Milwaukee man confuses travellers by writing ‘WELCOME TO CLEVELAND’ on his roof

As if trying to figure out the inner-workings of flight-travel while hoping to reach your destination safely and promptly wasn’t nerve-wracking enough.

A Milwaukee man, whose house lies close to the city’s airport, used the opportunity to send a puzzling message to visitors from his roof: ‘WELCOME TO CLEVELAND.’

The sign, that has confused travellers for decades, is gaining traction again after being shared throughout Twitter and other social media platforms.

Mark Gubin’s home rests in the flight path of Mitchell International Airport, making his roof wholly visible to those travelling by air.

The idea for the sign came after having lunch on his roof one day nearly forty years ago – in 1978 – with his then-assistant, reports the Journal Sentinel. Taking notice of all of the low-flying planes, the assistant told Gubin that it would be nice to make a sign welcoming people to Milwaukee.

“You know what would be even better?”

Following that conversation, Gubin took to his roof and with white paint, sent out a message that would be remembered for years to come. The message is decades old, but it’s breathing new life after recently making the rounds on Twitter.

The sign was sure to send travellers into a state of panic, seeing as the two cities in question are more than 400 miles apart and separated by not one, but two Great Lakes.

But why did he do it, you ask? Simply put, to mess with people.

“There’s not a real purpose for having this here except madness, which I tend to be pretty good at,” Gubin told news outlet.

He got his wish, more-or-less, when the then-Common Council president, Ben E. Johnson, sent him a letter saying that the sign was causing “outrage and panic.”

“It was all tongue-in-cheek, just for fun,” he said. “Living in the world is not a dress rehearsal. You better have fun with it.”

As for why he chose Cleveland out of all of the possible U.S. cities, Gubin admitted that he was making fun of them “a little.”