In 1889, Julius and Mary Klemm moved from their home in eastern Germany to a rapidly growing city in the middle of America.
Shortly after their arrival, the couple settled into a home on East 67th Street in an area that is now just southeast of downtown Cleveland. Julius took a job as a machinist in a sewing machine factory, using his salary to support their nine children to come, the first of whom was welcomed that first year in Ohio.
Cleveland had welcomed thousands of immigrants just like the Klemms by then, growing from a population of around 6,000 in 1840 to over 260,000 a half-century later. But after peaking at nearly a million inhabitants in the 1950s, that number has famously declined ever since.
However, one Clevelander that never left was Julius' sixth child, William. Growing up on the East Side, he bounced around multiple houses and neighborhoods during his career as an insurance salesman before eventually moving across town and settling into a modest two-bedroom dwelling on Wayland Avenue.
Bill, as he was known, left that house to his grandchildren after his death in 1980. My mother, who grew up in Cleveland Heights, had married a Bay Village native a few years earlier, and the couple decided to move their young family into what had long been her grandfather's home in 1986.
But that wasn't the only thing Bill left behind. He was an eccentric man by most accounts, but was a devoted fan of his beloved Indians and Browns, with the howls from his living room heard all the way down the street as a pair of televisions showed both teams at once. In the 1960s, he became a season-ticket holder for both of favorite teams, and his pair of seats at Browns games were eventually passed down with the house.
All of the cousins on my mothers' side can recall attending their first football game in Municipal Stadium from Section 7, Row N, bundling up and bringing a thermos of hot coffee to withstand the whipping winds off Lake Erie throughout the 80s and early 90s. I was fortunate enough to sit there three times, the first in 1993, but I was also the last person ever to occupy those seats, as my father and I attended the Browns' final home game before the franchise headed to Baltimore in 1995.
With the exception of myself, my younger brother, and one cousin, my entire family still calls the Cleveland area home. Yet somehow, I was the first to attend our home state's flagship university in Columbus.
I moved into Stradley Hall in the fall of 2002, a time that remains one of most incredible spans of my life. That team, led by a fellow Cleveland product, allowed me to experience a championship celebration for the first time in my life, something foreign to nearly all of my relatives back north.
My parents became bigger Ohio State fans as Cleveland's teams continued to struggle, but following the Buckeyes was never quite the same. They were MY team, representing MY school. Although they rarely missed a game on TV, I always got the impression that it was a way to stay connected to me more than it was about rooting for a sports team.
After graduating and moving to Chicago, I've stayed closest to OSU sports, mainly because my social circle is largely made up of fellow alumni. To this day, nothing brings that group of people together with more frequency than a gameday in the fall.
When yet another Northeast Ohio native led the Buckeyes to a title in 2014, I celebrated with former classmates. Sure, I called my parents that January night in Texas, but the conversation felt more as if they were congratulating me. This celebration wasn't a shared experience.
In the time since I moved out of the Buckeye State, the connection to my hometown has faded considerably. Not only are my visits rare, outside of an annual trip back for the holidays, but there are only a handful of friends in the area with whom I've kept in touch over the years.
But I don't regret this change, life in Chicago has treated me exceptionally well. I met and married my wife here. I've built a successful career and own a home here. I have wonderful people around me, many of whom also came from Ohio but now call Illinois home.
When visiting the place where I grew up, I'm now often struck by a feeling of unfamiliarity. The city has changed for the better in many ways, but it's not the place I once knew. It's become 'the place where my parents live,' 'where my cousins live,' but not the place I still call 'home.'
And yet, when asked where I'm from, I still can't help but respond with 'Cleveland.' It's as much a part of who I am as my height or hair color, neither of which I had any choice in selecting. I chose to attend Ohio State and have been rewarded with multiple championships, countless victories over our rivals, and a football team that has only lost 27 times since I enrolled 14 years ago.
That's not to say cheering for the Buckeyes isn't a tradition for countless families in Ohio, but my childhood memories aren't laced with memories of the Horseshoe. Instead, I'll go to my grave remembering that final Browns game before the move, my first visits to Richfield Coliseum and Gund Arena, and when my entire extended family used my 11th birthday as an excuse to gather in the upper deck of Jacobs Field and see the 1995 Indians in person.
Every Sunday afternoon, my parents get on a speakerphone and call me to catch up. Occasionally we get into heavy topics such as health, finances, or career advice, but in reality, the majority of these calls are spent discussing the Cavaliers, Indians, and Browns. These calls have become our way of staying connected, and this recent Cavs playoff run has led to some longer discussions than normal.
This ritual started shortly after my initial move to Columbus, but one phone call stands above the rest. It came in the spring of 2003, shortly after a ping pong ball gave the Cavs their biggest victory in franchise history. The greatest athlete our state has ever produced was staying home, and the promise of going to a parade in Public Square with my family was all but assured. It was the closest we'd been to the shared title we'd often just missed.
Thirteen years later, on Father's Day no less, that promise has never been closer to fulfillment. Should the Cavs pull out a victory in Oakland, we'll share a phone call that we've been waiting years to make, but not because the relationship between my family and our teams is unique.
By contrast, citizens of Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, and virtually every other major city have spawned similar shared feelings between parents and their kids. But a Cavs win will be ours, and no one else's, and we'll remember it always.
We're Clevelanders, and we always will be, even if that choice was made for us long ago.
