[image-1]Walter Goldbach, the man who created the original Chief Wahoo logo as a teenager in 1947, has died.

Goldbach, who lived in Medina Township, designed the logo when former Indians’ owner Bill Veeck organized an impromptu competition via his uncle’s graphics store. Goldbach’s version is the hooked-nose precursor to the modern, red-faced logo.

The 88-year-old artist told Fox 8 earlier this year that his drawing was never meant to offend anyone.

“It makes me sad, that’s what it does,” he told Fox 8, when asked about the possibility of Wahoo’s phase-out. “It makes me sad that it’s come to a point where it has gotten so serious, and it should never have come to this point.”

Cleveland has been selected for the 2019 MLB All-Star Game, and there is speculation that Chief Wahoo will no longer officially be associated with the franchise by that time. League commissioner Rob Manfred has certainly gestured toward his opposition to the logo, and the team has been incrementally elevating the “Block C” alternate logo since 2009.

Though the franchise is long past the point of getting any credit for Wahoo’s presumed eventual removal — and they ought to be ashamed — its demise will be a step forward for the team and for the city of Cleveland. Regardless of its creator’s intent, the image caricaturizes a race of human beings, untold members of which the U.S. has murdered and banished and quarantined since colonizers first set foot on the continent. 

The logo itself has been ardently opposed for decades by members of the local American Indian community and their supporters. In an era of racial hostility and vile rhetoric, relegating this symbol to the Western Reserve Historical Society is the only way to honor the death of its creator.

This article appears in Dec 13-19, 2017.

Sam Allard is a former senior writer at Scene.

7 replies on “Original Chief Wahoo Creator Dies at 88”

  1. Fer chrissakes, Sam, get the hell down from your soapbox and give it a goddamn rest. The guy died. You started with an obituary and ended with a rant…the same dead horse you have beaten into dog food and glue for too long now. At least wait until he is buried.

    SCENE already knows where I(and many other Clevelanders) stand. on this issue. Remember the fairy tale of the North Wind trying to blow the traveler’s coat off? The more you try to take something way from folks, the more tightly they will cling to it. Ask the people down where the South Wind comes from.

    Wahoo may become disassociated from the…dare I say it…TRIBE organization…but the image will remain on display in Cleveland for many years to come. It will not be disappearing any time soon, no matter how long SCENEsters whine or hold their breath.

    Old geezers (like me) will continue to wear it proudly. We won’t be burning our gear…or looking like homeless bums by “de-Chiefing” our merch…no matter how much you wish it to be so Ain’t gonna happen.

    Unless it is officially BANNED from public wear, by legal statute…or unless wearers are turned away from the ballpark under threat of arrest… Wahoo will live on. Get used to the idea. I can’t believe I have to keep on rewriting these same old responses to these same old Wahoo tirades. SSDY.

    I prefer the ’47 version (see above) myself. Looks like another persecuted minority…if you remove the feather.

    Chuckles the Clown

  4. I’m sure black face was also originally non-offensive, but we wouldn’t put that on a sports shirt and call the team the N*****s? If we’ve evolved beyond black face, we should see this logo as the same thing.

  5. Chuckles:

    Nobody’s trying to make you stop wearing your Wahoo gear or believes you’d do so voluntarily, but every year you keep up with it, you’ll look a little more clueless and bigoted. The prouder you are, the more ridiculous you’ll appear. You have the right to wear whatever racist images you choose and the rest of society has the right to move on without you.

  6. Any relation to Claude Thornhill? Do you even know who he was? I doubt it.

    I’m far beyond the point in life where I still give a good goddam about whether or not I look “cool”…if people even see you at all when you hit geezerhood, it’s only because you’re now the same as a rock or a tree…old and in the way.

    As for being thought of as “clueless”, that’s in the eye of the beholder…and what they think they happen to”have a clue” about. But that’s another issue for another time. It has no relevance to the subject at hand. We’re talking Wahoo here, not Clueless. Go play Clue (or watch the film) somewhere else.

    To a lot of Xers and Millenials, Boomers already look ridiculous, as soon as they appear. Comes with being a certain age. And what looks ridiculous to someone young may look perfectly acceptable to someone my age. Including the Chief. As the postmaster once said, to each his zone.

    More people in this town continue to see Wahoo as the symbol of a baseball team, rather than one of bigotry. It is not the Stars and Bars. Every poll on this issue still ends up the same…90% for the Chief, 10% whiners and crybabies.

    Newsflash: The world will eventually move on without me, no matter what I do or don’t do…and it will move on without you. too. It’s called “dying”…but it’ll likely be happening to me before it finally happens to you. And then you can pry my Wahoo gear off my cold dead corpse. Or burn me in it.

    Chuckles the Clown

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