West Side Recreation Club

Club History

The former West Side Recreation Club’s neglected condition offers little clue to the important role it once played as a political and social hub for South Bend’s Black community in the early twentieth century.

Built c.1912 as a dry goods store, the building became the West Side Recreation Club in 1929. In an era of segregation, it quickly became a gathering space for many African American social clubs, as well as a place where Black professionals could socialize and set up practices in rented office space. The club housed offices for attorney and politician J. Chester Allen, attorney Zilford Carter, and dentist Dr. Bernard Streets, who all became leaders in efforts to desegregate the nearby Engman Public Natatorium. Judge Chester L. DuComb also came to the club to gather support in his campaign to become the Republican nominee for mayor in 1929.

Over the years, the club became a frequent site of police raids targeting illegal gambling, eventually leading to the owner’s imprisonment in 1979. The West Side Recreation Club stopped meeting at the location in the 1980s, and the building later served briefly as a food pantry before becoming vacant.