Evening star., 1939-07-30
Cleveland Mixture
OF Nations, Dedicaies
Garden Area Today
MeNutt Will Speak
At Ceremony Honoring
Men of Many Londs

Ill lIlC al hldllu "lllSll CuJO dSlOSs
/ Cleveland's densely populated East
Z Side there lies mile-long green
strip of land destined in the hopes
%of its sponsors to become one of the
world unique beauty spots, where
stately walks, calm pools. shady
trees and bright flowers will be the
perpetual tribute paid to the great
of the myriad nations that have
formed the United States.
This strip of land. little over
35 acres. forms the Cleveland
Cultural Gardens, where the city's
more than 80 nationality groups,
in conjunction with several organi-
cations of native stock. have la
bored to construct a fitting me-
mortal to peace and the cultural
amalgam which this Nation has
become.
There tomorrow Paul V. McNutt,
recently named by President Roose-
welt to head the new Federal
security agency, will deliver the
chief address at impressive cere-
monies dedicating the gardens on
International Peace Day, which will
be celebrated by the hosts at
tending the World Poultry Congress
In Cleveland next week.
A Racial Melange.
In a world torn by strife and
hate, where nationalism serves as a
counter -irritant to the aspirations
of other peoples, the Cultural Gar
dens are held up as symbol OF
the melting pot of America.
Nearly sl,OoO,OOO will have been
poured into the undertaking by the
time the % gardens are finished
Fifteen are complete now, or prac-
tically so. Eight others are still
in early stages. Civic and ma
tionality groups, the city and Fed
eral Government through w. P. A
have all borne the cost.
Significant it will be that Mr.
McNutt will speak in the American
Legion Garden of the Nations,
where earth from the 30odd nations
which contributed their men and
women to the 65 per cent OF the
city's population which is OF foreign
descent, has been collected
AS Mr.. McNutt unveils the head
of a statue of peace, the land OF
Hungarians, Germans, Irish, French
English, Greeks, Scotch, Syrians
Slovenians, Croatians, Armenians
Serbs, Rumanians, Swedes, Danes
Firms, Russians, Polish, Czechs
Ukranians and Lithuanians, among
still others, will lie beneath his feet
Most of these are represented in the
gardens.
Only Two War Chieftains.
Not only has each nationality
group guided the development OF its
acreage, with the advice of city
landscape architects, but it has held
drives, solicited from door to door
of it's nationals, so that it could Gre
ate a garden symbolic of its tradi-
tional spirit and fill its inches and
walks with busts and statutes Of its
great men, the ones who mostssron-
tributed to the essence Of its~na-
tional spirit.
Only two military chieftains
strangely enough, are honored in the
garden area, and these are rather
on the periphery instead of in the
gardens proper The war heroes are
Gen. Milan Stefanik, one Of the
founders of deceased Czecho-Slo-
vakia, and Thaddeus Kosciuszko
Polish patriot and leader in the
American Revolution. .
The truly representative statues
are those of pets, men of God and
learning and art. In such typical
gardens as the English Shakespeare
garden, which was the first to be
dedicated, in 1916; in the classic
calm of the Greek garden: the ORR
entail charm of the Hebrew garden,
with its star of David layout; the
italian garden. with its authentic
stones from the forum of ancient
Rome, is to be found the true genius
Of the nations depicted.
German Poets Honored.
Among the statues already in
place and individually dedicated are
those of Goethe and Schiller, Ger
man poets; Maimonides and Spi-
:loza, Jewish philosophers; Cankar
and Gregoric, Slovenian poets;
Basanavicus, Lithuanian patriot;
Chopin, Polish pianist, and Ko-
mensky, Czech educator.
Not without its irony is the fact
that the two directing heads of the
cultural garden movement in Cleve-
land are Jewess, Mrs. Jennie K
11rioly o,oI Thorlnc 7
Wolfram The initiator Of the whole
idea was Jew, Leo Weidenthal, an
editor. COMMUNICATIVE support
for the gardens was organized in
1925.
While the various groups have
each looked after their own gardens,
the city itself looked toward the
whole, and to that end spent more
than 100000 in unification plan
to connect the gardens with walks,
and, in general, harmonic the en-
semble and give it rhythm, as it
were.
City Officials Varied.
City officials who have helped
tend the gardens in the midst of the
manifold troubles most industrial
cities are subject to these days in
clude Mayor Harold H. Burton, Fed
eral Relations Commissioner Frank
E. Bubna, Parks Director Hugo E.
Varga, City Landscape Architect A.
H. Alexander and his assistant,
Harold E. Atkinson.
This group alone indicates the
cosmopolitan variety of Cleveland S
multifarious races. Burton is Eng
hsh-Swiss-Iris Bubna is Bohem-
ian. Varga is Hungarian Jew
The architects are straight Anglo
Saxon. And the w. P A. workers