During a summer afternoon interview with Virgil Brown, Sr., the Cleveland elder statesman shared with us the personal philosophy and can-do attitude that propelled a boy from the Central Neighborhood from the shop floors at Republic Steel, Sherwin-Williams and the Wolf Envelope Company to the halls of power in Cleveland and Columbus.

Are you a native-born Clevelander?

No. My mother was from Kentucky , and my father was from Cincinnati . They moved to Cincinnati after I was born (1917). The family moved to Cleveland when I was 12. That was in 1929. My father was in construction, and there was more construction in Cleveland than in Cincinnati .

Before we came to Cleveland , we moved around a lot. There are six of us kids – I'm the oldest – and only two of us were born in the same place, and those two aren't in succession. I used to marvel at my friends when I was growing up when they said they'd never ridden on a train. We rode on the train all the time.

When we arrived in Cleveland , we lived in the Central area.

What was growing up in the Central neighborhood like?

It was good. In the summer there were chores to do, but we'd get them done quickly, so we could get down to the [base]ball field. Some evenings, I'd look up into the crowd at the field, and my dad would be sitting there watching us play.

…There were Jewish people and Italians and some Polish people in our neighborhood. Some of the kids I grew up with turned out very well…and some went into prison long-term.

One of the early lessons I learned from my father was to make my own decisions. He was always telling us: Don't do something because everybody else is doing it. You know what is right and you know what is wrong, and when others start doing the wrong thing, you come home. And that's what I always did.

Where did you go to school?

I went to Quincy Elementary and Central High School . I was in the college prep program there. I graduated in 1937, a year later than I should have. I was out of school for a year working in a Civilian Conservation Corps Camp in Steubenville , Ohio . We were building a 27-acre lake.

What kind of impact did your experience in the Civilian Conservation Corps have on you?

When you went to a camp, you filled out a very thorough application. I put on mine that I could type.

The first morning I got there, the superintendent said to me: I see on your application that you can type. Tomorrow, when you report for work, come to my office.

When I came in the next day the first thing he said was: Take a letter. I didn't know anything about shorthand, but he started talking, and I started writing. My instincts told me to write just enough of each word so that I'd know what it was when I came back later to transcribe it [for typing]. We did a couple of letters, and when I read them back to him he was satisfied.

I remember to this day some of the people I was writing letters to. Harold Ickeys [Secretary of the Interior under President Theodore Roosevelt] was one of them.

The government sent $25 a month home and gave you $5 a month, and because I was working at the camp, I got an additional $6. I didn't spend much of that. Our housing and meals were taken care of, so I saved most of my money from camp, and my mother saved part of what I sent home. At the end of my nine months at the camp, I went home and went back to school, and graduated in 1937.

I often marvel at how everything turned out when the camp's director said, “Take a letter.” I didn't say I don't take dictation, I sat there and did it.

What did you do after you graduated?

I went to work at Republic Steel, but it shut down about a year after I started there. My wife, Lurtissia, got me my next job. I'd met her in 1937, and she wanted to get married, but I'd lost my job in 1938 so I didn't think I was quite ready for that.

One day she said: I have a job for you. Her hairdresser's husband worked at Sherwin-Williams, and when I went to talk with him I got a job…and we got married.

Our daughter, Veretta, was born in 1939. And our son, Virgil Brown, Jr., was born in 1945. He's a lawyer. [Laughs] He's the one that most people know today. He's run for office several times, and right now he's on the State School Board. Veretta was the first girl to be president of her senior class at Glenville High School , and he was valedictorian of his class at Glenville. He got his [first] degree in physics at Case.

I was at Sherwin-Williams four years. It was a good job – by the standards of those days – but it was a hard and hot job. Every day at lunchtime I read the want ads.

One day an ad caught my attention because it asked for a high school graduate. It was from the Wolf Envelope Company , and when I went for an interview the company superintendent ( Ronald F. Harris ) told me he liked me, but that he couldn't pay me any more than what I was making at Sherwin-Williams. I told him that making more money was not my objective, getting a position where I could advance was.

He hired me, and made me the foreman of the Receiving Department for the materials, including the huge rolls of paper the company used to make its products. [Laughs] The guy sweeping the floor there knew more about what was going on there than I did when I came, yet they put me in charge of the Receiving Department.

The man who ran the “window” department – where they made the envelopes with the cut-out windows – died, suddenly. I told the superintendent, I could handle that department. He gave me a chance, and I took it. There was so much added on to my job that when I left – after 17 years – it took four people to replace me.

From there, I went into business for myself. My wife and I took out a mortgage on our house to start a business and in 1959, I bought a Firestone franchise. It wasn't for us.

After that, I decided to go into insurance. I started with Canada Life and was sent to Toronto for training, where I lived in a dormitory with all the other trainees, and in 1961 we rented a store front and opened the Virgil E. Brown Insurance Agency. We started gradually expanding to provide auto and property insurance.

Our first office was on 105 th Street . Today it's on Noble Road in Cleveland Heights .

When did you get started in politics?

It wasn't me that got me started, it was my wife. She's always been – from the time she was a girl – interested in politics. She's always passed out literature. She's always done volunteer work in political offices. And she was the one everyone on our street would call when the dogs were barking or the sewers were backing up. She knew who to call at City Hall to get things done. A lot of times, Harry Jaffe, the Cleveland Council Member from ward 25, where we lived, would get the call. One day, he stopped by our hous e to meet her. Eventually, she became ward leader.

In 1965-66 they changed the electoral ballot, dividing the state into districts. They were looking for someone to run for Representative in District 41, where we lived. Lurtissia was going to the meetings – about who would become the District 41 Representative [which represented Wards 24, 25, 27 and Bratenahl) – and dragged me along.

I expressed some interest in becoming the Representative, and they ignored me. At the 3 rd meeting I said: I'm running for the position, if you support me or not. They did not. I won the primary, but lost in the general election.

In '67, I ran for City Council. I did a poor man's poll – my daughter put together questions and she and some other people made phone calls – and it told me what areas I was weak in. We went door-to-door in those areas, and I beat him by a few hundred votes. I was on City Council for three terms.

In '72, there was a big foul-up at the Board of Elections. Some polls in our ward had to open up the next week so that people could vote. It was a terrible situation. The director at that time resigned under fire, and they were looking for someone to head up the Board. My name came up and I went for an interview.

When the Secretary of State at that time, Ted Brown, fired the Board, they went to court and got it restored, and they appointed me as the Director of the Board of Elections. I was there seven years.

When George Voinovich went from being a County Commissioner to being Mayor of Cleveland, I was appointed to fill his unexpired position. When I ran for the position in 1980, I won; and in 1984 I won; and in 1988 I won. After that, I was ready to retire. But I was offered the position of Director of the Ohio State Lottery. I'd planned on staying just three years, but I was there four years, when I finally did retire.

I was 74. I was ready. [Laughs] I haven't done much politically since.

You're a very socially responsible person. What have you been doing with all that political know-how and energy?

Now I spend my time working on the [Center for Community Solution's] Council On Older Person's advisory board. Seth Taft [another former Cuyahoga County Commissioner] is on the board and so is [former State Senator] Grace Drake. We lend whatever knowledge we might have to the board and we use whatever influence we might have to lobby for programs and projects that will help older people.

[Laughs] In this position I guess you could say I'm still using my political skills.

And I'm a member of our church trustee board. My wife and I have been a member of Bethany Baptist Church [ 105 th Street and Hampden] since the ‘40s.

You are a Republican and you are an African-American. That's a combination that's rare, especially in the Cleveland area. How did you become a Republican?

I've always been a Republican. My parents were Republicans. And when I met my wife, we never argued about politics because she was a Republican, too.

It fits my personal philosophy. I'm entrepreneurial, and I believe that you can and should help yourself.

You are 88 years old, in excellent health, and very active. In fact, you said you're going bowling after this interview is done. How do you keep so fit and healthy?

I don't eat anything special…I love to eat, and I eat what I want.

I've been blessed with good health most of my life.

When I was born in 1917, I was born with the influenza that was going around the U.S. then. I was not expected to live. I was a sickly child – and very underweight – when I came to Cleveland . My mother took all five of us kids to City Hospital [now MetroHealth Medical Center ] for a health exam. The doctors took one look at me and told her that I needed to have my tonsils removed. When they took them out – I was about 13 – my health improved immediately.

I'm having some problems with my back lately, but when you are 88 years old, the parts do start to wear out.

You've lived through the Depression, and several wars, and economic upturns and downturns, and you were at the center of Cleveland and Northeast Ohio politics from the mid-1960s to the early-1990s – and those were some pretty turbulent years—yet you have a very positive attitude about politics and life. What do you attribute that to?

I've always seen my own potential to do things and I've never been one to see obstacles. I was always going around them, over them, under them.

I think I get that from both my parents. I was born into a very poor family. Neither of my parents had much education. But my father was a very ingenious man…[and] my mother was a woman of great faith. Her motto was: The Lord will provide.

[Chuckled] Dad was more practical. He believed in prayer, but he also believed that after you were done praying, you needed to get up off your knees and do something to back up your prayers.

And I've never worried about having a job. If I didn't have one, I'd make one. My dad did a lot of interior work – painting, paper hanging, things like that – and I learned that from him. When I was 17, I bought my own tools. And when I didn't have anything to do, I'd let people know I was available, and I'd always had a job.