In 1921 the Cleveland Plain Dealer introduced to their readers those Cleveland Police Officers assigned the difficult task of directing automobile and pedestrian traffic in the city each day. Again in 1929 they featured a photograph and some brief personal information of 36 Officers who were commonly kown as “Corner Men,” working in the rain, snow and sunshine to keep people safe.
The Cleveland Public Library Photograph Collection staff researched their archives and were able to locate 15 of the original photographs from this 1929 series. We present a few of those Officers:
“The Plain Dealer, through the medium of the Picture Page, is going to introduce its readers to members of Cleveland’ traffic force. They have real jobs. Swinging the semaphore, of course, isn’t so hard. But that is a small part of the job. Answering questions is the task. A semaphore sentinel has to be a human city directory.”
For more information on police semaphores, visit: https://www.clevelandpolicemuseum.org/historical/traffic-semaphore/
For more information on Cleveland Public Library’s photograph collection, visit: https://cpl.org/aboutthelibrary/subjectscollections/photograph-collection/
