Winslow (1,500) Built 1951
May 21, 2025
May 21, 2025
Thunderstorms are something I've always had a love/hate relationship with. I vividly remember sitting in my older cousin's bedroom when I was probably 5 or 6 and being told that if you go outside during a thunderstorm you'll get struck by lightning and electrocuted. They told me that only one person on Earth had ever been struck by lightning and lived, and then that person later got struck by lightning AGAIN. Terrifying stuff for a little kid. As I grew older and learned a little bit more about science and how thunderstorms actually work, I actually really began to enjoy them. I loved watching a lightning strike and then listening for the thunder that was sure to come and counting to see how far away it was (which is probably another old wive's tale that I never took the time to debunk). While I still enjoy a good thunderstorm from the comfort of my own home, becoming an adult and having to drive through them in a car has given me a newfound disdain for them that harkens back to how I felt when I was a small child. It also seems to happen whenever I'm making a long trip to go gym hunting in southern Indiana. I've made four trips down south in the last six months, and I've driven through monsoon rains in three of those journeys. It's hard to enjoy all the natural beauty the southern half of the state has to offer when you're dodging standing water in the hills of Lawrence and Crawford County. Ironically, the one trip I made down there recently when the weather was positively serene happened to be when I visited a gym with its very own unique relationship with thunderstorms.
Winslow, Indiana is nestled smack dab in the middle of the rolling hills of Pike County. I've developed a soft spot for Pike County over the last year as I've criss crossed it many times in my travels. Collectively, they may have done the best job in the whole state of protecting and preserving their old gyms. I'd already been to Otwell and Stendal, and on this trip I made it to Winslow and Petersburg. All four of them are still standing and serving the communities that have cherished them for decades. The old Winslow gym is probably the most well-known of the four for a few reasons. One is that it is known as the home of the Eskimos, which is one of the more unique mascot names you will find throughout the history of Indiana high school basketball. I learned in Kyle Neddenriep's indispensable Historic Hoosier Gyms that they were given that name because they used to play in an old gym they called the "Cow Barn" which they tried relatively unsuccessfully to heat with potbellied stoves. It is also known across the state for its unique ceiling design that is called cross-hatching (if my memory of middle school art class serves me correctly). Finally, the gym's purple and yellow court design really helps it stand out as well, which brings us back to the gym's special connection to the lightning I feared so much when I was five years old.
If you assumed a rubber-composite court in the colors of bright yellow and purple was not original to when the gym was built in 1951, you would be correct. At one time the gym did have a normal hardwood floor. Historic Hoosier Gyms confirms a story I was told when I visited the gym about a lightning strike that ripped through the roof of the gym and damaged a portion of the floor and bottom bleachers in the late 90s. This was a crucial moment in the history of the gym. It stopped holding high school games in 1974 when the school consolidated into Pike Central. After that it served as a community center while occasionally helping out the elementary school that sits next door to this day. The elementary does have its own smaller gym. It would have been easy to use the lightning strike as a sign that it is time to close up shop and level the gym as so many towns have done across the state over the years. The people of Winslow decided that wasn't an option and once again stepped up to restore it. The floor was replaced with the purple and yellow masterpiece you see today (if you're surprised I like something this far away from the original, to be honest I am too. I think it just really pops and gives the place some more personality), and a little wooden cut out has been made where the lightning struck the bottom bleachers along one sideline. The rest of the gym looks much like it did when the seven time sectional champion and three time regional champion Winslow Eskimos called it home.
The gym is set up in a configuration that isn't super common, but I have seen it a few times. Its closest relative that I can think of is probably over in Haubstadt. There are permanent wooden bleachers that wrap around three sides of the gym. The one baseline that is devoid of seating features a small stage. The bleachers venture up 9 rows from the floor on all three sides. The bench seats are stained a very dark, almost maroon-brown color. Each individual seat is outlined and numbered. They are some of the prettiest ones you will find. In the two corners of the gym that the bleachers occupy, there are little platforms at the very top that I can imagine would have been popular spots for spectators who didn't mind standing to get a better view of the action. The top row of seats sit up a bit higher and are built like actual benches instead of sitting on little risers like the rest of the rows. Rectangular windows line the walls above the sideline bleachers. The gorgeous original wooden scorer's table sits at midcourt across from where the lightning hit on the other side. The baseline end opposite of the stage has two cut outs in the bleachers. One is an exit that leads to a small foyer. One has stairs that lead down to former classrooms below that now host events for the community center.
The stage itself is a little more subdued than others you will find in gyms from this era. It doesn't currently have a curtain, though I'm guessing it did at one point. It isn't framed in by anything other than the white brick wall that covers the whole gym. Underneath is a long row of yellow padding to protect players from the very minimal out of bounds area in front of it. While it is a little more plain, that's okay! The crown jewel of the gym sits up on the wall just to the right of the stage. A wooden scoreboard that looks older than the gym itself sits right above a vintage sign with the moniker "Kern McGlothlin Gymnasium," named after the legendary coach. His unfathomable coaching record of 194-42 is also posted on the sign which is a really neat touch. A beautiful Eskimo logo is painted in the middle as well. All of it works together perfectly to display and honor the history of the gymnasium and the basketball program as a whole. We've already covered the court and ceiling designs here, but I'd just like reiterate one more time how good they look. You just don't find old gyms as aesthetically perfect as this place (Spiceland and Lebanon immediately come to mind, but it's not a long list). The people in charge have done an incredible job over the years.
As I was walking around the gym, I just kept thinking about how ripe this place would be for a throwback game. It has enough seating (1,500 actually seems small, it feels much bigger). Structurally it's in great shape. It has a couple of more modern scoreboards, though it would be awesome to see that vintage one fired up again. The playing floor is a little short lengthwise, so a temporary double timeline might have to be used, but that has been done other places in the past. I just think it'd be a great experience for not only the high school kids, but the more seasoned members of the community who actually got to experience it in its heyday. You can't recreate the electricity that was Indiana high school basketball in the 50s and 60s, but even getting a little taste again would be pretty sweet. My next stop on this day was Petersburg, which I'll write about next week, and I had very similar thoughts there. Pike Central could rotate one throwback game every year in each place. Stendal and Otwell could host the girls, and Petersburg and Winslow could host the boys. It would only be once every four years at each gym to keep it fresh. These are just my own rambling ideas, and no one ever asks me anyways, but the opportunity is there. These gyms hold timeless memories for the people in these communities who lived big parts of their lives in them. Let them have a chance to show younger generations why they're so special. Give lightning a chance to strike twice.
