Teacher instilled in students they could achieve anything
Published: July 10, 2005
Grutell Daniel Woolfork’s piano students learned musical scales, five-finger exercises and countless reasons they should attend Fisk University.
Woolfork, a 1953 Fisk graduate, who died May 26 at age 74, touted her alma mater to kids who took music lessons at her Warrensville Heights apartment. She also promoted the historically black college in Nashville, Tenn., to her fifth-grade classes at Wade Park Elementary School and to teenagers who never had her as a teacher.
“Fisk. That was her mission,” said Conrad Hamlet, a friend and fellow educator. “If a young adult was getting ready to graduate from high school or had any inkling of going to a higher learning institution, she would ask them to consider Fisk. She would often go to Fisk with prospective students to see if she could convince them. She was a very hard-working Fiskite . . . relentless in raising scholarship money and trying to do something for the university.”
Woolfork, who served as president of the Cleveland Fisk Club for 17 years, sought out students with high grade-point averages from low-income households to enter her alumni group’s scholarship competition.
Because of her passionate support of the university, Woolfork became known to many as “Miss Fisk” in her later years.
“She was kind of the glue that kept the club together,” said fellow Fiskite Nina Dailey. “She was the one you would call if you needed to have an alumna do something that you didn’t want to ask them to do. She could get it done.”
Woolfork and her younger sister, Carol Ames, were born and raised in Cleveland in the East 90th Street and Cedar Road area. Her mother was a cook at a private club. Her father organized labor unions, worked for the state and ran assorted businesses.
They lived in a “very comfortable middle-class neighborhood” with “hard-working neighbors concerned about the upbringing of the children,” her sister said.
The sisters were always close. Before Woolfork died, they shared a room at Manor Care of Mayfield Heights.
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