sled dog?

Cleveland schoolchildren helped raise the money to buy Balto and his team out of a Los Angeles dime museum in 1927.

Who founded the Cleveland Orchestra in 1918?

Its inaugural concert was performed on December 11, 1918, at Grays Armory.

Comedian Bob Hope, who grew up in Cleveland, was born in which country?

He worked briefly at Cleveland's Chandler Motor Car Company before vaudeville.

Which industrialist founded Standard Oil in Cleveland in 1870?

His family plot at Lake View Cemetery sits on one of the cemetery's highest points.

Which assassinated U.S. president is entombed in a memorial at Cleveland's Lake View Cemetery?

He was born in Cuyahoga County and had asked to be buried at Lake View.

The Cleveland Metroparks system that encircles the city is known locally by what nickname?

The system also includes the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo, established in 1882.

By 1910 Cleveland had earned the nickname 'Sixth City'. What did the number refer to?

By 1920 it had climbed to fifth, with a population near 800,000.

In December 1978, Cleveland became the first major American city since the Great Depression to do what?

The city did not emerge from default until 1987.

In James Gunn's 2025 film Superman, downtown Cleveland stood in for which fictional city?

A flying kiss scene was filmed inside the historic Cleveland Arcade.

What job did Eliot Ness of 'Untouchables' fame hold in Cleveland during the 1930s Torso Murders?

The killer was never caught, and Ness later lost a 1947 run for mayor.

The Cavaliers began play as an NBA expansion team in which year?

Their original colors were wine and gold, which the team returned to decades later.

Cleveland once had the largest concentration of Hungarians in the world outside of which city?

Hungarian dishes like chicken paprikash remain local mainstays.

Which Case professor was the first American to win a Nobel Prize in science?

Seventeen Nobel laureates are associated with the university.

Garrett Morgan sold the rights to his 1923 traffic signal to which company for $40,000?

He also used his own smoke hood to rescue workers trapped in a tunnel beneath Lake Erie in 1916.

Cleveland's Playhouse Square is the second-largest US performing arts centre after which venue?

Its State, Palace, Allen, Hanna and Ohio theatres host Broadway tours and resident companies including the Cleveland Ballet.

Which Cleveland institution, founded in 1915, is the oldest African American theatre in the nation?

Langston Hughes, who lived in Cleveland as a teenager, wrote some of his earliest poems and plays in the city.

Which Cleveland street food, sold from downtown hot dog carts, is a local original?

Cleveland's other signature tastes include Bertman Original Ballpark Mustard, city chicken and the Italian community's cassata cake.

The Cleveland Public Library's John G. White collection holds the world's largest library on what?

Head librarian Linda Eastman, who oversaw the 1925 main building, was the first woman to run a major US library system.

In 1968 Cleveland became the first US city with a direct rail link between downtown and what?

Locals call the RTA Rapid Transit system 'The Rapid'; the Red Line is heavy rail while the Blue, Green and Waterfront lines are light rail.

Cleveland has hosted the Republican National Convention three times, in 1924, 1936 and which year?

The city has never hosted a Democratic National Convention, though it staged the 1864 Radical Democratic convention and the first 2020 presidential debate.

The Cleveland Thyagaraja Festival is the largest festival of what outside India?

Held each spring at Cleveland State University, it sits alongside Polish Dyngus Day and Slovene Kurentovanje on the city's ethnic calendar.