(C) Common Dreams
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Carl Stokes, 68, Dies; Precedent-Setting Mayor [1]
['Dirk Johnson']
Date: 1996-04-04
As Mayor, he steered a relatively moderate course, calling for calm and unity during the social and racial turbulence of the late 1960's that engulfed Cleveland and many other big cities. Thrust into the fore of urban politics at a time of such upheaval, Mr. Stokes seemed to relish the challenge, even as many whites viewed him with hostility.
"I'm glad I was born during the times I was," he once said.
Mr. Stokes's brother Louis, a Representative from Ohio, said yesterday that his brother had "inspired black Americans to aspire to higher political office all over the country."
Born in the poor black neighborhood of Central in 1927, Carl Stokes was only 2 when his father, Charles, a laundry worker, died. Raised in a public housing project for the poor by their mother, Louise, a cleaning woman, the Stokes boys would help support the family by carrying newspapers and working in neighborhood stores.
After dropping out of high school and going to work in a foundry, Carl Stokes entered the Army in 1944, and served in occupied Germany in World War II. After being discharged in 1946, he returned to Cleveland and earned a high school diploma, and then attended West Virginia State College and Cleveland College of Western Reserve University, majoring in psychology.
He worked for three years as an agent for Ohio's State Department of Liquor Control, and then returned to school at the University of Minnesota, where he earned a bachelor's of science degree in law in 1954. He then worked as a probation officer in Cleveland while attending the Cleveland-Marshall Law School, and in 1957 was admitted to the bar.
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[1] Url:
https://www.nytimes.com/1996/04/04/us/carl-stokes-68-dies-precedent-setting-mayor.html
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