The Fred Russell Gymnasium, once a part of Wartrace High School, will reopen on Saturday, Oct. 22, with a celebration between 2 and 4 p.m. 

It’ll be an opportunity for many who used to play ball there to reminisce and see the old gym restored to its glory days.  

“They preserved as much as they could,” said Wartrace town recorder Kathy Tyson. 

The gym was built in 1926. They know this from a 1925 article from the Times-Gazette, which described a “unique campaign” in which pupils, along with a K.W. Hudgins, sold goats, fowls, eggs, butter, pumpkins, cakes and candies to raise money for a new gym.  

They did so successfully. And by February of 1926, a second double-header in basketball was played in the new gymnasium, featuring boys teams from St. Andrews and Wartrace as well as the Wartrace girls against the Unionville girls. Wartrace won in both games.  

Little tidbits like this have given history to the gym. And many others who either played or had grandparents play at the gym contributed their own personal histories to the collection—like Claudia Curl, from Curl Construction, which has done the bulk of this project.  

“This gym served Wartrace High School from ‘26 to ‘72,” said Curl, who graduated from Wartrace High School in 1970 (the old high school was where the community center currently is).  

“I love the gym,” said Curl. “This is the first place I ever saw my husband. He and I both played basketball here.”   

Other stories include Elvera Lewis Smith, who played basketball in the Wartrace Gym 80 years ago. During her senior year, in 1943, they couldn’t use the gym because the army was using it for their teletype machines.  

The gym was named after Fred Russell, a Wartrace native who went on to become the sports editor and vice president of the Nashville Banner. He gained national attention in the 1940s and 1950s for writing the “Pigskin Preview” for the Saturday Evening Post.  

“So, we wanted to do this to teach the kids a little history,” said Curl. 

The county owned the gym as part of the school system. It was then acquired by the town of Wartrace several years ago. 

The gym was in bad repair when the town of Wartrace decided to close its doors in 2016. Tyson said there was mold everywhere, which you could smell, and portions of the flooring that had holes in it. 

 “It was just awful. If someone had allergies or asthma, they couldn’t come in here. We couldn’t risk keeping it open,” explained Tyson.   

This was in part due to the poor air circulation of the building, according to Curl. “The building couldn’t breathe,” she said. 

For the gym’s modern-day campaign, through the nonprofit “Friends of the Wartrace Gym,” Curl said they’ve raised $120,500 out their $130,000 goal, with donations coming from across the country.  

 “A lot of that came from businesses. And what we did was mail out 350 letters to people who had graduated from Wartrace High School. It was fun going to the post office and getting letters from Pennsylvania, from Texas, from Florida, from all over,” said Curl. They got about 100 responses from those letters.  

They also received a $75,000 grant from the State of Tennessee. But as costs of materials continue to rise, the original bid of $205,000 has turned into $270,000. “In a year and a half, materials went up, extremely. And we had surprises, too,” said Curl.   

For example, they found two places where the gym had caught fire at one time.  

Most of the renovations involved painting. The wooden bleachers are still original and were given a fresh coat of paint. They also got all new lighting, while the restrooms are now ADA compliant.  

They also installed a split AC unit that will keep the side with the water pipes warm in the winter without the need to heat up the rest of the gym, thus being cost effective.  

The exterior, too, received new siding. Initially, they planned to not take the exterior asbestos off, but the material crumbled when they started repairs.  

“I’m coming in here now and smelling paint. It's just awesome,” said Tyson.  

The newly renovated gym will be open for class reunions, movie nights, an indoor track, and of course basketball games for the Junior Pro kids. “That floor right there is a whole lot less intimidating than a high school,” said Curl.