Forest Hills community fundraising to save a small cottage with big ties to Cleveland’s history

CLEVELAND HEIGHTS, Ohio — Neighbors in a northeast Ohio group are banding collectively to save lots of a small cottage with a giant historical past behind it.

Should you take a drive by means of Forest Hills, a group in Cleveland Heights and East Cleveland, it’s nearly such as you’re getting into a distinct period.

Tony Rupcic has lived in Forest Hills for the reason that 90s.

“Architecturally, I feel it’s probably the most stunning neighborhoods in Cleveland,” he mentioned. “There’s a pleasant tapestry of architectural types like mid-century moderns, two-story colonials and the French Norman, domestically often known as Rockefeller houses.”

Within the mid-Twenties, John D. Rockefeller Jr. and architect Andrew J. Thomas created the event. They created greater than 80.

Beryl Tishkoff is the chair of the Forest Hills House owner’s Affiliation.

“A lot of the Rockefeller houses have been constructed between 1929 and 1931,” she mentioned. “We don’t contact the skin of the houses. The attractive cedar shingles, the slate roofs, the copper gutters. The entire parts that went into making them. We wish to keep the integrity of the neighborhood and other people actually do care. That’s what makes it enjoyable.”

Whereas the houses in Forest Hills are like a blast from the previous, rooted in Cleveland historical past, there’s part of this group that’s in jeopardy of not having a future: the Little Blue Cottage.

The Cottage sits on the nook of Lee and Monticello Boulevard. Tishkoff mentioned it’s a heat welcome into Forest Hill’s neighborhood.

“The blue cottage was initially the actual property workplace for the Forest Hill Mission of John D. Rockefeller Sr.,” she mentioned. “It simply makes me smile. It appears to be like like it’s from a fairytale.”

The 600 sq. foot cottage is about 100 years outdated.

“It’s a logo of the neighborhood,” mentioned Rupcic. “That is the one instance of this storybook, fairytale kind of structure in Cleveland.”

It’s now the headquarters of the Forest Hills House owner’s Affiliation, however it’s on the snapping point. The inspiration is sinking and the home windows and flooring are cracking.

“It will be a disgrace to return round this nook and it not be right here, or there can be a monument or a plaque that claims, ‘Right here stood the blue cottage,’ we’d just like the blue cottage to face right here for an additional 100 years,” mentioned Tishkoff.

After latest inspections, the Forest Hills House owner’s Affiliation realized they wanted about $80,000 to repair the sinking basis.

On Sept. 1 the group despatched out letters to its 1,000 members asking for assist to save lots of the cottage.

“We simply despatched out our first piece of literature asking for pledges and donations,” she mentioned.

Tishkoff goes to be reaching out for grant cash and companies close by to see in the event that they’d prefer to pitch in for the trigger.

“That is the factor that retains me up at evening, saving the cottage,” she laughed.

However she and different neighbors are hopeful that the tiny piece of massive historical past will keep proper the place it belongs, on the nook of Lee and Monticello Blvd.

“I don’t assume it’s going to go away. I feel the group goes to step up and we’ll attain the objective,” mentioned Rupcic.

Should you’d like to assist save the cottage, you possibly can donate right here.

To study extra simply name the Forest Hills Owners Inc. at 216-932-8952.