Alana Baranick, The Plain Dealer, Cleveland
Posted 3/29/2005 12:00:00 AM

Patty Crites

George Kossoff

Willie Ray Mackey

Josephine Milbrandt

Clementine C. Werfel

 

Patty Crites

By Alana Baranick
The Plain Dealer
Cleveland

Spencer Township - Patty Crites' prize-winning rabbits were known for their longfloppy ears, luxurious coats and unscheduled public demonstrations of bunny-birth.

The 63-year-old grandmother, who died of complications from congestive heartfailure and other health problems Oct. 27, raised droopy-eared English lopsand other breeds at Pat's Bunny Farm in Spencer Township for 30 years.

She showed her best bunnies at rabbit-club events and county fairs throughoutOhio.

At a few Medina County Fair rabbit contests, Crites entered pregnant rabbitswho ended up giving birth before the judging began.

"She didn't realize how far along they were," said her friend ReneeBurns. "People loved it, to see these little tiny pink things coming out."

Crites had as many as 250 rabbits at one time, and every one of them had aname.

"She read a lot of novels," said her daughter Regina Manos. "Everytime she saw a good name, she'd write it down."

She also raised ferrets and Peruvian guinea pigs. Over the years, she hada Vietnamese pot-bellied pig and a de-scented skunk as house pets. She kepta goat, ponies, horses, dogs and cats. She took care of two crows, Igor andJ.J., a pig named Peggy and her nine piglets.

Crites also had an African parrot and cockatiels. Her part-time jobs at aveterinarian's office in Litchfield and at a pet shop in Ashland yielded opportunitiesto adopt even more exotic animals.

"We almost ended up with a tiger," said her husband of 32 years,Jim. "One time she tried to bring home an African anteater. She went toan auction in Wooster and brought an emu home. The only thing she never broughthome was a monkey."

Crites, the daughter of a steel-hauling truck driver, was born Patricia AnnFetzer at Berea Hospital. She started bringing stray animals home while growingup on Worthington Avenue near West 117th Street in Cleveland.

The location of her childhood home made Crites a city girl, but Crites reallywas a country girl at heart.

"We always used to go out to see my grandmother on the farm in Medina," saidher younger sister, Beverly Magyar. "We weren't surprised when she startedher bunny farm. She had trophies and all kinds of ribbons she'd won over theyears. The hardest thing was for her to sell her rabbits when she was so sick."

Crites had three children - Brian Gerrick, Scott Gerrick and Regina - withher first husband, whom she married and divorced twice.

"They had some problems and were trying to patch things up," hersister said. "It didn't work. When I got married she said, 'Didn't youlearn anything?' "

After her second divorce, she met Jim Crites, who also was divorced and hadkids. They moved from Lakewood to a 17-acre farm in Spencer Township in theearly 1970s.

Patty, her husband and her kids engaged in 18th-century re-enactments, whereparticipants slept outdoors, wore pioneer garb, shot muzzle-loaders and paddledcanoes.

"On all the campouts and everything, Patty always came out looking beautifulwith perfect makeup on and never got dirty like the rest of us," saidre-enactor Bob Wulff.

When she was younger, Crites hunted bear in Canada and deer in southern Ohiowith her husband. She even went on rabbit hunts.

The only thing she ever shot was a fox.

But she was not averse to butchering the animals she raised - including bunniesthat weren't suitable for show or too old or unattractive to be sold as pets- and cooking the meat for her family. The practice is common among rabbitbreeders and farm folk.

"At rabbit shows, they'll have bunny-on-a-bun, creamed rabbit or barbecuedrabbit," said Burns, a fellow bunny breeder. "How many animals canyou raise and eat your mistakes?"

Crites grossed out her sister's kids one Easter when she tried serving themrabbit for dinner.

"They just thought that was amazing," her sister said. "Younever knew what you were going to get on the holidays."

By Alana Baranick
The Plain Dealer
Cleveland

George Kossoff June 12, 1912 - June 13, 2004 Youngstown native, son of Russian immigrants. B'nai B'rith Youth Organization volunteer. Told his three daughters: It's just as easy to marry a rich man as it is to marry a poor man.

Mayfield Heights - Of the many jobs George Kossoff held in his life,nonesatisfied his soul more than selling orthopedic shoes.

In the 1950s, he fitted customers who hobbled into the Cleveland Orthopedicstore with shoes that could help them walk straighter and with less pain. Kossoff,who died June 13 at 92, spent evenings at nursing homes, measuring the feetof clients who couldn't get to the store.

"He was just pleased to be able to be helpful," said Bob Levine,a family friend. "I don't know whether he made any money on it, but hegot psychic income. He made people feel good about themselves."

Kossoff had genuine empathy for folks with foot problems. He walked in painsince the 1930s, when he was pinned against the metal gate of an elevator bya pallet of boxes while working as a stockboy.

"He injured his leg," said his wife, Millie. "Thedoctor said he'd never walk."

Although drab, clunky, specially-fitted shoes could ease his pain, Kossoffpreferred to wear colorful Italian-made patent-leather dress shoes.

"At one time, he was a very spiffy dresser," said his daughter,Claire Nash. "He got a little less discriminating about mixing plaidsand stripes toward the end, but he did like to look sharp."

Kossoff couldn't wear classy clothes while pumping gas, cleaning car windshieldsand changing tires at the Rockwell Service Station at East 12th Street andRockwell Avenue, which he co-owned in the late 1930s.

"He hated that job," Millie said. "It was tough,dirty ... When he came home, the kids were sleeping already. He didn't wantto get nearanyone until he took a shower."

Working conditions were better in the 1940s, when he owned Komar Sales andService. He sold car accessories and such varying products as candy bars andnew-fangled television sets with 10-inch screens.

"We had a TV set because he sold them in his store," said his daughter,Linda Kemmerer. "People would come in our house and watch TV."

By the early 1950s, he was happily selling shoes. But his seemingly perfectcareer ended after four years due to a dispute over whether to keep the businessopen on Saturdays. Kossoff favored staying open, citing the potential for increasedsales. His boss staunchly disagreed.

Kossoff went from selling shoes to peddling fish at the WoodlandEast 55th Street Market. "Only fresh fish," his wife said. "Someof the times, they would still be moving."

He and his wife also ran a concession at Catalano's Supermarket on MayfieldRoad, where they sold fried fish on Fridays. When business dropped off in thelate 1960s, Kossoff went to work for the Cleveland Vending Co. He servicedvending machines until he was 69. Then he returned to Catalano's to work parttime until he was 80.

Kossoff struggled to support his family and "never thought he gave usenough," said daughter Claire. "But looking back at my childhood,I can't think of anything we wanted that we didn't get ... Dancing lessons.Acting lessons. BBYO (B'nai B'rith Youth Organization). He always had moneyfor us to do those things that were important to us."

The Kossoffs raised their kids in Cleveland Heights and South Euclid. Aftertheir youngest, Teri Alexander, graduated from high school, they lived in variousapartments until moving into the Schnurmann House retirement center in MayfieldHeights.

In his latter years, Kossoff planned seniors' bus trips tosuch places as Amish country, Toronto and Washington, D.C. "We would rent a bus and fillit up with friends," Millie said.

One of those friends, Maury Feren, remembered Kossoff as aman who wanted seniors from his Jewish Community Center group "to spreadtheir wings and do interesting things. George felt secure in himself andconfident he coulddo anything with the group. He never worried about successes. He believed inthe possibilities."

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: abaranick@plaind.com, 216-999-4828

Willie Ray Mackey

By Alana Baranick
The Plain Dealer
Cleveland

Willie Ray "Karimi" Mackey May 16, 1953 - Aug. 6, 2004 Born in Memphis, Tenn. African name: Osagyefo Karimi Salmone Faye. To instruct someone to call him in his last months, liked to say: "Hit me up on my cell."

Willie Ray "Karimi" Mackeyfelt a kinship with the primitive Dogon people of West Africa, who have beenmapping the stars for more than800 years.

The 51-year-old NASA astrophysicist and African dance instructor was fascinatedthat the Dogon, who revere Sirius - known as the Dog Star - knew of its tinycompanion star, Sirius B, centuries before modern astronomers identified it.

Mackey was pronounced dead, apparently of a heart condition, Aug. 6 - whileSirius was making its annual daytime appearance in the sky.

As a scientist, Mackeyconducted far-ranging "fundamental research thatdoesn't reveal itself until years downstream but is critical to development," saidJulian Earls, director of the NASA Glenn Research Center.

But he didn't look like a rocket scientist.

"He had his own style," said NASA colleague Eric Overton. "Inappearance, he was so down to earth, you would be shocked to know he even hada job. Then you find out he worked at NASA, had a Ph.D."

Mackey grew up in St. Louis, the eldest of nine children in what was essentiallya single-parent household. Ray, as he was known to his family, took care ofhis younger siblings while his mother worked the midnight shift at the postoffice. He got them ready for school in the morning and assigned them educationalprojects after school.

When his sisters saw aspider in the house, "not only did Ray kill it,he looked it up in the encyclopedia and gave a report," said his sisterKaren. "He liked Radio Shack science kits. He outgrew those and startedtaking things apart in the house. Lamps, appliances. He always found a wayto put it back together."

He watched public-televisionprograms like "Nova" to learn aboutthe stars. He tried to instill his passion for the heavens in his siblingsand, later, his daughters.

"He made us go in the back yard, and we'd have to look up in the sky," saidhis sister Yvonne. "He'd say, 'Analyze that.' "

In the early 1970s, Mackeyenrolled at Oberlin College, where he and classmate Diaris Jackson were "roaring with ideology, pushing for change, angrythat we'd missed the '60s, aware of the special gifts that made us leaders," Jacksonsaid.

Mackey, whose African name,Karimi, means "one whose spirit travels withthe stars," went to Boston to study astrophysics at the MassachusettsInstitute of Technology. He also trained in African dance and drum under RaymondSylla, an African cultural icon from Senegal.

After earning a doctorate from MIT in 1981, Mackey taught math at WilberforceUniversity in southern Ohio. Abasi Ojinjideka, with whom he collaborated onprojects integrating cultural arts and science, met him at a Kwanzaa event22 years ago.

"He was sitting on a drum, listening to music on headphones, readinga book and watching TV at the same time," Ojinjideka said.

Mackey started working for NASA in Brook Park in 1989 but later returned toWilberforce through a space agency program that allows scientists to spendtime at not-for-profit institutions. More recently, NASA lent him to CheyneyUniversity in Pennsylvania.

"We worked together to provide NASA exposure and computer technologyfor students who lived in a homeless shelter in Philadelphia," said J.Otis Smith, a Cheyney professor. "He was fun to work with. He personallyinspired some of our students to overcome their fear of science to explorethose fields more closely."

He also did his best to get his twin daughters, Nyonu and Naima, excited aboutscience.

"If you looked in the sky on a clear night, he could tell you the namesof the stars," Naima said.

One weekend, while visitinghis daughters at Hampton University in Virginia, Mackey woke them at 6:30a.m.,and said, "We're going to Norfolk StateUniversity. I want you to see the sunspots in the sky."

When they arrived, "he got out his little sunspot device with a mirror," Naimasaid. "We saw these little dots that would move across the paper. It wasneat."

Josephine Milbrandt

By Alana Baranick
The Plain Dealer
Cleveland

Josephine Milbrandt June 8, 1911 - June 27, 2004 John Adams High School graduate. Her husband died in 1990. Philosophy about the past: "It's water over the duck's back."

Avon Lake - Josephine Milbrandt kept three quarters, four dimes, twonickelsand scads of trust in a Whitman Sampler candy box on her back porch.

Alongside the box were dozens of fresh eggs.

Milbrandt, who died June 27 at age 93, sold eggs from the enclosed porch ofher Avon Lake home for more than 40 years. She banked on people putting moneyin the box and taking only the change they were due - and, of course, theireggs.

"She had the honor system," said her neighbor and customer, MaryMackin. "If you didn't have the money, you put an IOU in the box. Manytimes, she would be in the kitchen and come out and chat. She was very intelligent. . . very much aware of what was going on in Avon Lake and the world in general."

Milbrandt learned about entrepreneurship, customer relations and self-serveretail operations from her parents, the Blahas, in Cleveland in the 1920s and'30s.

Her father earned barelyenough to support his wife and two kids at his stove factory job. Her mother,anative of Czechoslovakia, told him, "You'renever going to get anywhere working for somebody else." So they openeda grocery store at East 131st Street.

To lighten their workload, they placed baskets at the door, so shoppers couldtake flour, canned vegetables and boxes of cereal from the shelves while theBlahas cut lunchmeat and ground coffee. Josephine was a youngster when sheand her younger brother started working in the store.

After working for eight to 10 hours a day, Josephine liked to unwind by roller-skatingat Euclid Beach Park. That's where she met her husband, George Milbrandt.

During the rationing daysof World War II, "everybody on the street wasraising rabbits or chickens for survival," said her daughter, Jo Grospitch. "Afterthe war, stuff was plentiful. Neighbors complained about the chickens. We livedon a small, 40-foot lot. Mom wanted a better life for us. She said we shouldbe on a farm."

In 1947, Milbrandt moved to Avon Lake with her husband, three kids and a dozenchickens. They ran a fruit farm and sold grapes to Welch's for jelly, but eggsbecame their bread and butter.

Each spring, egg seekers placed orders on a blackboard on the porch for dozensof eggs to be colored for Easter baskets.

"You'd say how many you need, and she'd hold them back," Mackinsaid. "The older the egg, the better the dye would take. She made sureshe had them for you whenever you came."

Milbrandt also boardedhorses in her barn. "My mother said she'd collectthe eggs and feed the chickens, but wouldn't clean the horse barn," herdaughter said. "That was man's work."

She donated eggs, time and money to Catholic churches in Avon Lake. She assistedwith bake sales and raffles sponsored by the ladies guilds at St. Joseph andHoly Spirit parishes. She helped prepare chicken dinners - not using her ownchickens - at St. Joe's summer festival.

Not long after St. Joseph School was started around 1949, Milbrandt came tothe rescue of parochial school students, who were denied rides on a schoolbus because they didn't attend Avon Lake public schools.

"Anyone that was along that street and was kicked off, she picked themup in her station wagon and packed them in," said her son and former St.Joe pupil, George. "It was like one of these circus acts. She ran thatwagon down the street to get those kids to school."

In recent years, the great-grandmother helped kids who visited the BradleyBay nursing home with the Right-to-Read program improve their reading skills.

She also kept track of birds that stopped by for a snack at the bird feedersoutside her window.

"She had bird feeders and a bird book," her daughter said. "Ifsome new bird showed up, she'd look it up. She had a finch feeder. Mom fellin love with the yellow birds. People would show up at her room at 5 o'clock,when the birds came to eat."

 

Clementine C. Werfel

By Alana Baranick
The Plain Dealer
Cleveland

Clementine C. Werfel June 2, 1908 - Aug. 2, 2004 Her twin became a nun. Survived Palm Sunday tornado of 1965, which destroyed some parish buildings. Greeting to priests: "How's my little boy?"

Strongsville - Clementine Werfel blessed priests at St. Joseph CatholicChurch in Strongsville with heavenly desserts, memorable meals and seeminglymiraculouscoffee.

The retired parish housekeeper, who died Aug. 2 at age 96, routinely walkedaround the dining table in the rectory, offering coffee to each priest.

"Would Father like regular or decaf?" the4-foot-something Werfel asked them one by one.

Regardless of the priests' individual preferences, she filled all their cupswith coffee from the same pot. The coffee drinkers silently accepted what theygot, as though Werfel really could turn regular coffee into decaffeinated,much the way that the biblical Jesus turned water into wine.

"She was so comfortable with priests and anyone, she treated everybodythe same," said the Rev. Mark Latcovich. "Clemmie made the rectorya home. She was like a mother and grandmother to you. She'd do anything foryou."

But she didn't treat hercharges with kid gloves. When a priest told her that he liked his beef "a little red," the diminutive Werfel handed hima bottle of ketchup and said, "Here. You can make it red."

She wasn't particularly fond of cooking, and sometimes it showed. She onceboiled filet mignon, which is supposed to be broiled, until it looked likeblack tennis balls in a stew.

"She loved to clean the refrigerator out, put it in a pot and call itsoup," Latcovich said.

Werfel did better with desserts. She made wicked fruitcake muffins, whichshe soaked in rum and brandy as they cooled. She drizzled hot pumpkin pie withhoney to make it sweet. Whenever she baked pies, she made around 10 at a time,then froze them or gave them away.

"She enjoyed playing in flour," Latcovich said. "Itwas like dirt in the garden. She was really into gardening."

Werfel got her first packet of flower seeds as a child growing up in Wilmore,Pa. She and her twin sister, Catherine, were the middle pair in a brood of12 kids. Her parents, first generation German-Americans, ran a prosperous farm.

"We had heat in the house; We had a bathroom, and we had a car," saidher only surviving sister, Mary Casey. "That was something for that dayand age."

Werfel, who had polio as a baby, stayed on the farm, working as a cook forfamily and farmhands until she was 31.

While visiting her sister Margaret in Cleveland in 1939, Werfel got a jobas a housekeeper for the Hilkert family, who had eight kids. Two of them becamepriests. Werfel became housekeeper at St. Joe's when the parish was startedin 1946.

When the Rev. Bob Sansonwas appointed to St. Joe's in 1991, Werfel "wasalready 83, and she was still making delicious apple pies and scrubbing thegarage carpet on her hands and knees," Sanson said.

As her ability to handleher duties diminished, "They let her stay therefor a while and had someone else come in to cook," said retired parishbookkeeper, Hilda Monteleone. "This did not go well with her. She didn'twant to give it up."

In 1994, Werfel reluctantly retired from the rectory and moved to the HarborCourt independent living community in Rocky River. The center provides oneraised flowerbed for each of its gardening enthusiasts. Werfel had two.

Bill Parobechek, whose late father chauffeured Werfel around for decades,inherited the job of taking the ever-feisty housekeeper to church and gardeningcenters. He did his best to keep up with her as they walked to her room atthe end of a long hallway at Harbor Court.

"She'd walk faster than I could, and I'm a mailman," Parobecheksaid. "She knew what she wanted, and she wanted it now. I would take herto lunch. We would be waiting to be served. She would ask the girl, 'Are youfrom out of state? It took you so long to serve us.'"

Werfel was accustomed tospeaking her mind, even at the rectory. "Shewas a tough lady," Monteleone said. "If she didn't like something,she told the priests."

Stories copyright 2004 The Plain Dealer. Reprinted with permission.