“St. Theodosius Cathedral”

This extraordinary Eastern Orthodox church, known or recognized by most Clevelanders, is a legacy of the 19th century, perched on Starkweather Ave. in Tremont overlooking a vast industrial landscape of steel mills. From its vantage point, one could watch as three to four successive generations of husbands, fathers and brotherscarried their lunch pails, descending the pitched slope each day to toil in the blast furnaces, coking ovens, open hearths, BOF’s, hot and cold strip mills and myriad support facilities that drove Cleveland’s economy through much of the 20th century.

Rt 490 and other freeways have severed the foot traffic that once wore paths down the steep grade of W. 7th.  The great assets of Republic Steel and Jones and Laughlin have since been been acquired by ArcelorMittal, a Luxembourg conglomerate. As industrial, economic, social and cultural changes have obscured much of Cleveland’s history in the last few decades, St. Theodosius still stands, listed on the National Register of Historic Places and still sustains a way of life and worship rapidly disappearing elsewhere.