Michigan State Historic Preservation Office Staff Comments, July 21, 2020 Johnson Recreation Center and Joe Louis Playfield Local Historic District, Detroit The report indicates the Johnson Recreation Center is a representative example of the Organic style. It is difficult to identify late 20th century architectural styles since no comprehensive guide has yet been developed. However, the SHPO believes the Recreation Center is more likely an example of what DOCOMOMO has identified as “Late Modern” architecture, a style that emerged in the 1970s in the transition period between Modernism and Post Modernism. Features associated with the Late Modern style include: Horizontal orientation, large areas without windows, belt courses, ribbon windows, dramatic sculptural conception of volume, no ornamentation, flat roofs, and no eaves. Since the building was constructed in 1977 the report would need to justify exceptional significance in architecture. To do so will probably require more time for research than is available as it will need to be compared to other similar Late Modern buildings. Because of its age, we recommend removing Criteria C: Architecture as an area of significance and including a notation that the building appears to be a good example of the Late Modern style and should be revaluated when it reaches the National Park Service’s recommended 50-year cut off. These resources would also be significant under Criterion B: Events as a representative example of the on-going segregation of public accommodations that restricted the civil rights of African Americans in Detroit in the 20th century. The areas of significance would include Entertainment/Recreation, Ethnic Heritage: Black, and Social History: Civil Rights as identified by the National Park Service. Because the Johnson Recreation Center is less than 50-years old, it must meet National Register Criterion G: Properties that have achieved significance in the last 50 Years. It is not enough just to state that it does. A case must—and can— be made, but to do so the report needs to put more emphasis on the ethnic heritage and social history associated with the segregation of recreational resources in Detroit. Suggestions include: • A discussion of the de facto color lines that existed in Detroit and their effect on the city’s African American community’s access to recreational facilities. There were some well-known color lines like Woodward Avenue and Tireman Boulevard that Blacks were discouraged from crossing. The report does this somewhat when discussing distances to facilities, which is a good start. The discussion should also include summary information on some of the few recreation sites in Detroit that were open to the city’s Black residents and include information on when they were in operation, when demolished, etc. The report includes information on Birdhurst Recreation Center, but others should also be included: Brewster Recreation Center, St. Cecelia Gym, Kronk Recreation, and the St. Antoine YMCA and Lucy Thurman YWCA are some examples. This would help put the role of the Johnson Recreation Center in the broader context of segregated recreation in Detroit. An interesting article on philanthropist Julius Rosenwald’s support of African American YMCA’s lists the St. Antoine YMCA. http://americanjewisharchives.org/publications/journal/PDF/1992_44_02_00_mjagkij.p df • Were there any protests to end the segregation of recreational facilities in Detroit? No information is included in the report. Ending discrimination in public accommodations was an important issue for the NAACP in the 1940s and 1950s when sit-ins, demonstrations, etc. were used to call attention to discriminatory practices. This would be a significant part of the story. • A path to showing how this resource meets Criterion G for exceptional significance would be to place stronger focus on its social/civil rights history. One important element missing in the report is the role the 1967 Rebellion played in pushing forward the city’s longstanding plans to establish parkland and recreation opportunities in the Eight Mile-Wyoming area. The Kerner Report, released in February 1968, investigated the violence that broke out in America’s cities in the summer of 1967 and included a list of issues it found to be the root causes. The report’s “Second Level of Intensity” list included “inadequate education” and “poor recreation facilities and programs.” This connection would be an important one to make to justify the late construction date for the resource. The Kerner Report can be found on-line at: http://www.eisenhowerfoundation.org/docs/kerner.pdf. According to a July 12, 1968 article in the Detroit Free Press, Arthur Johnson, head of the Detroit NAACP, had been appointed chair of the New Detroit Committee’s Youth, Recreation, and Cultural Affairs subcommittee, which indicates that the city was taking the recommendations of the Kerner Report seriously. Some information on the New Detroit initiative should be included. Page 4, paragraph 1 is missing a key part of the story for the Eight Mile-Wyoming neighborhood. The land was purchased by the first president of the Detroit Urban League (DUL), Henry Stevens, who then subdivided it and sold it to Black families. The connection to the DUL is significant as it was an organized effort to provide land to African Americans and enable homeownership when this simply was not an option for them in most of Detroit. Stevens was a member of the Associated Charities of Detroit, which provided funding to establish the DUL in 1916. See page 28, paragraph 2 in Detroit’s Birwood Wall by Gerald Van Dusen. Also see footnote 16, page 20 at this link: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/5183/d5a75c47e0ce87bdafd51f4610140944ba10.pdf. Page 4, Paragraph 2. The Detroit Urban League was a city-wide organization. The report should provide a little more background context on the main Detroit chapter of the DUL —when it was established; a bit on John Dancy, who served as its director for 42 years; and the work it did in Detroit. The DUL was in existence for 20 years before establishing a west side affiliate office. The report should better explain why it was necessary to establish a satellite office. The way the report reads, it seems like the west office drove everything. On Page 6, the section entitled “Tragedy in the Area” seems chronologically out of place. It should probably be moved to page 7 just before the last paragraph. On page 6, last paragraph, “Just at that time, World War II ended and the returning G.I.’s had aged, gained independence. .” This whole sentence is very awkwardly phrased. What specific time is being talked about? 1945? 1948? Does “gained independence” mean received support through the G.I. Bill? The national housing shortage was the result of ten years of economic Depression, when few could afford to buy or build homes, and 4 years of war during which the use of building materials was severely restricted to the war effort and not allowed for use in the construction of private residences. On page 7, was the Eight Mile -Wyoming area targeted for temporary war housing because of redlining and its classification under the HOLC maps? Weren’t Black residents upset that shoddily constructed temporary government housing in the area might negatively affect their property values? Homeownership for Blacks was a crucial part of the Eight Mile-Wyoming story. On Page 9, it states that Congresswoman Martha Griffiths should be enlisted to help assist with obtaining funding for the Recreation Center. A short background of Congresswoman Griffiths, who was known for her civil rights activism, should be included. In seeking her assistance, it sounds like getting the funding was more of a civil rights struggle than the report indicates. This should be further investigated. On Page 9, since the beginning of the report states the period of significance end date is based on the city’s use of Title I of the Public Works Employment Act of 1976, there should be a short explanation of what the Act is and its purpose. The history presented on the naming of buildings, while important, seems out of proportion. We would like to see more time spent on researching social history, the discriminatory practices in public accommodations that existed in Detroit, and the efforts by the Black community to obtain their civil rights. A general observation on the Bibliography. Researchers need to face the reality that documentation of 20th century resources will require more in-depth primary source research. There are few scholarly secondary sources currently available on many important topics from that period. When researching African American related properties, it is especially important to include African American-based primary sources. For example, newspapers such as the Michigan Chronicle, The NAACP’s The Crisis (available on-line), oral histories, or archival collections such as that of the Detroit Urban League and the NAACP. Resources like the Detroit Free Press that are easily accessed on-line are excellent starting points, but their interpretation of events could sometimes be one-sided. Stronger efforts to consult primary sources that tell the story of Detroit as experienced by its Black citizens need to be made to ensure the history being presented is a balanced one. Currently, the report seems to lack a sense of the struggle that was undertaken to end segregation in public accommodations. SHPO is adopting the policy of capitalizing the terms Black and White, as the APA Style Guide, the Chicago