Kentland (2,250) Built 1950
May 20, 2025
May 20, 2025
As I continue to visit and write about old gyms from bygone days, one of my favorite things is hearing from people who experienced them in different ways. Many remember them from the basketball games we focus on so much, but others remember them for hosting community fundraisers, pep rallies, gym classes, and school dances. If they grew up in the 50s, they often refer to those dances as "sock hops." The dances were called this because students would take off their shoes during them to protect the gym floor. If you're imagining poodle skirts and a slicked back John Travolta, then you may have had the same childhood as I did. The Grease soundtrack was on heavy rotation in my mom's car growing up, and I saw the musical more than once. That era has always stuck with me, and it's resurfaced now later in life as I get to talk with people who lived it firsthand. For people of my generation, it's reminiscent of my favorite comedy of all time, Napolean Dynamite, when Napolean is dancing with Deb while "Forever Young" plays in the background. All these thoughts and nostalgic feelings were swirling around me when I stepped into the old Kentland gym this spring. The lights were off, and the place was only illuminated by some sunbeams streaming through the upper windows. Hanging over the court was a giant white parachute of some sort. I never found out its purpose, but it looked like something that would be used as a decoration in a themed school dance back in the era of the Fonz. This era also happened to be the peak of Hoosier Hysteria and everything that came with it.
Most of the time I visit these old gyms with a guide of some sort that can show me around and answer some questions about the history of the place. Occasionally though, I'm on my own. That was the case here. The Kentland gym now serves as a community center for town. The original high school that was once attached to it became an elementary after consolidation swept through Newton County in 1966. Like its neighbor over in Brook, the school building was demolished in the late 90s but the gym was mercifully spared. I was told the gym is open most of the time during the day for people in the community to come in and use, and I was welcome to let myself in and look around. I happened to stop by at a time when a community group was finishing up a luncheon in one of the rooms underneath the bleachers. I didn't want to disturb them, so I quietly crept around the place to see the sights and take my pictures. I felt a bit like the Grinch sneaking around Cindy Lou Who's house on the night before Christmas, even though I knew I wasn't doing anything wrong. The giant parachute was also making the matter of taking quality pictures a bit challenging, but still I persevered. I started in the foyer of the gym where the original ticket booth stands prominently with pictures of past Kentland sectional championship teams in the background along with trophy cases filled with treasures from the school's past. They won five sectional titles in total, and three while playing in this gym. It was quiet, with only the faint sound of chatter from the luncheon in the distant background. I could almost hear the Hoosiers theme music playing around me. It felt like a sacred place. It also set the stage nicely for what I found through the next set of doors leading into the gym.
If you enter the gym from the ground level, the first thing you will see is a grand stage staring at you from across the court. The stage is one of the wider and taller ones you will find in a gym this old. The entire thing is framed in dark maroon brick that really stands out against the otherwise whitewashed walls. A heavy red curtain spans the length of the whole stage, and a big "K" is featured prominently in the center at the very top. Flanking the stage on each side are scoreboards hailing from different eras. On the left is a fairly modern one, and on the right is one that looks like it fits the time period from which the gym was built, I particularly enjoyed its hunter green color (believe it or not, there is actually a third scoreboard from yet a different time period that we will discuss later that really knocked my socks off). The rest of this baseline wall is bare except for some HVAC vents. The opposing baseline wall from which you enter the gym is also devoid of much signage or color. Its only points of interest are the three huge square windows made up of bricks of frosted glass that line the top. I'm not sure I've seen anything quite like them in terms of size, especially along a baseline wall. Windows tend to reside high up along the sideline walls in old gyms.
I really was shocked by how big and grand the gym felt in general. I wasn't expecting it in a town of this size and a gym built in 1950. The seating is primarily responsible for it feeling so vast. Today, there are only bleachers in the upper levels, and they seem to go up quite a ways. That's partially because they start above a seven foot wall on each side. They then go up 11 rows to the upper wall. All the seating is permanent. Shiny and well-cared for wooden bench seats sit upon short risers that are attached to a concrete floor. They look downright glossy for being 75 years old. It's truly a beautiful set of bleachers. The walls below them along each sideline are painted blue with a little blue devil mascot on the end. There's about 12-15 feet between the walls and the out of bounds lines. I have to think there used to be lower seating here of some sort that was removed along the way. The hardwood floor was obviously redone at some point, and it now features a gleaming court that is stained a light gold color. At center court is another menacing blue devil logo. I'm always surprised at how many schools allowed themselves to have mascots named after the ruler of the underworld considering how conservative most of these rural farming communities were, but it must not have been that big of a deal because I've found or read about at least a dozen that held tight to the "devil" moniker for all those years.
This was one of those gyms that was a pain to try and figure out which pictures I wanted to use for the blog because there were just so many little things that I wanted to capture. My favorite one was third scoreboard that looked like it was used in a time well before this gym was even built. I've never seen one quite like it. I have a hunch it may have been brought over from an older gym when this one was built (if anyone reading this has more insight into its history, reach out! I'd love to learn more about it). It just looks really cool. I also loved the old heavy wooden doors leading to the upper deck from the exterior stairs for some reason. Along one baseline wall are old school water fountains that are actually built into the wall. There's a singular wooden practice hoop with a fixed rim hanging on this wall as well. I just couldn't get enough of this place. I wanted to explore even more behind the stage and upper level stairs leading down to it, but I managed to refrain.
I've never liked the phrase, "nostalgia is one heck of a drug." It's partly because I'm such a nostalgic person myself, but I also don't like the kind of messaging it gives off. It implies that nostalgia causes people to view history through rose-colored glasses and block out all the negative portions of whatever they're fondly remembering. I don't really view nostalgia that way. Yes, I do look back on the history of Indiana high school basketball and long for many aspects of it that are largely gone today, but I don't pretend like everyone back then had it all figured out. The more I read and study this history, the more I am becoming well aware that Indiana had more than its fair share of issues over the last century, many of which manifested in different ways in the world of high school basketball. What a place like the Kentland gym can do is transport me back to those times in a way I otherwise wouldn't be able to. It's not a perfect time machine unfortunately, but it does a pretty good job. Yes, I wish I could sit in those bleachers during a sold out sectional championship game. Yes, I wish I could see a student section filled with almost the entire student body screaming along with their yell leader throughout the whole game. Yes, I wish I could walk down the street to the barber shop the next morning and hear the old men arguing about all the things the coach should've done differently. Yes, I wish I could see all the store windows on Main Street filled with signs rooting their local boys on as they moved onto the regional round the next week. I wish I could experience all these things. Visiting the Kentland gym made me feel them in my bones. It also reminded me of the many struggles different people faced during those times as well. I rarely think of one without the other. I guess nostalgia really is one heck of a drug: one that can remind you of why certain things used to be so much better, and why it's better that other things from the past are simply no more.
