Our History

The Cleveland Rape Crisis Center was founded in 1974 in response to Cleveland's long-standing need for services to assist survivors of sexual assault.

Before the decade of the seventies, most people who had suffered sexual abuse suffered in silence. Feelings of guilt, shame or fear kept these women, children and men from speaking out about, much less reporting, their assaults. Only in recent years has their silence been broken, in part by their outrage and refusal to accept misplaced blame, and in part by their knowledge that others will be there to support them.

Survivors of sexual assault discovered that talking about their assault provided tremendous emotional release. They were able to tell their stories for the first time without feeling that they were to blame for their own attack.

They also found that they were not alone.

Survivors discovered that their reactions were similar to those of others who had been attacked. Most significantly, they found other people who were sympathetic, understanding and supportive. Survivors began to help one another heal.

In 1973, Lynn Hammond was volunteering at the Free Clinic of Greater Cleveland and counseled many women who were survivors of rape, but had no where to turn. She and Carrie Zander, a member of the National Organization for Women's Task Force on Rape, set out to found an organization that served the needs of survivors of sexual assault.

In February, 1974, Cleveland N.O.W. and Case Western Reserve University Women's Law Caucus provided Hammond and Zander with seed money to set up a rape crisis telephone hotline service in space donated by the Cleveland Free Clinic. Initially the hotline operated only a few hours a day, five days a week, and was handled solely by volunteers who had been trained in hotline counseling.

During these early years, the Rape Crisis Center paid its expenses mainly through Center volunteers who solicited donations at community speaking engagements.

The volunteer and donation base grew as more people began to bring the problem of sexual assault to the public.

In 1976, the Center received a grant from the Cleveland and George Gund Foundations. These funds made it possible to expand the hotline to a 24-hour service and to hire four full-time staff members. These original staff members were Lynn Hammond, Carrie Zander, Lorraine Schalamon and Jeanne Van Atta. The staff recruited and coordinated the training of 75 volunteer advocates whose range of services included the 24-hour hotline, on-site counseling in emergency rooms, face-to-face counseling for rape survivors and their family and public education programs.

The Cleveland Rape Crisis Center had grown into one of the first of its kind in the country.

As the rape crisis movement grew nationally, activists across the country successfully lobbied for support from the federal government. The National Institute of Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice and the Center for Women's Policy Studies began serious research on the issue of rape. In 1995, the National Center for the Prevention and Control of Rape was established to provide a central clearing house for research and organizational resources. By 1979, there was at least one rape crisis center in every state, and the National Coalition Against Sexual Assault was formed.

As we reflect on the past, we are heartened by how far we have come. Thousands of survivors and their families have been helped, public awareness has increased significantly and professional sensitivity to survivors continues to grow.

The future work of the Cleveland Rape Crisis Center will continue to be providing supportive services to survivors of sexual assault and eliminating the crime of rape itself.

Click here to view a past list of CRCC executive directors and board presidents.