Boys Club Building, Battle Creek Michigan
The confluence of the Battle Creek and Kalamazoo rivers was an early first destination for settlers in south-central Michigan, where waterways were a chief avenue of transport throughout the eighteenth century. In Battle Creek, located at the confluence, these rivers were also essential to the commercial and industrial development of the city, which was settled in 1831. Entrepreneur Sands McCamly built a millrace between the two rivers in 1835, and was soon able to provide "a goodly amount of machinery with water power." Powered by the abundant local water power, mills sprung up throughout the town, producing woolen goods, flour, and wood supplies.
Access to outside markets was an important factor in Battle Creek's growing economy. Located on the Territorial Road, an important early thoroughfare connecting Detroit and Lake Michigan, the village was a natural stopping point for travelers, as well as a market center for trade goods. It was the coming of the railroad, however, that effectively elevated the city "from a parochial mill town into an industrial city with markets all over the world." The first railroad built through town was the Michigan Central Railroad, which was completed in 1845. The opening of a competing line in 1873, the Chicago and Lake Huron (later the Grand Trunk), led to lower freight rates and increased trade, and by the end of the century the city had become an important agricultural machinery manufacturing center, producing approximately ten percent of the nation's threshing machines and tractors, in addition to steam pumps, printing presses, organs, and pianos. Incorporated a village in 1850, Battle Creek was designated a city in 1859.
The area was likewise the destination for several free-thinking sects, and early churches in the area became gathering places for people sharing antislavery, temperance, and other social beliefs. In 1844, Quakers and Spiritualists established a small cooperative settlement on the western outskirts of Battle Creek. In the 1850s, this community provided safe haven to fugitive slaves, and was temporarily home to the former slave, feminist and abolitionist Sojourner Truth." Also in the late 1850s, the Seventh-Day Adventist Church established its national and international headquarters in Battle Creek. In 1866, its founders opened the Western Health Reform Institute, a hydropathic and dietary cure facility. The Institute was taken over and reorganized as the Battle Creek Sanitarium by Dr. John Harvey Kellogg in 1876. Until 1903, the Adventist headquarters and associated publishing business remained in the city. The Sanitarium passed out of church control in 1907, but stayed in operation until the 1940s under Dr. Kellogg. The health and dietary principles promoted at this facility formed the basis of a second industrial boom that revolutionized Battle Creek and established it as America's "Cereal City."
Guided by the precepts of the Adventist church, Dr. Kellogg developed a series of treatments for patients at the Sanitarium that included hydrotherapy, exercise, and a diet that strictly prohibited alcohol, caffeine, tobacco and meat. With his younger brother, Will Keith (W.K.) Kellogg, he developed several grain-based food products for use at the facility, and in 1894 introduced Granos, the first flaked breakfast cereal. These products were manufactured by the Sanitas Nut Food Company in a building adjoining the Sanitarium, which was managed by W.K. Kellogg until 1900. Following a fire, the Sanitas factory was rebuilt one block north of its original location in 1901, where it continued production under a variety of names, including the Sanitarium Health Food Company, the Battle Creek Food Company, and the Kellogg Food Company.
At the age of forty-six, W.K. Kellogg left the Sanitarium operation and in 1906 established the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company. Using his knowledge of flaked cereals, until this time limited to wheat products, W.K. begun the manufacture of Toasted Corn Flakes in a small plant on Bartlett Street. Taking an advertisement in the Ladies Home Journal, Kellogg was able to increase his production from thirty-five to 2,000 cases per day within months. An aggressive advertising and promotion campaign continued to enhance the company's growth. Reorganized as the Kellogg Company, the firm saw its business boom, and by the late 1920s it was "producing Corn Flakes, All-Bran, Pep, Krumbles, Bran Flakes, New Oats and Rolled and Redi-Cooked Oats in a plant with 30 acres of floor space, 2,000 employees, and an annual payroll of $2.5 million."
Between 1900 and 1915, over eighty cereal companies operated in the Battle Creek area, with varying degrees of long-term success. One early leader in the industry was C.W. Post, a salesman from Illinois and former Sanitarium patient, who developed a cereal coffee in 1894 that he named Postum. In 1895, Post began the first large-scale commercial production of cereal in Battle Creek, with Elijah's Manna (later known as Post Toasties) and Grape Nuts among its most important early products. Another manufacturer established at this time was the Mapl-Flake Company, which was purchased in 1917 by the Armour Grain Company of Chicago and was later absorbed by the Ralston-Purina Company. While most of the early cereal companies failed, both Ralston-Purina and Post still have large plants and grain elevators in Battle Creek, and Kellogg's remains the city's largest employer and a strong civic influence.
The growth of Battle Creek's cereal industry was part of the prosperity experienced by the nation as a whole during this post-war decade, when the city's population nearly doubled. As the Kellogg Company prospered in the first decades of the twentieth century, however, W.K. Kellogg became acutely aware that the prosperity of the times was not benefiting all of Battle Creek's residents, and that there was a particular need to offer activities and opportunities to the city's youth. To answer this need, Kellogg anonymously donated $150,000 in 1926 to the City of Battle Creek to erect and equip a clubhouse for boys in Irving Park. On November 14th, the City officially accepted the gift, with the understanding that "it shall not be identified with any national organization holding any religious affiliations or ceremonials and that religion shall not in any way affect or prejudice either officers or members."
To oversee the construction, maintenance, and management of the facility, two local foundations were enlisted on behalf of the donor: the Fellowship Corporation and the Battle Creek Foundation. The Fellowship Corporation was created by W.K. Kellogg in 1925 to anonymously channel his personal philanthropies, supporting projects that answered Battle Creek's most pressing needs. In 1931, the corporation was reorganized as the Child Welfare Foundation, and then as the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, ultimately contributing over $831,000 to local hospital, church, and school projects. The Battle Creek Foundation was established in 1926 to provide "a perpetual fund for civic improvement," and its first public activity was management of the Boys' Club Building." Working together on this project, the overarching goal of the two organizations was to bring "the greatest good to the greatest number." Kellogg's first major philanthropic effort for Battle Creek, the Youth Building has commonly been referred to as his "First Gift." Other public buildings later constructed with his support included the Ann J. Kellogg School in Hickory Corners (1930), and the Kellogg High School (1933) and Kellogg Auditorium (1936) in Battle Creek.
In February 1928, the Boy Scouts of Battle Creek accepted the gift of the building and a $150,000 maintenance endowment, and W.K. Kellogg was publicly acknowledged as the donor behind the project. The building was dedicated at a public ceremony on June 14th of that year. Identified as the "Associated Boys Club" on architectural plans, the building was never generally recognized by that name; instead, it was known as the Boys' Club Building, the Boy Scout Building, and then as the Boys' and Girls' Building, when the facilities were subsequently opened to girls and women. When operations were transferred again to the city's Civic Recreation Association in 1937, the building's name was finally changed to the W.K. Kellogg Youth Building. Thereafter, it was known more commonly as the Youth Building.
The Boys' Club Building was designed by the prominent Grand Rapids building and architectural firm of Benjamin & Benjamin. Thomas and Adrian (father and son) were only in business as Benjamin & Benjamin between 1925 and 1928, but had previously worked together under the firm name of T. Benjamin & Son (1903-18), and Benjamin, Robinson & Benjamin (1921-24)." The son of Dutch immigrants, Thomas Benjamin began his career as a furniture maker, but by 1889 had started working as a carpenter and builder. In 1903 he was joined in this endeavor by his son, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. An innovative full-service team, the Benjamins published from 1906 to 1908 a magazine entitled Homes, a vehicle through which they illustrated style trends and showcased their own designs. They worked together as Benjamin & McLaughlin until the senior partner's retirement in 1934.
As Benjamin & Benjamin they designed a number of commercial, educational and public buildings and residences in western Michigan. They also "arranged for construction financing, oversaw construction, sold homeowners' insurance and real estate, and even developed real estate" as part of their business. Their specialty, however, was designing and building homes. Commissions in Grand Rapids, which eventually encompassed designs for over 150 houses, include the Baxter Brothers Building and Van Stensel & Timmer Store (both 1925), East Grand Rapids School (1926, never built), Holtman House (1926), Otte House and Hekman House (both 1927), Apted House and Kloote House (both erected 1929). Other Michigan commissions include the Labor Temple and Burns & Kerr Store in Niles (1928), the Cedar Lake Academy in Cedar Lake (1928), and the Otto Seyferth House, George Cannon House and Lawrence Gordon House in Muskegon (1928).
Battle Creek buildings designed by Benjamin & Benjamin include the Kellogg Hospital (1926), the Fish OK Laundry on Hamblin Avenue (1925), and the Seventh Day Baptist Church at Emmet and North Washington streets (1928). As Seventh Day Adventists, the Benjamins designed a church for that denomination on Cass Road SE in Grand Rapids (razed) that led to other Seventh Day Adventist commissions in Washington (DC), Pennsylvania and Florida. It is possible that the Benjamins were introduced to W.K. Kellogg through their church membership. In choosing a firm to design his boys' club, Kellogg was familiar with their talents, as he had also commissioned them to remodel the Kellogg Company headquarters and to design his estate at nearby Gull Lake (1925-27).
The Boys' Club Building was designed to be a comprehensive recreational facility. As originally constructed, it contained a seventy-five-by-twenty-foot natatorium (swimming pool), a sixty-by-eighty-foot gymnasium with gallery seating for 300, a banquet room, fully-equipped kitchen, locker room and showers, a large lounge/assembly room, and numerous small club rooms. Within a month of opening, girls were also invited to use the facilities, and for the next nine years the Boy Scouts shared the clubhouse with other youth groups in the community.
In an effort to broaden its outreach to underprivileged children, the Battle Creek Foundation turned over use of the building to Battle Creek's Civic Recreation Association in 1937. For the first time, the building was opened to the general public as a recreation center. Under the new arrangement, the association was charged with developing and delivering programs at the Boys' Club Building, and the foundation continued to furnish operating and maintenance funds. While the building continued to serve as headquarters for Scout activities, the pool and gymnasium were used by the high school for physical education classes during the day, and the addition of game room equipment, hobby shops, and additional showers and lockers soon boosted attendance figures to over 16,000 per month by the summer of 1938.
While the building's role grew to serve individuals and groups from outside Battle Creek, its focus remained largely local. The gymnasium hosted basketball teams from Battle Creek junior and senior high schools as well as other league and city games, including regular season and championship tournaments. The lounge was used for meetings as well as orchestra and chorus rehearsals, while the offices and club rooms housed other groups and agencies, such as Camp Fire Girls and the Work Progress Administration (WPA). In 1939, the building was officially registered with the American Youth Hostels, Inc. as part of that national chain, and for a brief time in the early 1940s it provided rehearsal space for a Michigan WPA Music Project orchestra. In 1942 a "war-time recreation program" was introduced at the Boys' Club Building to address the recreation needs of Battle Creek's citizens and soldiers, with a wide range of indoor activities and special hours specifically offered to women employed in the war effort. The building also provided classrooms and lecture space for training students with the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps.
After the war, the Boys' Club Building continued to see intensive community involvement. In 1949 the Battle Creek Foundation spent over $130,000 in improvements to the building that "resulted in enlarging the swimming pool section to provide seating facilities for 1,100 spectators" as well as "additional space for offices, handicraft shops, shower and locker rooms and lobby space." The building interior was completely redecorated, and heating and air conditioning systems were also improved at that time. During the following season approximately 300,000 people made use of the Youth Building facilities, including the Battle Creek Civic Art Center, which offered adult and children's classes in refurbished facilities in the upper gymnasium.
In 1950, the Kellogg Foundation finally transferred ownership of the Boys' Club Building to the City of Battle Creek. With the transfer, the city assumed the annual operating costs of between $12,000 to $14,000 and committed itself to maintaining the building as the core of its nationally recognized recreational program. As part of this effort, and under the leadership of City Recreation Director Arch Flannery (until his retirement in 1960), the facility's programs were again redirected towards serving children and youth, in keeping with the foundation's original vision. The Boys' Club Building continued to serve the community until 1988, when the City Department of Recreation, Parks and Buildings moved its offices from the building and mothballed the structure as requiring repairs too expensive to justify. Vacant since that time, the building was renovated for residential use in 2003.
Building Description
Dedicated in 1928, the Boys' Club Building is a flat-roofed, two-story recreation facility and youth center. The roughly 15,000-square-foot building is constructed with walls of buff-color brick and gray terra cotta trim. It is designed in the Art Deco style, which was widely employed at the time for city halls, county courthouses, and other public buildings throughout the country. The dramatic and highly articulated example here in Battle Creek, however, is unique in Michigan outside of Detroit. Designed by the Grand Rapids (MI) firm of Benjamin & Benjamin, it was constructed by Seirn B. Cole, a local contractor.
The Boys' Club Building occupies a park-like setting at the edge of Battle Creek's downtown. Located two blocks north of the Battle Creek River at the corner of West Street and Garfield Avenue, the building sits on a terraced bluff overlooking the Central High School athletic fields. Historically Known as Mykins Hill, this spot was once part of Irving Park, a landscaped 70-acre civic green space at the northern city limits. The property is now surrounded to the north and east by residential neighborhoods, and to the south and west by school property. It currently encompasses approximately 2.42 acres.
The main entrance to the building is located on the front (west) wall. The entrance is elevated, and accessed by a concrete stair. At the base of the stair is a concrete landing, and another stairway that drops down to a sweeping quarter-circular front driveway/parking area. The driveway connects Garfield Avenue and West Street. Under a perpetual easement and right-of-way, this corridor is maintained as a surfaced linear park for pedestrian and cycling users. The front lawn slopes down from the building to the drive, and is contained by a concrete retaining wall. At the rear (east) entrance, an asphalt drive and parking lot were removed in 2003, and a concrete patio was added adjacent to the porch. A seeded lawn and playground equipment were also installed at that time. Several large conifers are located on the rear lawn area.
In 2003, a new three-story apartment building was constructed near the north end of the Boys' Club Building. The new building sits at a slightly lower elevation (near street level). It is sited on an east-west axis, at a diagonal from the old building and parallel to Garfield Avenue. A glass enclosed walkway connects the two structures.
The Boys' Club Building is oriented to the west, and is composed of a nine-bay center facade, with three-bay side wings. The whole sits on a stone-faced masonry foundation with daylight basement. The original building footprint is rectangular with opposing front and rear wings. Later additions (described below) have since produced a more irregular plan. The building facade is strictly symmetrical, with the north and south wings secondary to the projecting center wing. A strong emphasis on this center wing is achieved through the skillful arrangement of parts and textures, and the generous use of abstracted traditional details (some of them vaguely Elizabethan in origin).
The center facade wall is defined by nine stepped pylons, each capped with terra cotta coping. The profile of the pylons is also stepped, creating a restless surface effect and a dramatic, angular roofline contour. Vertical lines are also reinforced on the center facade by nine narrow windows. Anchoring the front wing at ground level is the building's main entrance, a center arched opening with terra cotta surround. Above the doorway is a crenellated terra cotta entablature with multiple shield devices. Stand-off aluminum lettering applied across the entablature reads "YOUTH BUILDING." The lettering was installed ca. 1937 when the facility was officially renamed. The existing exterior metal doors and transom in the front doorway were replaced with comparable new units in 2003.
Flanking the center wing are crenellated side wings that sit on a stone-faced foundation and terra cotta water table. The crenellations are also of terra cotta. Vertical channels beneath the raised merlons reinforce the repeated vertical emphasis. At each corner of the building are stepped piers, with terra cotta coping, and molded shields with heraldic emblems. Window openings on secondary elevations have terra cotta lintels, sills, and architraves, with decorative shields centered above the large windows. The large windows were originally multi-light fixed steel sash with horizontally pivoted four-light sash inserts, but most were removed or partially enclosed over the years. New aluminum replacements were reinstalled in 2003.
Centered on the rear (east) elevation is a one-story porch with open portico. The arched colonnade was enclosed with windows and brick ca. 1949 as part of a larger construction project, in which a twenty-eight-by-eighty-six-foot, two-story brick addition was constructed on the back (east) side of the natatorium (north wing) to create additional pool seating (above) and office/utility space (below). The porch was redesigned at that time to bridge the old and new structures, and provide permanent and secure access between the two. Designed by Battle Creek architect Louis Sarvis, the addition blends almost seamlessly with the older structure by using the materials and details of the original. In 2003, the porch windows were reopened, screens were installed, and the original flagstone floor was refinished.
A second major expansion was completed in 2003 with the construction of a freestanding three-story, nine-unit apartment building. The new building is located off the north end of the Boys' Club Building, set back at an angle and slightly behind the structure. It is rectangular in plan, and mimics the blocky, rectilinear massing of the older building. The roof is a low-pitched hip. The architects for the project, Urban Resources of Madison (WI), incorporated some elements of the original building into the new design. The exterior wall finish, for instance, is Exterior Insulation Finish System (EIFS), which produces a smooth surface comparable to that found on the side wings of the Boys' Club Building. A stylized version of historic corner piers and pylons is also incorporated into the new design. A two-story glass enclosed walkway connects the buildings, providing shared access to services, but minimizing the visual impact of the addition and clearly differentiating the old design from the new.
Functionally, the Youth Building is composed of three major parts: the center mass that originally housed the lobby, lounge, offices (all on the upper level), and locker rooms (basement level); the north wing, occupied by the pool and stadium seating area; and the south wing, where the gymnasium (upper level) and banquet hall (basement level) were located. Over the years, evolving changes in building usage and management resulted in some degree of plan alteration and remodeling, particularly with the onset of municipal stewardship in 1937 and again during World War II when the building was temporarily used for training and office space.
Vacated in 1988, the building was mothballed and over a ten-year period it suffered various problems associated with roof failure. Water penetration caused significant damage to wall, floor and ceiling finishes, and some architectural elements were subject to vandalism. In 2003, an ambitious program of rehabilitation was initiated and the building was converted to thirty-one living units. With this renovation, most of the larger recreational areas were converted to apartments, and the volume of those spaces was significantly impacted. However, the smaller formal spaces, like the lobby and lounge, where significant original features are concentrated, now function as a common space and community room for tenants, and features within those rooms have been repaired or replaced in-kind as needed. This includes a number of fine period details that are characteristic of the Tudor Revival style: flat Tudor-arched doorway openings; wood corbelling in stairway openings; half-timbered wall and ceiling treatments; and decorative tile floors and wall inlay. Other interior elements of note include the stair balustrade near the front lobby that displays Tudor-inspired shields and tracery, and the lounge fireplace with herringbone brick chimney back beneath a large terra cotta shield.
Redesign of the larger, more utilitarian spaces in the building was more challenging. To maximize available space, an additional floor was added above the gymnasium for residential apartments. Original glazed brick on the outside gym walls was retained in the first-floor apartments and hallways, and enclosed window openings were reopened throughout for installation of new aluminum windows that mimic the historic steel sash configuration.
The natatorium (in the north wing) also became a two-level space with loft apartments. As in the gym, original glazed brick on the outside walls of the room has been retained, and the tile lining the pool is incorporated directly into the finished room design. The pool mezzanine, including metal railing, support rods, and decorative brackets, was retained for upper-level access and circulation.
In the banquet room (south wing at lower level), window trim and mock ceiling beams that enclose structural steel roof beams are preserved within the new two-bedroom apartments. Other functional spaces such as second-floor exercise/craft rooms and basement changing rooms (now apartments) are generally unadorned and have standard contemporary finishes.
However, glazed brick walls and terrazzo floors in the first-floor rear addition (1949) are preserved in the new living units there.
Exterior view of front and side elevations, looking northeast from the C.W. Post (Central High School) Athletic Field (2001)
Exterior view of primary entrance on west elevation, showing crenellation and center projecting bay (2001)
Looking northwest across the rear elevation, showing enclosed one-story portico. The 1949 addition is located on the far right (2001)
Front lobby, looking south to stairwell and front entry. Note the Tudor-arched openings, original double doors and multi-light transom (2001)
Lobby, looking northeast towards enclosed office area, showing original wood trim and decorative tiles in plaster walls (2001)
Stairwell, looking southeast towards gymnasium entrance. Note corbelled wood arch in upper left corner, metal hopper windows on stairway landing, and decorative metal railing (2001)
Lounge, looking northeast towards raised stone fireplace (2001)
Pool, looking south. The 1949 addition on the left expanded to accommodate stadium seating (2001)
Gymnasium, looking northwest. Lower wall finish is glazed orange brick. Note decorative half-timbering on far wall (2001)
Banquet room in basement, looking southeast. Note half-timbered ceiling treatment, original wood trim, and metal sash hopper windows (2001)
Looking northeast across the C.W. Post (Central High School) Athletic Field, showing front (west) and side (south) elevations. Note the elevated building site and three-story addition on left (constructed in 2003) (2004)
Building facade, looking southeast and showing new doors and windows. On the left is a glass walkway that connects to the side addition (2004)
Looking north across building facade, showing relationship of historic building and side addition (2004)
Primary entrance on front (west) elevation, showing crenellation and center projecting bay (2004)
Looking northwest across rear (east) elevation. With the 2003 rehabilitation, windows have been reinstalled and the one-story portico reopened. The new three- story addition is visible on far right (2004)
Looking south across rear (east) elevation at juncture with new addition (2004)
Interior view of lobby, looking south to stairwell and front entry. The stairwell was enclosed in 2003 to meet fire code, but the arched ceiling and exterior doors were reinstalled and historic tile flooring retained (2004)
Lobby, looking northeast towards enclosed office area (2004)
