The Cleveland Cultural Gardens Collection

A joint venture of the Cleveland State University Library and the Cleveland Public Library

The Cleveland Cultural Gardens, extending along East Blvd. and Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. in Cleveland's University Circle area, is a unique collection of landscaped, themed gardens each representing a different ethnic group/organization in Cleveland. Begun in 1916, sixteen gardens had been dedicated by the 1930's. Now numbering 33 and continuing to grow, they represent many of the cultural backgrounds of Cleveland's diverse population.

The Cleveland Cultural Gardens Collection is a collaborative digital project between the Michael Schwartz Library at Cleveland State University, the Cleveland Public Library, and the City of Cleveland. Here 565 black and white photographs and maps from the Cleveland Press Photograph Collection at Cleveland State University, the Photograph Collection at Cleveland Public Library, and the City of Cleveland archives were digitized, cataloged and indexed in Cleveland Memory to provide a historical pictorial perspective of the gardens from the early to mid part of the 20th century. This collection contains images from nearly all of the gardens.

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For Further Study ...