Part 5. Cleveland Scenes

Johnson, who made a fortune in streetcars and steel, was in Johnstown, Pa. for the Great Flood of 1889 because he owned a steel mill there. He led the local relief efforts, and the devastation he witnessed changed his life. He turned against the privileged rich, who escaped all responsibility for the collapse of the dam, and became one of the leading Progressive reformers of the era and the legendary four-term mayor of Cleveland, who spent the rest of his life fighting the city’s powerful Republican business elite.

Competing protest groups shared the same square, hurling vitriol and insults at each other, with what almost amounted to gleeful banter. Many of the protests had the air of well-rehearsed theater, although it takes only a tiny spark to ignite a fire. And Ohio is is an “open carry” state.

“It’s every citizen’s right to be able to defend themselves and their family, and I believe that an open-carry society is a much politer society.” Tim Selaty, Director of Operations, Citizens for Trump.