Alexandria (Old) (1,500?) Built 1960
April 2, 2025
April 2, 2025
The passing of basketball season means the dawn of spring. Warm weather and sunshine helps dampen the blow of not having anymore games to attend for 7 long months. Along with spring comes one of my second loves, baseball. I was always terrible at it growing up. My hand-eye coordination is worse than Shoals' all-time record against Barr-Reeve. While I could never hit a baseball, I loved the statistics that were involved with it and I became a student of the game while watching the Detroit Tigers growing up. Fast forward to modern times, and for the first time the coming of baseball season also means my own boys' introduction to the world of organized sports and the circus sideshow that is T-ball. We enrolled them in the Alexandria Little League that is just a couple miles from our house, and soon it was time to go pick up their jerseys at the school complex that houses all grades from K-12 on the same property. As we pulled into the parking lot, I noticed people were filing in and out of the elementary school gym to grab their gear. I didn't think anything of it at first, but then like a bolt of lightning, it hit me. Someone had mentioned on Facebook last year that the current elementary building and gym was once the original high school building on the school complex. This meant that the gym used to host high school games. This meant that the gym was one I needed to take pictures of and review for the blog. This meant that I had unknowingly stumbled upon a Hoosier Hysteria miracle right after the basketball season had ended. I was loving T-ball already.
Last spring I didn't get inside a gym or write a blog for all of April and May. This year I've been determined to not let that happen. I wasn't expecting to find one accidently like this though. It drove me to do some quick research when I got home and read up a little more about the history of the schools and gyms in town. Thanks to some local historians on Facebook and a great article on the Alexandria Historical Society website, I was able to do just that. The original Alexandria High School and gym were built downtown near the intersection of Washington and West Streets. The school and gym were replaced when the new high school and gym were built on the south side of town in 1960. The old downtown high school and gym were used as a community center until they were lost in a fire in the late-70s. The new high school and gym (which is the one I'm writing about here) were used until the current high school and gym were built in 1977. Since then this gym has been used as a middle school and elementary facility. In fact, it only was a high school gym for 17 short years. They won two sectional titles in that timespan to go along with the 11 others they've collected over the years. One of those two sectional championships came in 1963 which was one of the first years of the vaunted Anderson sectional right after the "new" Wigwam opened. I can only imagine what the reception must have been like back in town after they brought home that hardware which was right in the heart of the golden age of Indiana high school basketball.
At 1,600 seats, Swayzee boasts of having the largest elementary school gymnasium in the state. Alexandria can't be far behind. I would say with a few adjustments, it would be ripe for a throwback game itself. There are two sideline sections of permanent bleachers in the gym that look like they should mirror each other in theory, or at least did at one point, but there is one confusing quirk. One sideline has the old bleachers going wall to wall (except for some small door cutouts in the bottom corners that I assume lead to the old locker rooms underneath) and straight up 18 rows to the top. The opposite side seems to be missing the bottom 8 rows. The upper 10 start at the top of an eight foot wall. There's no stairs or anything leading to those upper rows, so it seems the bottom rows were just removed to make more space for P.E. class. This is pretty commonplace in repurposed old gyms, but most of the time there isn't a giant section of permanent seating sitting above where the old bleachers used to be that were taken out. Since there's no access to the upper bleachers, they seem to just be sitting dormant and useless. I guess it doesn't really matter since there's a large section on the opposite side and the gym isn't needed for big crowds anymore, but it's still disappointing. It looks like they've even removed a small section of the bleachers in one corner completely for some reason. The bleachers themselves were painted red at some point and it's chipping away in some places to reveal the beautiful original stained wood underneath. If they'd get some retractable bleachers to connect the upper section to the floor, this place would be primed for some bigger events.
The red that was used on the bleachers and all over the rest of the gym is pretty red. It's a little darker, but it's definitely red. It only struck me later when I was looking back at the pictures because Alexandria High School's primary color is a much darker maroon. The red doesn't look bad here, just a little odd. It is accented by yellow everywhere. Above the accessible sideline bleachers are shadowy painted silhouettes of players in different sports in action poses. It definitely fits the elementary vibe. The baseline walls are pretty bare except for more red and yellow paint. One side has "Tigers" written in old Windows95 style font in the center of a yellow racing stripe that goes across the middle of the wall. The opposite side has a couple of school achievement banners hanging along with some school sponsor decals. Old practice hoops with wooden backboards and fixed rims hang along the sides, harkening back to my youth in the old Westview gym. The hardwood floor looks like it hasn't been redone in a long time (which isn't a bad thing) and is stained a nice dark gold color. A ferocious tiger head sits inside the center court circle which is reminiscent of the one that used to be at the current high school gym before they revamped it all this year.
Since moving out into the Madison County countryside, we actually have an Alexandria address now even though most of our life outside of home is lived in Anderson. One thing I've noticed about the community here is just how tight-knit it is, especially in the support of the local schools. Everywhere you go in town, people are wearing their Alexandria Tiger gear. You can't avoid it. It's one of those special small towns that was just big enough to never be sullied by consolidation. While it did absorb Orestes at some point, it got to keep its name and identity. You also feel that support in the Little League program. It's huge for a town this size. It felt like every kid under the age of 10 was in the gym that night to pick up their new uniforms and start the season. While we've kind of been living on the edge of the community the last few years, it's very evident how much the culture and history of the Alexandria Tigers means to the people in town. They have a gem of an old gym that symbolizes that heritage beautifully. Above one door to the gym are the words "Once a Tiger, Always a Tiger." You feel that in your bones here.
