Ralph Perk | |
|---|---|
 Perk in 1973 | |
| 52nd Mayor of Cleveland | |
| In office November 9, 1971 – November 14, 1977 | |
| Preceded by | Carl B. Stokes |
| Succeeded by | Dennis J. Kucinich |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Ralph Joseph Perk (1914-01-19)January 19, 1914 Cleveland,Ohio, U.S. |
| Died | April 21, 1999(1999-04-21) (aged 85) Westlake, Ohio, U.S. |
| Political party | Republican |
| Children | 7 |
| Occupation | Politician,lawyer |
Ralph Joseph Perk (January 19, 1914 – April 21, 1999) was an American politician who served as the 52ndmayor ofCleveland,Ohio from 1971 to 1977.
Born to an ethnicCzech American family in Cleveland, Perk dropped out of high school at 15 and later took correspondence courses to earn his high-school diploma. He studied history, political science and mathematics at the Cleveland College ofCase Western Reserve University andSt. John's College in Cleveland.[1] During theGreat Depression he worked as apatternmaker, then worked with his brother George in running the Perk Coal and Ice Company. He went on to work in real estate, but returned to patternmaking duringWorld War II to aid in the war effort, after the military rejected him due to earlier health problems resulting fromkidney stones.[1] Perk then moved into politics, becoming a precinct committeeman for Cleveland's Republican Party in 1940 and then assuming the leadership of the Southeast Air Pollution Committee tasked with fighting industrial pollution inthe Flats.[1]
Beginning in 1953, Perk was elected to five two-year terms onCleveland City Council from the city's Ward 13, representing his nativeBroadway–Slavic Villageneighborhood. During his service on Council, Perk founded the American Nationalities Movement, an umbrella agency for 35 nationality groups.[1] In 1962, he was electedauditor ofCuyahoga County, the first Republican to win countywide office since the mid-1930s; he was re-elected in 1966 and 1970.[1] In1965 and1969, Perk ran for mayor of Cleveland and was defeated both times in thegeneral election. In1971, Perk won the Republican nomination for mayor for the third time. He defeated future mayor, governor, andU.S. SenatorGeorge Voinovich, then a member of theOhio House of Representatives, in the primary. Perk went on to win the general election, "propelled into office by a heavy ethnic [Eastern European] vote."[2] He became the first Republican to serve as mayor of Cleveland since the 1940s,[3] and proceeded to make future mayoral electionsnonpartisan.[4] He was reelected in1973 and1975.[1]
As mayor, Perk benefited from his good connections with PresidentRichard Nixon, allowing Cleveland to obtain federal funds to aid neighborhoods and to help crack down on city crime in the era ofIrish American mobsterDanny Greene.[3] He also greatly expanded Cleveland's international ties by initiating severalsister city partnerships.[5]
It was Perk who also recommended that theCleveland Division of Police move to the Justice Center after years of battles between Cuyahoga County and the City of Cleveland. In 1973, Mayor Perk and his Akron Counterpart met and proposed building Project CAIA-or Cleveland Akron International Airport on 5,000 acres (20 km2) inRichfield, Ohio.[6] Had the CAIA been built, CAIA would have rivaled New York'sJFK International Airport, orChicago'sO'Hare International and madeCleveland Hopkins International Airport akin to Chicago'sMidway Airport. The plan was opposed by environmentalists, who petitioned the federal government to create theCuyahoga Valley National Park in 1974. In 1974, Mayor Perk also proposed merging the CTS-or Cleveland Transit System with suburban transit systems. In 1975, voters passed a 1% sales tax to create theGreater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority, know locally as RTA.[6][1]
In 1972, three years after the Cuyahoga River fire and Mayor Stokes's efforts to clean it up, Perk formed the NEORSD-or theNortheast Ohio Regional Sewer District.[7] In December 1970 a federal grand jury investigation led by U.S. AttorneyRobert Jones, the first grand jury investigation of water pollution in the area, led to Jones filing multiple lawsuits against the polluters (about 12 companies inNortheast Ohio).[8][9] After leaving the U.S. Attorney's office for an unsuccessful run for County Prosecutor in 1972, Jones was brought in to the Cleveland Legal Department to assist with NEORSD matters.[10]
In 1974, Perk won the Republican nomination for theUnited States Senate seat formerly held byWilliam B. Saxbe, who had resigned to accept the appointment to the office ofUnited States Attorney General. Perk, however, was defeated soundly byDemocratJohn Herschel Glenn, Jr. Perk had stated that he was counting on running against theincumbent senator,Howard M. Metzenbaum, who had been recently appointed to the seat by then GovernorJohn J. Gilligan. Metzenbaum lost the primary to Glenn. Subsequently, in1977, Perk suffered an upset defeat in the non-partisan primary for mayor, finishing third behindDennis Kucinich, a former political ally, andEdward F. Feighan. Kucinich prevailed over Feighan in the general election, setting the stage for his subsequentmayoralty.[11]
As mayor, Perk was also known for his manypolitical gaffes.[6] On October 16, 1972, he accidentally set his hair on fire when he attempted to use a welder's torch for a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the American Society for Metals at theCleveland Convention Center.[12] A spark from the torch had "hit his head and his hair caught fire thanks to a product that a barber put in it earlier in the day."[6] The mayor later jested, "There are more hazards to this job than I expected."[12] For this, the media proclaimed Perk to be the "hottest mayor in the country" and even Cleveland nativeBob Hope joked about the incident.[6]
In another incident, Perk's wife, Lucille, famously rejected an invitation fromFirst LadyPat Nixon to an event at theWhite House in order to attend her regular bowling night. Later, Perk explained his wife's comment to mean that she was unable to attend because the invitation had come too late and she was unable to prepare for travel. Perk was rumored to say, "tell them it's your bowling night." Though the remark brought howls of laughter throughout the city, it endeared the Perks to their ethnic Eastern European voter base.[6] In yet another gaffe, Perk suggested that a study onpornography ought to be conducted by municipal sanitation workers.[6]
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Perk also appointed Richard Eberling in 1973 to chair a committee to redecorate the mayor's office in City Hall, a move that proved unpopular with numerous sources. In 1974,The Plain Dealer exposed Eberling's record as a petty criminal in a front-page story; Perk defended Eberling, and approved the financing of project until the amount significantly over-reached the budgeted amount. Eberling's lover, Obie Henderson was hired as Perk's personal secretary. Eberling was later found guilty in the death of Ethel M. Durkin, a Cleveland area widow; he also linked himself to theMarilyn Sheppard murder inBay Village, in 1954. Circumstantial evidence also links Eberling to at least four other murders committed over a period from 1946 to 1970 that involved his stepfather, his purported girlfriend, and both of Mrs. Durkin's sisters.
Perk and his wife had six sons and a daughter.[1] His son, Ralph J. Perk, Jr., served as a municipal court judge in Cleveland from 1989 to 2003. Another son, Thomas Perk, is a council member in the village ofValley View in addition to being a fire fighter. Yet another son, Kenneth Perk, is a member of the Cuyahoga Heights Board of Education. His second-youngest son, Allen G. Perk, is the President and CEO of XLNsystems Inc. inColumbus, Ohio.
Perk was diagnosed withprostate cancer in the 1990s, and underwent treatments for the disease.[13] The treatment was thought to have been successful, but in early 1998 Perk and his family learned that the cancer had not only returned but had spread. Perk's children spent a year caring for their father at home. Five days before his death,[14] Perk was admitted to the Corinthian Skilled Nursing Center inWestlake, Ohio. He died there on April 21, 1999.[15] He was buried atHoly Cross Cemetery [Wikidata]inBrook Park, Ohio.[16]
| Party political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Republican nominee forU.S. Senator fromOhio (Class 3) 1974 | Succeeded by |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Mayor of Cleveland 1972–1977 | Succeeded by |