Economy (350?) Built 1922
April 17, 2025
April 17, 2025
When I first read what I consider to be the old Hoosier gym Bible, Kyle Neddenriep's Historic Hoosier Gyms, two gyms in particular seemed to be in a category of their own: Little York and Economy. They felt a little bit more fragile and rickety than the rest. This is due to the fact that they are almost entirely made out of wood. It sets them apart, as almost every other gym structure from the early days (or any era for that matter) is made of brick, cinder block, or stone. The more I've read about the history of Indiana high school basketball, the more evident it's become how rare and special these gyms are. We often refer to many of the small bandbox gyms of the 1920s-1950s as "old barns," but if you didn't know that there were basketball hoops hanging inside of Little York or Economy, you would most likely assume there were cows and horses inside them just from the outer appearances. These two gyms look much more like the old one that still stands in Wingate, which literally was a horse livery before it was later turned into a gym. For these reasons, both Little York and Economy have been high on my list of old gyms I want to see in person for a long time. I finally got to see Little York from the outside this winter (ironically it's now actually being used as a barn of sorts for storing farm equipment). The Economy gym has been better preserved as an actual house of basketball. I was fortunate to step inside a few weeks ago and find that the wait had been well worth it.
The Economy Cardinals first had basketball teams competing in the IHSAA tournament in 1919. They didn't have a lot of fortune competing in the daunting Richmond sectional. While they may not have ever captured that elusive sectional crown, they still had a lot of teams that the community loved to come out and support over the years. The gym can't hold more than a few hundred people, but that's not necessarily a problem for a town of only a few hundred itself. Being small isn't necessarily a bad thing though, a gym that creates an environment as intimate as this one can be just as special as a packed Tiernan Center a little ways up US-35. The gym once sat just a few yards away from the old Economy High School building. All that is left of it now is a stone marker that almost acts as a headstone, and the old ag building that sat behind it which is now utilized as a community center. The exterior of the gym recently received a facelift when an Indiana artist spraypainted a beautiful mural on the front as part of a Wayne County art contest. The mural pays homage to pieces of Economy history with features like the cardinal mascot, a Wayne County tournament trophy, and two ticket stubs that point out the year the gym was built and the year the town was platted. In order to make the mural last for a long time, metal siding was put on the front of the gym as well. The rest still has the original wood.
My guide for the day was Mr. Dan Hollenberg who is the Perry Township trustee for Wayne County and is the caretaker of the gym. He was gracious enough to not only show me around, but give me even more history and backstory about the gym. He confirmed what I already expected in that the Economy gym is the oldest wood frame high school gym in Indiana that is still standing (the people of Wingate might try to argue this, but as I previously mentioned, their gym started out as a horse barn and wasn't turned into a gym until after the one in Economy was built, so I don't think that counts). Inside, it doesn't look like much has changed over the course of the last 100 years. According to Historic Hoosier Gyms, the court is 23 feet short lengthwise of being regulation sized. I've seen some short courts before, but this one might be the tightest in both length and width. The hardwood floor has more scratches than you can count and I imagine a couple dead spots, but I wouldn't change it for a thing. It costs a lot of money to refinish a gym floor, and while I'm sure it would look nice all glossy and shined up, it was so cool to see it wearing the scars it's accumulated from over a century of Indiana basketball. The dark reddish-brown hue is weathered in the best way.
The baseline wall where you enter the gym is bare except for a few red pieces of padding along the bottom. The out of bounds lines along the baselines are basically the walls themselves, so any cushion under the rims is welcome. The opposite baseline features a small stage that is framed in red and has a decorative white lattice piece going across the top of it. An old school scoreboard hangs next to it on the upper corner of the wall. The most eyecatching parts of the gym lie along the sidelines. Each sideline has 4 rows of wooden bleachers that don't quite span the entire length of the floor. They're as old as the gym itself. The roofline of the gym slants downwards slightly over the seating sections. There are a few big support posts standing right in front of the bleachers, slightly obstructing the view of spectators and striking fear into the heart of any player who dares pursue a loose ball in that direction. The bottom half of the walls behind the bleachers are painted red and tops are white. Beautiful old rectangle windows line the upper walls letting in a stream of natural light. There are also support beams that run horizontally from the walls to the vertical posts. Mr. Hollenberg told me that back in the day they would lay long boards across them to create a balcony of sorts, and that's where the student section would be. Talk about being right on top of the action! Some long old ladders also hang along the upper sideline walls, I'm not sure of what their purpose would be. The original scorer's table is still here as well at center court, covered in more protected padding.
The last place Mr. Hollenberg showed me was the basement of the gym. They recently received a grant to repair the basement in an effort to seal it up and keep the water out. As I've learned along the way visiting all these old gyms, if you can keep them dry, they last a long time. They did an amazing job. The cellar felt like it was a part of a new build, not a 100 year old building. For years it served as the cafeteria for the old high school along with housing the locker rooms for the teams playing above. They're hoping to continue to secure further grants and funding to improve and preserve the gym so it can be used for events and basketball games for years to come. I pray they are successful in their endeavors. This wooden beauty deserves to stand tall for another century and continue to serve the people of Economy. There's a reason it stuck out to me when I first laid eyes on it in a book a few years ago. After visiting it in person, its memory will forever be imprinted on my mind, as I'm sure it is for the many people who have passed through its doors over the years.
