Establishing Neighborhood House: 1916-1929

Immigrant Beginnings

Neighborhood House had its origins in the combination of massive immigration that combined with the rapidly growing settlement movement in the early 20th century.  But Neighborhood House would also begin in its own unique home-grown way.

Beginning in the late 1800s, the United States experienced the “new immigration” that would change the face of the nation..  The new immigration included two million Italians between 1880 and 1910–a number that would double by 1920.¹  In Madison, the Italian population increased 158 percent, to 1100 people. And they overwhelmingly moved into a single neighborhood known as Greenbush or, in the local vernacular, simply “The Bush.^“2

In those days, before the profession of social work was institutionalized, social workers went door to door to practice their craft.  And new immigrants provided much of the reason for these services.  A 1916 undergraduate thesis by University of Wisconsin  student Henry Barnbrock Jr., 72 single-spaced typed pages long, documented the social problems attendant with the sudden increase of Italian immigrants in one of the most run-down areas of the city–a swamp polluted by rotting refuse with inadequate infrastructure, and dilapidated housing.³  Barnbrock’s thesis may have jumpstarted the effort to establish Neighborhood House, as it specifically recommended such an organization.⁴ The situation caught the attention of Associated Charities⁵ in Madison. Mrs. Helen Dexter was the Associated Charities Visiting Housekeeper–an early version of social worker who would visit homes for the purpose of helping the woman of the house learn better ways of home-making and coping.  She, along with Miss Mary Saxton, the Attic Angels’⁶ Visiting Nurse, led the charge to create what we now know as Neighborhood House.⁷

On June 13, 1916, Associated Charities approved a request by Mrs. Dexter to open “a Social Center or Community House in the Italian colony” with Attic Angels paying one-third of the rent and Mrs. Dexter the rest. The original purpose was for the house to be a place where the Italian women could come to learn American customs and English language.⁸

On Sunday, September 24, 1916, Miss Saxton and Mrs. Dexter, along with  the wealthy and influential Thomas E. Brttingham and Dr. Thomas Hunt, opened and dedicated “Community House” at 807 Mound Street, barely three blocks from where Neighborhood House stands today.  The building they chose was reputed to have been the home of former Governor James O. Davidson, who had also been lieutenant governor to the famous Bob LaFollette.  Many others were also involved,and it was an all-volunteer effort in its early days.  “Mrs. Harry Parke saw to it that every one who had an article to give from an ice box to a piece of linen had an opportunity to give it” in order to furnish Community House. Someone even donated a Chickering piano.  Associated Charities appointed a committee to direct the house, and Mr. Brittingham agreed to take over the rent.⁹

Associated Charities also formed a committee to examine building “an apartment” in the area “to guide the Italians in their building and remodeling.” They invited “a group of public-spirited men who might choose to give of their wealth for this purpose” to a fundraising dinner for the project.  When they made their pitch they were met by “scorn,” especially by Mr. Brittingham. Another member of the dinner remembers “how cynical he was.  I remember his remark, ‘We would always have the poor with us and the unfortunate.'” But “he followed [saying] that if any effort along social lines were made he would be interested. Remembering the newly opened Community House we put that suggestion in the back of our mind to be brought out at a later day.” In the next few years five small apartment buildings did get built on South Park street. In August of 1917, Community House moved to 25 South Park Street, only two blocks away, in hopes of being closer to the immigrant Italian community in Madison. This move marked a name change for the center, from Community House to Neighborhood House. Mr. Brittingham would pay the rent for the entire time Neighborhood House remained there.¹⁰

A Health Hub for the Community

Within their first year of opening, Neighborhood House became a health hub for the community. Beginning in May of 1917, Neighborhood House brought health care to sick children and others in need who may not have received care otherwise, and gained recognition for the medical clinic that it hosted. The clinic, and Mary Saxton’s work in sustaining it, would be a staple of Neighborhood House for years to come.¹¹

By August of that same year, clinic nurses reported serving over 120 patients, most for serious illnesses. Of all the serious cases, only one patient died because of the outstanding and attentive care of the medical staff.¹² In December of 1918, patient numbers increased drastically due to the flu pandemic of 1918, which hit Madison hard. By October of 1918, the supply of nurses was inadequate to treat the amount of influenza cases at hand. Consequently, to alleviate some of the demand for trained nurses, school teachers organized to offer their services where needed. During this time twenty-two of the 221 public school teachers and 1,100 school children were ill with influenza. With this in mind, many institutions decided to take action to prevent infection by shutting down operations. For instance, to avoid interactions with infected children, high schools cancelled their extra-curricular activities. Churches and courts were also constantly closing whenever large portions of their congregation contracted the virus. The University of Wisconsin-Madison had to delay the departure of 76 men for the officers’ training at Camp Grant until cases of influenza declined. Organizations like Attic Angels— that led initiatives to support wellness and healthy aging through outreach to the community—had provided funding for past health care clinics, but this sudden outbreak meant Neighborhood House had to search for more funding to ensure their community was cared for.¹³

Programs, Classes and Entertainment Offered at Neighborhood House

In its five years at the Park Street location, Neighborhood House offered a variety of clubs and classes to the community. And while the focus was on the Italian community, it also attracted and responded to the diversity of the community around it.  Reflecting the linguistic and cultural realities of the time, these activities were often, but not always, segregated by race/ethnicity and gender. The schedule of programs (always planned out to mirror the school year) for 1919-1920¹⁴ included the following:

Monday–Afternoon———-Music (boys)
Evening———- English (men)
Tuesday–Afternoon———-music (boys)
Evening———-Jewish Boys’ Club
Wednesday–Afternoon———-Baby Clinic
Evening———-Colored Boy Scouts
Thursday–Afternoon———-English
Evening———-Italian Boy Scouts
Friday–Afternoon———-Colored Women’s Club
Evening———-English (men and women)
Saturday-Morning———-Children’s organized play
Afternoon———-Classes for girls
Evening———-Boys’ and Girls’ Classes

Neighborhood House also began a garden program in 1917, thanks to Frank M. Edwards, who donated his time to creating a garden on-site. In addition, Mr. Edwards directed the garden program for boys. To show appreciation for his efforts, Neighborhood House decided to announce Frank’s gift at its weekly Wednesday entertainment night that included a social dance. Adults as well as children participated in Neighborhood House’s garden clubs.¹⁵

Home-making skills continued to be a prominent focus.  Neighborhood House offered a sewing club to Jewish girls every Monday and to Italian mothers every Thursday from the first year it opened in 1916. The program started with one sewing machine, and within the first year the program was so well attended that they needed to raise funds to purchase additional sewing machines.¹⁶  The sewing clubs were one of two early examples of University of Wisconsin student involvement with Neighborhood House, as the “Chi Omega girls”–a university sorority–got involved in leading the classes.¹⁷ The other was a “Russian Tea” fundraiser to get a Christmas tree for Neighborhood House in December of 1916.¹⁸

With the “Americanization” mission that grew daily among social service groups in the city, and the need and desire for English language learning among the Italians, Neighborhood House also offered English and citizenship classes. In 1917 the attendance for the English class offered at Neighborhood House was so large that, similar to what happened with the sewing classes, they needed to split the class in half. The community, adults, and children alike valued and utilized the programs to their advantage.¹⁹

Within the first years of operation Neighborhood House quickly became an established and valued institution in the neighborhood where people felt welcomed and safe. The Italian community in particular, who were not only strangers in a strange land but had suffered the loss of family and friends in World War I, needed a community space.²⁰  And in those few years Neighborhood House succeeded so much that it was bursting at the seams.  In February of 1919 the Day Nursery had to expand into a nearby church.²¹ In July of 1919, with Mrs. William Kittle’s urging, the Public Welfare Association board decided that Neighborhood House was beyond capacity and voted to look for a new location.²² The decision came none too soon, as by September of 1920 there were 250 people a month coming through the door at its Park Street space.²³

The Madison Public Welfare Association, renamed from Associated Charities, had a major influence on decisions regarding Neighborhood House. Board members of Madison Public Welfare Association had noticed how Neighborhood House had expanded continuously since its founding in 1916. The Association realized the degree of support that Neighborhood House had offered for immigrants as the Italian population kept expanding, reaching 1,500 in 1921. They also recognized that, while the existing space had served a fine purpose, four years after founding it had become too small to accommodate all the activities possible in the community. It was time for Neighborhood House to become a full-fledged community center. And it was with such a vision that the Madison Public Welfare Association began planning the expansion of Neighborhood House.²⁴

Neighborhood House Moves and Expands

Finding a new space was not a quick or easy process, but it brought forth resources like never before.  In March of 1920 Mrs. Kittle was still pressing the Public Welfare Association to take action.²⁵  So the Public Welfare Association appointed a committee to find a bigger space. In May of 1920 Mr. Brittingham offered $6,150 toward the purchase of a new building.²⁶

Neighborhood House supporters dreamed big.  An internal memorandum of the big dreams was picked up by the June 3, 1920 Capital Times, reporting that “The house will have an auditorium seating 500 people, with a large stage. A concrete moving picture machine booth will house the lantern that will make the splendid collection of films owned by the university extension division available. Large dressing rooms will flank the stage.”²⁷  It of course was not to be.  Interestingly, unlike the settlement house model that had expanded from London through New York and Chicago and elsewhere, the planners were quite specific that “No living rooms for resident workers are included in this plan. It is planned that housing for worker be secured in ninth ward, probably in building now rented by Public Welfare Association.” ²⁸ That would change in the end, but there is no record of the change as a policy decision.

They located a former furniture store at 768 West Washington Avenue owned by the Van Deusen estate,²⁹ across from Brittingham Park. The initial cost for the building was $6800 but the final price grew to $10,000 because the building needed many improvementsto convert it  from its previous life as a furniture store to a welcoming community  center. Members of the Kiwanis Club, Rotary Club, Roxana Club, Technical Club, the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, and other individuals chipped in to cover the difference.  A group of Italian men, led by Mr. Anton Navarra, whose family would also provide years of volunteer support for Neighborhood House, raised $94 toward the purchase.³⁰

 In 1921, when Neighborhood House moved to the converted furniture store on West Washington Avenue, the governing committee also set to work on hiring their first paid staff.  This required, of course, that they had to find funds. And once again community connections paid off.  Joseph Brown, a member of the Industrial Board of Vocational Education, was a strong supporter of Neighborhood House, especially its “Americanization program” that focused on immigrants and paralleled the Vocational School program. Mr. Brown lobbied the National Office of Vocational Education to allow the Vocational School³² to to pay for staff at Neighborhood House specifically to support their citizenship and Americanization education efforts.³³   In May the Vocational Board agreed to pay $2,400 a year for a settlement worker.³⁴

This funding scheme made Neighborhood House unique in the settlement field.  No other settlement house was funded through the National Office of Vocational Education.³⁵  The relationships created through the funding scheme also led to the creation of an executive committee for Neighborhood House, with two members from the Vocational Board, two from the Public Welfare Association (soon renamed to the Family Welfare Association), and an at-large member, Edgar B. (often called “E. B.”) Gordon from the University of Wisconsin, who would go on to be one of Neighborhood House’s most prominent leaders.³⁶

The executive committee then went on to hire its first staff.  Henry Barnbrock Jr., the author of the thesis on the neighborhood, may have been the initial choice, though he declined.³⁷   Instead, they hired Gay Braxton, in September of 1921. In 1922 Gay Braxton would bring Mary Lee Griggs onto the staff.  Braxton and Griggs would become the longest-serving staff Neighborhood House has known.

Gay Braxton and Mary Lee Griggs

Gay Braxton (1877-1962) was the first staff member of Neighborhood House, where she remained from 1921 until 1949. She was educated at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts,³⁸  which produced many leaders in the settlement house movement.  Braxton had a strong resume of settlement house work, including at the Chicago Commons.

The Chicago Commons was founded by Dr. Graham Taylor, a minister and progressive social reformer, adapting the already famous Hull House model in Chicago.³⁹  Among its resident staff were not only Gay Braxton but E. B. Gordon, who went on to become a professor of music at the University of Wisconsin⁴⁰  and, later, president of the Neighborhood House board.  It was Taylor who recommended Braxton to Gordon.  Gordon would later refer to Braxton as  “the Jane Addams of Madison.”⁴¹

 During Braxton’s time with Neighborhood House, she wrote articles for the Madison Capital Times about Neighborhood House, covering financial happenings, promoting events, and highlighting their work.  Braxton worked extensively to get Neighborhood House’s name out to the public to gain their support, speaking to many groups both local and far away.

Her approach was specifically opposed to charity.  She believed in all involved, whether members or volunteers, feeling “ownership” over what happened at Neighborhood House.  Early in her time at Neighborhood House she felt compelled to close the sewing class, for the men were out of work and the women had no money for materials. “It is very hard at times not to give materials when you see a woman is eager to learn, but the Italians are so easily pauperised that we simply cannot do it even to our best women.”⁴² Braxton saw the “Settlement House not [as a] ‘Charity’ but a charitable institution, giving no material relief. It does not as someone has suggested try to make people ‘good’….The settlement offers opportunity for expression in finer and better things among the neighbors and workers.”⁴³  She went to lengths to make sure people understood that those who came to Neighborhood House were “not on charity” and not to be pitied.⁴⁴  She was also strict with Neighborhood House funds.   Mary Lee Griggs recalls that Braxton was particular about money. “City, state or Community Chest — she was determined it should be used to the best of her ability. If a nickel was used for something else, you’d hear from her.”⁴⁵

She was also no lightweight when it came to maintaining order at the house.  She was working in a tough neighborhood with many challenges: “Our discipline problem is of paramount importance, while we invited everyone in to the clubs, care had to be taken to see that they behaved and were not disorderly while in the building. If they were disorderly and continued so they were asked to go out. A test of the success of such discipline was expressed early in the fall when the worker overheard the following conversation between two boys. ‘So I can’t come in, I don’t belong there’. ‘That makes no difference,’ said the other boy, ‘you can come in and stay as long as you behave yourself’.⁴⁶

Consequently, for some of the children, Gay Braxton seemed larger than life. Josephine La Galbo remembers Miss Braxton from her childhood in the 1930s:  ” [She was] very strict, she was very straight-laced…. I made some culottes and I had to go up and show them to Miss Braxton. She praised me. It was really nice. We were so shy when we had to go see Miss Braxton.” ⁴⁷

If Gay Braxton was the tough-love leader, Mary Lee Griggs was the gentle and kind nurturer.  Braxton’s nephew recalls that she “was tougher than Mary Lee and not so warm, but her high competence, her absolute integrity, and her genuine dedication came to be valued.”⁵⁰ Braxton and Griggs were long-time friends and maintained a life-long relationship in Madison.

Mary Lee Griggs’ history with Neighborhood House has a little mystery in its beginning.  She may have taken some convincing to accompany Braxton to Neighborhood House as she apparently had been offered a position in an Iowa settlement house just as Braxton was coming to Madison. But, as the story is told, she arrived with Braxton in the fall of 1921 and never left.  Lending credence to the story is that Gay Braxton recalls Griggs starting out volunteering and Braxton’s February 1922 monthly report mentions Griggs helping with Neighborhood House and teaching at a local school.⁵¹

 In September of 1922 Mary Lee Griggs became a paid staff member, as the director of the Play School and parent education programs. The majority of Mary Lee Grigg’s time was spent with children. She believed that Neighborhood House helped develop strong youth. In the Madison Capital Times, Griggs stated that “We never had the trouble spring up with children in the Bush area like they did elsewhere in the city. That area had the lowest delinquency rate in Madison.” She attributed this low delinquency rate to Neighborhood House.⁵² Griggs was as much of a private person as Braxton was a public figure, seemingly content to work quietly with the children of Neighborhood House.  She worked for Neighborhood House even after Braxton retired, until 1966.

Growing the New Neighborhood House

On November 11, 1921, Armistice Day commemorating the end of WWI in 1918, the new Neighborhood House with its new “Resident Worker,” as Braxton was called initially, was finally able to have its first formal opening ceremony. It was a dramatic event, with speakers that included the Mayor of Madison, the superintendent of schools, a sociology professor from the university, and Graham Taylor, the director of the Chicago Commons settlement house that produced Neighborhood House’s first board president and head resident^.53

Gay Braxton was not shy about taking the reigns of Neighborhood House and shaping it in her own image:   “It might be interesting here to note that there were no records available for work previously done at the Neighborhood House. The slate was clean. There were no traditions to uphold and no community residents to cater to so the worker made the contacts in the neighborhood. … It was a case of having a plan beautifully worked out on paper and no one to enjoy the plan. Until the child, ran passing by the house were [sic] solicited and invited to attend a certain club on a certain day. They responded in crowds, out of sheer curiosity at first- to see what was to happen.⁵⁴In fact, there were records of what Neighborhood House had done, though it was perhaps accurate that Neighborhood House had not yet established a clear culture.

There were also road bumps in those early days. Braxton, in her typical unvarnished honesty, recalls the first neighborhood meeting she tried to organize.

I spent my spare time for two weeks making posters announcing this meeting and placing them in strategic places in the neighborhood. When the time came for the meeting, Mr. Siemers of the Vocational School and his speakers arrived and one neighborhood man. When I went through the neighborhood the following day to ask the reason for the small attendance, Mr. Navarra said, “If you want these people to read your signs, you will have to put them in Italian.”⁵⁵

It was not only Italians that Braxton had to connect with.  She noted people from twelve different countries in the neighborhood.⁵⁶  And she didn’t shy away from trying to influence the newcomers’ culture, particularly when it came to gender roles.  While Braxton always expressed the utmost respect for the Italians’ manners and identity, she also regularly bemoaned the “old country traditions” that kept girls isolated in the home and forced into early marriages, even preventing them in many cases from participating in Neighborhood House activities.The Neighborhood House leadership prided itself on providing programming for boys and girls, though it mostly maintained gender segregation in its early days.  But organizing more social clubs for girls “at first it meant that the workers had to escort the girls to Neighborhood House and home.”  The first time Neighborhood House offered a camp for girls, in 1924, they could only convince five families to send their girls. But they eventually began offering mixed-sex dances⁵⁷  and they even offered basketball for girls.⁵⁸

Neighborhood House also immediately became associated with the Madison Community Union when it formed.⁵⁹  Even while dependent on the Community Union’s funding, Braxton felt comfortable pushing on its policies.   In one case the Community Union objected to the selling of tickets for plays or parties, perhaps because doing so would interfere with the Community Union’s fundraising, though the reason goes unstated.  Braxton held her ground, arguing that it was a case of members of Neighborhood House taking ownership of raising money for things like camps that were not already covered by the Community Union.⁶⁰  A later typed report, untitled and undated except for a handwritten “1927”, and typed in Gay Braxton’s style of presenting all the unvarnished facts, describes two plays held in May and June that did not raise as much money as hoped because the Community Union had insisted that the plays only be advertised in the neighborhood.⁶¹

Even the National Federation of Settlements, of which Neighborhood House was a member, couldn’t squash Braxton’s steadfastness.  Gay Braxton’s relationship with the secretary of the National Federation of Settlements, Lillian M. Peck, in particular had its bumps.  On at least two occasions they disputed the dues owed by Neighborhood House to the National Federation.⁶²  When Peck asked Braxton to provide room and board for a German refugee, Braxton outright refused, citing a lack of funds.⁶³

None of this is to suggest that Braxton was antagonistic or obstreperous.  Her reports to the executive committee were always brutally honest of her own shortcomings and regularly asked for support and advice.  And, as the lone Resident Worker, she needed the support. Her first report as the Resident Worker,  for September of 1921, stated that 334 people used the house during the month, and she made 39 home visits. Events at Neighborhood House included Hebrew classes, Italian Band, English Class, Doll Club for younger girls and Girl Reserves for older girls, Italian women sewing class, and Story House for children. She was hopeful about the preparations of the downstairs rooms for table games, circle games, and playtime for children.⁶⁴   As the months progressed she added Sunday afternoon programs of music, song and pictures representative of all nationalities.  She supported the women who came for English classes by providing child care while they studied.  She organized plays, pageants, and parties, including stuffing 400 people into a space with a capacity for 100 for the Christmas party. Discipline, multiculturalism (as it was defined at that time), and access to literature and art were hallmarks of Braxton’s practice and she was cognizant about not duplicating other efforts in the neighborhood.⁶⁵

The second year attendance at Neighborhood House was 15,820 people, with 827 meetings, 1166 home visits, and 34 activities per week.⁶⁶ Of course it would be impossible for Gay Braxton to do this alone.  From the beginning Braxton knew that she was going to draw heavily on University of Wisconsin students.  In her first plan she noted that “Leaders and directors of these [activities] will be students from the University. These students will be under the supervision of the resident worker.”⁶⁸ A number of students came via the University YWCA.⁶⁹ By 1923 Neighborhood House had 50 students volunteering.⁷⁰  Much of the work of managing the many clubs at Neighborhood House, such as the sewing club and boys woodworking club, fell to University of Wisconsin student volunteers.  It wasn’t easy volunteer work:  “Some of the students are getting their first experience in disciplining unorganized groups, sometimes they come out victors oftentimes they are the losers. This [d]oes not seem to baffle them as they are always ready for the fray the next time.”⁷¹  Students also raised money.  In December 1922 University “girls” raised $25 for window shades.⁷²  The University of Wisconsin sororities donated $63.50 in 1921 for Christmas parties,⁷³  a tradition that was to last at last into the 1930s.⁷⁴  And Neighborhood House suffered the same problems with university students that plague community organizations today:  “The month of January has been a hard month at the settlement, because the volunteer students have all been busy with examinations and unable to attend the clubs…. This was especially difficult in the class for women where they bring their babies. Some of the mothers got discouraged and decided to wait until the return of the teachers so that the babies could be cared for.”⁷⁵  Graduate students were also part of the act, some of whom would have become resident workers had there been enough bedrooms.⁷⁶

Expanding Again and Building on Momentum

Gay Braxton recalled “how disappointed I really was when I saw the size and arrangement of the rooms, for I felt with such small quarters, expansion and real work would be impossible.”⁷⁷  And, in fact, she was right.  Even the new location wasn’t big enough for the attendance Neighborhood House generated.  In May of 1924 Neighborhood House hosted 13,383 people and 941 meetings in just eight months.⁷⁸

By the end of 1925 the mortgage on the original building had been paid and discussions about possible expansion began.⁷⁹ In July of 1926, The Public Welfare Association created a committee  including the by now familiar names of Kittle and Brittingham, as well as Anton Navarra–a local resident–to study expanding Neighborhood House. They originally looked at two properties in back of Neighborhood House on Mound Sreet,⁸⁰  but decided that the properties were too expensive.⁸¹

Interestingly, these efforts were about to intersect with those of the Lions Club.  An unknown writer, with prose reflecting the Prohibition times, relates that: “For some months before we got acquainted with the Lions Club I had coveted the lot next door to Neighborhood House not because of the booze that was hidden there but because the groups coming to Neighborhood House were fairly bursting the walls with their numbers.” The Lions Club had not only purchased the lot next door to Neighborhood House in 1924 for $1,500 but they made an initial gift of $1,800 and kept fundraising until they had enough for a $10,000 building.⁸²  The Welfare Association committee took a liking to the property⁸³ and was able to have plans drawn up by Law and Law Architects pro bono.  The total cost of the building  was $9304.⁸⁴

So in 1926 Neighborhood House built an addition, more than doubling its size.⁸⁵ It had a large manual training room, and a recreation room with folding doors that opened to a stage in the old building.  It also had  large club rooms on the second floor for men and women, equipped with fireplaces courtesy of the Lions Club. Gay Braxton recalls “Mr. Lowman coming up the stairs and looking at the skeleton of the new building, and asked [‘]why don’t you have a fireplace in the mens’ club room[‘]. I asked ‘Do men like fireplaces too?’ He said ‘Of course they do’. When told that we had only $100 for the one fireplace, he said “Change that and the Lions’Club will give an additional $100 for a fireplace in this room.'”⁸⁶  Our unknown author relates that “The men were skeptical of the second floor room until they saw the magazines, the smoking stands, and the homey fireplace.  Then they realized the room was for them and made use of it until their number grew so large that they had to meet downstairs.” The Lions Club also gave $450 a year to pay the mortgage interest until 1929.⁸⁷

A personal memory Charlotte Navarra Ciccarelli’s father, Anton Navarra, was an important figure in Neighborhood House’s expansion. After his untimely death, the rest of the family began attending Neighborhood House.”Mother went to English class and our first activity was the story hour. It was a most cheerful and lively place compared to our home. In time we went to many classes suitable for our ages. Neighborhood House was our home away from home – not only because of the learning and play experience but also because Miss Braxton and Miss Griggs made us feel comfortable – they were understanding of the Italian customs and compassionate. They gradually helped us make the transition from the ‘immigrant’ staus toward becoming the real Americans my father had dreamed for us.””I enjoyed the clubs and classes and eventually I became a helper to the volunteer leaders and the staff members. My first responsibility was taking charge of the membership rolls. Everyone who participated in activities had to become a member and pay annual dues – ranging from 1¢ to 25¢ according to age. I prepared the cards with necessary information, collected the dues, and manned the service window inside the entrance. Every participant had to check in at the window before going to club or class.””It was my job also every Saturday afternoon to collect 5¢ from each child coming to the Saturday matinee. Children in our neighborhood seldom if ever attended the movies. A good friend of Neighborhood House donated a silent movie projector. One of the older boys learned how to operate it and silent movies were rented and shown at 2 p.m. on Saturday. The gym was converted to a theatre. The white wall was the screen. Volunteers from the music conservatory came and played accompanying music on the piano. Althought the old film often broke — a great time was had by all!”88

 With the growth, Neighborhood House increased to three paid staff and built on its strong university connections.  When Neighborhood House created its executive committee in 1922, its first president, who remained into the 1940s, was University professor Edgar B. Gordon.  In 1926 there were six students receiving credit from the university for volunteer work, four student teachers, two university voliunteer basketball coaches, and three music teachers from the Wisconsin School of Music.⁸⁹ The sociology department at the University established a group work course that allowed students to do their field work at Neighborhood House. Gay Braxton notes that “In the year 1926-1927, we had 1122 meetings with an aggregfate attendance of 25,262.”⁹⁰ The number of activities expanded to include, among others, the Women’s Good Times Club and the Campfire Girls, which would become one of the most memorable childhood experiences for many girls in the neighborhood.⁹¹ The success of Neighborhood House’s early health care clinics motivated the Public Welfare Association, philanthropic organizations throughout Madison, and medical professionals to continue reprising their clinics for the Neighborhood House community.  And Neighborhood House started its own newsletter, “The Neighbor” whose moniker was copied with permission from the Northwestern Settlement in Chicago.⁹²  Neighborhood House was also having a city-wide impact.  The citizenship class presented a radio play on WIBA, “listening In,” in 1927.  The play was based on their visit to  the circuit court when the federal examiner was cunducting hearings.⁹³

One of the popular stories of the era was one of the Lions Club’s early investment in Neighborhood House.  It seems they put $500 into equipment for the workshop in the basement of Neighborhood House, including large saws. Eight of the saws were stolen.  The story is told two different ways.  In one version, a boy was inquiring into who was invited to a party at Neighborhood House. When he was told that none of the boys  present when the saws were stolen could attend, he ran off and shortly thereafter seven of the saws miraculously returned.  In the other version the ending was the same, but in this case the boys were denied access to basketball.⁹⁴  Both versions tell something of the culture of Neighborhood House at the time.  There was no shortage of delinquency in the Greenbush neighborhood, and even serious crime, among youth.  But the Neighborhood House staff decried the use of the courts to deal with that delinquency.  These stories, of which the saws are only one, were used to show that there was another way.

By the end of the 1920s, it seems, Neighborhood House had found its footing. Gay Braxton was now the “Head Resident” as they had three full-time staff and six part-time staff,⁹⁵ 936 registered members, 1200 meetings with attendance of 27,590.⁹⁶  On May 30, 1930 Neighborhood House incorporated as its own agency, with a board of 12, formally separating from the Public Welfare Association and becoming an official agency of the Community Union.⁹⁸

It was a good thing Neighborhood House was riding a wave of success and commitment because, in the next two decades, the organization would have to face the two worst global crises of the century.

Continue

Notes

1. Library of Congress.  (no date) Immigration–Italian.http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/immigration/italian3.html

2. An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, University of Minnesota Social Welfare History Archives.  Kittle was a central figure in the Madison Public Welfare Association and would go on to become chairman of the Federation of Settlements in Washington D.C.

3. Housing Conditions of the Italian Community by Henry Barnbrock, 1916, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives. A Braxton essay, Girls’ and Womens’ Work Committee, from February 5, 1931,Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives, says the 1916 thesis was a “Doctor’s thesis” by a graduate student. But The Wisconsin Alumni Magazine, Volume 17, Number 10, lists Barnbrock’s thesis in the bachelor’s degree honors category.

4. Housing Conditions of the Italian Community by Henry Barnbrock, 1916, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives. The Neighborhood House: The Americanization Forerunner of Madison’s Italian Community, 1916-1927, by Noah Valentino, 2010. B.A. Thesis, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.  http://minds.wisconsin.edu/handle/1793/46882.  Barnbrock’s daughter, Eleanor Moss, in an October 19, 1983 letter to John O. Holzhueter, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives, quotes her father’s letter to Gay Braxton, on his being remembered at the Neighborhood House 25th anniversary celebration: “I deeply appreciate more than I can say the thoughtfulness to include me among those who were to be remembered on this anniversary occasion. Somehow I thought my thesis of 1916 had been long forgotten on the shelves of the university library.”

5. Associated Charities was a networked group of service organizations in Madison. In 1919 they would come to be known as the Public Welfare Association and then the Family Welfare Association.  They would have a board of 45 members by the late 1920s.The association was particularly concerned with services provided to the Italian population in Dane County.

6. The Attic Angels are still around today.  The story has it that way back in 1889 Miss Elva Bryant became aware of a family so poor that they could not clothe their newborn twins. She met the need by sewing garments for them and, in the process, found that the need extended well beyond one family.  So she and her sister Mary, along with friends, organized themselves in an attempt to meet the need.  The Attic Angel Association picks up the story: “At some point, the sisters were up in their attic, collecting discarded clothing for these children and, upon descending, were greeted by their father, General E.E. Bryant, who declared, ‘Here come the attic angels!’  The group of women enthusiastically adopted the name and it has been retained to the present day.” Very early on the Attic Angels focused on health care, bringing the first visiting nurse to Madison.

7. An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

8. Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

9. The exact name of the place is in some dispute. Documents from those directly involved refer to it as “Community House” but the Wisconsin State Journal article uses various names, including “Neighborhood House”. Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives:   An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries; New Settlement House is Ready, The Sunday State Journal. Sept. 24, 1916; Maduson’s First Settlement House to Open Sunday. The Wisconsin State Journal. Sept. 21, 1916, page 4.

10. Neighborhood House, An Answer to a City Need, by Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives ; Report of Neighborhood House, by Mrs. Dudly Montgomery, Chairman. from Report of Public Welfare Association for year ending September 1, 1920, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .  An April 16, 1941 letter from Braxton to Kittle  refers to a conversation with Mr. Stark, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives. A typed document, “Neighborhood House –The Past, 1916-1949” with no author says that “the Civics Club put up the block of  stucco houses across from St. Joseph’s church on South Park Street number twenty five was rented by Associated Charities and Community House was moved”.

11. Work of Welfare Society Outlined. The Wisconsin State Journal. Oct. 16, 1921,  pages 1, 23.

12.  120 Patients are Treated at Clinic Within 12 Months. Wisconsin State Journal August 20, 1917.

13. Fifteen to Twenty Mothers Bring Alien Children to Clinic Every Wednesday. The Wisconsin State Journal. May 4, 1917, page 3; Summary of the Epidemic, The Capital Times, October 11, 1918, p. 1. Attic Angels in Appeal for Funds. The Capital Times. Nov. 15, 1918, page 4.

14. Report of Neighborhood House. Mrs. Dudly Montgomery, Chairman. From Report of Public Welfare Association for year ending September 1, 1920, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

15.  Neighborhood House Boy’s Club Eager to Learn How to Garden. The Wisconsin State Journal. May 3, 1917. Page 6. Clubs and Churches. The Wisconsin State Journal. Apr. 2, 1917.

16. Neighborhood House Sewing Class Growth Demands More Machines. The Sunday State Jounal. Dec. 17, 1916, page 2.

17. Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

18. Russian Tea For Xmas Tree Fund. The Wisconsin State Journal. December 13, 1916, page 11.

19. Neighborhood House English Class Gains In Popularity. The Sunday State Journal. Feb. 25, 1917, page 9.

20. Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives

21. Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives

22. Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives. Excerpts from the Family Welfare Records, no author, no date, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives

23. Report of Neighborhood House. Mrs. Dudly Montgomery, Chairman. from Report of Public Welfare Association for year ending September 1, 1920, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

24. An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

25. Excerpts from the Family Welfare Records, no author, no date, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

26. Excerpts from the Family Welfare Records, no author, no date, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

27.  Memorandum of Building Plan for Ninth Ward Community House to be Located on Edge of Brittingham Park (June 21 written in), Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House Planned. The Capital Times. June 3, 1920, page 2.

28. Memorandum of Building Plan for Ninth Ward Community House to be Located on Edge of Brittingham Park (June 21 written in), Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

29. Neighborhood House, An Answer to a City Need, by Mrs. William Kittle, october 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

30.   An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries; Neighborhood House, an Answer to a City Need, by Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House Purchase Assured. The Wisconsin State Journal. Sept. 12, 1922, page 4. Neighborhood House Draws 14,000 Persons During Year. The Capital Times. Sept. 12, 1922, page 2.

31.  Neighborhood House Album: 1st and 2nd Residents, Image ID:  95918, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives,http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM95918.

32. The Vocational School was the fore-runner of Madison Area Technical College, now known as Madison College.

33. An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

34. Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

35. An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

36.   Neighborhood House Records from P.W.A. Records-1916-1921, no author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives

37. letter from Henry Barnbrock to Mrs. Kittle, August 7, 1920: gives advice on how to think about the settlement house worker position. Says “My going with the Red Cross on the 16th means that probably it would not be right for me to consider the Madison position early this fall.” Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

38. Miss Braxton, Well-Known Social Worker, Succumbs. Madison Capital Times Monday, March 26, 1962,

39. The Social Welfare History Project, by Grahan Taylor. http://www.socialwelfarehistory.com/people/taylor-graham/ ; The Heritage from Chicago’s Early Settlement Houses.  The Social Welfare History Project.http://www.socialwelfarehistory.com/organizations/heritage-chicagos-early-settlement-houses/

40. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries ; also Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries; Edgar Gordon, Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, http://wcftr.commarts.wisc.edu/exhibits/radio-pioneers-madison/wisconsin-school-air/edgar-gordon

41. Good Afternoon Everybody, by William T. Evjue, The Capital Times, October 10, 1941, pages 1, 8.

42. March 22 Report of the Work of the Neighborhood House, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

43. April 18, 1933–Talk to the Grace Drakeley Circle, Presbyterian Church, Mrs. Theodore Herfurth’s, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

44. 1921 December Report of the Work of the Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

45. Is Neighborhood House Era Ending? by Robert Pfefferkorn,Wisconsin State Journal September 12, 1976.

46. Resume of the Work of the Neighborhood House from Sept. 1921 – Dec. 1923. Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

47. Josephine La Galbo, personal interview, 2014.

48.  Photo from booklet Neighborhood House 1916-1941. Open Door 25 Years of Service. From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, courtesy of the Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

49.  Photo from booklet Neighborhood House 1916-1941. Open Door 25 Years of Service. From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, courtesy of the Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

50. Remarks at ceremony honoring Mary Lee Griggs, 11/15/81 by William Landram Williamson, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

51. Neighborhood House Tots’ Best Friend for 44 Years is Retiring, by Frank Custer, Madison Capital Times Friday, April 15, 1966; Good Afternoon Everybody, by William T. Evjue, The Capital Times, October 10, 1941, pp. 1, 8; Reminiscences on Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, Oct. 9, 1941, by Gay Braxton, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.; February 1922 Report, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

52.  Neighorhood House Tot’s Best Friend for Forty-four Years is Retiring, by Frank Custer, Madison Captial Times. April 15, 1966, page 25

53. Playlet–History of Neighborhood House, by John Borek, 1941, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries; Neighborhood House to be Open Nov. 11. The Captial Times. Nov. 7, 1921. Page 2.

54. Resume of the Work of the Neighborhood House from Sept. 1921 – Dec. 1923, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives

55. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

56. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

57. Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, University of Minnesota Social Welfare History Archives;  Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, byGay Braxton, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

58. Letter from Gay Braxton to Blanch Trilling, Feb. 18, 1926, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

59.  Mrs. William Kittle was on the nominating committee that created the first Community Union board, and that board included a representative from the Public Welfare Association.  Welfare Union is Launched, The Capital Times, April 27, 1922, p. 1. The Madison Community Union incorporated in 1922 as the Madison Community Union.  It would later call itself the Madison Community Chest, and then merged with the United Givers Fund in 1953, and would finally become  the United Way of Dane County. See  Wisconsin Historical Society, United Way of Dane County Records, 1920-1980.

60. Minutes of the Neighborhood House executive committee, April 14, 1927, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

61.untitled and undated document, except for a handwritten “1927”, but written in Braxton’s style,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

62. 4-22-31 letter from Gay Braxton to Lillian Peck; 9-11-39 letter from Gay Braxton to Lillian Peck, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

63. 5-15-39 letter from Gay Braxton to Iillian Peck, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

64. 1921 September Report of Work of the Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

65. Resume of the Work of the Neighborhood House from Sept. 1921 – Dec. 1923, by Gay Braxton,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

66. Resume of the Work of the Neighborhood House from Sept. 1921 – Dec. 1923 by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

67.  Neighborhood House Boys Club Woodworking, Image ID: 98836, Wisconsin HIstorical Society Archives, http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM98836.

68. 1921 September Report of Work of the Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

69.  Settlement Work in “Little Italy” Started by Y.W. The Capital Times. Oct. 17, 1921.

70. Resume of the Work of the Neighborhood House from Sept. 1921 – Dec. 1923, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

71. 1921 November Report of the Work of the Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

72. Report, December 1922, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

73. 1921 December Report of the Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

74. Josephine La Galbo personal interview, 2014.

75. January 1923 report, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

76. 1925: Better Men and Women for Madison, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

77. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

78. May 25, 1924 letter from Gay Braxton to Mrs. Kittle, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

79. Neighborhood House Building Committee, December 22, 1925, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

80.  July 21, 1925 letter from Gay Braxton to Neighborhood House Executive Committee, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

81. Report of the Building Committee of the Neighborhood House, August 5, 1925, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

82. “Lions Club Investment in the 9th Ward” January 1934, unknown author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; The Enlistment of a Service Club in Time of Peace. Given to Lions’ Club at Neighborhood House Noon luncheon 1/19/43, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives;  Neighborhood House Building Committee, December 22, 1925, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

83. Report of the Building Committee of the Neighborhood House, September 18, 1925, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

84. Neighborhood House Building Committee, March 3, 1926, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

85. An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

86. The Enlistment of a Service Club in Time of Peace. Given to Lions’ Club at Neighborhood House Noon luncheon 1/19/43, by Gay Braxton, Wisconsin Hisotrical Society archives.

87. “Lions Club Investment in the 9th Ward” January 1934, unknown author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

88. My Story: How Neighborhood House Influenced My Life, by Charlotte Navarra Ciccarelli, written for the occasion of Neighborhood House 70th anniversary, Neighborhood House archives;  Braxton indicate that dues were 1¢ to 25¢ per month, not per year–December 1930 report for Board of Directors’ Meeting, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

89. An Account of the Beginnng Years of Neighborhood House:  1916-1926 by Mrs. WIlliam Kittle.  In Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

90. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, by Gay Braxton,  from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

91. History–Neighborhood House–Highlights–1916-1949, no author.  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Josephine La Galbo interview, 2014.

92. Feb. 5, 1926 letter from Braxton to Harriett Vittum; Feb. 9, 1926 letter from Harriett Vittum to Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

93. “Listening In” presented Saturday 4-10-2 at 10am over WIBA, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.  The document in one place lists the year as 1937, but 1927 in two other places and the play’s context makes 1927 the most likely date.

94. “Lions Club Investment in the 9th Ward” January 1934, unknown author, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; April 26 report, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives

95. 1929 report, by Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

96. 1930 Neighborhood House–Sent to Capital Times new year edition, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives .

97. 1945-1946 at Neighborhood House, Madison, Wisconsin. From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

98. Neighborhood House–Highlights–1916-1949.  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Pioneers in the Neighborhood House Organization Work,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; April 18, 1933–Talk to the Grace Drakeley Circle, Presbyterian Church, Mrs. Theodore Herfurth’s, Gay Braxton, WI archives; Cottage Data to Date- June 26, 1940 (handwritten over typed 2/9/39) Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.  Neighborhood House had been listed as an agency of the Community Union separately from the Public Welfare Association for a number of years, but it likely could not receive Community Union funds directly.

Times of Crisis: 1929-1949

Sacrifice is always a relative term. Whether those who lived through the back-to-back crises of the Great Depression and World War II sacrificed more, or achieved more, than those before or after them will always be open to debate.  But there is no debating the uniqueness of the times they lived through.  On the heels of what seemed the limitless optimism of the “Roaring Twenties” came a contrast so sudden and stark that it is difficult to imagine.  And nowhere in Madison were the consequences felt more deeply than in the Greenbush neighborhood.

Neighborhood House in the Great Depression

As the aftermath of the stock market crash and ensuing economic meltdown of 1929 made its way westward across the country, some of its worst effects were on the immigrant community in Greenbush that Neighborhood House served.  For Neighborhood House, the Great Depression initially meant low participation, a decrease in funds, and insecurities in regards to the organization’s immediate future.

By the end of 1930, the situation was bad.  Gay Braxton reported that,  “for the last eight years we have been trying to build up a fee schedule for the various clubs where each registered member would pay a small monthly fee ranging from 5 to 25 cents. Last year from these fees we took in about $230.00. Not much to be sure, but enough to have the members feel that they had a part in i[t]. This year the fee is almost impossible with the members. They haven’t money for bread and meat much less a luxury like they consider Neighborhood House. Each child has learned to rejoice when his card is punched for dues. Of course this has never been exacted from those where we knew they could not pay but it has always been gotten around some way. This year the only thing we knew to do was to have a ‘job list’ where each child could do a small job in return for having his card punched.”¹

But even those strategies seemed incomplete. By mid 1931 the board of Neighborhood House estimated that participation had dropped by at least half at functions that required money. Many of the participants were day laborers and were only able to find a few days of work a week. Finding themselves too depressed or saddened, many participants stopped attending language and citizenship classes in the evenings. Children also stopped attending events since their families could not afford the small fees of one or five cents.²

The Depression turned Neighborhood House’s focus from offering language and citizenship courses for new immigrants to providing services for the surrounding community in hopes of easing the hardship that came with the Great Depression. With a lack of stable work for Madison’s residents, Neighborhood House “developed more social and handicraft clubs to meet the needs of the idle adults.” The Depression also impacted what clothing and food the community could afford for themselves, or received as relief from the government. These new food products and standard issue clothes opened up another opportunity for Neighborhood House to aid the community.  They taught adults how to cook new dishes from the food products that were becoming more common and offered sewing classes for adults to modify their standard issue garments.³ Neighborhood House additionally supported the City of Madison’s Groves Bills–an unemployment compensation program with a more long-term focus that also received praise from the National Federation of Settlements⁴

By the mid-1930s, Neighborhood House had gained its footing in this new economic terrain. Gay Braxton reflected that “Our work became greatly enhanced and our aggregate attendance for the year 1933-34 was well over forty thousand with an individual enrollment of 1,055, the highest in our history.”⁵ The surrounding neighborhood was noted as having lower juvenile crime than other areas of the city, which was attributed to the hard work of Neighborhood House.⁶

The Great Depression did not show how much couldn’t be accomplished, but instead showed that, if Neighborhood House could overcome ten years of depression, the organization could overcome whatever the future brought. Fortunately, Neighborhood House had support from both within and without for these tasks. Through collaboration with the University of Wisconsin, the Vocational School, the City of Madison, and many individuals Neighborhood House made sure each class and program had someone willing to help. They also worked to reassure those who lacked jobs that they could still get one, teaching interview skills and connecting people to job opportunies.

A personal memory A scarf knitted by Miss La Galbo9 Josephine La Galbo, from an Italian immigrant family, went to Neighborhood House between about 1935 and 1942, when she was between 7 and 14 years old. She lived “right around the corner on Mound Street” and took full advantage of the clubs and classes provided at Neighborhood House. She was a Bluebird and then a Campfire Girl. Neighborhood House also sent kids to summer camp and Josephine remembers “we had to sell dishrags to go to camp.” She learned to sew and knit at Neighborhood House. She said it “was a big building, and we had our meetings upstairs and they had sewing machines up there.” With all of the sewing and knitting done over her lifetime, Josephine said, “They made me the woman I am today.” Miss La Galbo remembers how important University of Wisconsin students were to Neighborhood House even in those early days: “All our instructors were students at the university. They were all very nice. I know they were all going to school and we had different people in the school year and the summer” Miss La Galbo was also involved in the gardening club and attended the regular movie showings. During the summer, she said “they’d give you seeds and they’d give you a prize for whoever had the best flowers.” The movies normally cost ten cents, but on Saturdays they were offered for a single penny at Neighborhood House. Miss La Galbo’s father also made use of Neighborhood House.  He participated in citizenship classes, and got his citizenship papers as a result.8

Growing the Programs of Neighborhood House

Neighborhood House did much more than simply respond to the Depression.  They continued to build programs for every age. Mary Lee Griggs, whose focus was always on children, led the effort to start a pre-school program in 1931. Not only did the program offer early childhood education, it also provided early childhood health care, as all pre-schoolers received physical examinations as part of their enrollment.¹⁰ In 1935 the Gamma Delta Club, for teen girls,¹¹  and a Camp Fire Alumni Association for teen girls that were at least 17 years old and had attained Firemakers rank, began.¹²  Yet another older girls club, the N.B.B.O, or Nobody’s Business But Our Own, organized.¹³

Both the Camp Fire Alumni Association and N.B.B.O, along with service and entertainment activities, took what could best be called virtual trips.  The Camp Fire Alumni Association went to Europe, and N.B.B.O. went to Hawaii.  The girls did all the work as if they were really traveling, including completing passport applications. They created reports on each portion of the journey with such fine details that it required looking up newspaper articles to confirm that the trips were virtual and not real.¹⁴  This theme of getting youth to think beyond the neighborhood also led to an interest in hiking and hosteling.  Whether it was a day hike from “The Bush” to the Arboretum, or an overnight bicycle trip with a hostel stay, Neighborhood House got their youth thinking of the world beyond the neighborhood.

Hostelers, courtesy of Wisconsin Historical Society16

First Hostel Trip, June 19, 1940 On June 19, 1940, six girls and one leader pioneered Neighborhood House’s first overnight bicycle trip.  The cost for each girl was $2.80 for food and hostel. “We started from Neighborhood House at 5:30 A.M., June 14, 1940….. Our trail went from Neighborhood House to Picnic Point on Lake Mendota, to Pine Bluff, to Cross Plains, to the [illegible] Hostel – back by way of Cross Plains to the Post Farm Hostel (via highway 14) to Neighborhood House…. Next to coasting down hills, resting was the fondest thing we were of. At Cross Plains we explored a cheese factory. Hostel highlights: When Mary D. skidded into a mud puddle on Prairie Point and we had to dunk her in the lake to get the mud off – When we discovered we had brought cans but no can-opener! – When we shared our sandwiches with our Hosteler friend from Davenport Iowa – When we were officially initiated into hosteling in the “bunk-house” floor early in the morning – When we went to sleep with and on top of the chickens – When we found the wild strawberries.”15

Neighborhood House also continued elaborating its relationship with the University of Wisconsin, specifically with the sociology department.  The sociology department at the time was much more than an academic department and provided strong applied skills. Gay Braxton reported that “The group work students give ten hours per week service to the settlement during their senior year. Their field work is carefully supervised by our trained workers and university credit is given them. The department co-operates in surveys, and studies desired by the settlement.”¹⁷

The program that would perhaps be the most influential, and bring Neighborhood House fully out into the neighborhood, would be the Better Homes and Gardens Club.  The club was founded at Neighborhood House in 1931 by the Madison Woman’s Club as part of the city’s Better Homes and Gardens movement. The club expanded quickly, with 65 gardens in 1931, and almost 100 in 1932.¹⁸   In 1933 they founded a Junior Garden Club for kids ranging from seven to fifteen years of age.  It started out with 53 members, expanding to 60 kids by 1935 and 130 in 1936.¹⁹   Perhaps the club’s proudest moment was in 1936, when they got McKay Nursery to donate 50 elm trees, and got the city to plant them.²⁰  Mrs. Isaac Sinaiko, who was a central leader in establishing both the adult and children’s clubs, became such a beloved figure that, when she died, a memorial fund sprang up in her honor without any organizing needed.²¹

But it was certainly not all a bed of roses. Gay Braxton referred to Neighborhood House during this time as the neighborhood’s “trouble clerk…because it tries to alleviate the troubles of the neighbors by conferring with them and aiding them in establishing contact with other social agencies.”²³  The Depression was weighing down on the neighborhood, sometimes bring out the roughness of the neighborhood.  One of Gay Braxton’s  typical tell-it-like-it-is reports contains the following entry: “One real problem, the boys gangs. The [club] leader had to do things by force which he knows is unethical but it had to be done. One conversation ran like this in the [club leader] entry one evening: ‘Well, we sent that [gang] leader to the hospital, we wonder what will happen to the next one.’ It has taken the combined effort of the staff to reckon with this gang but when the gang has an average attendance of 14 out of a possible 16, and the gang leader says to the club leader, ‘You are the best leader that we have ever had and that’s a compliment, too’ we feel that we might be making some headway.”²⁴

Neighborhood House never shied away from such challenges and, as the popularity of the programs and participation kept growing, Neighborhood House once again was looking for more space.

The Casa di Bambini

In 1927 the Public Welfare Association provided $700 for a cottage at 709 Mound Street–the property to the back of Neighborhood House–to be used by Neighborhood House for what was then termed “domestic science” and more resident workers. There was some talk about purchasing the cottage but budget cuts in 1928 quelled that discussion.²⁵

So after another year Neighborhood House began renting the cottage, producing a decade-long saga that perhaps illustrates the stresses that the Depression produced.  In the spring of 1929 there was more talk about buying the cottage, which was then valued at somewhere between $4,500 to $5,000, and the value would plummet by more than a third over the course of Depression.²⁷   It would lead to disputes, deferred maintenance, and tension between Neighborhood House and the members of the Daggett family who also suffered as a family through the process.

From 1929 on there were problems with the building:  furnace issues,²⁸  a robbery through a window without a lock, more furnace issues,²⁹ a lease dispute,³⁰ and a need for painting.³¹   In 1933, as the Depression bore down, Mrs. Daggett agreed to take $35 rather than $40 for monthly rent.³²   And maintenance only got worse, with a small fire that required a garage roof repair that remained undone for a year, when Braxton contacted a city building inspector,³³ and broken door locks that remained broken for at least two months.³⁴  By 1936 the repair list grew to include the cistern, chimney, more painting,³⁵  and the front screen door.³⁶   The cistern remained broken for at least three months.³⁷  When the Daggett family finally hired painters, they never finished the job, and Braxton informed Mrs. Daggett that “The painting that they did looks very nice and it is too bad that men who can do as good work as this keep themselves so steeped in liquor all the time.”³⁸  The furnace and garage continued to have problems well into 1937³⁹  and the porch steps fell apart.⁴⁰   Perhaps frustrated with the situation, in 1936 the Daggett sons started talking about selling the cottage,⁴¹  and in 1937 went to a month to month rent⁴² and put the cottage up for sale for $3,500.  But it was only valued at $3,000 by this time.⁴³

And then it got interesting.  In early 1938 Mrs. Daggett died and her sons became more and more anxious about selling,⁴⁴ but they weren’t willing to take less than $3,400.  The Neighborhood House board, for reasons that are unknown, went to Mrs. Augustus M. Frish to request a $3,000 loan.⁴⁵   Frish was sympathetic, but had a steep payback condition–$1,000 at the time of the loan and then $350 to $500 in yearly payments.⁴⁶   Mrs. Frish then apparently went out and started soliciting funds to help Neighborhood House make those payments.  But that violated the restrictions that the Community Union placed on all its funding recipients, creating a whirlwind of embarrassed and uncomfortable letters between the Neighborhood House Board, Frish, and the Community Union.  In the aftermath, Frish withdrew the loan offer.⁴⁷   Meanwhile the cottage continued to deteriorate.⁴⁸

Finally, the idea was hatched to ask the Community Union to simply keep making payments on the cottage, only for a mortgage rather than rent.  The Community Union agreed and the Juvenile Protection Association chipped in $1,500.⁴⁹  In 1940 Neighborhood House finally was able to purchase the cottage, install a commemorative plaque thanking the contributors, and begin $425-440 in repairs, right down to the kitchen sink.⁵⁰

And while the cottage was referred to as the Casa di Bambini–the house of children–it was used for a wide variety of activities over the years.  Those uses included: cooking classes, play school, sewing school, health league, night school and citizenship, rug and quilt club, piano lessons, various clubs, photography, and suppers.⁵¹

Going on 25 Years

By the late 1930s, the neighborhood was still predominantly Italian, but the reach of Neighborhood House had expanded.  Records from a 1939 membership list included 315 Italians, 34 “Colored,” 18 “American,” 16 Jewish, 10 German, 6 Irish, 5 German-Norwegian, 4 English, 3 Norwegian, 3 Austrian-German, 2 Irish-Scotch, 1 French, 17 other mixed nationalities (one each), and 54 unidentified.⁵²   By 1941 Gay Braxton remarked “We can scarcely call our neighborhood foreign now, with no new immigrants entering the country since the early ’30s.”⁵³

In the fall of 1941, Neighborhood House had been going for 25 years.  It had established a permanent space that had more than doubled in size from 1921 to five large club rooms, a manual training room, three play school rooms, and living space for five resident workers spread across two buildings.⁵⁴  By 1941, Neighborhood House was an independent organization with funding from the Vocational Board and the Community Union, and had both a board of directors and an auxiliary board. By 1941, 341 Italians had become U.S. citizens.⁵⁵   Tens of thousands had participated in Neighborhood House programs.  The Neighborhood House slogan had become “an interest for every member of the family.”⁵⁶

So it was time to celebrate.  On October 5th of 1941 Neighborhood House began a five-day observance of their 25th year serving the community of Madison. The celebration was attended by employees, members, and community leaders alike with Mark A. McCloskey, then recreation director for the Federal Security Agency (now called the United States Department of Health, Education, and Welfare), Lea D Taylor, president of the National Federation of Settlements, as well as long-time Neighborhood House leaders such as Mrs. William Kittle. The anniversary week celebrated the various groups of members who used the house. Tuesday was “Adult Day,” with a discussion of adult education led by superintendent of Madison Vocational Schools A. R. Graham, followed by a play titled Acceptance of Neighborhood House in the Neighborhood. “Citizenship day,” on Wednesday, included a speech  by Judge Fred M. Evans about citizenship issues in Madison, and then an accordion duet performed by Neighborhood House members. “Children’s day,” on Thursday, consisted of performances by children’s groups at the house, including a tap dancing recital directed by the Kehl Dancing School.⁵⁷  Organizers prepared a booklet of the history and programs of Neighborhood House.⁵⁸  300 people attended the final day’s banquet⁶⁰  and radio station WIBA broadcasted portions of the 25th anniversary events live.⁶¹

From Depression to War

Two short months after the 25th anniversary celebration, Japanese warplanes bombed the naval port at Pearl Harbor, and the United States entered World War II. Gay Braxton noted that “…our small community contributed its share of participation in the world battle by sending 290 of our boys and girls to war. Most of these went to foreign fields, eight of them gave their lives for this country.”⁶²

The impacts of the war on Neighborhood House were two-fold.  First, Neighborhood House found it hard to get and keep workers, as men and women alike were called into every aspect of the war effort. But Neighborhood House soldiered on, steadfast in its commitment: “the slogan of all settlements during the war was ‘Be as normal as possible, do not let this generation suffer for things that are his right.'”⁶³ The 1942  Wisconsin State Journal quoted Miss Braxton as saying, “During war time, we will try to keep up our normal programs, so that in later years, no Neighborhood House member will be able to point out what he missed during his childhood as a result of the war. Now more than ever, children, teen-age boys and girls and adults, as well, need the security and friendliness they can get from participation in Neighborhood House activities.”⁶⁴ Girls continued to attend sewing and handicraft lessons while boys continued  woodworking, table games, archery, and drum and bugle lessons.⁶⁵  The Lions Club purchased equipment for a photography dark room.⁶⁶  Dances provided a chance for young boys and girls to meet and socialize. In addition to the programs for youth, adults participated in sewing clubs for women, rug weaving classes, Red Cross meetings, and Sunday movie matinees at Neighborhood House. The programming schedule would begin in earnest in late afternoon after school and run well into the evening until 9 or 10pm.⁶⁷

A personal memory Volleyball at Neighborhood House, courtesy of University of Minnesota Libraries68 George Fabian, the owner of Park Street Shoe Repair who still lives and works in the neighborhood as of 2015, remembers going to Neighborhood House in the early 1940s, when he was about nine until he was a teenager. He says: “I used to go there during the week for various activities but what I remember the most is on Saturday afternoon they would show movies for a penny…. They’d show the movies and people would come in late and they’d open the door and let the light in and I remember people hollering ‘Shut the door! Shut the door!'” Mr. Fabian recalls that a lot of the volunteers at Neighborhood House were university students–“They were in charge of the place”–and how small the place was, even in its expanded space. Physical recreation was a challenge: “We played basketball and we had a low ceiling and we couldn’t shoot the ball with a high arc, we had to almost throw it straight. And it was a tiny little place, it wasn’t much bigger than the [shoe] shop in here.” Mr. Fabian emphasizes how important Neighborhood House was for the immigrants of the time. “My parents and a lot of immigrants went to night school there to learn to become a citizen. They would learn English and learn how to write their names and what have you…. My parents came here and most of the people came with nothing, nothing! And they got nothing. There was no subsidized housing, there wasn’t welfare, there was none of that and that’s a big difference. That’s why the Neighborhood House was so important to us.”69

While programs and events continued without interruption at Neighborhood House, wartime forced adjustments to the overall curriculum. As the young men of the neighborhood enlisted in military service, Neighborhood House began to cooperate with the city of Madison Defense Program, supporting the troops abroad in whatever ways possible.The Wisconsin State Journal captured the feelings of support in 1944 by quoting a young man who frequented the House as asking “if his name was listed among the 218 on the service plaque. When he was told only those in service were counted, he said, ‘Well, you will have to change it to 219 because I’m going next week.'”⁷⁰  Women gathered at Neighborhood House to sew and knit for the Red Cross, in support of the war effort, putting in 396 hours in February of 1942.⁷¹  Neighborhood House sponsored educational programs for parents of those in the service,⁷²  and for all community members on topics such as “Rationing” and “Ceiling Prices”.⁷³

A New, and Temporary, Normal

As the war drew to a close, Neighborhood House aided the war recovery efforts while teaching their children about international peace and friendship.  The girls sewing club ran the “American Youth for European Youth project” putting together and decorating medical kits and sewing kits to send overseas. The sewing kits included embroidered towels, hand-knit washcloths, hand-made baskets and needle books. Each girl donated needles, thread, and a thimble for each kit.⁷⁴ The small children’s program also made scrapbooks for Dutch children in the Netherlands, showing them what life was like in the United States.

In accordance with the 1945 yearly theme of “the United Nations,” Girl Scout Troop 34, from Neighborhood House, visited the foreign display at the historical museum on the University of Wisconsin campus and planned imaginary trips to foreign countries using travel books, following the examples set by the Camp Fire Alumni Association and the N.B.B.O..  In addition to Troop 34’s project, the handicraft group made Mexican gourd chains and the woodworking groups created motifs from other countries.⁷⁵

As soldiers began returning home to their families, “committees at the Neighborhood House arranged welcome-home parties.”⁷⁷  But it was not as simple as welcoming soldiers home and assuming life would return to normal.  “Return of boys from service, though a joyous reunion, created new problems in the families. These men left home as yong boys and returned as mature men with war horrors and world travels behind them. Adjustment to normal living at home and at work was too much for some of them. Disappointments were many and some were disillusioned upon reaching home.”⁷⁸  Even for those who stayed home, the war changed the relationship between the generations. “Four years of sorrow and distraught family life gave teenagers more freedom from parental guidance. To-day we are working with parents to meet the result of this freedom and to steer it back into the normal channel.”⁷⁹

Gradually, Neighborhood House returned to their focus on community work. Neighborhood House organized events to help families in the area meet each other and enjoy each other’s company. Starting in 1946, Family Night became a monthly tradition at Neighborhood House. Activities on these nights included blindfolded boxing run by the boys youth program, community movies, dancing to the “Virginia Reel”, singing “I’d Like a Bustle that Bends,” and potato races in which mothers and sons raced to the finish line balancing potatoes on teaspoons. Neighborhood House also gave out awards. Laverne Shunk and her four children won the award for “the largest family present.”⁸¹ In 1947 the community once again came together when the boys of Neighborhood House entered into a Soap Box Derby.⁸² Neighborhood House staff didn’t arbitrarily determine what to do.  Every ten years they surveyed their community to find out what kinds of acvtivities people in the neighborhood wanted.⁸³  And it wasn’t just token surveying.  In one case they contacted 833 families.⁸⁴

 Among the projects near and dear to Gay Braxton’s heart was the establishment of a Neighborhood House family camp. It was common for settlement houses to have their own summer camps for youth and families who could otherwise not afford a vacation, and Miss Braxton was determined that Neighborhood House would be among those.  Neighborhood House had been sending boys and girls to the camps of other agencies since 1924 when the Lions Club supported four boys going to YMCA camp for two weeks. That was also the year that Gay Braxton worked so hard to start sending girls to camp.  It was not easy to convince parents with traditional gender expectations that girls could go to camp too: “After taking mothers from the neighborhood out to view the premises and they saw a perfectly good house, no tents, and no lake near by, we were able to persuade five mothers to let us care for their daughters for one week in the then country.”  And she worked tirelessly for years after to keep the girls going to camp: “Each year after that we were able to persuade a few more mothers to entrust us with their children until in 1927 eleven mothers with their nine children went out for four days…. In 1929 we ventured to go to a cottage on the lake, but not until eight mothers with their eight children had tried us and it out first.”⁸⁵ Then the demise of  the  City Camping Commission prevented having a camp between 1930 and 1935.⁸⁶

But it was not until 1939 that Neighborhood House would establish a committee, including members of both the Neighborhood House board and the auxiliary board, to seriously pursue the question.⁸⁷  They met on and off from 1939 to 1944, visiting potential sites and finding them either unsuitable, unaffordable or too far away.⁸⁸   In 1946 a new committee formed and redoubled its efforts, even mailing 50 letters out to realtors in hopes of locating a suitable site.⁸⁹  But, alas, it was not to be, and the wind seemed to go out of the sails of the committee when Welfare Camp Inc. bought a 320 acre farm on the wisconsin River and made it available to community organizations in Dane County.⁹⁰  The failure of Neighborhood House to establish its own summer camp would be one of Braxton’s biggest disappointments.⁹¹

Not having its own camp certainly didn’t deter Neighborhood House from continuing to get its youth out of the neighborhood, however.  Hiking and hosteling continued apace, with an adventurous spirit that could only be achieved in simpler times before the bureaucratization of risk.

Trip to Mount Horeb and Blue Mounds June 10-11 1947 Seven boys and one brave leader started out the morning of June 10, riding along highways 151 and 18. “The boys gathered at the bicycle shed about 8: A.M. and had quite a time loading all their equipment in the baskets…. The first stop was made at Verona where the boys refreshed themselves and refilled the canteens…. During the trip frequent stops were made after a long hill was overcome either by riding or walking…. The next long stop was at Mount Horeb. Here it started to rain a little but no one got very wet….. Just as we started through the gate to Blue Mounds it started to rain. There was no place to take cover so the only thing to do was to get wet and this we did. Everyone was soaked to the skin but all were happy…. We finally reached a shelter and removed our wet clothing. The boys had swimming trunks and sweaters to put on. We rung out our clothes and then the sun came out and helped with the drying. …the hunt for wood then took place. Chuck Beckwith [one of the boys] went down to the owners cottage to get some wood and he used his last nine cents to buy wood…. We trampd through the woods and found plenty of dead wood to use. The fire was built and the boys started to prepare the food they had brought with them…. By this time it was getting dark and since the hostel at Mount Horeb was not open it was decided to sleep in the lookout tower…. It was a very cold night and the wind was blowing very strong…. Three of the boys used the leader for a pillow and he had a difficult time with his legs going to sleep from their weight. Four of the boys started to sing to pass away the time because by now the wind was so strong that it was almost impossible to sleep…. Finally it was day light and every one was cold so we decided to get up and built a fire and make breakfast. Everyone was tired and sleepy and wanted to get home. The next trip will be to Devil’s Lake and it is hoped the weather will be much better. Reservations will be made at the hostel.”92

In 1948, Neighborhood House made headlines with the news that Dick Miyagawa, a University of Wisconsin boxing star, had become the director of the Boy’s Program at Neighborhood House. Mr. Miyagawa graduated with a degree in Recreation and Sociology from UW Madison, in addition to being one of the first three men to complete the University’s new course in Community Recreation and Leadership. In the middle of his time at UW-Madison, he put his education and athletic career on hold and fought in Europe for 18 months during World War II as a member of the army. He returned to completing his education and participating in boxing in 1947. His fame was assured that year when he lost the NCAA 130-pound title to Glenn Hawthorne of Penn State in “one of the most unpopular decisions ever rendered in the varsity field house.”  He was renowned as a great fit for his new Neighborhood House position due to his expansive educational skill set, which included fishing, diving, swimming, music and, of course, boxing.⁹³

Miyagawa also brought an unusual multi-cultural perspective.  A Japanese American born and raised in Hawaii,⁹⁵  he lived with both poverty and the challenge of his heritage in the aftermath of World War II.  But he didn’t shy away from his ethnic and geographic background, and offered a unique talent to Neighborhood House–so unique that It took extra effort to even attempt it. Gay Braxton put the word out to Miss Betty Cass:  “Our new boys’ worker here at Neighborhood House, Dick Miyagawa, is planning to have a class in ukulele instruction, but our plans are being held up temporarily because of the scarcity of Ukuleles.”⁹⁶  Miss Cass put an article in the paper, and it was not long before Braxton wrote her in appreciation, noting that “8 ukes have been given us to date.”⁹⁷  Miyagawa pushed other boundaries as well, and got in some trouble when he brought a group of boys to Longfellow school and they misbehaved.  When he later asked for use of the Longfellow gym, he was politely declined.⁹⁸  He, like many of the boys workers, would soon move on to other pursuits.⁹⁹

The End… And The Beginning

By the late 1940s Neighborhood House had helped hundreds of new immigrants become citizens and establish themselves across Madison, touched the lives of tens of thousands of others, and watched a predominantly Italian neighborhood become more diverse with fewer foreigh-born residents and more “American white and colored” residents.¹⁰⁰  In 1926, more than half of the Neighborhood House participants were Italian immigrants.  By 1946 they were only about a quarter, having been replaced by a more diverse array of European immigrants, African Americans, and “mixed” families.¹⁰¹   Braxton was proud of the work: “Adults were encouraged to bring their talents to the settlement and exchange with adults of other countries. Many lovely patterns of crotched work, of cut work and even recipes for making spaghetti and meat balls were passed on to neighbors. Our pleasant Sunday Afternoons where the old master pieces in music were presented by Madison artists were delights to the older people.”¹⁰²

Neighborhood House had helped the community weather a Great Depression and a World War, and had shepherded its transition.  “The neighborhood has evolved from ‘Little Italy’ and ‘Green Bush’ to Columbus Park. The settlement has been successively called The American Home in the Foreign Community, The Investment in Americanization, The Melting Pot, The Trouble Clerk (where complaints, and misunderstandings in American Life were registered) and today–The Neighborhood Center.”¹⁰³

Gay Braxton had been at the helm for more than two decades–the two toughest decades of the century.  She had become increasingly worried because attendance had dropped off.  As part of a site visit for the National Federation of Settlements, Lillian Peck (who never had a warm relationship with Braxton) described that Gay Braxton “is pretty much discouraged and should go away for some period of time.”  and felt she was “hostile” to other neighborhood centers that were forming in the city at the time.¹⁰⁴

The Vocational School, which had paid the Neighborhood House staff salaries for as long as there had been paid staff, was also noticing that things were changing.  By their estimation, the Americanization mission–which was the reason for their funding–had been completed.  By the end of 1948, the Vocational School was considering ending its financial support of the Neighborhood House staff¹⁰⁵  and, early in 1949, the decision was finalized.¹⁰⁶

The discussions began about what to do.  In November of 1948, perhaps already aware of the Vocational School’s intentions, Neighborhood House board member E. B. Gordon, with a tenure as long as Braxton’s, wrote to Waterman Baldwin, executive secretary of the Madison Community Union.  He explained that the Neighborhood House board of directors wanted “an objective study made of Neighborhood House and the community by a disinterested group.” Such a study, he argued “is in line with what is being done among all settlements, who find that the dislocations incident to the war make such a study imperative.” He relayed a suggestion from a fellow board member that “the Community Welfare Council be asked to secure one of the National Federation of Settlement people to head this study.”¹⁰⁷  Shortly thereafter, Gay Braxton wrote to John McDowell, Executive Director of the National Federation of Settlements, requesting such a study.  In doing so, she made her own position clear: “I believe that the Neighborhood House has played an important part in the development of the foreign quarters of Madison and while that service may have been completed, I still feel there are other fields to conquer.”¹⁰⁸

Within two weeks, John McDowell replied to Gay Braxton that he would do the study himself.¹⁰⁹  Braxton replied with some gratitude, and some insight into how tense those times must have been:

“My urge that you direct the study is this — it will be alright with me whatever they do with the House if study is efficiently made….I should hate to see the work scrapped because of a poor study. BUT if the work done by the settlement is competed in Madison (Vocational School feels their job is completed) and can be carried on by others, I’d be the first to say God bless you–but unless this is wisely decided I would regret it…. There are two opinions among the oldsters who have served the Neighborhood House these many years. The one is those people who are releasing their hold on many things now at their advanced age; and the Neighborhood House is just another one of those things; the other opinion is that of the oldsters whose baby the settlement is and they think it should carry on indefinitely. Let’s strike the happy medium and do whatever we do wisely and with knowledge….. If the above does not show you that it is a matter of life or death that you take and direct it, I can’t make you see it.”¹¹⁰

Then, following her signature, Gay Braxton writes,  “It is not generally known here that I am leaving and I believe it is the wish of the Executive Board that it not go out until the study has been completed.”¹¹¹

The plan for the study was not without some controversy.  As word spread that the Executive Director of the National Federation of Settlements was coming to Madison to do a study, word also got around about an effort to build a a $30,000 community center in south Madison. A set of discussions temporarily put that community center project on hold and expanded McDowell’s work to also collect data for that area.¹¹²  The director of the East Side Youth Activities Council also got into the act, worried about the potential of a plan being created by outsiders.¹¹³

McDowell’s study was not as extensive as might have been expected.  He talked with 25 people serving or living in the 9th and 14th Wards, worked with secondary data on the neighborhoods, and reviewed records from Neighborhood House itself. His findings on Neighborhood House did not show an organization in decline.  In 1949 the average weekly attendance was 465, 11% preschool, 54% grade school, 21% high school, and the rest adults or families. There were  four full time and two part time staff, five students from the university’s Sociology and Recreation” program and twelve from Education. The annual budget was a modest $20,300, with $15,622 coming from the Vocational School.¹¹⁴

The need was clearly justified.  The problem was how to plug a hole that covered three-quarters of the Neighborhood House budget in the context of increasing competition from other areas of the city with an increasing need for the same services.  McDowell came up with three options.  “Plan A” would have Neighborhood House serve the entire 9th ward, but McDowell was concerned the population of need would be too small to justify the expense. “Plan B” would have Neighborhood House “serve as the headquarters of a staff that could work in as many such neighborhoods as the community could afford to serve.”  But that plan would still require physical spaces in each of the neighborhoods.  “Plan C” would turn the Neighborhood House buildings into office space for the Community Union and other community agencies, ending neighborhood work in the city. McDowell Recommended Plan B.¹¹⁵

An advisory committee created to oversee the study voted unanimously to support McDowell’s recommendation. This choice made it possible to rethink Neighorhood House as a provider of city-wide services. A follow-up committee fleshed out the plan to form “Madison Neighborhood Centers,” creating a governing committee with five members from Neighborhood House , five from the East Side Youth Activities Council, one from the city recreation department, four at large members, and one from each other neighborhood served by combined agency.¹¹⁶

On May 31, 1949, shortly after the decision to establish Madison Neighborhood Centers, Gay Braxton submitted her resignation to the Neighborhood House board of directors, which she asked be effective July 1:

 “In reflection, I have seen a newly arrived immigrant neighborhood develope into a normal American Community: I have seen most of the neighbors become naturalized citizens: I have seen the education level of the fourth grade of their parents advanced to the High School, to the University and even some higher degrees for their children: I have seen the jobs of street sweepers and ditch-diggers of their parents replaced by the business and professional careers of their children–In other words I have seen a neighborhood grow up.”¹¹⁷

Braxton apparently exited quietly as there are no records of any retirement celebration, only a mention that the board would plan a recognition dinner in her honor when she and Miss Griggs returned from summering at their cabin,¹¹⁹  but there is no record of the dinner itself. The Auxiliary Board voted Gay Braxton to be an honorary member,¹²⁰ which she graciously accepted. Braxton and Griggs also would move out of Neighborhood House to their own home at 4018 Birch Avenue, in Madison’s Westmorland neighborhood, where they regularly hosted Auxiliary Board meetings.¹²¹

E.B. Gordon, who had helped bring Braxton to Neighborhood House, resigned from the board at the same meetig that Braxton’s resignation was accepted.¹²² For the first time in 27 years, Mary Lee Griggs would commute to her work at Neighborhood House. The settlement house era had ended.  A new, as yet uncertain, era had begun.

Continue

Sources

1. December 1930 report for Board of Directors’ Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

2. Depression Hinders Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal, June 5, 1931, p. 8.

3. Gay W. Braxton, Our Work With Adults, in Neighborhood House, 1916-1941, Open Door Twenty Five Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

4. America has Dole in its Worst Form, Relief Worker Says, January 15, 1932 Wisconsin State Journal, p. 5..

5. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, Gay Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries

6. “Since 1916 Neighborhood House Has Met Changing Needs of Growing City,” Madison Capital Times, 21 January 1964, p. 9.

7. A Birdhouse built by Aldo Trameri when he was a teenager at Neighborhod House in the 1930s.
Courtesy of Jim Trameri

7. Josephine La Galbo interview, 2014.

9.  Photograph by Randy Stoecker.

10. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives;The Neighborhood House Pre-School, Mary Lee Griggs, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

11. Neighborhood House, 1916-1941, Open Door Twenty Five Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

12. organization of Camp Fire Alumni Association: 9-15-1933, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

13. Requirements for Initiation of New Members of N.B.B.O. oct. 29 1932, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

14. scrapbooks, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

15. First Hostel Trip, June 19, 1940, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives. Possibly written by Martha Nelson according to photo caption at

16. Bicyclists Posed in Front of Neighborhood House, June 19, 1940, Image ID: 95322, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives, http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM95322.

17. Braxton, 1931. Minneappolis. Next Steps Ahead of the Settlement, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

18. History of Garden Club at Neighborhoo House 1931-1938, April 10, 1935, Marjory Charlton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

19. Madison’s First Junior Garden Club Organized, Wisconsin State Journal, May 19, 1933, p. 7; History of Garden Club at Neighborhoo House 1931-1938, April 10, 1935, Marjory Charlton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives

20. 50 Elms Planted to Provide, Shade, Beauty on West Side, Capital Times, 5-27-36.

21. Sept. 23 1946 letter from F. S. Brandenburg to Brxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

22.  Neighborhood House Scrapbook: Garden Club Member, Image ID: 96376, Wisconsin Historical Society, http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM96376.

23. Braxton, Our Work With Adults, Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries

24. Ten Months’ Report Neighborhood House 1938-1939, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

25. Gay Braxton, 1929, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Cottage Data to Date- June 26, 1940 [handwritten over typed 2/9/39] Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

26.  1945-1946 at Neighborhood House, Madison, Wisconsin, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

27. Cottage Data to Date- June 26, 1940 [handwritten over typed 2/9/39] Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

28. September 27, 1929 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

29. April 11, 1930 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

30. Cottage Data to Date, [2-9-39 crossed out, June 26, 1940 handwritten in], Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

31. March 31 1931 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

32. Cottage Data to Date- June 26, 1940 [handwritten over typed 2/9/39] Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives..

33. Nov. 10 1933 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Oct. 2 1934 building inspection report 709 Mound–Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

34. April 13 1934 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.; May 11, 1934 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

35. March 5 1936 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

36. May 12, 1936, letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

37. June 8, 1936 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

38. July 20, 1936 letter from Braxton to Mrs. Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

39. Oct. 1 1936 letter from Braxton to Mr. J. P. Butler, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.; March 24 1937, letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.; Nov. 9 1937 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.; Nov. 27 1937 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

40. Oct 23, 1936 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

41. June 24, 1936 letter from Braxton to Mr. J. P. Butler, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

42. March 24 1937, letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

43. Cottage Data to Date, [2-9-39 crossed out, June 26, 1940 handwritten in], Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

44. Cottage Data to Date, [2-9-39 crossed out, June 26, 1940 handwritten in], Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

45.  January 27 1939 letter from President of board of directors to Mrs. Augustus M. Frish, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

46. February 6 1939 letter from Braxton to Mrs. Carl Tenney, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

47. Cottage Data to Date- June 26, 1940 [handwritten over typed 2/9/39]. Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; May 2, 1939 letter from John P. Butler, chairman of executive committee of Neighborhood House to Charles J. Birt of Madison Community Union , Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; May 2, 1939 letter from John P. Butler to Mrs. A. M. , Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

48. Oct. 5 1939 letter from Braxton to Daggett, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

49. Cottage Data to Date, [June 26, 1940 handwritten over typed 2/9/39], Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; April 1, 1940 letter from Braxton to Mrs. Ralph Jacobs, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.; April 5, 1940 letter from John P. Butler to Frank RossV; March 21 1940 letter from Gay Braxton to John P. Butler, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

50. April 13, 1940 letter from Kohler Co. to Mrs. Sarah Sinaiko, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.; Oct. 8, 1940 letter from Braxton to John P. Butler, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

51. March 25, 1940, Use of the Cottage, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

52. Ten Months’ Report Neighborhood House 1938-1939, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

53. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, Gay Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

54. Reminiscences of Twenty Years at Neighborhood House, Gay Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

55. Neighborhood House, an Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

56. Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

57. Wisc State Journal 7, 1941 – Neighborhood House Plans 25th Anniversary in October Sunday oct 5, 1941 – “Neighborhood House Opens its 25th Anniversary Today” ; 25th Anniversary Brochure, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

58. Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

59.  Neighborhood House 25th Anniversary Banquet program, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

60. History of Neighborhood House is Told to 300 here” The Capital Times, October 10, 1941, p. 3.

61. Neighborhood House Program to be on WIBA, Madison Capitol Times, Oct. 5, 1941, p. 28;  Neighborhood House Plans 25th Anniversary in October, The Capitol Times, July 27, 1941; Neighborhood House Opens its 25th Anniversary Today Wisconsin State Journal, Oct. 5, 1941;  25th Anniversary Brochure, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries

62. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House Today, Gay W. Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

63. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House Today, Gay W. Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

64. Neighborhood House Prepares Madisonians to Win Citizenship. Wisconsin State Journal, September 23, 1942.

65. Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries

66. The Enlistment of a Service Club in Time of Peace. Given to Lions’ Club at Neighborhood House Noon luncheon 1/19/43,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

67. Neighborhood House Adds to Program, Wisconsin State Journal, August 27, 1944, p. 22; Neighborhood House 1916-1941 Open Door 25 Years of Service, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries

68. photo from 1945-1946 at Neighborhood House, Madison, Wisconsin, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

69. George Fabian interview, 2014

70. Neighborhood House Adds to Program. Wisconsin State Journal, August 27, 1944.

71. Louise C. Marston, Housewives Manage to Find Time for Many Hours of Red Cross Work, Wisconsin State Journal, March 15, 1942, p. 13.

72. Program Planned for Service Parents, Wisconsin State Journal, June 14, 1942.

73. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; A Decade of the Auxiliary Board History, Mrs. Ralph Jacobs, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

74.  Neighborhood House Projects Get Underway, Wisconsin State Journal, November 4, 1945.

75.   Neighborhood House Groups Have Projects. Wisconsin State Journal, November 18, 1945.

76.  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

77. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives. A Decade of the Auxiliary Board History, Mrs. Ralph Jacobs, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

78. Neighborhood House October 1, 1946-April 1, 1947,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

79. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House Today, Gay W. Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

80.  photo from 1945-1946 at Neighborhood House, Madison, Wisconsin, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

81. Neighborhood House Has Family Party, Wisconsin State Journal, October 30, 1946.

82. Timeline,1948 from Neighborhood House archives.

83. E.B. Gordopn to Waterman Baldwin, 11-22-48 correspondence, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

84. Neighborhood House October 1, 1946 – April 1, 1947.From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

85. Gay Braxton presentation to “board meeting 0ct 19, 1939”, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

86. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; The Family Camp, Edmund Hart, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

87. letter from John P. Butler to Mrs. T. F. Kennedy, Nov. 7, 1939, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

88. Camping study Committee Meeting, Dec. 11, 1939, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives. October 17, 1940; minutes of the board of directors, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

89. letter from Leo Kehl, member of family camp committee to Gay Braxton, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; 7-12-44; letter from Ralph Jacobs to Mrs. Al. Retzlaff, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; camp committee meeting march 18, 1946, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; minutes of the family camp committee Oct. 28 1946, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; minutes of camp committee, Oct. 27, 1947, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; The Family Camp, Edmund Hart, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

90. New Organization Plans Boys Camp, Wisconsin State Journal, December 21, 1947.

91. letter from Gay Braxton to Board of Directors of the Neighborhood House, May 31, 1949, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

92. Trip to Mount Horeb and Blue Mounds June 10-11 1947, Charles Schwartz,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

93. Star Boxer Miyagawa Heads Boys Work at Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal, February 1, 1948, p.17.

94. Photo from, Star Boxer Miyagawa Heads Boys Work at Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal, February 1, 1948, p.17.  Courtesy of Wisconsin State Journal.

95. Lords of the Ring: The Triumph and Tragedy of College Boxing’s Greatest Team, By Doug Moe, University of Wisconsin Press, 2005.

96. Feb. 18, 1948 letter from Gay Braxton to Miss Betty Cass, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives:.

97. Apr 8 1948 letter from Gay Braxton to Miss Betty Cass, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives:, thanking her for the article in Feb. asking for ukuleles..

98. Feb 26 1948 letter from GayBraxton to Mr. Philip H. Falk, city superintendent of schools, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; March 16 1948 letter from Glenn Holmes, director of Madison public schools dept. of health, phys ed, recreation, and safety, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

99. Barbara Ellis and Lois Bradley, Swimming Meet Big Event in Lives of Teen Agers, Wisconsin State Journal, August 14, 1949, p. 10.

100. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House Today, Gay W. Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

101. Neighborhood House October 1, 1946 – April 1, 1947,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

102. Neighborhood House: An Answer to a City Need, Mrs. William Kittle, October 9, 1941, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; An Interest for Every Member of The Family, Gay W. Braxton, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

103. 1945 – 1946 at Neighborhood House, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

104. Lillian Peck, Neighborhood House October 1, 1946 – April 1, 1947. From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 242, Folder 534, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

105. Trade School’s Needs Weighed, Wisconsin State Journal, 1December 12, 1948.

106. City-Wide Welfare Plan Studied Here, Wisconsin State Journal, pp. 1, 2, March 31, 1949.

107. letter from E. B. Gordon to Waterman Baldwin, 11-22-48, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

108.  letter from Gay Braxton to John McDowell, 12-3-48, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

109. letter from John McDowell to Gay Braxton, 12-15-48, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

110. letter from Gay Braxton to John McDowell, 12-27-48, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

111. letter from Gay Braxton to John McDowell, 12-27-48, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

112. letter from Waterman Baldwin to John McDowell, 2-24-49, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

113. Youth Center SurveyPlanned for South Side, Wisconsin State Journal, February 18, 1949, pp 1, 2]

114. Report on Study of Neighborhood House, John McDowell, 3-17-49, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

115. Report on Study of Neighborhood House, John McDowell, 3-17-49, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

116. May 4 1949 minutes of the Neighborhood House Survey Follow-Up Committee, From the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 12, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

117. letter from Gay Braxton  to Board of Directors of the Neighborhood House, May 31, 1949, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives,  letter from R. W. Bardwell, director of Vocational and Adult School to Gay Braxton, March 29, 1949, acknowledges “your resignation from the Vocational School staff at the close of the present year.”

118.  Madison Altrusa Club, Image ID: 57755, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives, http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM57755.

119. Mary Brandel Hopkins, An Orchid to Miss Gay Braxton,  The Capital Times, July 9 1949.

120. Oct. 5 1949 auxiliary board meeting,  Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Nov. 1, 1949 auxiliary board meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

121. March 7 1950 auxiliary board meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Oct. 2 1951 auxiliary board meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Dec. 4 1951  auxiliary board meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Oct 5 1954 auxiliary board meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Oct. 4 1955  auxiliary board meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

122.  Gay Braxton’s Resignation Accepted.  Wisconsin State Journal, June 24, 1949.

Neighborhood House 1949-1966:  Finding a New Path

Neighborhood House tried to carry on with some sense of normalcy into the 1950s, but its placement under the auspices of Madison Neighborhood Centers  was impossible to ignore.  The administrative structure had changed and the funding structure had changed.  No longer was Neighborhood House in charge of its own staff or its own funding or even its own programming.  As Madison Neighborhood Centers, or MNC, established itself, Neighborhood House would be transformed.

Madison Neighborhood Centers

The story of Neighborhood House in the 1950s is a story in the background of the bigger stories of the time.  And the first of those stories is Madison Neighborhood Centers.  MNC was a bold attempt to have it both ways–a coordinated network of community organizations with centralized funding, and a decentralized network of community organizations with maximum autonomy. There were many crucial questions to be answered:  how much autonomy would each center have? How would funds be allocated? How would governance be structured?

As MNC got organized, it hired Chester Zmudzinski as the director on the recommendation of John McDowell, the Director of the National Federation of Settlements whose study had led to the creation of MNC.¹ Zmudzinski  had done a stint at the Orleans Neighborhood Center in New Orleans  prior to his wartime military service.²  After the war, he spent a year doing community organizing in Cleveland and then returned to his hometown of Pittsburgh to run a settlement house.³ He arrived fresh in Madison in September 1949 to direct MNC.⁵ Chester Zmudzinski, and his wife, Florence Zmudzinski, would quickly become important players on the Madison community organization and urban redevelopment scenes. Zmudzinski believed that MNC continued the settlement philosophy that would “help people take continuously greater responsibility for working out their own problems.”⁶   Florence would volunteer at Neighborhood House until she became a field supervisor for the University of Wisconsin School of Social Work in 1955.⁷   The Zmudzinskis would initially move into Neighborhood House, which was also the first headquarters of MNC.  By May of 1953, they had moved into the former Casa di Bambini at 709 Mound Street, where they remained at least until 1960 and probably until urban renewal wiped the neighborhood off the map.⁸  Chester Zmudzinski brought with him a flare for neighborhood organizing⁹ that would have caught Saul Alinsky’s eye.  We don’t know whether Zmudzinski was aware of Alinsky’s work,¹⁰ though the famous community organizer’s notoriety was certainly spreading by this time, and Zmudzinski’s practice was certainly consistent with much of Alinsky’s style of community organizing.

MNC brought together Neighborhood House with the East Side Youth Activities Council (which would later become the Atwood Community House¹¹) and the south Madison group that would shortly create the South Madison Neighborhood Center.¹²  These were the three organizations that had gotten into the mix through the McDowell study that recommended the MNC concept. This combined MNC would almost immediately become a “Red Feather Agency” of the Madison Community Chest (the latest incarnation of what would eventually become the United Way), a high honor in those days.¹³

As MNC matured, it defined itself as an agency that worked “to make neighborhoods…better places in which to live” with “a program of recreation and informal education” that emphasized “creating neighborliness.” It focused on three levels:  One was to “help develop the best potentialities of the individual.” Another was “the group” as the “laboratory of democracy.” Finally, the expectation was that the individual “will evolve for himself the kind of attitude that will help him to move beyond his own immediate needs and those of his group to that of the wider neighborhood.”¹⁵  MNC expanded its board of directors to five members each from Neighborhood House Association, Atwood Community House, and South Madison Neighborhood Center, selected by their advisory boards.  Those 15 members would then select 10 at-large board members.  Each center was to have its own center director, but there would remain a tension between centralization and decentralization.  At a 1952 board meeting, when the question arose of whether the MNC board would have to approve the by-laws of the individual community centers, the president of the Neighborhood House board took the position  that “the autonomy of the agencies is complete.”  Zmudzinski, however, believed that the MNC board had “responsibility for all activities at all agencies.”¹⁶   MNC would eventually create a thick manual of policies governing programming and even use of the physical facilites at the three centers.¹⁷   Mary Lee Griggs would no longer be an employee of Neighborhood House, but would serve as the pre-school director for MNC, running programs at the South Madison Neighborhood Center as well as at Neighborhood House.¹⁸

The New Neighborhood House

 In the first year of operation after Gay Braxton’s retirement, Chester Zmudzinski was not only the MNC director, but also the director of Neighborhood House.¹⁹  He maintained some continuity, including the still popular Family Night,²⁰ woodworking for men, and sewing for women.²¹  Involvement of university students also continued, with group-work students from the University of Wisconsin school of social work, and recreation students from the school of education.²²  But there were also changes.

In the fall of 1949, Mary Lee Griggs began bringing Neighborhood House reports to the auxiliary board meetings, filling Gay Braxton’s shoes in only that specific role.²³  The Neighborhood House board, now awkwardly both an “advisory” board to MNC and a formal board for the Neighborhood House Association, changed their constitution to increase “representation from the neighborhood served” and delete “reference to Vocational School support or to work among immigrants” as Zmudzinski had challenged that their board was controlled by outsiders and of course the Vocational School was no longer involved.²⁴

And there were programmatic changes.  On October 1, 1950, Neighborhood House began revealing those changes through an open house to presents its new face to the community, with  Al Waxman as the new center director.  The open house brought together Neighborhood House’s board of directors, staff, and young and old members of the center. Neighborhood House provided cookies and refreshments as board members and Al Waxman gave personal tours of Neighborhood House, explaining the changes with posters and graphs.  Bob Rowen, the new director of the South Madison Neighborhood Center, also attended the open house, showcasing the partnerships Neighborhood House had garnered since it became a part of Madison Community Centers. Overall, more than 200 Madison residents attended the open house and   Chester Zmudzinski was pleased to see what he perceived as “a good cross-section of the people of Madison.”²⁵

Madison Neighborhood Centers and Neighborhood House attempted to articulate a new holistic model to guide their work.   In this model, both the individual and the community would be helped through group participation. Research to determine community needs was also an important part of the model. And accomplishing these impacts would require everything from individual casework to groupwork to community organization and a shift to more intensive intervention.²⁶ The belief was that Neighborhood House had concentrated too much on large groups that “centered around interest and age levels and bordered on mass activities.” Now, the groups were to be smaller and organized around friendships and common needs.  In addition, the model emphasized the importance of serving people, especially children, whose problems were too severe to allow them to function in groups. In 1954, for example, Neighborhood House had approximately 20 groups of youth, ranging from three to fifteen years old, but only about 175 total.  Similarly, there were six adult groups with 180 total members.   There would also be a shift away from education and toward civic engagement and community building that would attempt to tackle local issues and  overcome the divisions arising in the neighborhood as race and class differences became more prominent.²⁸

In contrast to this holistic model that appeared on paper, the practice seemed more bifurcated between the divisions forming in the field of social work at the time between the clinical therapy model and the more political community organizing model.

On the clinical side were the casework and groupwork methods that Neighborhood House staff, volunteers, and interns began using, especially in their programs focused on children. Perhaps the most pronounced of these was the pre-school.  Miss Griggs had become the second most powerful staff person at MNC with her apppointment as the organization’s pre-school director.  Neighborhood House’s remodeled pre-school room featured prominently at the 1950 open house and, by its second year, would double its enrollment.²⁹  Neighborhood House also started a school for what at the time were labeled “mentally retarded children” with the Madison Board of Education.³¹  The emphasis on children would also bring with it an emphasis on recreation, not simply for recreation’s sake, but as a human development strategy.³² “Better citizens through neighborhood participation in constructive recreation programs” was a main focus for Madison Neighborhood Centers and, for Neighborhood House, “Community betterment through neighborly cooperation, creative group activity and recreation is now the watchword.” As part of the strategy, Neighborhood House participated with the Junior Chamber of Commerce in establishing “tot-lots”–miniature playgrounds for children–in the 1950s.²³

More clinical forms of social work grew as Neighborhood House responded to the shifting demographics of the neighborhood.  The organization continued to work with the remaining Italian and Jewish immigrants but as they gradually gained economic stability, and urban renewal plans for the area leaked out, many of those families moved out and low-income black families moved into the neighborhood. These families experienced some of the same problems as the previous groups that lived in the neighborhood but they also possessed their own  issues exacerbated by racism and poverty. In order to better serve the more diverse community, Neighborhood House started developing relationships with the Dane County Public Assistance Department, Family Services, the Probation Department of Dane County and the City Welfare Department.³⁴  The center took many roles like providing services for undeserved populations, starting a program for the elderly, and acting as a referral service to put people in touch with specific agencies or service centers based on their needs.³⁵  In 1952 Madison Neighborhood Centers collaborated with the Dane County Mental Health Center to develop parent discussion groups.  Neighborhood House worked with Family Services to develop methods for supporting families whose children were in the intensive group service program.³⁶

The emphasis on casework would grow.  When John McDowell was brought back to study MNC in 1957, one of his major findings was that staff regularly encountered family and personal problems in their work, and that there should be a professional case worker on staff.  MNC struggled to get funding to achieve that goal, however.³⁷

On the one hand, then, Neighborhood House shifted to a professionalized clinical social work model.  But, on the other hand, perhaps the most profound shift in the work was the emphasis on community organizing.  In some ways the emphasis  was simply an extension of the settlement house model that focused on building the capacity of the community.  In other ways, however, the emphasis on community organizing was a shift from building capacity to also putting that capacity into motion. And Chester Zmudzinski seemed at his best when he was organizing his neighbors to raise a ruckus.

From Neighborhood House to the Neighborhood

In the words of the Madison Neighborhood Centers’ Fifth Anniversary Report,

 “Perhaps the most significant development of the past five years is that of the Brittingham Neighborhood Council–a citizen’s organization which has been very active in the solution of neighborhood problems. This organization has succeeded in involving the people in the elimination of land use such as salvage yards and has prevented zoning changes which compromise the residential nature of their neighborhood. In addition they have succeeded in getting properly painted crosswalks as well as the elimination of parkiing on the park side of W. Washington Avenue to protect the children attending the Brittingham Park playground.”³⁸

The Brittingham Neighborhood Council formed probably in early 1953.  It was also referred to as the Brittingham Park Neighborhood Council and the  Brittingham Park Civic Council,  and was the full embodiment of Neighborhood House’s “new approach centered on helping the people to exercise their rights and responsibilities as citizends toward the solution of problems facing the neighborhood.”³⁹  It was also part of a broader community organizing effort from MNC, which additionally supported the South Madison Neighborhood Council.⁴⁰

It is not completely clear how deeply involved MNC and Neighborhood House were in the formation and sustenance of the Brittingham Neighborhood Council. Some reports say that the group formed initially to oppose a zoning change that would have brought more industry to the neighborhood and they then contacted Neighborhood House to help them organize a neighborhood council.⁴¹   Al Waxman, who was the Neighborhood House director until 1953 or 4, described himself as an “advisor” to the group.⁴²   And Zmudzinski, who we must remember was also a neighborhood resident, figured prominently in news coverage of the issues that the Neighborhood Council took on.⁴³   But who recruited residents, organized the meetings, and managed the details of keeping the organization running is not discussed in the available documents.

What is clear is that Zmudzinski and Neighborhood House provided a lot of logistical support, particularly when it came to organizing against the junkyards in the neighborhood.  Perhaps the way to understand the transition from the settlement house version of Neighborhood House to this new community organizing incarnation was that the settlement house version helped residents sustain themselves in the face of living in the midst of a foul urban slum made all the worse by a lack of controls over what businesses could do in the neighborhood.  The new Neighborhood House took on as its mission helping residents to change causes rather than only deal with the effects.  As the famous community organizer Saul Alinsky was fond of saying about social workers, “They organize to get rid of four-legged rats and stop there. We organize to get rid of four-legged rats so we can get on to removing two-legged rats.”⁴⁴

The metaphor aptly describes what was happening in the neighborhood now known as Brittingham.  In the neighborhood’s midst were two salvage yards, and residents charged that they were a breeding ground for the rats that infested the neighborhood, along with being an assault on the senses.⁴⁵  The Brittingham Neighborhood Council engaged the battle in the summer of 1953, organizing a petition with 400 signatures opposing the license renewals for Paley Brothers Company salvage yard and Gerke Auto Parts.⁴⁶

The Madison city council arranged a public hearing on the relicensing question, held in a school auditorium in expectation of a large crowd.  Neighborhood House got a local bus company to provide transportation, and obtained loudspeakers to publicize the meeting.  300 people showed up and they were in a raucous mood, at times drowning out the supporters of relicensing.  Neighborhood House staff stayed in the background, having provided research support, with photos of the legal violations they believed Paley Brothers and Gerke had committed. Zmudzinski did not stay in the background, testifying against the relicensing along with many other residents.⁴⁷  The Neighborhood Council won big–getting Gerke’s license revoked, forcing Paley to move everything inside a rat-proof warehouse, and getting the building of a third junkyard torn down.⁴⁸

Like most community organizing groups of the time, the Council wasn’t merely oppositional.  From the big confrontational win on the junkyards, they would move on to a variety of issues–fixing drainage on streets, painting crosswalks, getting fencing around softball diamonds, and influencing zoning appeals.⁴⁹  Perhaps most notably, they became active in the city’s urban renewal efforts for the neighborhood,⁵⁰  which may have ultimately led to their undoing in 1960.⁵¹

Neighborhood House’s Neighborhood in the Throes of Urban Renewal

Neighborhood House got a new director, Quentin Schenk,⁵² just as urban renewal was heating up in the mid-1950s.  The long arc of history has not been kind to urban renewal.  Variously referred to as “urban removal” or “negro removal” by its critics, urban renewal was caught in the contradiction between the desire to do good and a lack of understanding that “good” was not just about the product but also about the process.  And so it was in Madison when Mayor Paul Soglin, who inherited the last vestiges of what would be known as the Triangle project when he first became mayor in 1973, was paraphrased in 2013 as judging it “one of many unsuccessful urban renewal projects of its era”.⁵³

The first target of urban renewal in the area was the Brittingham redevelopment project south of Washington Avenue–across the street and to the east of Neighborhood House–and already problems with the process were appearing.⁵⁴  And even in the midst of questions being raised over whether government could simply condemn and take land and buildings for urban renewal, Madison city government had expanded its focus across West Washington Avenue to the “Triangle”⁵⁵ — the exact area that Neighborhood House defined as its neighborhood during the settlement house era.

Government urban renewal advocates chose this area of the city because they perceived it as deteriorated and crime ridden. However, George Fabian, who participated in Neighborhood House as a child in the 1940s, recalled, “in my experience there was nothing bad about the neighborhood… Doors were left unlocked, and everybody felt safe.”⁵⁶  Rather, the city’s urban renewal planners targeted the neighborhood for these projects because it was one of the oldest neighborhoods in Madison and its housing stock was slowly deteriorating.⁵⁷ To a large extent, both perceptions are true.

But the promise, or threat, of urban renewal made things worse well before the housing was torn down.  As word got out, there was an accelerated exodus from the neighborhood as long-time families started leaving as early as 1958. They were replaced by people with less money and more stressed lives, and many of them were African American.  Landlords began renting indiscriminately, unable to find more stable tenants who didn’t fear that the neighborhood would be bulldozed out from under them.⁵⁸

 Chester and Florence Zmudzinski would play influential roles in Madison’s urban renewal saga. Chester Zmudzinski was known as a proponent of urban renewal and was not shy about single-handedly trying to influence its course, forwarding his own proposals to the mayor’s office.⁶⁰    In a 1957 letter from Chester Zmudzinski to John McDowell, still the director of the National Federation of Settlements at the time, he writes proudly that “The Neighborhood Council in the Neighborhood House area had succeeded in opposing the vested interests in their attempt to block urban renewal in their neighborhood. This year one whole block will be razed and replaced with new apartment dwellings.” Then, a bit further down and in a different tone, he acknowledges that “It doesn’t seem like it will be much more than five years that Neighborhood House will remain in its present location….  One of the things that perhaps bothers us most is to gather conviction about what our role will be in this neighborhood and the south side when these neighborhoods are renewed.”⁶¹

Chester Zmudzinski’s main purpose for writing McDowell was to invite him out to conduct another study of what MNC had accomplished in its eight years of existence, and to answer some strategic questions about its future.  McDowell’s report was highly complimentary of how his own recommendations had been implemented.  He also was supportive of Chester Zmudzinski’s community involvement, writing that “Chester Zmudzinski’s activities in relation to citizen participation in city planning and urban renewal are quite appropriate for a neighborhood center’s agency executive. In fact, many such executives in other cities envy him his direct channels of communication to this branch of city government. It is to the advantage of the neighborhoods served by this agency that such channels be maintained.” But McDowell also issued a caution:  “The transiency of so many families in the Neighborhood House area, the relatively high extent of poverty as measured by public welfare recipients and the uncertainty as to the future of urban renewal programs in the neighborhood make the task of finding and developing local leadership much more difficult.”⁶²

McDowell’s worry was shared by the Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board, which was getting regular updates on urban renewal planning for the Triangle area as early as 1958.  In 1959 they invited Rebecca Barton, director of the Governor’s Commission on Human Rights, to speak on “Human Rights and the Triangle Area.”⁶³  In November of 1959 the Auxiliary Board bluntly categorized its concerns for the neighborhood:

  “A particular problem is our neighborhoods undergoing Urban Renewal –
1. Robbed of our leadership –
2. Creating an economic and racial Ghetto–
Sapped of its social and psychological strength.
Look forward to an increase in Juvenile Delinquency
Services needed –
1. Pre-relocation services
2. Relocation services
3. Post relocation services.”⁶⁴

Neighborhood House did what it could to counterbalance the centrifugal force of urban renewal.  They encouraged more organizing among the new residents of the neighborhood, having supported two “negro groups” that gradually invited white members to join them.⁶⁵    MNC staff also conducted a survey of the Triangle area in October 1960.  At that point, they found, the neighborhood was about two-thirds white, and one-third homeowners. Only about one-sixth of the housing was occupied by residents who had been there ten or more years. The survey also documented some of the tensions between old and new residents that included both Blacks and college students, and expressed concerns about what would happen to everyone who would be displaced.⁶⁶  The study produced worries:   “Redevelopment will cost the transient community a cheap place to live… It will cost the stable community its home….  A number living on income from buildings they own in the Triangle will be unable to buy similar income property with the price they are likely to receive when they are bought out.”⁶⁷

Chester Zmudzinski’s support for urban renewal waned somewhat as concerns about displacement grew, and he took leadership among the residents in opposing government property acquisition for the Brittingham project until there was adequate relocation for the Triangle residents.⁶⁸  Some of these concerns were likely amplified by Florence Zmudzinski, who took a position with the Madison Redevelopment Authority (MRA) in 1960⁶⁹  and became the MRA’s relocation officer for the Triangle project in 1961.⁷⁰  Chester would reaffirm his support after becoming involved in backroom negotiations to create 160 units of pubic housing across the city, including 60 units of public housing for seniors in the Triangle area, approved by the city council in 1961,⁷¹ though none were ready by the time residents needed them.⁷²

Florence Zmudzinski was perhaps even less easy to satisfy.  In late 1962, as the first buildings were being razed in the Triangle, she issued a scathing report on the failures of the MRA to address the extreme shortage of habitable, affordable housing and the excess of racial discrimination preventing Blacks in particular from obtaining decent affordable housing.⁷³  In short, her position was that “the relocation plan is ‘unrealistic’ in terms of existing housing; ‘over-optimistic’ about new housing; ‘unknowing’ about needs of displaced persons; ‘misleading’ about financing; ‘uninformed’ on Negro problems, and ‘misinformed on reduced-rate housing.”⁷⁴

The heat increased, as more groups organized against urban renewal. The Madison Home Owners Association, formed in August of 1963, and including residents from the Triangle area who were apparently without the support of MNC or Neighborhood House, hung the MRA in effigy and put a referendum on the April 1964 municipal ballot to disband the MRA.  It lost by only 367 votes out of 39,000 cast. ⁷⁵

Neighborhood House in the Throes of Urban Renewal

It was in this context of uncertainty and conflict that Neighborhood House attempted to operate. And the uncertainty and conflict would reach into Neighborhood House itself.  For Neighborhood House was inside the Triangle and was facing the same wrecking ball as every other building in the neighborhood.  By this time Nancy Kelley had become the center director,⁷⁶ and she would be given the monumental task of helping to shepherd Neighborhood House through planning, replanning, replanning yet again, managing the organization through its own displacement, and eventually helping it settle back in.

It was also a context of sadness.  Not only were the staff and boards of Neighborhood House dealing with the reality that a building brought to life over 40 years by the sounds of joy and anguish, the sights of children and adults, the smells of coffee and tobacco and spilled juice, the impressions left by hands and feet, was going to be destroyed. On March 25, 1962, Gay Braxton died at the home she shared with Mary Lee Griggs, following a short illness.⁷⁷

Planning for the expected move had actually begun as far back as the end of 1960, when Neighborhood House leaders thought they might have a  new building in Brittingham Park that could be shared with the Child Guidance Association.⁷⁹  A year later they were considering purchasing a property from a Mrs. Ganzer at the corner of Mills and Vilas, building a two-story structure, and renting the second floor to the Dane County Guidance clinic.⁸⁰   The fall of the next year Neighborhood House began looking west of South Park Street.⁸¹

By spring of 1963, Madison Neighborhood Centers was considering a space at South Mills and Milton, but they were competing with a doctors group considering the whole block.⁸²  The doctors shifted their attention to the next block, allowing MNC to bid on the space they wanted, and Neighborhood House began planning for a 140 x 140 buiding.  Neighborhood House began fundraising planning.  It is worth reflecting upon the fact that the MRA was apparently only offering $42,000 for the existing Neighborhood House property, leaving the Neighborhood House auxiliary board with a fundraising goal of $65,000 in March of 1963⁸³ that grew to $75,000 by the next month.⁸⁴  Given that this was the gap that Neighborhood House faced, it is no wonder there were concerns raised over the relocation of residents.

In another illustration of the machinations wrought by urban renewal, discussions about the new Neighborhood House building then shifted to the possibility of moving the relatively new Glidden Paint building from Regent Street to the new Neighborhood House property rather than demolishing it.⁸⁵  There was a clause in the urban renewal documents that would allow for the possibility,⁸⁶  but it had been all but  ignored in planners’ zeal to enact their own grand plans on a bulldozed blank slate.  But Neighborhood House persevered, and judged that the costs–$5,000 to buy buy the building, $80,000 to move and remodel it, and $50,000 to add gym onto it–would be $41,000 less than a new building.  And they convinced the MRA.⁸⁷ In February of 1964 the MRA authorized seeking bids on the plan.⁸⁸

As it would turn out, however, the bids to renovate the Glidden Paint building came in way higher than hoped, exceeding the Neighborhood House budget by $70,000.  Luckily, the MRA released them from the the obligation to buy the building.⁸⁹

The plan shifted to a new building of “prefabricated steel components covered by a masonry exterior, at a total cost of some $175,000.”⁹⁰  And time was growing short.  Demolition of Neighborhood House would not wait until a new building had been constructed.  Like so many residents from the neighborhood, Neighborhood House was to be evicted before they could find an appropriate new home. But first, they had to say goodbye. The auxiliary board began planning a “Farewell to Neighborhood House,” asking their members to bring sheet cakes.⁹²  In May of 1964 125 people, including many who grew up with Neighborhood House showed up to say farewell.⁹³   One of the old-timers reflects on Neighborhood House and the day of farewell:  “It was the place to go when you didn’t have any other place to go when I’m maybe from 5 to 15. You could always walk in, when they didn’t want you anyplace else. They didn’t preach at you….  You know I’ll never forget the last day of the old Neighborhood House. It got around, and a lot of us filtered back. One woman came back from the state of Washington, just for the occasion. It didn’t get any publicity but we had a cake, and some coffee, and talked about old days.”⁹⁵

And then it was time to move.  The staff settled into an old house at 110 South Lake Street^.96  Nancy Kelley recalls that “18 groups, from nursery school through parent groups met in schools, churches, and a neighborhood barber shop.”⁹⁷  An unidentified author reported that “The basement of this house is full of storage. The activities are being held in Longfellow School, Trousdale Methodist Church and St. James Educational wing. Staff and some older groups are being held in the office building on Lake Street.”⁹⁸  The Zmudzinskis would have to move also, and would end up at 2007 Adams Street⁹⁹  in the Vilas neighborhood. By the fall of 1964¹⁰⁰ 768 West Washington would exist no more.

The challenge was immense–how to have Neighborhood House without a Neighborhood House.  But Nancy Kelley looks back on the time as a defining moment in the organization’s history:  “Heavy emphasis was placed on home visiting, so that families coming into the program for the first time could identify themselves with the services of the agency, rather than a physical facility. Of the 87 families participating in the minimum care program that year, only six were from ‘The Bush.’… Looking back over this difficult period of transition, the staff now believes that the decentralization of services and extension of itself into the newly-defined service area were the crucial factors in maintaining the agency’s vitality.”¹⁰¹

New Beginnings, New Endings

Construction for the new Neighborhood House began in late January, 1965.¹⁰² Friends of Neighborhood House came out of the woodwork.  George Foster, the executive director of the Wisconsin Bankers Association, accompanied Chester Zmudzinski on fundraising expeditions.  Oscar Rennebohm, when asked for $15,000 for Neighborhood House, instead gave $65,000 for Neighborhood House and the South Madison Neighborhood Center.¹⁰³  Friends and former staff funded the equipment for the new pre-school room.  The Altrusa Club, which Gay Braxton and Mary Lee Griggs had been involved in, gave $1,000. The Auxiliary Board raised funds to buy extra land for a children’s play yard.¹⁰⁴  Leo Kehl, who had been involved with Neighborhood House for more than 30 years, teaching dance there, donated  the Kehl School of Dance 35th recital proceeds to Neighborhood House.¹⁰⁵

While the new Neighborhood House was being constructed, a set of apartments were also going up in the Triangle area.  These were the senior citizen apartments resulting from the deal cut to gain the backing of area residents and Chester Zmudzinski, and quell the critiques of Florence Zmudzinski.  On June 24, 1965, the complex would be dedicated as the Gay Braxton apartments and its address would be 702 Braxton Place.  The day of the dedication Gay Braxton’s aura was expanded as both city newspapers reported, presumably on the basis of one of the speeches, that she had led Neighborhood House for 40 years,¹⁰⁷ though it was actually “only” from 1921 to 1949.

Back at Neighborhood House, center director Kelley was focusing on the new neighborhood before the new building even opened.  Nancy Kelley saw a neighborhood where one of every twelve families was headed by a single parent, where half the families there in 1960 had not been there in 1943, where the average annual income was $1,000 below the city average, and where people feared that the bulldozer might come for their home too. In response, Neighborhood House had already helped organize the Lake Wingra Community Council to protect against the unchecked excesses of urban renewal.¹⁰⁸  The Council would not be shy, even taking the bold step of opposing expansion of the zoo in November of 1965.¹⁰⁹  And Kelley was contemplating whether Neighborhood House should start specializing more than in the past, perhaps focusing on the residents of the Gay Braxton apartments who were participating in a needs assessment conducted by a graduate student who was partnering with Neighborhood House.¹¹⁰

The new Neighborhood House began operations in the fall of 1965,¹¹¹ sharing its space with the Dane County Mental Health Center West Side Clinic.  The building, though half the size of the original plan and just under $200,000,¹¹² had a unique configuration with a gymnasium in the center and then offices on either side with separate entrances.  So the clinic operated on one side, and Neighborhood House operated on the other, with direct access to the gym, and two floors of office and meeting space.  The building was dedicated on October 31st in front of 200 supporters and a cast of speakers that included  Mayor Otto Festge, Dane County Board of Supervisors chair Darwin Bruns, the 9th ward alder, the Madison Redevelopment Authority chair, and the United Community Chest executive director.¹¹³

There would be two more changes that would make the break between the old Neighborhood House and the new almost complete. First, in December of 1965, the Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board decided to dissolve.  Like others, they also took the position that Neighborhood House should be more led by its local constituency.  Many of them had also served for a very long time, and perhaps they saw this as a moment for a clean slate.  In any event, they quietly disbanded, though pledged their continuing support should they ever be needed.¹¹⁴  

Then came the final break with the past.  In 1966 Mary Lee Griggs had worked with preschool children and done dozens of other jobs at Neighborhood House for 44 years, surpassing even Gay Braxton’s longevity with the organization. She worked at the West Washington location, the South Madison Neighborhood Center, and and briefly at the new Mills Street location. In May of 1966 she announced her retirement. Like Gay Braxton before her

, Miss Griggs was reluctant to be the center of attention.  “I’ve had all the thanks any teacher or social worker could ever want in seeing what fine citizens my boys and girls have turned out to be.”¹¹⁵  “I didn’t want any attention paid whatever to my retirement, but nobody would listen to me.”¹¹⁶  At a special retirement dinner honoring her decades of work, Henry Barnbrock Jr., the author of the 1916 University of Wisconsin thesis that helped jump-start Neighborhood House, was the surprise guest of honor¹¹⁷⁵

Griggs reflected on the most recent changes with some sadness “It made my heart ache to see the houses and the people go…. It was hardest for me, too, to see the little girls grow up to be mothers and ask me to care for their children, only to find they live too far from the center.”¹¹⁸ Her concern  foreshadowed the future. In the ensuing years, that sadness would become anger.

Continue

Notes

1. Pittsburgh Man, 35, Gets Neighborhood Centers Position, Wisconsin State Journal July 20, 1949.

2. http://host.madison.com/news/obituaries/article_18196c6e-af5a-5555-8058-fb45d67ab3da.html.

3. Chester Zmudzminski, Wisconsin State Journal May 30, 1965.

4.. photo-sketh by Edward Schumann, Chester Zmudzinski, Wisconsin State Journal May 30, 1965.

5.. David Giffey,  Chester Zmudzinski,   pp. 45-47 The people’s stories of South Madison, 2001, Volume 1,http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/WI/WI-idx?type=article&did=WI.MPLPeopleStory.i0024&id=WI.MPLPeopleStory&isize=M&pview=hide.

6. Chester Zmudzinski, “The Development of Decentralized Services”, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

7. Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush. Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63

8. New Director Here, Capital Times September 17, 1949; the Zmudzinskis stayed at Neighborhood House at least until June 1950, as the Neighborhood House address is listed for the birth of their daughter in the June 2, 1950 Capital Times ; and probably at least until February 25, 1951 where a Wiscosin State Journal article, “Voters’ League Arranges Neighborhood Meetings for City Council Candidates” discusses people organizing candidate meetings in their “homes” and lists Mrs. Chester Zmudmzinski’s meeting at Neighborhood House. Then a Wisconsin State Journal article on May 12, 1953 “Brittingham Area Tackles its problems” says Chester Zmudzinski was living on Mound Street directly behind Neighborhood House. Finally, a Wisconsin State Journal article, “Injured in Fall,” February 3, 1960 lists Florence Zmudzinski at 709 Mound St, the address of the Casa di Bambini.  And 709 Mound Street was listed as tax-exempt on the 1960 property tax rolls, so remained part of the Neighborhood House property.

9. Frank Custer Since 1916 Neighborhood House Has Met Changing Needs of Growing City. The Capital Times, Jan. 21, 1964The Capital Times, Jan. 21, 1964.

10. Alinsky’s first book, Reveille for Radicals was published in 1946, University of Chicago Press.

11. East Side Youth Candidates Meet, Wisconsin State Journal, April 9, 1954 (this is the last mention of ESYAC in newspapers); Playschools Help Youngsters ‘Find’ ‘Selves, Wisconsin State Journal October 13, 1956 (part of series on Red Feather services, and the first mention of Atwood Community House rather than ESYAC). The same address listed for both organizations in thje 1952 First Annual Report and the 1954 Fifth Anniversary Report. Florence Zmudzinski says that ESYAC became Atwood Community Center in her article Leaving Greenbush, Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.

12. Madison Neighborhood Centers First Annual Report, 1951-52, Neighborhood House archives. South Madison to Dedicate Community Center, Wisconsin State Journal May 18, 1952.

13. Neighborhood Center Formed on South Side. The Capital Times, April 22, 1950, p. 2.

14. Cover, Madison Neighborhood Centers, First Annual Report 1951-52, Neighborhood House archives, photo by Randy Stoecker.

15. Madison Neighorhood Centers, First Annual Report 1951-52, Neighborhood House archives.

16. Madison Neighborhood Centers Board Meeting, June, 1952, Neighborhood House archives..

17. Madison Neighborhood Centers Manual, WI archives, 1968 handwritten in

18. Youth, Tots, Old Folks–South Side Center Serves Them All, May 3 1956, The Capital Times. MNC Fifth Anniversary Report, 1949-1954, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

19. WSBMA Support for Neighborhood House Requested, Wisconsin State Journal, February 2, 1950.

20. Neighborhood House Busy With Activities, Wisconsin State Journal February 10, 1950February 10, 1950.

21. Neighborhood Centers Build Better Citizens by Recreation, Wisconsin State Journal, September 28, 1953

22. Neighborhood Centers Build Better Citizens by Recreation, Wisconsin State Journal, September 28, 19533

23. October 5, 1949 Neighborhood House auxiliary board mtg:, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

24. Madison Neighborhood Centers Board Meeting, June, 1952,  United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

25. Warren Jollymore, Reorganized, Neighborhood House Opens Today, Wisconsin State Journal, Sunday Oct. 1, 1950 p. 12 No author. October 2, 1950. 200 Visit Neighborhood House Here Sunday. The Capital Times. Accessed from newspaperarchive.com.

26. Madison Neighborhood Centers.1949-1954. Fifth anniversary report, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

27.  Madison Neighborhood Centers community work model, Report to the Program Committee, January 30, 1968, p. 4, Neighborhood House archives, photo by Randy Stoecker.

28. MNC Fifth Anniversary Report, 1949-1954, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.  Study on Relocation of Neighborhood House, no date, no author, Neighborhood House archives..

29. 50th Anniversary Celebration, January 14, 1968, Neighborhood House archives; Warren Jollymore, Reorganized, Neighborhood House Opens Today, Wisconsin State Journal, Sunday Oct. 1, 1950 p. 12 McDowell. 1957. Report to Board and Staff of Madison Neighborhood Centers, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

30.  Neighborhood House, photo by Arthur M. Vinje, Image ID: 67414, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives,http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM67414.

31. Neighborhood Centers Build Better Citizens by Recreation, Wisconsin State Journal, September 28, 1953.

32. Madison Neighborhood Centers.1949-1954. Fifth anniversary report27. Madison Neighborhood Centers.1949-1954. Fifth anniversary report, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

33. Neighborhood Centers Build Better Citizens by Recreation, Wisconsin State Journal, September 28, 1953.

34. No Author. No Date. Documentation of Need for Case Worker, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

35. John McDowell. 1957. Report to Board and Staff of Madison Neighborhood Centers, from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

36.. Report to the Program Committee, January 30, 1968, Neighborhood House archives.

37. Report to the Program Committee, January 30, 1968, Neighborhood House archives;  Report to the Board and Staff of Madison Neighborhood Centers, Inc. John McDowell. 1957,  from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

38. MNC Fifth Anniversary Report, 1949-1954, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

39. MNC Fifth Anniversary Report, 1949-1954, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives;  Involving Citizens in the Process of Social Change. Madison Neighborhood Centers – Madison, Wisconsin, February, 1967. Report prepared by Nancy E. Kelley, faculty member, School of Social Work, University ofWisconsin, Neighborhood House archives

40.. Report to the Board and Staff of Madison Neighborhood Centers, Inc. John McDowell. 1957; from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries; 50th Anniversary Celebration, January 14, 1968, Neighborhood House archives.

41. John Newhouse, Improvement Council Sets Its Sights High, Wisconsin State Journal May 12, 1953

42. Jeers highlight Junk Hearing, Wisconsin State Journal June 24, 19533

43. Jeers highlight Junk Hearing, Wisconsin State Journal June 24, 1953 Gerke Salvage Yard Plea Again Rejected Wisconsin State Journal August 28, 1953 p. 8 section 1. Neighborhood Unit Offers Ad on Zone Change Opposition, Wisconsin State Journal October 16, 1953, p. 12, section 1Neighborhood Unit Offers Ad on Zone Change Opposition, Wisconsin State Journal October 16, 1953, p. 12, section 1.

44. p. 68 in Saul Alinsky,  Rules for Radicals, New York:  Vintage, 1971.

45. John Newhouse, A Neighborhood Decides to Be Better…, Wisconsin State Journal, July 19, 1953.

46. Jeers highlight Junk Hearing, Wisconsin State Journal June 24, 1953.

47. Involving Citizens in the Process of Social Change. Madison Neighborhood Centers – Madison, Wisconsin, February, 1967. Report prepared by Nancy E. Kelley, faculty member, School of Social Work, University ofWIsconsin, Neighborhood House archives; Junkyard Hearing Expected to Draw ‘Bus-Load’ Crowd, Wisconsin State Journal June 23, 1953; Jeers highlight Junk Hearing, Wisconsin State Journal June 24, 1953.

48. John Newhouse, A Neighborhood Decides to Be Better…, Wisconsin State Journal, July 19, 1953.

49. John Newhouse, A Neighborhood Decides to Be Better…, Wisconsin State Journal, July 19, 1953; Neighborhood Unit Offers Ad on Zone Change Opposition, Wisconsin State Journal, October 16, 1953, page 12.

50. MNC Fifth Anniversary Report, 1949-1954, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

51. Involving Citizens in the Process of Social Change. Madison Neighborhood Centers – Madison, Wisconsin, February, 1967. Report prepared by Nancy E. Kelley, faculty member, School of Social Work, University of Wisconsin, Neighborhood House archives. Kelley says the Council disbanded because they lost their indigenous leaders, but it is possible those leaders left the neighborhood because of urban renewal

52. MNC Fifth Anniversary Report, 1949-1954, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

53. Dean Mosiman Paul Soglin won’t do investigation of 1960s urban renewal project,  Wisconsin State Journal, August 1, 2013.

54. Public Hearing Required for Redevelopment, Wisconsin State Journal, August 30, 1956.

55. Lew Roberts, 2 Urban Plans Still in Doubt, Wisconsin State Journal March 1, 1958.

56. Neighborhood House Adds to Program, Wisconsin State Journal  August 27, 1944.

57.. Etsy Dinur, Remembering the Greenbush, Isthmus,  March 21, 2008.

58. Documentation of Need for Case Worker, no date, no author,  from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries; Report to the Board and Staff of Madison Neighborhood Centers, Inc. John McDowell. 1957,  from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries; Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush. Historic Madison: a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.

59. Photo first appears in Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush. Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.  Permission courtesy of Historic Madison, Inc. Photo first appears in Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush. Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.  Permission courtesy of Historic Madison, Inc. Photo first appears in Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush. Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.  Permission courtesy of Historic Madison, Inc. ourtesy of Historic Madison, Inc.

60. Compromise Exptected on W. Main St. Closing, Wisconsin State Journal, January 13, 1961.

61. April 26, 1957, Zmudzinski writes to McDowell,  from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

62. Report to the Board and Staff of Madison Neighborhood Centers, Inc. John McDowell. 1957,  from the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records, Box 104, Folder 13, Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries.

63. April 7, 1959 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

64. November 3 1959 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

65. March 1, 1960 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

66. Neighborhood House Survey October 1960, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

67. Stanley Williams, Will Redevelopments Create New Problems? Wisconsin State Journal January 29, 1961.

68. Mack Hoffman, City Announces ‘Compromise’ on Public Housing, Capital Times May 26, 1961.

69. Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush. Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region, 2005, Volume XX, pp. 46-63.

70. Field Office Set To Aid Triangle Renewal Project, Wisconsin State Journal, December 2, 1961.

71. Involving Citizens in the Process of Social Change. Madison Neighborhood Centers – Madison, Wisconsin, February, 1967. Report prepared by Nancy E. Kelley, faculty member, School of Social Work, University of Wisconsin, Neighborhood House archives; Herbert Marcus, Units Clash Over Sites For Housing, Capital Times May 9, 1961, p. 6; We Hope Promises Made About Public Housing Will be Kept, Capital Times May 26, 1961; Zmudzinski Backs Plan for Triangle, Wisconsin State Journal August 17, 1961.

72. Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush, Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.

73. MRA Urges City to Change Building Inspection Plans, Capital Times November 10, 1962.

74. Triangle Relocation is in trouble, Wisconsin State Journal November 16, 1962.

75. Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush, Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region. 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.

76. Sam Onheiber is Neighborhood House President, Capital Times, October 1, 1962. Doris Jackson preceded her for at least 1959 and 1960. Neighborhood House Past… Present… Future, Annual Meeting Report, November 14, 1960, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

77. Miss Braxton, Well-Known Social Worker, Succumbs, The Capital Times, Mar 26, 1962, p. 12.

78. Photo from Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush, Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region, 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.  Courtesy of Historic Madison, Inc.

79. December 6, 1961 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

809. December 3, 1961 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

81. Sam Onheiber is Neighborhood House President, Capital Times, October 1, 1962.

82. Make Offer by Mar. 14, MRA Tells Neighborhood Centers, Wisconsin State Journal March 4, 1963.

83. March 1963 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

84. April 1963 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

85. Some Triangle Buildings’ Removal on Bids Backed, Wisconsin State Journal May 23, 1963; Triangle Building Bid Plan Approved, Wisconsin State Journal May 24, 1963.

86. Florence Zmudzinski, Leaving Greenbush. Historic Madison. a journal of the Four Lake Region, 2005, volume XX, pp. 46-63.

87. MRA to Negotiate Vilas Towers Site, Wisconsin State Journal December 11, 1963; Frank Custer, Since 1916 Neighborhood House Has Met Changing Needs of Growing City, The Capital Times, Jan. 21, 1964.

88. John T. Aehl, Public ‘Doesn’t Understand’ Redevelopment, MRA Says, Wisconsin State Journal February 12, 1964.

89.. New Neighborhood House is Planned, Wisconsin State Journal June 20, 1964.

90.  Proposed Neighborhood House, Weiler, Neighborhood House archives, photo by Randy Stoecker.

91. New Neighborhood House is Planned, Wisconsin State Journal June 20, 196482. New Neighborhood House is Planned, Wisconsin State Journal June 20, 1964.

92. May 5, 1964 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

93. Neighborhood House Farewell, The Capital Times May 16, 1964, p. 11.

94. Photo from, Neighborhood House Farewell, The Capital Times May 16, 1964, p. 11. Courtesy of Wisconsin State Journal.

95. $15,000 Idea Now $65,000, Wisconsin State Journal February 7, 1965.

96. December 1, 1964 Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives; Neighborhood House Farewell, The Capital Times May 16, 1964, p. 11.

97. Involving Citizens in the Process of Social Change. Madison Neighborhood Centers – Madison, Wisconsin, February, 1967. Report prepared by Nancy E. Kelley, faculty member, School of Social Work, University ofWIsconsin, Neighborhood House archives.

98. document withno date, no author, no title, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.  The locations are confirmed in: New Neighborhood House is Discovering A New Job, Wisconsin State Journal, June 28, 1965.

99. Chester Zudzminski, Wisconsin State Journal May 30, 1965.

100. New Neighborhood House is Discovering A New Job, Wisconsin State Journal June 28, 1965.

101. Involving Citizens in the Process of Social Change. Madison Neighborhood Centers – Madison, Wisconsin, February, 1967. Report prepared by Nancy E. Kelley, faculty member, School of Social Work, University of WIsconsin, Neighborhood House archives.

102. John T. Aehl, MRA Supports Urban Renewal Project for University Ave., Wisconsin State Journal, January 20, 1965.

103. $15,000 Idea Now $65,000, Wisconsin State Journal February 7, 1965; John Newhouse, Total $2 Million Given in Rennebohm Funds, Wisconsin State Journal January 7, 1968, says NH got 100K for new building.

104. Some other kind of talk by someone–no date or author, presumably about urban renewal, still using typewriter that uses capital I for a 1, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

105. Proceeds from Kehl Recital Go to Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal June 10, 196595. Proceeds from Kehl Recital Go to Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal June 10, 1965.

106.  New Neighborhood House building, from 50th anniversary brochure, Neighborhood House archives, photo by Randy Stoecker.

107. Owen Coyle, Sentiment Glows At Dedication of Triangle Housing, Capital Times June 24, 1965; Housing Project Officially Named After Gay Braxton, Wisconsin State Journal June 25, 1965;  William T. Evjue, Hello Wisconsin, Capital Times April 19, 1969 describes that, on April 10, Gay Braxton’s birthday, Mary Lee Griggs held a party at Gay Braxton apartments and presented residents with the 48-star U.S. flag flown at NH from 1922-1926 to be hung in the community room. Griggs had read that residents had asked for a flag in their newsletter, the Braxton News.

108. New Neighborhood House is Discovering A New Job, Wisconsin State Journal, June 28, 1965.

109. Neighborhood House Board Opposes Plan for Expansion of Zoo, Capital Times, November 3, 1965.

110. Helen Matheson, Neighborhood House Event’s Today, Wisconsin State Journal, October 31, 1965.

111. Square Dance Lessons, Wisconsin State Journal, September 29, 1965.

112. $15,000 Idea Now $65,000, Wisconsin State Journal February 7, 1965, says that the new Neighborhood House was 78 x 120, with a cost of $194,000.

113. Neighborhood House Dedication is Sunday. Wisconsin State Journal October 25, 1965 Neighborhood House Opens, Capital Times November 1, 1965 Edward Nicholls, 200 Attend Dedication at Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal November 1, 1965

114. aux bd dec 7 65:Neighborhood House Auxiliary Board Meeting, Neighborhood House Records 1915-1980, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives.

115. Neighorhood House Tot’s Best Friend for Forty-four Years is Retiring. Madison Captial Times,. April 15, 1966, page 25.

116. Louise C. Marston, After 44 Years of Teaching, She Plans Visits, Wisconsin State Journal,  May 8, 1966.

117. Class of ’16 Grad Returns to Scene of His Triumph, by Frank Custer, Cap Times May 13, 1966 According to the obituary for Griggs, she kept working part-time for several years after retirement.  Death Notices, Wisconsin State Journal January 16, 1981105. Class of ’16 Grad Returns to Scene of His Triumph, by Frank Custer, Cap Times May 13, 1966; Death Notices, Wisconsin State Journal January 16, 1981, says that Griggs kept working part-time for several years after retirement.

118. Neighorhood House Tot’s Best Friend for Forty-four Years is Retiring. Madison Captial Times. April 15, 1966, page 25.

119. Mary Lee Griggs and Children at Neighborhood House, photo by Tom Barlet, Image ID: 95906, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives,http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM95906.

Neighborhood House 1966-1990:  Controversy, Conflict, and Punk Rock

1966 signaled a period of challenges for Neighborhood House as intense as anything the organization had experienced.  Along with the move to the new building and Mary Lee Griggs’ retirement, center director Nancy Kelly, who had led Neighborhood House through its strenuous relocation, left for a position at the University of Wisconsin School of Social Work.¹

Kelley’s departure would usher in a period of leadership instability for Neighborhood House, as new center directors would come and go every couple of years until the late 1970s.  In fact, the news mentions no new center director at Neighborhood House until May of 1967². At that point Dena De Witt³ had the job. By the end of 1969, Winifred Cook would be listed as the director,⁴ followed by Jerry Glaeve in mid-1970.⁵

But Neighborhood House kept the services going, grabbing every opportunity that presented itself, and experiencing so much membership growth that Zmudzinski was quoted as saying “Our membership is multiplying so fast we may have to become selective in membership soon.”⁶Madison Neighbohood Centers partnered with the Rotary Club, who had purchased an old farmhouse and leased it to MNC for $1 a year.⁷  In contrast to Gay Braxton’s vision of a summer camp for everyone, however, this operated from more of a social work vision that focused only on boys in trouble.  All three centers under MNC got right on board with the new federal Head Start program.⁸  Neighborhood House collaborated with the summer Rent a Youth program managed by college studens who would connect people with odd jobs to local youth desiring work.⁹  In another collaboration involving college students and youth, fifth and sixth grade girls went door to door collecting old toys to repair and paint, helped by two University of Wisconsin students.¹⁰  Neighborhood House ran a nursery class for pre-schoolers¹¹ and a daycare.¹²  Friday night dances for pre-teens drew a big crowd.¹³ Even the Madison Mustangs football team helped out with Neighborhood Houses’ recreation program in 1970.¹⁴  Neighborhood House membership fees remained modest at $5 per year plus 50 cents per child up to a $5 maximum charge for children.¹⁵

Neighborhood House also continued its practice of being a community space.  Some of the community events resurrected the old days of the organization,  as it hosted meetings of the Italian-American Bersagliere Women’s Club¹⁶ and served as a tryout space for theater groups.¹⁷ Others reflected the growing social work culture in the organization, with meetings of Parents Without Partners¹⁸ and a support group of former patients from the Mendota Mental Health Center who met in the basement of Neighborhood House.¹⁹  Others may have simply been fun or had a fundraising angle.  In 1966 the Forest Products League met at Neighborhood House, asking each member to bring “useful toys, games, and books for the children at the center.”²⁰    In 1970 Neighborhood House provided space for a regular flea market, with entertainment.²¹

But perhaps most interesting was the niche that Neighborhood House began to carve out for itself in the crazy days of the 1960s.

Neighborhood House and the Issues of the Sixties–Global and Local

The 1960s and 1970s was an era of great social activism and upheaval throughout the nation, Wisconsin, and especially in Madison. Demonstrations focused on nuclear testing, civil rights   and especially the Vietnam War disrupted daily life in the city. Marches, rallies, boycotts, protests, and demonstrations were frequent and widespread. Many of these events were closely connected with the University of Wisconsin-Madison and related student organizations.²²

Both the university and the students were expanding closer and closer to Neighborhood House and the organization once again adapted to history, even supporting the mobilization of that youth activist energy. High school and college teenagers were also very much involved with the anti-war effort during this time. Some of those groups used Neighborhood House as a base of organization. As Lester Pines, who worked with teens at Neighborhood House during this period,  puts it, “the late 60’s and 70s were a very exciting time on campus and there was a great effort [at Neighborhood House] to turn all of that energy into something productive and positive that would really help the community.” The work of Neighborhood House during the period also shaped the students who participated in it.  Lester Pines and Roberta Gassman met when they both started working with the teen and children’s programs at Neighborhood House while University of Wisconsin students. Their work at Neighborhood House led Mr. Pines to get a Law degree, Ms. Gassman to get a Masters in Social Work, and the two of them to build a life together.²³

Neighborhood House created a unique niche for itself in this time of turmoil as a place of reflection, mobilization, and mediation. They opened their doors to a membership rally and dance by the Madison NAACP Youth Council.²⁴  When the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, WHA-TV offered free bus service for people to come to its studios to discuss their feelings after the funeral. Neighborhood House was one of the free bus stops.²⁵   When a group of Catholics attempted to create a parish less constrained by the church, they met at Neighborhood House.²⁶  Neighborhood House briefly became the home for an alternative high school,²⁷ with unique programs like engaging students in community service, that hoped for a dozen students but ended up with almost three times that.  They started with a volunteer staff²⁸  and quickly grew to nine paid staff²⁹ until they ran into official opposition from the school board and internal problems.³⁰  Neighborhood House was the meeting spot for the Ninth Ward organization, sponsoring discussions of issues facing the neighborhood and holding candidate forums.³¹

Neighborhood House also provided its space for the anti-war movement, and even those who opposed the activism surrounding it.  After police and students clashed during the very first Mifflin Street Block Party, organized at that time as an anti-war event, Neighborhood House hosted a meeting between the two that tried to mediate the conflict.³²  In the lead-up to the national Vietnam Moratorium demonstrations, Neighborhood House sponsored discussions about the war.³³  When 73 members of the Ninth Ward organization voted unanimously to support a city council resolution “giving Madison residents the right to refuse to take part in an undeclared war”, they were meeting at Neighborhood House.³⁴  And Neighborhood House hosted the Consumers League when they went beyond their usual agenda of discussing utility rate hikes to focus on “the war as it relates to consumers.”³⁵

Back in the neighborhood, there was also conflict.  The Triangle urban renewal area, save for Neighborhood House and the Gay Braxton apartments, was a wasteland of emptiness.   All the hardship endured by all those displaced, and the only thing the city had to show for it was a small housing development and an otherwise big empty space.  In 1966 the Lake Wingra Council, which Neigborhood House had helped organize, decided to do something about it.  They started organizing a new non-profit group to build low and moderate income housing in the space.³⁷It was tough going at first, as their vision was to recruit already fiscally stretched existing nonprofits to contribute funds to the start-up of the effort.³⁸  But eventually they succeeded in forming the Bayview Foundation, composed of representatives from Lake Wingra Community Council, Beth Israel Center, the Memorial United Church of Christ, St. James Catholic Church, The League of Women Voters, Longfellow School PTA, the Madison Homeowners Association, the alders from the 8th, 9th, and 13th wards, and Neighborhood House itself.  They created a plan for 144 units of housing and got $1.99 milion in federal funds to help build the apartment complex³⁹  that was scaled back to 102 units with its final approval in 1970.⁴⁰  Neighborhood House would initially benefit from the increase in housing, and then later feel the effects from the construction of a new community center in the midst of this housing.

Into the 1970s another group of people who were organizing were gays and lesbians. Madison was a difficult place for people who did not identify as heterosexual. Lesbian and Gay organizations (trans identities were even more marginalized at the time) were just beginning to grow at the time, and the Gay Center was pretty much just an office space in an office building. The only social spaces were gay and lesbian friendly bars, but that wasn’t everyone’s scene. So a group got together and organized dances at Neighborhood House. “We’d hold a dance, and then wait for the pressure to build and we’d organize the next dance.” ^40a

Warning Signs

While Neighborhood House the building had more than achieved its potential as a hub of civic engagement in the community, Neighborhood House the organization was trying to find its footing.  Perhaps off balance in the chaos of the 1960s, perhaps disrupted by the unresolved tension between centralization and decentralization in Madison Neighborhood Centers, or perhaps for other reasons, Neighboood House was continuing to experience staff instability and, it seems, some degree of distraction.

Neighborhood House’s 50th anniversary would have been on September 24, 1966.  The day came and passed without a mention in any media or saved records.  It was not until November of 1967, more than a year later,  that there was a brief announcement in the paper of an open house celebrating the anniversary on January 14, 1968.⁴¹ In another brief media announcement, the justification for the chosen date simply said that date was chosen for the year Neighborhood House got its “first permanent home”–a statement requiring a generous interpretation of the facts.⁴²  To add to the mystery, a radio program promoting the January anniversary celebration featured Mary Lee Griggs and Chester Zmudzinski.  There is no mention of any Neighborhood House staff being involved.⁴³ Finally, the only evidence that the event took place is a booklet dated January 14, 1968, with historical highlights and photos from the old Neighborhood House.  There was no newspaper coverage.

Whatever stresses Neighborhood House was experiencing in the late 1960s may have been exacerbated by efforts from within MNC to nurture a fourth community center to be added to the mix.⁴⁴  That center, the east side Wil-Mar Neighborhood Center, was ready in August of 1968.⁴⁵  While certainly cause for celebration, as the need was great, it also created stresses on an already tight operating budget, since the United Community Chest⁴⁶  refused to increase MNC funding to cover the new center.⁴⁷  Both Neighborhood House and MNC were trying to operate out of the Neighborhood House building to save money, but the cramped quarters were hampering the work of both organizations and MNC was hoping to have funds to move by 1971⁴⁸ even though they were operating at a deficit in 1970.⁴⁹

Surviving The Cut

In 1970 the United Givers Fund of the Community Chest had a less than stellar fundraising campaign. And it started to look at where to cut.  As it commenced its deliberations, an interpretation began to gather momentum that the Fund was going to close Neighborhood House.  Chester Zmudzinski wrote an energetic critique of the Fund in Jun of 1970 saying that the Fund wanted to limit Neighborhood House to social group work and community organization, and expected volunteers and students to take over the rest of the activities.  Zmudzinski himself ruminated that one center would likely have to be dropped.⁵⁰  The theme got amplified by the media, who noted that MNC would have to make the final decision, but that one center would have to go and that one would be Neighborhood House because a Dane County Social Planning Agency study had concluded that the Ninth Ward was “slightly more stable and less in need” than the areas served by the other centers.⁵¹

This was about much more than a cut to one city organization.  The United Givers Fund was in fact making choices that would increase funding to some organizations and cut others, such as MNC, by as much as ten percent. For MNC this was worse than a ten percent cut, because they were asking for a 61% increase.⁵³   Furthermore, critics charged the Fund with applying a cold corporate style of judgment, focusing on heartless calculations of “how much it costs in terms of unit of product.”⁵⁴  The Three alders in the Neighborhood House area, the state assemblyman, and a mayoral candidate called on the Fund to support Neighborhood House.⁵⁵    At a raucous Ninth Ward Organization meeting in January of 1971, participants charged the Fund with adopting a funding plan that served the middle class rather than the poor and using language like “management inefficiency” that reflected “the kind of production rationalization the corporations are engaging in.”  Zmudzinski was particularly activist, asserting that “the current challenge to institutions, where people are trying to get in, to have a say in decisions that affect their lives, to achieve a senene of communality.  It doesn’t seem to be the kind of thing the Chest is prepared to recognize.”  The participants voted unanimously to save Neighborhood House.⁵⁶   Opponents of the Fund’s position turned up the heat, leafletting and flyering,⁵⁷ charging the Fund with increasing funding to its own operations while it cut agencies.  Seventeen members of the Ninth Ward Organization promised to end their contributions to the fund.  Others threatened to picket the Givers building, start a counter-fund, and even sue the Fund on the grounds that it solicited contributions from area residents by asking them to support Neighborhood House when they were really going to close it.⁵⁸    Letters to the editor were numerous, including from the Co-op Nursery housed at Neighborhood House.⁵⁹

This reporting, and the fanning of the flames, came through The Capital Times newspaper, known as the more progressive of the two Madison newspapers.  When the Community Chest board overwhelmingly approved the cuts later in January,⁶⁰  the other Madison newspaper–the Wisconsin State Journal–took the editorial position of defending the Chest and supporting its decision,⁶¹  framing it as allowing the Chest to reap a windfall it could use to fund new programs.⁶²   The State Journal also published a letter to the Editor from the Fund defending its position and reiterating that MNC, and not the United Givers Fund of the United Community Chest, would make the decision whether to close Neighborhood House.⁶³   They reiterated that position in an article by the Capital Times.⁶⁴

Madison Neighborhood Centers was doing its own damage control.  The vice-president of MNC spoke to a meeting of about 100 Ninth Ward residents, attempting to reassure them that MNC was looking for other strategies to deal with cuts besides closing centers and was adamant that MNC hadn’t even discussed closing Neighborhood House.  MNC nonetheless got an earful for not threatending to end their relationship with the Fund and not forming a special committee to deal with the issues.⁶⁵  And there was a lot to fight for.  By this time, Neighborhood House had  a morning co-op nursery run by 31 parents, an afternoon regular nursery school, a teen drop-in after school program with tutoring and job referral, a new transportation program for elderly with plans for an independent living project, a free and very popular meeting space, and 47 volunteers in addition to the regular staff.⁶⁶

Then in February word came that MNC was somehow keeping all four centers open.⁶⁷    It’s unclear why.  Certainly the wide support from political officials and the public for Neighborhood House helped.  The Rennebohm Fund, which had supported the construction of the new Neighborhood House,⁶⁸ and gave the organization a sizable grant in 1970,⁶⁹ announced it was giving the Wil-Mar Neighborhood Center a $30,000 grant.⁷⁰

Fallout

The United Givers Fund cut would begin a period of tremendous struggle within MNC that would reverberate through the community centers.  The media would begin using phrases like the “annual fight to keep open their Mills Street Neighborhood House”.⁷²   In trying to find a way to deal with the budget cuts and increase the pay of center staff to create some stability in the centers, the MNC board considered reducing the MNC staff, prompting Zmudzinski to threaten resignation.⁷³  The Givers Fund had also allocated some special funds to support a study of MNC toward restructuring the organization and increasing its management efficiency,⁷⁴  invoking further conflict over the parameters of the study and who would do it.⁷⁵

In June of 1971,  Chester Zmudzinski resigned as executive director of Madison Neighborhood Centers, effective on September 17.⁷⁶   He had been at the helm for twenty-two years, approaching Gay Braxton’s 28-year tenure at Neighborhood House.⁷⁷

By 1972, the study sponsored by the United Givers Fund, now renamed The Dane County United Way, was completed.  It was quoted as saying “Administration of the Madison Neighborhood Centers (MNC) is a shambles” and recommended that Neighborhood House be closed and resident representation on the MNC board be reduced because of resident “parochialism,” “inexperience,” and “ignorance”.  The report blamed Zmudzinski  in absentia, and without naming him, for some of the problems.⁷⁸  It will remain an open question whether Zmudzinski was the problem, or whether the culture of funding had shifted so much that the civic engagement and community organizing approach he advocated had simply gone out of style (or was seen as too much of a threat) with funders, as it had in other places.⁷⁹  Shortly thereafter, for reasons that remain unclear, Madison Neighborhood Centers voted to change its name to United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County effective in 1973⁸⁰and hired Henry Pitt as its new director.⁸¹   Pitt would attempt to shift the organization from “recreation-oriented-type programs to social-adjustment-type programs,”⁸² but his stay with MNC, like many of the staff who followed, would be too short-lived to make much difference.

Back at Neighbohood House, and just as the United Givers Fund cuts went into effect, the Dane County Mental Health Center, which had been renting out one wing of the building, began looking for bigger space to handle a fifty percent increase in clients.⁸³    After wrangling over sub-leasing, MNC ended the lease in early 1972, ⁸⁴   putting even more pressure on the organization’s finances.  Neighborhood House had reduced its director position to part-time status, and had lost its director in the process. ⁸⁵   In September of 1972, the MNC board put Neighborhood House up for sale,⁸⁶   but the higherest offer was $70,000 below the appraised value.⁸⁷   Seemingly stuck with the building, they rented out space to the Urban Leage.⁸⁸

Working Across the Life-Span at Neighborhood House in the 1970s

These times must have been amazingly distracting for the staff at Neighborhood House.  No one could have blamed them if they would have just walked away.  We would have lauded them if they had simply persevered.  But, far from just hunkering down and trying to ride the storm out, they ventured right out into the maelstrom, innovating like they had never innovated before.

Perhaps the innovation that was most ahead of its time was the Independent Living for the Elderly project.  The aging of Madison’s population had become visible in Greenbush, and in the construction of the Gay Braxton Apartments.  But it remained a seriously underserved population segment. With token funding from the United Way Innovation Fund and a grant from the State Division of Aging, Neighborhood House initiated a pilot project to provide transportation, educational services, and home visitation for the elderly. The transportation services would not simply get elders to various care services but also to events and other places.  The education services would  focus on social security, medicare, services, avoiding fraud, and a variety of other topics.⁸⁹  The program engaged seven students in occupational therapy and two in public health nursing at the University of Wisconsin and even got elders involved as volunteers.  The program provided 111 rides in its first three weeks⁹⁰  and served 513 elders in its first year.⁹¹

Paul Rowland was unemployed at the time he began volunteering at Neighborhood House.  Among his duties was driving the van that transported elders around town.  He then got a job as the janitor for Neighborhood House, to which he added his grant-writing talents, helping to produce the proposal to expand the Independent Living project to become SMILE–Services to Maintain Independent Living for the Elderly. ⁹³   And even this successful program would have to manage disruption, when someone stole the van and Neighborhood House had to use a rental car for a time.⁹⁴

Finally with a new director in the fall of 1972, Reginald Stalling,⁹⁵ Neighborhood House’s innovation would expand across the ages.  Neighborhood House made the daring choice of hiring Lawrence Merkle, who was the very first male graduate in pre-school education from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, to co-direct an innovative new daycare center with Mrs. Venice Duter, another University of Wisconsin graduate experienced in special education.  Their philosophy  focused on fostering independence and making free choices, using arts and crafts to bring out the child’s creativity. As Merkle stated, “I want to create a child initiated classroom, where the child really will choose what he wants to do. He’s what we call free-playing most of the time. The teacher is there to help and enhance what the child is doing.”⁹⁶

For older youth, Neighborhood House initiated a youth jobs and leadership program.  With Lester Pines working as youth coordinator, Neighborhood House hired ten high school students for five hours a week, focusing not just on doing the work but also learning community leadership skills by engaging in the community.⁹⁸   The teen discussion groups at Neighborhood House focused on such edgy topics as the “legal rights of juveniles,”⁹⁹ and “women’s liberation.”¹⁰⁰ Neighborhood House even coordinated with the Bayview Center for a teen party held in the larger gym space at Neighborhood House.¹⁰¹

In between were all manner of programs.  Many of them focused on the arts, including performances by an acclaimed puppet theater troupe,¹⁰² a play performed on a “small makeshift stage” in the Neighborhood House gymnasium that nonetheless got rave reviews,¹⁰³ square dancing,¹⁰⁴ and pottery classes.¹⁰⁵ There were arts and crafts fairs,¹⁰⁶  a bake sale/rummage sale/ceramics sale with an accompanying carnival,¹⁰⁷  and even an Aquarium Club sales and auction event.¹⁰⁸   Neighborhood House was booked almost every night of the week.¹⁰⁹

Other programs were education focused, such as the People’s Law School, with 18 courses to choose from and taught by lawyers volunteering their time.¹¹⁰   On February 27, 1974 Neighborhood House participated in the one-year commemoration of the occupation at Wounded Knee by hosting a potluck dinner.¹¹¹   They continued to host political district meetings, now the 13th district rather than the Ninth Ward.¹¹²

Neighborhood House also served the health care needs of the community, hosting a health screening clinic, ¹¹³  and serving as the original home of Group Health Cooperative way back in 1975¹¹⁴  when “HMO” was a new acronym in health care.

Miss Griggs Returns

Quiet, kind, Miss Mary Lee Griggs had never invoked controversy and had only been in the news when her work was featured.  After her retirement she had stayed out of the media spotlight except for a brief moment in 1969 when she donated a 1922 flag from the old Neighborhood House to the Gay Braxton Apartments community room.¹¹⁵   But that was about to change.

In the early 1970s, there were still vast barren tracts in the Triangle redevelopment area and the Madison Redevelopment Authority had decided to fill it with a large medical facility and hotel.  And, for the first time in public, mild-mannered Mary Lee Griggs had been pushed too far. We get the sense that she was never that keen on urban renewal–the disruption of family life, the dismembering of community networks, and the destruction of Neighborhood House.  But she’d made only a few vague and indirect statements in the context of her retirement. These new plans, however, were too much.  Miss Griggs’ expectation, everyone would come to learn, was that the neighborhood that was destroyed would be replaced by a neighborhood, and the new plans that contained no housing violated her sensibilities and her expectations.  So in May of 1971 she showed up in the city clerk’s office with a petition from 125 residents demanding that the city council “follow through on the MRA’s early plans to keep the triangle a residential area.” Griggs also wrote an open letter printed in “The Neighbor” newsletter then being published by Neighborhood House, with a tone perhaps never before heard from her: “During the years when the homes were being torn down and families were forced to move, we relied on the promises that the redevelopment would restore homes for private families even though we saw the hospital grounds expanded and medical offices built. … The promises to preserve the triangle as an area of homes for people, it seems, are not to be kept….. It looks as if Madison is getting to the point where the City doesn’t care about people anymore…. Those people who had their homes in that area sure got a raw deal.”¹¹⁶

A “compromise” plan that included elderly housing, a grocery, and other retail, was approved by the MRA in August.¹¹⁷  In November a Wisconsin State Journal headline read “George Mitchell, Neighborhood House OKs Triangle” but the article itself only said that Madison Neighborhood Centers had approved the plan, not Neighborhood House, and on a 15 to 5 vote.  The five no votes were not identified.¹¹⁸  And the compromise did not satisfy Miss Griggs.  In October of 1973 she wrote to the mayor, the youthful Paul Soglin, urging him to kill the plan: “I lived in the old Neighborhood House on West Washington Avenue for almost 30 years and I was on the staff of Neighborhood House and, later, Madison Neighborhood Centers for 44 years. I believe I know from first hand experience just what was done to the people living there…. When the people were pressured out of the area they were promised that the area would continue to be residential. I don’t need to tell you what has happened.”¹¹⁹   Miss Grigg’s unwavering opposition brought others out.  A letter from Charlotte Navarra Norris, who came of age in the old Neighborhood house, lamented to a friend that  “It is particularly regrettable that someone like Miss Griggs, who earned the respect and confidence of the families in the Triangle through sincere devotion and hard work, was apparently used by the officials to motivate and influence the families and then was betrayed together with the neighborhood.”¹²⁰   In the end, Soglin let the project proceed, but he expected it to die under its own weight, which it did by mid-1974.¹²¹

Miss Griggs would have more to fight, and plenty of fight left in her, just a couple years down the road.

United Neighborhood Centers (the renamed Madison Neighborhood Centers) had remained unstable through the ensuing years and had evoked the ire of its member centers.  In early 1976 the Wil-Mar Center packed a UNC meeting passing a resolution that would prevent UNC from determining what groups could be housed at the centers.  Wil-Mar had apparently lent aid and comfort to groups that could jeopardize UNC’s United Way funding and tax exempt status.  The attendees additionally passed a resolution to review the UNC director, and by-law changes that gave centers more power in UNC decisions.¹²²  The board would fire director Pitt a couple of months later.¹²³  And UNC’s fiscal situation had never recovered.   The United Way had again cut UNC funding by $16,000 for 1976, even though UNC increased the number of centers to six, and they had  a $32,000 gap.¹²⁴

So in June of 1976 UNC once again voted to unload Neighborhood House one way or the other, by selling or leasing it.¹²⁵   They justified the decision by saying that the center had “sloppy programs” and inadequate staffing, and they were worried about United Way funding because the funder de-emphasized day care.¹²⁶

Weathering the storm in the Neighborhood House director chair this time was Marjorie Chirichella–who had covered Neighborhood House news as a a writer for the Wisconsin State Journal while she was a University of Wisconsin student.  Marjorie Chirichella was a “larger than life kind of person.  She was from the east coast, and was definitely not part of subdued midwestern culture.  She could break out in song at a moment’s notice, and was known for Hungarian Goulash at Neighborhood House potlucks.”  It is her work with the kids of Neighborhood House that her daughter Gina most remembers.  Along with the after-school program Marge ran, she was also known for loading up the Neighborhood House summer camp kids, and her two dogs, into her own blue van for trips near and far.¹²⁸

This fight to save Neighborhood House seemed like history repeating itself.  Once again, people organized, though in noticeably smaller numbers, with 15 at one meeting¹²⁹  and 12 at another.¹³⁰   There were more fundraisers.¹³¹  Madison General Hospital again offered to buy but reduced its offer by even more, $120,000 below the appraised value.¹³²

The one thing that was different was that Mary Lee Griggs, who had remained publicly quiet through the previous threat, this time made her voice clear:  “Something is going on down there that bothers me a great deal…. When I see some of the things happening down there now, I’m almost glad she’s [Gay Braxton] not around to see it…. Why can’t they use the building that’s there? If there’s no need for it, well, alright, but for the life of me, I can’t understand it.”¹³³

Once again, no willing buyer stepped forward at a price that UNC was willing to entertain.  Instead, it appears, UNC tried to eliminate the Neighborhood House director position^.134  Marjorie Chirichella and Neighborhood house would hold them off into early 1977, but eventually they lost the fight, at least temporarily.¹³⁵   But, once again, Neighborhood House itself survived with Nancy Schmelzer serving as acting director.136

Neighborhood House as Political Player

Even while under constant pressure, or perhaps because of it, Neighborhood House worked to expand its power and establish itself as a force in city politics. It was a fundraising space for progressive causes, hosting Bonnie Gruber’s lasagnia dinner fundraiser for her 1977 city council campaign.¹³⁷ Neighborhood House also hosted a spaghetti dinner fundraiser for the new nonprofit Triangle Neighborhood Corporation’s attempt to start a co-op grocery in the triangle.¹³⁸

Neighborhood House itself got into the political mix when a new plan for a “multi-service center”–a kind of social service mall with a daycare–was floated by an architectural firm.  The plan would have duplicated some of Neighborhood House’s services and turned Neighborhood House itself into a library with crafts and games.  There was not enough money left in the Triangle urban renewal pot to support the plan, and Neighborhood House was exploring other ways to spend the funds.¹³⁹

And Neighborhood House brought political education into the mix.  They hosted the first film festival dedicated to older adults, which included films about the Gray Panthers and other activist elders, co-presented with the Resource Exchange Network of the University of Wisconsin School of Social Work and Jewish Social Services.¹⁴⁰  On a theme that remains all too familiar in Madison, they hosted Eddie Carthan Day with a forum featuring Mertle Lacy, the mother of Ernest Lacy, a Black man who died as the result of a violent arrest in Milwaukee in 1982.¹⁴¹  Carthan was the first Black man elected as mayor of Tchula, a small Mississippi town who was convicted of assaulting a white police officer and aquitted of hiring the assassination of a political rival, all of which he said was due to his refusal to acquiesce to the white power structure.¹⁴²   Neighborhood House was also the meeting place of the Citizen’s Party, which was attempting to position itself as a progressive alternative to the two major parties.¹⁴³

Much of this political work occurred as Neighborhood House was starting to regain some stability in a new director’s position.  David Eppstein was the longest-serving director since Gay Braxton, from 1979 to 1985, and the first since Nancy Kelley to last more than a year or two. He arrived at Neighborhood House after working as director of the relatively young Deerfield Community Center–the only rural organization in UNC. For Eppstein, “having gone to school in Madison in the late sixties, early seventies, my desire to do community organizing and to develop these sorts of programs and grow things was a passion.” ¹⁴⁴

And grow programs he did. Neighborhood House became the home of the SWAP program, one of the first experiments in alternative economies in Madison, where members would earn credits by doing work for each other, and spend those credits on work done by others.¹⁴⁵  And one of the growing issues in the continual changing neighborhood was growing conflict between elderly residents and university student residents. So Neighborhood House organized REACH–Restoring Elderly And Community Harmony–to deal with elderly and student conflict and attempt to get students more engaged in the neighborhood. The plan was to sponsor separate events that would draw each group into Neighborhood House and then develop joint programs. One such strategy was to create a network where seniors would get services from students, and in turn provide garden space for students and opportunities for conversation. But students were harder to reach, and an attempt to give students discounts for wellness classes didn’t work. Then Eppstein met up with Roger Eischens, associated with Madison’ Movin’ Shoes–a store for runners and walkers. Eischens was also a yoga instructor and Neighborhood House got him to do yoga instruction as a means of attracting students. The classes became so popular they ran out of space and Neighborhood House leased the space of the former Mound St. Grocery Co-op space to open a yoga center. ¹⁴⁶

One of the highlights of Eppstein’s tenure was a benefit concert featuring Bonnie Raitt and Chris Williamson for the International Treaty Council, working for Native American water rights, and Northern Lights magazine. A friend knew of Raitt and WIlliamson’s concert tour, and urged Eppstein to sponsor a Madison show through Neighborhood House that could also be a fundraiser. “On a complete whim, a complete shoestring, knowing [nothing] about what we were doing, we ended up putting on this one night concert for clean water and Native American rights at the Churchkey in Madison…. Bonnie Raitt came to town, I cooked dinner for her at my house…. The concert was wildly successful and complete fun to do.” ¹⁴⁷

Eppstein’s appetite for political struggle had been unseen at Neighborhood House since Zmudzinski’s days, and one struggle in particular would keep him and Neighborhood House in the news for years.

Longfellow School

Longfellow School had long been the neighborhood school, and from the days of urban renewal has been threatened with closing.¹⁴⁸   In late 1979 that threat became much more real, with the Madison school board proposing to close Longfellow School and Hoyt School and convert Lincoln Elementary to a middle school.   The result, according to concerned residents on Madison’s south side, would disproportionally reduce educational opportunities available to low-income children of color.¹⁴⁹

Eppstein participated at a meeting with a group of people, mostly parents, who opposed the closing of Longfellow. But the issue seemed below the radar in Madison initially. As they strategized, one of the strategies they came up with was to go to the school board meeting, have Eppstein register to speak in opposition, and at the closing of his speech, call for a walkout of anyone interested in stopping it. “We packed the room with 50 odd poeple. So I finished my speech, and urged anyone interested to walk out and meet in the hallway. And 50 people walked out of the school board and all of a sudden you get a lot of press. So that snowballed into six or eight months of furious activity.” ¹⁵⁰

This was also a circumstance where the relationships forged through United Neighborhood Centers could be mobilized.   The South Madison Neighborhood Center, Neighborhood House, and the Madison NAACP traveled to Chicago to meet with federal Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) officials and ask them to begin an investigation into discriminatory effects of the school board’s plan, commencing a flurry of activity for the remainder of 1979.¹⁵¹  They then requested an investigation from the Wisconsin state Department of Public Instruction, or DPI.¹⁵²  And they connected with Madison Teachers Incorporated, who agreed to pay legal fees involved in requesting a federal restraining order to block the school closings if DPI didn’t ask the Madison Board of Education to delay its decision.¹⁵³  DPI refused to act, saying it had no power in the matter. ¹⁵⁴  Neighborhood House and the South Madison Neighborhood Council were joined by the Citizens Coalition for Educational Planning, and together they made a formal complaint to HEW, whereupon the HEW Office for Civil Rights initiated an investigation.¹⁵⁵

In February of 1980 the school board delayed a decision on their plan.¹⁵⁷  And then everything went quiet until a news report surfaced that Madison General Hospital would lease Longfellow School for “medical education,” with Neighborhood House opposing the move. ¹⁵⁸   It would be three more years, delayed by a long illness and then the death of the HEW attorney managing the investigation,¹⁵⁹  before HEW would issue its finding that the plan was discriminatory.  However, they cut a deal with the school board to come up with an alternative plan without having to admit any wrongdoing. ¹⁶⁰  Part of the new plan involved creating the 28 member Lincoln-Franklin Demographic Task Force, whose task was to somehow resolve the differences. A 1984 Wisconsin State Journal article stated that “no group of citizens has ever made a greater effort for the school district than the Lincoln-Franklin Demographic Task Force.” The study resulted in a number of recommendations for the school board including “pairing” schools together in order to prevent future closures and giving schools the opportunity to share expensive equipment as well as ideas between teachers and administrators. Ultimately, the task force attempted to move Madison towards more equitable school desegregation¹⁶¹ but time has not yet rewarded their efforts.

Settling and Shifting into the 1980s

The 1980s, to a large extent, signaled the end of the 1960s era.  The social issues certainly didn’t go away, but the activism surrounding them died down.  And Neighborhood House tried to settle into the new era with its own shifts.

Perhaps nothing more signified the shift to the 1980s than the passing of Mary Lee Griggs on January 15, 1981.¹⁶²  Her death was noticed across the city, with the Madison City Council putting its weight behind fund-raising for a memorial, and instructing the city planning and parks departments to cooperate with Neighborhood House in its implementation.¹⁶³   And perhaps it was symbolic of the times that a small movement formed to rename the Parkside Apartments for Griggs, but no one organized the residents of the apartments around the idea, and the best that people could muster was renaming the apartment building’s lounge and putting up a plaque.¹⁶⁴

 And Neighborhood House concentrated on programming.  A 1981 program guide listed:

Monday: singing club, karate, pre-teen drop-in, teen drop-in, pottery.
Tuesday: pottery class, yoga, pre-teen drop-in teen drop-in, yoga for runners, karate, weight control class.
Wednesday: senior exercise, ballet, pre-teen drop-in teen drop-in karate, yoga.
Thursday: pre-teen drop-in teen drop-in movies, karate, yoga for runners.
Friday: crafts and cooking club, karate.
Saturday: karate.
Special events: senior.¹⁶⁵

Some of these activities built and maintained partnerships.  Yoga classes were, for a time, provided by University Extension.¹⁶⁶ The Tenants Union offered free workshops on tenants rights.¹⁶⁷    A variety of experts became involved in an oral history series on a wide variety of topics at Neighborhood House.¹⁶⁸

Neighborhood House continued its focus on the arts, to great success.  In 1980 Cosmo Di Salvo and Catherine Stitgen participated in a pottery class for seniors at Neighborhood House. In order to show their appreciation to the center for providing these integral services to the Madison senior community, Di Salvo and Stitgen presented Neighborhood House with the pottery pieces that they created in the class, lovingly named “Rockhenge” and “Merry-Go-Round.” Neighborhood House pottery teacher Bacia Edelmen called the two sculptures presented to the center “very creative pieces.”¹⁶⁹   In 1980 the center began sponsoring a series of trips, which were open to anyone, to the Fireside Playhouse in Fort Atkinson to see a variety of performances.¹⁷⁰   In 1984 Neighborhood House held a dance for local teenagers featuring DJ Charlie Brooks.¹⁷¹

And Neighborhood House did not forget its roots, hosting an annual Greenbush reunion that brought together old residents with all those wanting to keep the neighborhood alive in their imaginations and memories.¹⁷²

But the 1980s also signaled a new era of almost continuously difficult economic times.  Gone were the days that funded a college education, the War on Poverty, and urban renewal.  In its place was what would become known as neoliberalism, and its effects were felt most intensely by those at the bottom and those who served them.  Once again Neighborhood House responded to the times, working with the Hunger Network to distribute food during harvest season,¹⁷⁴ and putting its kitchen to work as part of a church-based network rotating to provide free meals during the week. Wth staples from the foodbank and day-old produce from Greenleaf Grocery, Neighborhood House took its turn each week feeding 80 to 150 people, engaging students, seniors, and evel local businesspeople in serving the lunches. ¹⁷⁵

Neighborhood House as an organization was itself increasingly suffering.  By 1983 David Eppstein, the Neighborhood House director, was the only full-time employee at the organization.¹⁷⁶   And it only got worse. The city’s Community Development Block Grant, or CDBG, funds were dropping every year and those declines were passed down to United Neighborhood Centers, which saw its funds decline from about $302,500 in 1984 to about $250,000 in 1985 and just under $200,000 in 1986. During that same period, UNC’s funds from United Way dropped from about $205.500 to about $200,000 and then down to about $174,000.¹⁷⁷  Helen Klebasadel, a Neighborhood House employee, reported “in recent years, staff had been cut, programs eliminated, and their fundraising efforts increased.” As Klebasadel put it, “we’ve gotten real creative in trying to keep things going.”¹⁷⁸   UNC kept trying to sell the building.  For a brief period of time it appeared Neighborhood House might move into “Rodeo’s Steak House¹⁷⁹  but that plan quickly dissipated as did another attempt to unload the building in 1989.¹⁸⁰

The financial pinch was occurring at the same that UNC was continuing to increase the number of centers–they were up to six in 1981 and stretched out to Deerfield,¹⁸¹ UNC was under an almost perpetual state of planning and reorganization that was forcing the centers into spending vast amounts of time on planning and replanning.¹⁸²  The continuing tension between centralization and decentralization was unresolved, as funders began pressuring UNC to centralize¹⁸³  and the centers, particularly Neighborhood House, balked.¹⁸⁴  UNC was going through more management turmoil, attempting to shift from an “agency coordinator” position¹⁸²  created as a money saver back to an “executive director” but having difficulty finding someone who could do the job.¹⁸⁶  The city’s Community Development Block Grant program and United Way both began threatening to withhold funds from UNC because of reporting problems.¹⁸⁷  And the South Madison Neighborhood Center made a concerted effort to leave the UNC fold altogether, but eventually failed.¹⁸⁸  But UNC kept adding centers, and was up to seven in 1988.¹⁸⁹

Neighborhood House and the New Immigrants

Little noticed at first, as a result of new federal immigration legislation in 1965 and the conclusion of the war in Vietnam, the country was experiencing a new wave of immigration from new places, especially Global South places like Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America.  And some of those new immigrants were arriving in Madison.  The Bayview apartments in particulary had become home for many Hmong immigrants in need of extra services.  So intense was the need that the Bayview Foundation began planning a new community center in the midst of the apartment complex.  While the plan was that the center would be only for Bayview residents, it was nonetheless only a few blocks away from Neighborhood House. ¹⁹⁰   But of course there were many more immigrants than the Hmong in Bayview and the Triangle now had the highest concentration of subsidized housing in the city.¹⁹¹

Immigrant services was the familiar territory Neighborhood House had been founded upon. Neighborhood House even helped these new immigrants to take English language classes through Madison Area Technical School–the modern incarnation of the old Vocational School that funded the old Neighborhood House’s Americanization efforts. But this was also unfamiliar territory, as the lessons learned about working with immigrants were now mere history.  And the cultures were different.  David Eppstein voiced his perceptions that the European immigrants of half a century past had worked very hard to get along.  It was not an entirely accurate portrait, but there apparently was a level of tension between Blacks and Southeast Asians in the Triangle area that became a focus for Neighborhood House and other service organizations, with Neighborhood House organizing a benefit dinner and other cultural events for the new immigrants.  As Eppstein put it, “we want people to help us continue what we consider a rich tradition: helping new immigrants get settled.”¹⁹²

Southeast Asians were, of course, not the only group that turned to Neighborhood House. Ray Kumapayi, the president of the African Association of Madison, describes Neighborhood House as a “home away from home,” and a place for “African immigrants…to get advice about life, meet and assimilate to the American culture.” In 1994, a well-known member of the local Nigerian community passed away, leaving many Nigerians lost and without a place to meet and mourn together. Neighborhood House “afford(ed) us support we needed during this difficult time,” and eventually many of the African associations in the city began to use the center as a support and celebration space.¹⁹³  For Cecilia Miranda, from Bolivia, “I was lost when I came to the US at age 18 and when Neighborhood House opened for us to have a group, it helped me regain my dance.”¹⁹⁵  For Leslie Ann Busby-Amegashie, of the Caribbean Club who arrived in 1994, “Being from another country, when I came here, I wanted to see if I could meet other individuals from my country or other Islanders. I was directed here because I was told a lot of international individuals–students–came here, so I was sure I would be able to find someone else from the Caribbean. I came directly here and I met other people–just what I was looking for–and made lasting friendships.”¹⁹⁶

And dance and celebrate and connect they did.  The Neighborhood House 70th anniversary celebration program listed  Italian, African, and Mesaghios Greek dancers, a Triangle/Bush video, and Hmong ethnic craft display, and ethnic foods. It also promoted the “Neighborhood House Creed–Neighborhood House is dedicated to those form near and far who seek freedom and opportunity, friends and neighbors, and to those who, in turn, finding these values here, offer them to others.”¹⁹⁷  In 1990 Neighborhood House took multiculturalism to the State Street steps of the state capitol grounds, with African poetry, Middle Eastern dancers, Hmong dancers, Greek dancers, Africal dancers, African-American performers, and others.¹⁹⁸

The Ed Holmes Era

While culturally Neighbrhood House was experiencing a resurgence, fiscally it was suffering when, In 1987, Ed Holmes stepped into the director’s seat at Neighborhood House. Holmes had actually started as the youth director when David Eppstein was director. Eppstein described Holmes as “very charismatic and popular with the young Black population.” And while his stay was shorter than Eppstein’s it was equally memorable.¹⁹⁹

Holmes stepped into the results of the UNC economic disaster.  There wasn’t enough funding to pay the needed staff, and the building was falling apart.  And Holmes went to work.  In May of 1987 Neighborhood House ran a dance-a-thon that raised $4,000–an event that would be repeated for a number of years after.²⁰⁰ In June they sent out 5000 letters to raise funds for the summer camp that had organized 15 volunteers to serve 44 youth.²⁰¹  Holmes helped organized a Miss Teen Madison Pagaent and, lest we criticize the move too quickly, we should note the letter to the editor about the pageant that read “What a great idea to have a Miss Teen Madison Pageant where community service is more important than swimsuit competition”.²⁰²  Though even with the shift in emphasis, or perhaps because of it, the pageant didn’t attract enough contestants to run a second year.²⁰³

After another dance-a-thon in 1988²⁰⁴ a bake sale featuring 1,000 apple pies to be sold for $5 each in 1989,²⁰⁵ and some city funds, Ed Holmes was ready to spend some of that money.  The first thing he did was get the Neighborhood House roof fixed,²⁰⁶ and then the floor.²⁰⁷  He also tapped into the new rules for work-study at the University of Wisconsin, getting six work-study students who could provide academic support to minority school kids.²⁰⁸

Holmes also focused on building collaborations, helping to organizing the Bayview-Brittingham-Vilas Neighborhood Steering Committee, that included area organizations, hospitals, and businesses.²⁰⁹  And he brought Neighborhood House into collaboration with Centro Hispano in 1988 for the Cinco De Mayo celebration.²¹⁰

Big Art and Loud Punk

Holmes also helped usher Neighborhood House into the 1990s. Neighborhood House had always taken risks, and that risk-taking spread to the arts as the 1990s approached.  In 1988 Jim Holloway, in need of services himself, found Neighborhood House.  He was a mostly self-taught artist who’d experienced some rough times, and found a sense of belonging in Madison and support from Neighborhood House.  Helped by 20 after school drop-in youth,²¹¹  Holloway donated months of his time painting a mural across the entire wall of the gym at Neighborhood House.

Holloway mural²¹²

The colorful mural was a representation of a variety of experiences and feelings that Holloway associated with Madison, including a rainbow that symbolized hope, an image of Neighborhood House director Ed Holmes under the rainbow, and a picture of a “white dog on a teeter totter (who) followed a kid to the center one day.”²¹³   It took more than a year to complete, and was finally unveiled on November 7 of 1989.²¹⁴

In another sign of the times, Neighborhood House opened the newly painted gymnasium to touring punk and rock bands, becoming a sober all-ages venue. This offered teenagers in the Madison community a rare opportunity to see their favorite bands play live in a safe and welcoming environment. One of the most memorable shows was the punk rock band Fugazi.  Five dollars to get in was a cheap price for the 400 people who lined up to see Fugazi play at Neighborhood House on June 19th of 1990. The band from Washington D.C. started touring on September 3, 1987, and have since played over 1000 concerts, covering all fifty United States, Europe, Australia, South America, Japan and others. They are a self-managed band run through Dischord Records.²¹⁵ Fugazi always ensures that their concerts are open to people of all-ages and charge from $5 to $7 in accordance with their philosophy to keep music affordable.²¹⁶  One attendee said of the show that the room was “Hot! Literally 100 something degrees inside” and also “crowded, rambunctious, but peaceful. Great venue for a great show.”²¹⁷  Another said “I was at this show! Fugazi Live Neighborhood House, Madison, WI June 19th, 1990. Place was so packed, and hot/humid as only a Sconnie can believe.”²¹⁸

Get a recording of the Neighborhood House concert.

Into the Nineties

It appeared that Neighborhood House was becoming more and more adept at surfing the heavy waves created by the constant state of crisis in United Neighborhood Centers.²²⁰  Ed Holmes seemed to be at the top of his game, even running, if unsuccessfully, for alder against the indomitable Tim Bruer and picking up The Capital Times endorsement for “his track record as director of Neighborhood House in building coalitions and providing positive programs for area residents.”²²¹

And then, almost as if it were an attempt to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, the worsening UNC budget crisis forced them to again cut Neighborhood House to a half-time director.²²²  At the close of 1990 Ed Holmes left for a position as minority services coordinator at Memorial High School, and would eventually go on to become principal at West High School.

So once again, the end was nigh.  And once again Neighborhood House would prove its fortitude.

Continue

Notes

1. two Directors are Named for Neighborhood Centers, Wisconsin State Journal May 6, 1966

2. We culd find no records of the Neighborhood House advisory board for this period, and the MNC board records are sparse, so we only have newspaper sources to go on. Zmudzinski is referred to as Neighborhood House director in Viewers all Ready at Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal March 22, 1967. But the papers regularly confused Zmudzinski’s title. In this case, however, it was part of a photo caption showing him with a child in front of a new donated color TV at Neighborhood House, making the title more plausible

3. the newspapers couldn’t decide how to spell her name, calling her Diana DeWitt in Neighborhood House Meeting, The Capital Times May 22, 1967; Dena De Witt in Wingra Area has Free Lawn Work, Wisconsin State Journal April 24, 1968; and Dena Dewitt in Free Clean-Up Service Offered in Wingra Area,Capital Times April 22, 1968. We could find no Neighborhood House or Madison Neighborhood Center records to establish her correct name.

4. Girls’ Work Makes Old Toys New Gifts, Wisconsin State Journal, December 14, 1969.

5. Stolen Checks are Found in Monkey Cage, The Capital Times, June 26, 1970.

6. John T. Aehl, Despite All the Weeds, Triangle Area Sprouts, Wisconsin State Journal, August 8, 1966.

7. John Newhouse, Downtown Rotarians Pitch In With Financial Aid, Wisconsin State Journal, September 27, 1970.

8. Frank Custer, City’s Poor Tots Begin ‘Head Start’, The Capital Times, February 7, 1966.

9. Ruth Flegel, Rent a Youth in Summer for Double Benefit, Wisconsin State Journal, June 9, 1970.

10. Girls’ Work Makes Old Toys New Gifts, Wisconsin State Journal, December 14, 1969.

11. Center Plans Nursery Class For 6 weeks, The Capital Times, April 23, 1969.

12. Mills Street Day Care Center, The Capital Times, May 14, 1968.

13. Gina Chirichella interview, 2015.

14. Photo with caption of Madison Mustangs football team play working with kids at NH, The Capital Times, October 19, 1970.

15. Givers Fund Aids Neighborhood Centers, Wisconsin State Journal, November 12, 1969

16. Italian-American Club to Meet, Wisconsin State Journal, September 10, 1968.

17. Strollers Set Tryouts for ‘Harvey’ Cast, Wisconsin State Journal, May 10, 1970.

18. Parents Without Partners to Hear Drug Usage Talk, The Capital Times, April 6, 1967.

19. Robert Distefano, What Freedom Really Means…, Wisconsin State Journal, September 10, 1967.

20. FPL Unit Will Meet Thursday, Wisconsin State Journal, September 18, 1966.

21. Flea Market Set Saturday, The Capital Times, May 19, 1970; Flea Market on Mills Street, The Capital Times, July 22, 1970.

22. 1960-69, UW Archives and Records Management, https://www.library.wisc.edu/archives/exhibits/campus-history-projects/protests-social-action-at-uw-madison-during-the-20th-century/1960-1969/; Vietnam and Opposition at Home, Wisconsin Historical Society, http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/tp-040/?action=more_essay; UW-Madison Archives & Oral History, http://archives.library.wisc.edu/uw-archives/exhibits/protests/1960s.html.

23. Lester Pines and Roberta Gassman Interview, 2014.

24. NAACP Youth Rally Saturday, The Capital Times, January 14, 1966.

25. TV to Cover Funeral, Wisconsin State Journal, April 9, 1968.

26. John E. Mollwitz, Madison Catholics Seek Reform With Communities, Wisconsin State Journal, May 11, 1968.

27. Roger A Gribble, ‘Freedom School’ Is Planned Here, Wisconsin State Journal, March 5, 1970.

28. Students to Help Develop Own Courses in New School Here, The Capital Times, March 5, 1970.

29. Roger A. Gribble, VISTA Workers May Teach at Freedom House This Fall, Wisconsin State Journal, August 14, 1970.

30. Matt Pommer, ‘No-Wall’ School backers Told Of Board’s Doubts, The Capital Times, January 4, 1972.

31. Candidates for Mayor to Talk, The Capital Times, Feb. 25, 1969.

32. Ninth Ward Meet on Mifflin Issue, The Capital Times, May 17, 1969.

33. Rallies, Open Houses and Talk-ins Among Moratorium Events Here, The Capital Times, Nov. 12, 1969.

34. Peace Moves Backed by Ninth Warders, Wisconsin State Journal, May 12, 1970–they also voted to support a resolution to stop the war and bring the troops home by a margin of 58-9.

35. Consumers League Will Meet Tonight, The Capital Times, February 16, 1971.

36. Image courtesy of the UW-Madison Archives, #S00502.

37. John T. Aehl, Council To Hear Plan On Housing in Triangle, Wisconsin State Journal January 8, 1966.

38. Steven Barney, Wingra Community Council Meets Old Problem: Money, Wisconsin State Journal, January 11, 1966.

39. Triangle area apartments get U.S. Go-Ahead Wisconsin State Journal, February 3, 1968.

40.  George Mitchell, FHA Gives Go-Ahead for Triangle Housing, Wisconsin State Journal, February 21, 1970.

40a.  Gay dances **

41. Neighborhood House to Note Birthday, Wisconsin State Journal, November 23, 1967.

42. Neighborhood House Observes 50th Year, Wisconsin State Journal, December 12, 1967.

43. Today’s Radio Highlights,Wisconsin State Journal, December 12, 1967.

44. Rosemary Kendrick, Near East Siders Agree on New Center, The Capital Times, February 23, 1968.

45. East Neighborhood Center Established, The Capital Times, August 16, 1968.

46.The United Community Chest was the precursor to the United Way.

47. Some Observations by the Executive Director on the Financial Crisis and Restructuring of the Agency, June 13, 1970, Neighborhood House archives.

48. MNC board meeting minutes, March 24, 1970, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives., United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

50. Some Observations by the Executive Director on the Financial Crisis and Restructuring of the Agency, June 13, 1970, Neighborhood House archives.

51. Dave Wagner, Budget Squeeze Threatens Mills Neighborhood House, The Capital Times December 18, 1970.

52. Headline images from: Budget Squeeze Threatens Mills Neighborhood House, The Capital Times December 18, 1970; Dave Wagner, Neighborhood House Becomes a Bleak House, The Capital Times, Jan 8, 1971; Dave Wagner, Givers’ Fund to Kill Neighborhood House While Hiking Own Budget, The Capital Times, Jan. 18, 1971.

53. No Decisions Made on Centers’ Closing, Wisconsin State Journal, January 21, 1971.

54. Dave Wagner, ‘Efficiency’ Over Human Needs?, The Capital Times, Dec. 22, 1970.

55. Dave Wagner, Aldermen Fight GIvers Fund Cuts For Center, The Capital Times, Dec. 29, 1970.

56. Dave Wagner, Neighborhood House Becomes a Bleak House, The Capital Times, Jan 8, 1971.

57. 9th Ward Meeting to Mull Many Community Problems, Wisconsin State Journal, January 24, 1971.

58. Dave Wagner, Givers’ Fund to Kill Neighborhood House While Hiking Own Budget, The Capital Times, Jan. 18, 1971. It is interesting to ponder that the Madison Sustaining Fund, the precursor to what we now know as Community Shares of Wisconsin that is considered by many to be the progressive alternative to the United Way, started in 1971.

59. Co-op Nursery Defends Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal, January 11, 1971.

60. Helen Matheson, Despite Budget Cuts, Agencies Keep Hopes, Wisconsin State Journal, January 20, 1971.

61. Chest Board on Right Track, Wisconsin State Journal, January 21, 1971.

62. Helen Matheson, Community Chest Now Can Start New Efforts, Wisconsin State Journal, January 24, 1971.

63. United Givers Cites ‘Neighborhood’ Backing, Wisconsin State Journal, February 17, 1971.

64. No Decision Made on Closing Of Mills Neighborhood House, The Capital Times, February 13, 1971.

65. Staff searches for Way to Keep Mills St. Center Open, The Capital Times, Feb. 1, 1971; Joseph McBride, Hopes for Neighborhood House Are Told to Ninth Ward Residents, Wisconsin State Journal, February 1, 1971.

66. Karen Cue, Neighborhood House Struggling, Daily Herald, Feb. 8, 1971.

67. All 4 City Centers to be Preserved, The Capital Times, February 19, 1971; Mills Street Center Will Remain Open,Wisconsin State Journal, February 20, 1971.

68. Rennebohm Fund to Help Wil-Mar, Wisconsin State Journal, February 2, 1971.

69. John Newhouse, A Druggist’s Gift that Keeps on Giving, Wisconsin State Journal, April 17, 1972.

70. Rennebohm Fund to Help Wil-Mar, Wisconsin State Journal, February 2, 1971.

71.  Headline images from: All 4 City Centers to be Preserved, Madison Capital Times February 19, 1971; Mills Street Center Will Remain Open, Wisconsin State Journal February 20, 1971.

72. Dave Wagner, At Stake in Triangle: Federal Cash, Local Interests, The Capital Times June 15, 1971.

73. Report on the Meeting of Center Directors, MNC, February 1, 1971, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

74. Helen Matheson, Neighborhood House’s Future Looks Gloomy, Wisconsin State Journal, January 16, 1971.

75. MNC Executive Committee Meeting Minutes, March 30, 1971 letter from Amos. T. Burrows Jr. ED of United Community Chest to Chester Zmudzinski, April 8, 1971.

76. MNC Personnel committee meeting minutes, Sept. 13, 1971, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives; Zmudzinski Quits as Center Director, Wisconsin State Journal June 12, 1971, p. 1.

77. Frank Custer, Zmudzinski To Be Honored for 22 Years of Service. The Capital Times, November 30,1971.

78. Dave Wagner, Neighborhood Center Shakeup Asked, The Capital Times, January 11, 1972.

79. Jordan S. Yin. 1998. The community development industry system: a case study of politics and institutions in Cleveland, 1967–1997. Journal of Urban Affairs, Volume 20, Issue 2, pages 137–157.

80. MNC board of directors meeting September 27, 1972, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

81. Neighborhood Centers Chief Named, Wisconsin State Journal, August 3, 1972.

82. Sheila Tefft,Neighborhood House Changing Programs, Wisconsin State Journal, 0ctober 29, 1972.

83. Rosemary Kendrick, Mental Health Unit Moving, The Capital Times, January 30, 1971.

84. MNC Board of Directors Meeting, February 24, 1972, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

85. MNC Executive Committee Meeting July 20, 1972, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

86. MNC Executive Committee meeting, September 4, 1972, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives. How MNC got ownership over the building is unclear, since the Neighborhood House Association was the original owner, but that must have been an agreement for affiliation at some point.

87. MNC board meeting minutes, November 8, 1972, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives ; Hospital Seeks to Buy Neighborhood House, Wisconsin State Journal Friday, October 1, 1976

88. UNC board meeting minutes, January 25, 1973, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

89. Vivian Waixel, ‘It’s the Small Things That Hurt’, Wisconsin State Journal, July 18, 1971.

90. Helen Matheson, A Proposal: To Help Aged Live In Dignity, Wisconsin State Journal, April 16, 1972.

91. For Elderly Folks in Madison There’s Now A Reason To Smile, The Capital Times, July 28, 1972.

92. Image from Neighborhood House document, Independent Living for the Elderly, approximately 1971, Neighborhood House Archives.

93. For Elderly Folks in Madison There’s Now A Reason To Smile, The Capital Times, July 28, 1972.

94. Meanest Thief Steals Van Used for Elderly, The Capital Times Saturday, January 15, 1972.

95. Sheila Tefft,Neighborhood House Changing Programs, Wisconsin state Journal, 0ct 29, 1972.

96. Marjorie Chirichella, Daycare Demands Roles for Men, They Proclaim, Wisconsin State Journal, Dec. 31, 1972; Jo Banko, Daycare Center to Open, The Capital Times, December 30, 1972.

97.  Photo from Marjorie Chirichella, Daycare Demands Roles for Men, They Proclaim, Wisconsin State Journal, Dec. 31, 1972.

98. Neighborhood House to Train Committed Youths, The Capital Times, September 8, 1971; High School Leaders, Wisconsin State Journal September 6, 1971.

99. Juvenile rights, The Capital Times, February 9, 1971.

100. Teen discussion, The Capital Times, February 22, 1971.

101. Bayview Center plans teen party, Wisconsin State Journal, October 8, 1976.

102. William Glover, Eccentric Puppet Theater Is ‘Basic as Bread’, Wisconsin State Journal October 8, 1972.

103. Sheila Tefft, ‘Memory’ Lingers On, Wisconsin State Journal, December 11, 1973,

104. Square Dance, The Capital Times, October 15, 1974

105. Pottery Classes Offered Soon, The Capital Times, Thursday, July 18, 1974.

106. Crafts Fair, The Capital Times, Saturday, April 21, 1973.

107. Neighborhood House Plans Carnival, The Capital Times, June 12, 1974.

108. Aquarium Club Slates Auction, The Capital Times, February 1, 1974.

109. Ed Bark, Neighborhood House in Long Survival Struggle, The Capital Times, August 28, 1976.

110. People’s Law School Open Oct. 21 With 18 Courses, Wisconsin State Journal, Friday, October 12, 1973.

111. Wounded Knee Day Marked Here Today, Wisconsin State Journal, February 27, 1974.

112. Soglin Featured, The Capital Times, March 25, 1974; Candidates Forum Set for Tonight, Wisconsin State Journal, March 20, 1975.

113. Mifflin Health Screening Clinic, The Capital Times, November 15, 1976.

114. Owen Coyle, Dane County’s HMO: It’s Ready to Become Reality, The Capital Times, October 13, 1975.

115.  William T. Evjue, Hello Wisconsin, The Capital Times, April 19, 1969.

116. Mike Miller, Triangle: A Last Ditch Struggle, The Capital Times, May 11, 1971.

117. Dave Maraniss, MRA Approves Plan for Triangle, The Capital Times, August 18, 1971.

118. George Mitchell, Neighborhood House OKs Triangle, Wisconsin State Journal, November 12, 1971.

119. October 5, 1973, letter from Mary Lee Griggs to Mayor Paul Soglin, Neighborhood House archives ; this letter was published in The Capital Times, October 13, 1973 as “Griggs says City Not Playing Fair”.

120. September 7, 1973 letter from Charlotte Navarra Norris to “Lillian”, Neighborhood House archives.

121. Tom Foley, Soglin asks elderly low-cost housing in triangle project, The Capital Times, June 20, 1974.

122.  Rosemary Kendrick, Wil-Mar Packs Meeting, Changes Rules for Centers, The Capital Times, January 30, 1976.

123.United Center Dismisses Pitt, Wisconsin State Journal, March 27, 1976.

124.Rosemary Kendrick, Neighborhood House To Be Closed, The Capital Times June 25, 1976; Ed Bark, Supporters Start Drive to Save Neighborhood Center, The Capital Times, August 4, 1976.

125. Robert Pfefferkorn, Is Neighborhood House Era Ending? Wisconsin State Journal, September 12, 1976.

126. Rosemary Kendrick, Neighborhood House To Be Closed, The Capital Times, June 25, 1976.

127.  Headline images from: Robert Pfefferkorn, Is Neighborhood House Era Ending? Wisconsin State Journal, September 12, 1976; Ed Bark, Neighborhood House Goes Up For Sale, The Capital Times, August 27, 1976.

128.  Gina Chirichella interview, 2015.

129. Residents Ask Neighborhood Center to Reconsider Closing, The Capital Times, July 15, 1976.

130. Ed Bark, Supporters Start Drive to Save Neighborhood Center, The Capital Times, August 4, 1976.

131. Ed Bark, Supporters Start Drive to Save Neighborhood Center, The Capital Times, August 4, 1976; Robert Pfefferkorn, Is Neighborhood House Era Ending? Wisconsin State Journal, September 12, 1976.

132. Ed Bark, Neighborhood House Goes Up For Sale, The Capital Times, August 27, 1976.

133. Robert Pfefferkorn, Is Neighborhood House Era Ending? Wisconsin State Journal, September 12, 1976.

134. December 14, 1976 memo from UNC director Mary Kay Baum to Neighborhood House advisory board and staff, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

135. Minutes of Neighborhood House Board Annual Meeting, February 17, 1977, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives, list Marge Chirichella as the director; Gina Chirichella interview, 2015.

136. David Eppstein interview, 2016.

137. Gruber Sets Fund-Raiser, The Capital Times, February 22, 1977.

138. Benefit Dinner, Wisconsin State Journal, May 12, 1977.

139. Thomas W. Still, Plan for Triangle center gets a push, Wisconsin State Journal May 16, 1978; George Hesselberg, Hope for multi-service center in Triangle fades, Wisconsin State Journal, August 19, 1979.

140. Older adult films at Neighborhood, The Capital Times, April 8, 1981.

141. Eddie Carthan Day Saturday, The Capital Times, February 15, 1985

142. Jury clears a former mayor in Mississippi killing of foe November 5, 1982, New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/1982/11/05/us/jury-clears-a-former-mayor-in-mississippi-killing-of-foe.html.

143. Citizen’s Party offers an alternative: Smith, The Capital Times, March 18, 1980.

144. Neighborhood House News Mar-Apr, probably 1979 though no year is listed on the masthead, but only in an upcoming events listing inside, lists Eppstein as director, Neighborhood House archives; Neighborhood House News, January 1983 also lists Eppstein as director. Eppstein was listed as director in 1986-7 in the Neighborhood House Planning Document 1986-87, Neighborhood House archives, but Eppstein himself, in a 2016 interview, says he was director only until 1985. Since there is no clear record of Nancy Kelley’s start date it is possible that she served as long as Eppstein,

145. Rosemary Kendrick, Can’t afford something? Try SWAPping your talents for it, The Capital Times, April 5, 1980.

146. David Eppstein interview, March 22, 1016.

147. Benefit Concert, Wisconsin State Journal, May 28, 1981; David Eppstein interview, 2016.

148. Roger A. Gribble, Longfellow School’s Closing Opposed, Wisconsin State Journal, March 23, 1971.

149. Crista Zivanovic, Groups charge bias in school closing plan, The Capital Times, November 9, 1979.

150. David Eppstein interview, March 22, 1016.

151. Crista Zivanovic, Groups charge bias in school closing plan, The Capital Times, November 9, 1979; A flyer, “Longfellow School, 1858-1979??”, in the Neighborhood House archives, also refers to the Longfellow Community School Organization fighting the proposed closing, but the organization does not show up in the news reports.

152. Crista Zivanovic, DPI is asked to probe city school bias charges, The Capital Times, November 21, 1979.

153. Madison teachers will pay for cost of restraining order, Wisconsin State Journal, November 27, 1979.

154. Roger A. Gribble, DPI: No power to probe charges, Wisconsin State Journal, December 2, 1979.

155. Noah Paley, Federal unit to investigate school closings, Wisconsin State Journal, December 28, 1979.

156. Photo by James Steakley Own work [CC BY-SA 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0 or GFDL http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html], via Wikimedia Commons athttps://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ALongfellow_School_Panorama.jpg.

157. Robyn Curry, Decision on Longfellow School use is delayed, Wisconsin State Journal, February 19, 1980.

158. Rosemary Kendrick, Madison General gets OK for school, The Capital Times, December 16, 1980.

159. Richard W. Jaeger, Board took positive approach, Wisconsin State Journal, December 4, 1983.

160. Dianne M. Paley, Agency says board built bias, Wisconsin State Journal, June 27, 1983.

161. The Integration Plan, Wisconsin State Journal, September 16, 1984.

162. Death Notices, Wisconsin State Journal, January 16, 1981.

163. Griggs memorial gains backing, The Capital Times, March 15, 1981.

164. July 16, 1981 Community Development Authority of the City of Madison release, City of Madison Department of Planning and Development, Nov. 15, 1981, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

165. Neighborhood House Programming, 1981, unknown source–newspaper like, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

166. University Extension Yoga Classes, Wisconsin State Journal, June 11, 1982.

167. Free workshop on tenants rights offered, The Capital Times, November 16, 1983.

168. Learn some history on Tuesdays, Wisconsin State Journal, March 26, 1984.

169. Potters donate two works, The Capital Times, July 30, 1980.

170. Fireside Bus Outing Set, Wisconsin State Journal, August 6, 1980.

171. Special Events in Madison, Wisconsin State Journal, March 23, 1984.

172. General Interest, The Capital Times, December 2, 1983.

173. Preparations for the third annual Greenbush reunion, Image ID:  110431, Wisconsin Historical Society Archives, http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:4294963828-4294955414&dsRecordDetails=R:IM110431.

174. Acts of Charity, Wisconsin State Journal, November 19, 1985.

175. Business helps, The Capital Times, March 17, 1986; David Eppstein interview, 2016.

176. Sunny Schubert, 67 years of giving refugees a boost, Wisconsin State Journal, June 23, 1983.

177. Joe Graf, Neighborhood centers feel financial pinch, Wisconsin State Journal, May 5, 1986.

178. Joe Graf, Neighborhood centers feel financial pinch, Wisconsin State Journal, May 5, 1986.

179. Neighborhood House Monthly Report, August 1987, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

180. UNC board meeting minutes August 3, 1989, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

181. UNC board meeting minutes, October 1981, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

182. Neighborhood House Planning Document 1987-87 United Neighborhood Centers Reorganization Task Force Meeting Minutes, August 31, 1981, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

183. UNC board of directors minutes August 27, 1987, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records; UNC meeting minutes September 8, 1987, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

184. August 19, 1987 letter from Neighborhood House Board of Directors to Nathaniel Robinson of UNC, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records , Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

185. UNC board meeting minutes beginning 1980, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

186. UNC board meeting minutes September 1, 1988, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives; UNC board meeting minutes January 19, 1989, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

187. UNC board of directors minutes of emergency board meeting September 14, 1987, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives; letter to Nat Robinson from mayor Sensenbrenner, October 4, 1988, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives; letter to Pat Van Gorp, from Leslie Ann Howard, United Way, October 5, 1988 , United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

188. Robb Johnson, S. Madison Center charts indpendence, The Capital Times, Jan 18, 1988; UNC Corporate Board of Directors Meeting June 9, 1988, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.  UNC representatives wanted Ed Holmes to be part-time director at SMNC and part time at Neighborhood House. SMPC representatives were not happy about that and the minutes refer to the meeting as “confrontational.”

189. UNC Press Release April 26, 1988 , United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

190. Rosemary Kendrick, Bayview planning new $300,000 community center, The Capital Times, April 3, 1982.

191.  Sunny Schubert, 67 years of giving refugees a boost, Wisconsin State Journal, June 23, 1983.

192. Sunny Schubert, 67 years of giving refugees a boost, Wisconsin State Journal, June 23, 1983.

193. Ray Kumapayi interview, 2014.

194.  photo courtesy of Ray Kumapayi.

195. Cecilia Miranda interview, 2014.

196. Leslie Ann Busby-Amegashie interview, 2014.

197. October. 19, 1986 70th anniversary program, Neighborhood House archives. The city council passed a resolution commemorating the anniversary–Resolutions adopted, Wisconsin State Journal, December 11, 1986.  We could find no media coverage of the event and thus we don’t know its impact.

198. Neighborhood House Party, Wisconsin State Journal, September 28, 1990.

199. David Eppstein interview, 2016; May 1987 Neighborhood House Center Report to the UNC board, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives. It’s unclear when Holmes actually started, but he first shows up in the May 1987 report.

2000. May 1987 NH Center Report to UNC board, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

201. Neighborhood House Center Report June 1987, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

202. letter to editor, hooray for teen pageant, Wisconsin State Journal, December 12, 1987.

203. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, November 1988, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

204. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, April 1988, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

205. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, October-November 1989, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

206. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, December 1989, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

207. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, January 1990, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

208. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, August 1989, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

209. Neighborhood committee meets tonight, Wisconsin State Journal, March 8, 1988.

210. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, April 1988, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

211. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, September 29 1988, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.  Holloway donated months of his time painting a mural across the entire wall of the gym at Neighborhood House.

212.  This image is reconstructed from photographs in the Neighborhood House archives. The vertical lines show where the photos were pieced together. The biker and basketball player are not part of the mural. Reconstruction by Randy Stoecker

213. Tom Waller, Artist’s mural is gift to kids, Wisconsin State Journal, June 27, 1990.

214. Neighborhood House Center report to UNC board, October-Nobember 1989, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

215. Dischord Records, http://www.dischord.com.

216. Fugazi Life Series, http://www.dischord.com/fugazi_live_series?page=8.

217. anonymous quote told to a student researcher, 2014.

218. Anonymous quote at http://www.dischord.com/fugazi_live_series/about.  Also see Symphony of Ghosts blogpost, Fugazi Live Neighborhood House Madison WI June 19th 1990, posted on June 17, 2009,  http://symphonyofghosts.blogspot.com/2009/06/fugazi-live-neighborhood-house-madison.html.

219. Photo courtesy of Pat Graham and Fugazi https://www.dischord.com/fugazi_live_series/madison-wi-usa-61990

220. Tim Kelly, Neighborhood Centers are ‘in trouble,’ Wisconsin State Journal, June 28,1989.

21. Cap Times’ choices for City Council, The Capital Times, March 30, 1989; the State Journal endorsed Bruer State Journal choices for City Council, Wisconsin State Journal, March 30, 1989; Seven of eight incumbents re-elected to City Council, Wisconsin State Journal, April 5, 1989.

222. memo from Kay Hendon to UNC Board, December 10, 1990,United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

Striving Toward Independence:  1991-2015

As Neighborhood House reached the 1990s, it seemed to settle into a pace that would last into the new millennium.  Much of the credit for that achievement would go to those who provided stable leadership even in the face of continuing problems in United Neighborhood Centers.  And perhaps no one provided more visible stable leadership than Linda Weyenberg.

The Linda Weyenberg Era

Linda Weyenberg first started working at Neighborhood House as a field placement student in the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Social Work.  “She had gotten her degree in social work later in life, while she was in her 50’s,” reflected Andy Heidt.¹  When UNC cut Neighborhood House down to a half-time director position, and Ed Holmes left, she first filled in through her role as program coordinator²  and then as acting director later in 1991 before she became the full-time director. Linda Weyenberg’s leadership helped maintain stability at Neighborhood House into the early part of the 21st century. During much of that time, the community center employed only two full-time paid staff–Linda, and the youth program director, initially Jennifer Classon.³  Weyenberg brought some of the old settlement philosophy with her. Neighborhood House hosted community meals that drew in a diverse group from the community, from the homeless to university professors, in an attempt to bring people together from different walks of life.⁴ She also channeled some of Gay Braxton’s style, as “She could be kind of gruff–kind of a working class woman, but had a heart of gold.”⁵

Linda was pivotal in organizing Neighborhood House’s food pantry efforts. Most of her monthly reports to UNC included some version of the phrase “the food pantry has been extremely busy.”⁷

Linda was passionate and dedicated to the Neighborhood House mission. Her son Sam tells a story about someone who came into Neighborhood House looking for clothes and a shower because he had a job interview the next day. Dismayed that Neighborhood House didn’t have anything like that, she spent the whole evening making calls and looking for options for this man. It was situations like this that kept her motivated to create a place where people could get a shower and find clothes for a job interview. She was driven to provide necessities and opportunities to her community. Her son speaks of her passion for service, and how she was “always very devoted to everyone as a person first, and you treat people that way. She saw this as a real opportunity to put that philosophy and perspective on life into play, and to try and foster that more. And, I think that diversity that she was able to help promote here was really showing by the time she retired.”⁸

New Traditions and Old

Through the 1990s, Neighborhood House continued building on new traditions and bringing new groups into its fold.  The center remained a local all-ages concert venue.  In 1995 the noted Chicago Emo bands Cap’n Jazz and Braid played at Neighborhood House.⁹  The Black Star Reggae Band played a benefit to support the the 21st African Youth Movement’s efforts to establish a local African cultural center.¹⁰   Neighborhood House even on occasion served as a last minute plan b, such as when the Milwaukee band Compound Red had to move from a private house party to accommodate all the fans.¹¹

Neighborhood House also organized an 80th anniversary open house,¹² creating a new tradition that began with the 70th anniversay in 1986.  This anniversary celebration also continued a tradition of an absence of media coverage.  But media coverage prior to the event allowed Weyenberg to note the center’s work on “developing leadership skills for users, teaching English, and offering recreational activities.”  She also noted that, in 1995, Neighborhood House served more than 5,000 people on an operating budget of only $110,000.¹³

Those users were quite varied, including fencing classes offered by the Durendal Fencing Club,¹⁴ and the summer camp kids who learned how to tie dye–not yet a lost art in the 1990s¹⁵–and produce their own newspaper.¹⁶  Neighborhood House partnered with Centro Hispano and Olbrich Botanical Gardens to help kids learn how to garden.  And it was more than a select few who were interested–they had 80 kids in all.¹⁷  Neighborhood House also worked to bring fresh produce to their food pantry through a network of people including farmers market vendors,¹⁸ and was the founding location for the Madison Table Tennis Club.¹⁹

Other activities continued some of the oldest traditions of Neighborhood House.  The Neighborhood House garage sale, sometimes called rummage sale and sometimes including a “huge” used book sale, ran every spring from the early 1980s, and continued uninterrupted into the mid-2000s.²⁰  The annual Holiday auction, held every December since the early 1980s, also kept going into the late 2000s.²¹  And Neighborhood House continued the work to maintain the memory of the Greenbush neighborhood, co-sponsoring a spaghetti dinner celebrating the centennial of Trinity United Methodist Church and the Greenbush.²²

The End of United Neighborhood Centers

All this time Neighborhood House was also managing the challenges created by the continuing troubles of United Neighborhood Centers.  In 1992 Mayor Soglin got involved by advocating for a major fundraising campaign to create even more and bigger community centers,²³ potentially adding to the unpredictability of the community center scene.  In early 1994, the South Madison Neighborhood Center again voted to leave UNC,²⁴  but had difficulty coming to agreement with UNC.  Mayor Soglin vetoed a city council resolution giving the center $44,000 to split from UNC,²⁵  and the city council then agreed to keep funding the center through UNC, thwarting the breakaway attempt.²⁶

UNC also continued to have management issues, as the city challenged its hiring practices,²⁷ and it continued to have difficulties keeping a director. ²⁸  By late 1996 the South Madison Neighborhood Center, the Wil-Mar center, and even the newly joined Vera Court center, were all trying to leave the UNC fold.  The city council was considering a budget amendment that would allow centers to keep getting their portion of city funds even if they became independent.²⁹   The neighborhood centers at the time were giving seven to eight percent of their funding to United Neighborhood Centers, and many of them believed that they weren’t getting their money’s worth in return.³⁰

Finally, in early 1998, Mayor Sue Bauman and the United Way developed a “transition plan” that would dissolve UNC and provide the individual neighborhood center boards and staff with extensive training to take over their organizations, including gaining ownership of their buildings beginning in 1999.³¹   With backing from the powerful city Board of Estimates for centers to use CDBG funds to buy their own buildings,³²  UNC held its closing celebration on December 15, 1998.³³

This change created both opportunities and difficulties for the centers as “the center directors become executive directors, with new roles and responsibilities, and advisory boards become formal governing boards.”³⁵  Not all went smoothly.  Broadway-Simpson-Waunona didn’t survive the transition, the South Madison Neighborhood Center got taken over by the Boys and Girls Club, and Vera Court had to close for a while.³⁶

The transition was not easy for Neighborhood House either. Linda Weyenberg noted that Neighborhood House was in a “changing neighborhood” that made fundraising challenging, but the building had space that could be rented out to others if it needed.³⁷  Janet Laube, a board member at the time, reported that “our board was small and always struggling and trying to get more members.” The short-staffed board worked hard at the “keeping-it-alive end of things….  We did get funding from the city that helped, but we were always trying to raise money because we were always in short fall for the budget.”³⁸   But  despite the financial and organizational challenges brought about by the end of  UNC, Neighborhood House was happy to be on its own. As Andy Heidt emphasized, they wanted to be “for and by the community” and “to control their own destiny.”³⁹  Being independent of the UNC enabled staff, volunteers and users of Neighborhood House to do just that: to determine for themselves what their future would look like.

Neighborhood House in the New Millennium:  Channeling Immigrant Roots

Neighborhood House was still adjusting to its newly independent status when the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks shocked the United States, leaving the nation at a loss for words and searching for direction.  And, like the anti-immigrant sentiment that Neighborhood House worked to overcome during World War II, some people directed their reactions at innocent immigrants. Muslim Americans across the country became outsiders in their communities as a result of misguided anger from their neighbors.  A group of Muslim women in Madison, Wisconsin felt the direct effects.  Members of the Muslim Women’s Group recalled, “After September 11th we were afraid to go outside. The Neighborhood House was a safe haven not just for the food, not just for the fun, not just for the good, but for the bad, for the support.”⁴⁰  Sadat Abiri realized that they needed a place to come together and turned to the community center that her children had attended. She used Neighborhood House as a way to bring a sense of belonging and stability to the lives of Muslim women and provide a safe haven where they could meet.

From the time of that historical rupture in 2001, the Muslim Women’s Group adopted Neighborhood House as a safe place to make friends and, in times of uncertainty, to support one another. Members of the organization feel the people at Neighborhood House “[are] truly there for us. My sisters here are truly there for me [with services like] laundry, cleaning, food, family. I can count on the people here. It’s family.” The group evolved into one of the central organizations that helped to preserve the purpose and mission of Neighborhood House in the community center’s time of need. As the Neighborhood House budget declined, they helped in whatever way they could. “When we first started the rooms were shabby, but we painted and changed the carpet, put in fans, and added chairs.” One of the women commented that she was raised to give service to the community. The Muslim women’s group is very proud of their association with Neighborhood house and always tries to make the center better for everyone using the space. This demonstrates the nature of Neighborhood house and shows that the center is accepting and that “everyone is welcome, diverse.”⁴¹

The story of the Muslim women’s group is but one of many stories of ethnic and cultural communities who found a home at Neighborhood House. The Ghana Association moved to Neighborhood House when they outgrew the member’s house they started in.  For Richardson Addai-Mununkum, President of Ghana Association, “We see Neighborhood House as our home, so to speak, where we gather a family meeting. Culturally we have a “family home.” And “family home” is where you meet every member of the family. We see Neighborhood House as a family home.”  Neighborhood House provides the contrast to the individualism and isolation of U.S. society that can be so surprising to immigrants.  For Richardson, “In [Ghana] the community where you live, it’s so common to everybody that you don’t necessarily need permission to visit your neighbor, kids don’t need permission from their parents to go to their neighbor’s house…. If there’s a party going on, you don’t need an invitation, you just join. So coming here where everything is just so regulated and segmented, that I see people staying in their houses more than interacting with their neighbors. So in that sense we see the Neighborhood House as the community meeting place where people can meet other people. “⁴²

The Oak Apple Morris Dancers reflect an old England heritage that found Neighborhood House.  They started as a student group, and were using the University of Wisconsin Union South until the mid-2000s, “but we kept losing students, and evenually the union twigged to the fact that we were mostly faculty, staff, and alumni of the university and people who had no association with the university, using university facilities and they kicked us out. So we had to find some other place and I thought, ah, Neighborhood House.”⁴³

These groups, along with the African Association of Madison, the United Nigerians in Madison Association, Ballet de Folklorico,  the Caribbean Club, the Boliviamanta Group, the Liberian Group, Danza de Todos Los, the Japanese TAIKO Drum group, and Youth Karate are but a few organizations welcomed by Neighborhood House.⁴⁴

The Growth of Youth Programming

Youth services and activities have always been a core part of the Neighborhood House mission.  And the youth program directors have always been core staff. In the new millennium youth changed, and the role of the youth director became ever more important.  Youth were becoming more sophisticated, more savvy, while at the same time needing all the developmental support they have always needed.

Youth programming took off in the new millennium, though it also resurrected some of the oldest themes of Neighborhood House.  More than half a century earlier the youth of Neighborhood House took what we would today call “virtual trips” to far away places, learning everything they could about those places as if they were actually visiting, because that is what they could afford.  In 2002 Jennifer Classon, then youth director at Neighborhood House, took a group of high school youth on an actual study trip to Madison’s sister city, Arcatao El Salvador.  The group included Tehmina Islam,⁴⁶  who would eventually work at Neighborhood House.  The youth had to raise their own travel expenses, and such expectations might seem lofty.  But Classon had seen what organized youth could do.  In a marathon walk fundraiser for Neighborhood House, the teens obtained $5,000 in pledges–far beyond their original $2,000 goal.  That allowed Neigborhood House to pay off their van and buy new rims and backboards for the gym.⁴⁷

The van that they helped pay off was itself an achievement that many would have called unrealistic.  Classon was working to improve the quality of after school and summer camp programs, in order to bring more structure and provide leadership opportunities. But the world was getting smaller, and helping youth make their way in that world required more than what could be accomplished within the walls of Neighborhood House itself. Classon was using her own car to drive kids around to do community work.  But her car wasn’t enough. So she led an effort to buy a vehicle to transport youth groups.  It seemed an uphill battle–it wasn’t just getting a van, but repairing it, putting gas in it, and insuring it.  So the effort required an ambitions fundraising project that provided one of the bright spots in Neighborhood House’s funding history.  Classon says “So we fundraised, got a grant to pay for the van. It increased mobility tremendously. The kids were really involved in [the fundraising] part. We would host community dinners to be able to bring in additional money to pay for those things.” The passenger van that Neighborhood House acquired increased mobility and allowed the youth leadership group to travel to New York City for a cultural experience.⁴⁸

Tehmina Islam, that youth who went to Arcatao with Classon, also became a summer camp counselor under the direction of Classon.  She remembers fondly the fun and friendship these programs brought to her and the youth of the community. The first word that comes to her mind when reflecting on her time at Neighborhood House is “acceptance”. “So many people came in and out of those doors,” states Islam, “and there was always a place for them, there was always a place for me, and really consistently a place for our voice to be heard.” Islam used her work as a camp counselor to continue Neighborhood House’s rich tradition of acceptance by passing it on to the young people of Madison. For the youth of Neighborhood House, summer not only involved swimming and bike lessons and trips to museums and the ice cream shop, but also team-building exercises in the center’s gym and human rights lessons and activities.⁴⁹

One of Islam’s most memorable moments from these programs involved writing letters with her students to President Bush Jr. to stop the appalling killing of women in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. “One girl wrote, ‘Dear Mister President, stop sitting in a chair” recalls Islam. “That was her idea of what leadership in the US did; she did not understand why people weren’t acting on behalf of human rights. I really loved her ability to say something really simple and have it mean so much.” Islam, Classon and the rest of the Neighborhood House staff successfully organized the center’s youth programming to develop independent and globally-minded future leaders.⁵⁰

The next youth director, Alexis London, would continue the spirit of innovation.  In 2004 she organized a group of Neighborhood House after-school youth to write, direct, and star in their own movie “The Real Neighborhood,” a fictional production about seven people who lived in Neighborhood House.  They worked with  WYOU Community Television representative Whitney Wilcox, who provided technical support.  From all accounts, it seemed like a grueling process, but  their labor resulted in a premier at the Orpheum theater.⁵¹

Alexis London’s time at Neighborhood House also saw the creation of a new mural for the Neighbhborhood House gymnasium. London and the Neighborhood House youth got together with artist Lance Owens for the massive project.  While Owens was the artist in charge of the mural, he was adamant that “Everything is directed in some respect by the youth. Everything was drawn exclusively by the youth or executed by the youth”. The kids involved were not without lack of instruction, however. Lance stepped in when necessary to teach painting techniques and how to execute such a large piece of art.⁵²

 The mural is “almost a fantasy walk through the history of Neighborhood House”, showcasing not only what has gone on at the center but also how the Greenbush Neighborhood has developed and changed around it.  These include images such as kids playing in Vilas park, or the enormous Greenbush doughnut looming in the background.  Cultural groups then meeting at Neighborhood House are represented in creative ways, like “the kite shaped like Africa float[ing] above Henry Vilas Zoo” that symbolized the presence of the African Association of Madison at the center.  The process by which the mural was created reflects the beauty and importance of Neighborhood House in the community. As Owens described, “I think that’s what’s so different about this [mural] versus some other types of murals. People who were here working on the mural had a huge amount of control over what got painted when they painted it. If you were here working on the mural and you wanted to paint a certain thing in a certain place, you could. That really did happen.”⁵⁴

Neighborhood House also never became shy about supporting alternative educational practices seeking space in its building, regardless of their long-term prospects.  This time it was a Waldorf-style pre-school that would incubate until it grew large enough and strong enough to move into its own space,⁵⁵  Neighborhood House also hosted Horizon High School, for youth recovering from addiction.⁵⁶ They opened up their space to Mark Wagler and his students from Randall School to study the history of the Greenbush neighborhood,⁵⁷ and to the Madison TechShop project that paired University of Wisconsin students with area nonprofits wanting computer and Internet technical assistance.  Overall, university students remained an important part of the mix, with an estimated 200 University of Wisconsin-Madison students involved at Neighborhood House in 2006.⁵⁸

Times of Celebration and Sadness

As the years had passed and newer, shinier, and bigger community centers rose up in Madison, the media became fond of referring to Neighborhood House as “one of the smallest community centers” in Madison, as well as the oldest.  Whether that impacted how people saw Neighborhood House is unclear, but the mid-2000’s were not fiscally kind to the organization.  A community survey also showed that not many people had heard of Neighborhood House–less than 30%, the second lowest of all the community centers included in the study.  And while 81%  of people living in the Atwood community center area knew about that organization,  69% of people living around Neighborhood House knew about it.  And only 31% knew about the programs in it.⁵⁹

The early warning signs of the 2008 national economic collapse were also showing, with the food pantry having served 2,500 people in 2005 and Weyenberg saying that Neighborhood House needed $100,000 to meet the growing needs. As a result, the Neighborhood House board formed a finance committee.⁶⁰  Fundraising got increasingly creative, with Neighbohood House leasing out 32 parking spaces at $20 each when the University of Wisconsin football Badgers played in town.⁶¹  But these efforts would fall well short of the funds needed.

Linda Weyenberg was also facing increasingly serious health difficulties, with Brian Benford, who had moved up the ranks from youth director to programming director,⁶²  taking increasing responsibility for the overall operations of the organization.

In this context Neighborhood House celebrated its 90th anniversary on October 21, 2006.⁶³  While once again ignored by the mainstream media, the alternative media reported a large turnout that included mayor Cieslewicz and Linda’s fellow community center directors from across Madison who took a moment during the event to surprise her with an award for her service and leadership⁶⁴

Linda Weyenberg would formally retire in 2008, the longest legacy of any Neighborhood House director after Gay Braxton.  Her popularity catalyzed the “Acorn Fund” which quickly attracted initial contributions of $7,200.⁶⁵  She would prove difficult to replace.

Times of Struggle

In 2008 the Neighborhood House board hired Zanna Majerle as the new director.⁶⁷ She arrived in the midst of a national economic collapse producing depression-like circumstances for many of Madison’s residents, and for the organizations that served them.  But, unlike the Neighborhood House of 70 years previous, the Neighborhood House of 2008 did not have the connections to wealth and power, or the presence of a strong community to hold it up.

In the midst of the crisis, Neighborhood House continued supporting alternative and diverse activities to the extent it was able. Neighborhood House provided the venue for the “Back in the Day” Drag King Show.⁶⁸  On Thanksgiving of 2009, it was the site for the Alliance for Animals free vegan feast.⁶⁹  And when a hip-hop artist’s request for a space to teach hip-hop to kids was turned down by another organization, Neighborhood House welcomed him.⁷⁰ By April of 2010 Neighborhood House was serving about 4200 people per year, up 600 from three years prior, and food pantry demand was up 50-percent from the previous year to 60 families a week. All while the Neighborhood House budget was $30,000 in the hole.⁷¹

And fundraising wasn’t filling the hole.  In desperation, Neighborhood House briefly considered running a beer garden on University of Wisconsn Badgers football game days, but abandoned the idea because of the contradictory messages it might send.⁷²  Neighborhood House tried to partner with the for-profit Gus Macker basketball tournament fundraiser, hoping to bring in a large amount of money with a single event in May of 2010. Unfortunately, the strategy fell short when the money it earned didn’t meet the very high hopes nor even cover the costs of the event.⁷³   And a lack of funding meant a lack of programming and building maintenance, and declining memberships, which of course hurt funding even more. The number of dance groups at Neighborhood House declined as groups had trouble maintaining their own membership during the economic collapse and Neighborhood House’s financial woes required deferring maintenance that accelerated deterioration in the building. The community center’s infrastructure reflected the trying financial times Neighborhood House was experiencing. Many members, including Cecilia Miranda, describe the state of the facilities as “cruddy” when they first walked into Neighborhood House. Miranda described hosting events at Neighborhood House as requiring days of cleaning and prep work to get the room clean and presentable.⁷⁴

The stress was beginning to show on the organization itself. The board was forced to confront the terrible fiscal realities facing Neighborhood House, and  by 2010 the board was down to six members.⁷⁵   By 2010, the problems were becoming apparent to the city.  As city staff did site visits they saw the decline in both numbers and quality in the youth programs in particular, and they began pressing Neighborhood House to improve both the numbers and the quality, but to no avail.⁷⁶  By 2011 the City of Madison had withheld $84,000 of their funds for Neighborhood House, leaving only a $37,000 operating grant to keep the doors open and the lights on.⁷⁷   The board was forced to let the director go and one board member took on the role of “community coordinator” in an attempt to fill the administrative gap⁷⁸   Neighborhood House members were devastated to find out that the organization was on the verge of shutting down. For Cecilia Miranda “Coming to Neighborhood House is my outlet; I just forget what is happening outside in the crisis of life… I would have felt homeless [if Neighborhood House closed] because this is my second home.”⁷⁹

Most organizations would have collapsed at this point. Even Chicago’s famous Hull House–the grandmother of all settlement houses–closed  its doors and filed for bankruptcy in 2012.⁸⁰   But not Neighborhood House.

Planning for a Change

From the days of urban renewal, when its neighborhood was wiped out, Neighborhood House had struggled to reclaim its space and its image.  The common wisdom in the media was that Neighborhood House no longer had a neighborhood, was too small to be a powerful player on the community center scene, and the word “oldest” was used in such an ambiguous way by the media that it wasn’t clear whether the organization’s longevity conferred status or decrepitude.

Neighborhood House had been trying to find the path forward ever since and in 2008, sensing the dangers ahead, the board redoubled its efforts.  In the summer of 2008, Janet Laube sent an email to fellow board members with her five-year vision for Neighborhood House. Her vision included a new or refurbished building with more distinction from the surrounding community facilities, greater outreach to youth from more neighborhoods,a revitalized and more diverse board, and an expanded image for Neighborhood House across the area communities.  Laube’s e-mail was the first known record of the start of strategic planning at Neighborhood House in the new millennium.⁸¹  That fall, the Neighborhood House board conducted focus groups with its members.  One board member compiled the results and sent them out to the others, including lists of possible goals, missions, purposes, and identities for the community center, along with strategies for funding such as partnerships with local businesses and hospitals.⁸²  In February 2009, an unknown author floated another plan with short term goals, goals for building an identity in the community, attracting funding, developing various communication strategies, and constructing a new building.⁸³

Also in early 2009, Tehminia Islam, who had gone from high school student to summer camp counselor, to now a board member at Neighborhood House, sent a “Strategic Planning Request” to current and prospectve board members asking them “What is your dream community center in 10 years? Please include what you might see/hear/smell/taste/ feel literally and figuratively.” Islam compiled the responses, de-identifying them, and sent the results to the board.  Many thoughts touched on the facilities themselves, expressing both an interest in a new building or expanding the current location. All discussed expanding the programming available at Neighborhood House, with many interested in it being a multi-generational center with activities for youth through seniors. Others stressed the importance of welcoming a wide variety of groups and cultures to utilize the space and programs at the center. A few also emphasized partnerships with major players in the community, such as hospitals and businesses, to improve funding and meet fundraising goals.⁸⁴

In a report to Neighborhood House from the Greenbush Neibhborhood Planning Team, the Greenbush Neighborhood Association made several recommendations to the board at the center based on a community survey they had conducted. The first of these was more noticeable signage, as their survey revealed that few people in the neighborhood knew what Neighborhood House was. The community also widely thought Neighborhood House was for “disadvantaged people” and did not have a good impression of the place. To correct for this, the association recommended better publicizing volunteer opportunities and activities in the neighborhood newsletter, to get the local community more involved. Though few in the neighborhood used Neighborhood House, many expressed interest in utilizing the gym and attending youth programming and other activities at the center.⁸⁵

Strategic planning became more intense in February 2010 when the board met with a community development educator from the University of Wisconsin Cooperative Extension to discuss needs and goals for the strategic planning.  In the notes from the session, board members established that they recognized that the constituency of the center had changed and Neighborhood House needed to re-establish who the organization did and should serve. Board members considered both a high demand with high support scenario–with a new building offering more programs and receiving more support–and a high demand with low support scenario–with all of the demand but no new resources.⁸⁶  Janet Laube recruited Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson to join the board, both of whom would be integrally involved in the next steps of this planning process and take turns as board president.⁸⁷

Recovery

In early 2011, the board submitted a proposal to the city for a strategic planning grant, and got a consultant to help shepherd them through the full strategic planning process.  It was not easy. A Friends of Neighborhood House group formed, and tensions between that group and other Neighborhood House supporters created challenges for the planning process.⁸⁸  The City of Madison got involved, as Neighborhood Services Coordinator Lorri Wendorf began attending board meetings for about a year and a half to do board development, and had to overcome some resistance to do so.⁸⁹

Some might think it would have been smart to just maintain the status quo of user groups hosting meetings and events at the space while the center’s leadership kept the bare essentials going and tried to find a new path. Or, maybe find a graceful way to close. But Neighborhood House had faced this before–in 1949 when the Vocational School withdrew its funding; again and again in the 1970s when United Neighborhood Centers tried to sell its building.  It had weathered a Great Depression, a World War, the turmoil of the 1960s, and budget cut after budget cut after budget cut.

Once again, the Neighborhood House spirit honed over nearly a century of experience took over. The first thing that happened is that Amy Roundtree decided to focus on providing a summer camp even though there was no city money coming in to fund it. Amy organized the curriculum, wrote grant proposals, and recruited volunteers who dedicated their time and energy to make the program happen.⁹⁰

And the board started searching for a new executive director, despite the advice of their strategic planning consultant, who encouraged the board to wait until after the planning was completed. While over 40 applications were submitted and numerous very qualified candidates applied, Nate Warnke, who led the search, described Dan Foley as the “next shining light”.⁹¹ Formerly of the YMCA in Madison, Dan Foley took the position of executive director in 2011⁹²  hoping to secure Neighborhood House’s commitment to the community and rebuild its programming. Andy Heidt had extreme confidence in Dan: “this is a dude with skills; he turned Neighborhood House around financially.”⁹³   Dan Foley felt that the key to keeping Neighborhood House alive rested in returning it to the basics of business. He pushed a strategy that would show the community that failure and closing were not options. Dan exclaims, “Being a not for profit 501(c)(3) does not mean you lose money! You need to keep the front doors open just like any other business.” As a result of this strategy, he attracted private donations, which rose to six times their previous levels. In addition, he worked to showcase to the city where money was being spent and on what programs, convincing the city of Madison to reinvest in the community center. He led the organization to examine the various avenues of revenue as separate entities in order to diagnose how to boost revenue from each avenue. In doing this, he accomplished what he set out to do by increasing grants, funding from the city, and other revenue sources.⁹⁴

Neighborhood House also hired Amanda Ryan in 2011 to take on the role of program director. She , too had a big job ahead of her. The summer program was the only thing that was running at the time she joined the team. Through lots of thought, and some trial and error, Ryan begin developing Neighborhood House’s programs. Starting a mentoring program was her main goal and she accomplished it by accessing the University of Wisconsin’s Aspiring Nurses Association, channeling back to Neighborhood House’s oldest origins with Miss Mary Saxton, the Attic Angels’ Visiting Nurse.  She started with six mentors to be a support and resource to six youngsters in the community. Ryan also worked with multiple interns including Ben Tolle, who started at Neighborhood House around the same time as Ryan did in 2011, and is still is involved today in 2015 in a more independent role ensuring after school programs are running smoothly.⁹⁶

The Neighborhood House spirit showed in the 2011 edition of the long-standing holiday auction.  When veteran Neighborhood House member Andy Heidt took up the microphone to start the auction, little did he know his performance as auctioneer would go down in the memory books at Neighborhood House. The event was a record breaking success, bringing in over $6,000. While the success of the auction is memorable, the overall Holiday Party organized in 2011 was described by Nate Warnke as “a really successful Christmas party…it was the best auction we’ve ever had. It was the most well run scenario as far as everything goes. It was the best attended fundraiser we’ve ever had.”⁹⁷

The success gradually gathered steam. For board member Stephanie Johnson “I honestly was feeling hopeful because I felt confidence in Melissa with the strategic planning process… I was feeling hopeful like we’re on a path and we’ve got a direction now. I was so impressed with Amy’s chutzpah in getting that curriculum under way and really taking the leadership of developing the summer camp. I was hopeful to have a new executive director who had an experience and a skillset to bring us really solid leadership.”⁹⁸  The growing confidence among the staff and board helped them organize a presentation in front of the city’s Citizen’s Committee that would help determine their funding fate.  Perhaps most important, leaders from the cultural groups using Neighborhood House gave passionate testimony.  In the eyes of Lorri Wendorf, “that was crucial.”  The Citizen’s Committee vote was close, and Neighborhood House was refunded by a slim margin.⁹⁹

A moment of sadness visited Neighborhood House when, on November 25, 2013, Linda Weyenberg passed away at Agrace Hospice.¹⁰⁰  Imbued with her spirit, Mary Lee Griggs’ spirit, Gay Braxton’s spirit, and the spirits of all those living and passed who had brought Neighborhood House to the cusp of a new century, the momentum built.

As finances improved, the board of directors, which had dwindled in numbers through these traumatic times, reorganized. By 2013, the board was back up to eleven members, restoring the leadership structure of Neighborhood House.¹⁰¹  A new German school had started,¹⁰² recalling those early days of Neighborhood House where a few brave German immigrants were welcomed even in the midst of two world wars that branded them the enemy. By 2014, the financial books at Neighborhood House were secure. Dance groups began coming back and, with them, the livelihood of the community center. Cecilia Miranda was proud to see Neighborhood House again become presentable, with a waxed floor she now would walk barefoot on.¹⁰³   User groups were still meeting, summer camps ran throughout the summer, children danced to the latest music in the community room, and the center’s operations were functioning at full swing. Movie and meal nights, with Chinese food provided by the nearby Hong Kong Cafe,¹⁰⁴ or jerk and curry spiced chicken provided by the Caribbean group to raise funds for steel pans used in calypso music¹⁰⁵  brought welcome aromas and tastes back to the building. The rummage and craft sale returned.¹⁰⁶   Once again, you could walk into Neighborhood House to hear the music of all parts of the world, feel the floor shaking, and see the smiles on the faces of the dance groups in the gymnasium.

In 2015 Dan Foley, hoping to retire for real, passed the director’s  mantle on to Andy Millman, who arrived with an appreciation for, and experience with, “small, scrappy nonprofits.”  With two extended stints in the director’s chair of such small scrappy nonprofits, he also brought with him a track record of working with youth and people with disabilities, the latter of which would add a new diversity dimension to Neighborhood House’s work. “¹⁰⁷

To be continued…

Continue

Notes

1. Andy Heidt interview, 2014.

2.UNC board meeting minutes January 10, 1991, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

3. Andy Heidt interview, 2014.

4. Sam Weyenberg interview, 2014.

5. Jonathan Gramling interview, 2014.  Gramling was Neighborhood House’s first accountant when it became independent from UNC, and came to know Linda well.

6. Photo from Neighborhood House archives.

7. Neighborhood House monthly reports to UNC, United Neighborhood Centers of Dane County, Inc. Records, Wisconsin Historical Society archives.

8. Sam Weyenberg interview, 2014.

9. Braid, posted April 14, 2013, https://www.facebook.com/braidcentral/posts/10151578929277419; Stephen Thompson, City punk fans add spunk to concert scene, The Capital Times, March 25, 1994.

10. Neighborhood News, Wisconsin State Journal April 7, 1993 .

11. In the Basement, Wisconsin State Journal July 18, 1996.

12. The Works, Wisconsin State Journal June 6, 1996.

13. Gail Perry-daniels, Neighborhood House to celebrate 80 years, Madison Capital Times June 7, 1996.

14. Escape Calendar, Wisconsin State Journal July 12, 1992.

15. Just for Deadheads? Knot! Wisconsin State Journal August 19, 1993.

16. Kids do newspaper with help with fund, Capital Times December 10, 1997.

17. Project helps children grow, Wisconsin State Journal August 10, 1993.

18. Anita Clark, The Gleaners, Wisconsin State Journal September 15, 1996.

19. Madison Table Tennis Club gets a boost with a new space, Bob Jacobson, October 10, 2013,http://www.isthmus.com/arts/recreation/madison-table-tennis-club-gets-a-boost-with-a-new-space.

20. The Works, Wisconsin State Journal Thursday, March 30, 1995. The last garage sale listing in the papers was Wisconsin State Journal March 31, 2005.

21. Community center sets 26th annual holiday auction, Wisconsin State Journal December 5, 2008.  There is no 2009 holiday fundraiser listed, and the last year it is listed is in the Wisconsin State Journal December 1, 2010.

22. Church News, Wisconsin State Journal May 12, 1993.

23. Joel Broadway, Neighborhood programs get a boost, Wisconsin State Journal May 2, 1992.

24. Rochelle Denise Thomas, South Side center splits from ‘family’, Wisconsin State Journal January 14, 1994.

25. Opinion: Center not Neighborly, Wisconsin State Journal April 14, 1994.

26. Joel Broadway, Family center funding approved,Madison Wisconsin State Journal April 20, 1994 .

27. Joe Schoenmann, Neighborhood centers hit over hiriing, The Capital Times July 19, 1994.

28. Pat Schneider, time to close a broken umbrella?, The Capital Times November 15, 1996.

29. Jonnel LiCari, Future unclear for neighborhood centers, Wisconsin State Journal November 17, 1996.

30. Dean Mosiman, On the verge of independence, Wisconsin State Journal February 6, 1998,

31. Dean Mosiman, On the verge of independence, Wisconsin State Journal February 6, 1998.

32.. Dean Mosiman, Panel adds money for social projects, Wisconsin State Journal October 27, 1998.

33. Dean Mosiman, UNC bids itself goodbye, Wisconsin State Journal December 16, 1998.

34. headline image from: Dean Mosiman, UNC bids itself goodbye, Wisconsin State Journal December 16, 1998.

35. Learning to Make it Work on Their Own, by Dean Mosiman, Wisconsin State Journal, December, 31, 1998, Pages 1,3.

36. Dean Mosiman, Center hurt by money problems, Wisconsin State Journal December 16, 1999.

37. Dean Mosiman, Learning to make it work on their own, Wisconsin State Journal December 31, 1998.

38. Janet Laube interview, 2014.

39. Andy Heidt interview, 2014.

40. Muslim women’s group interview, 2014.

41. Muslim women’s group interview, 2014.

42. Richardson Addai-Mununkum interview, 2014.

43. Patricia Sanford interview, 2014.

44. Neighborhood House Community Center, Inc., 2005 annual report, Neighborhood House archives.

45. photo from Neighborhood House archives.

46. Sandra Kallio, Teens head for sister city , Wisconsin State Journal June 26, 2002.

47. Teens walk for a cause, Wisconsin State Journal May 2, 2002.

48. Jennifer Classon interview, 2014.

49.Tehmina  Islam interview, 2014.

50. Tehmina slam interview, 2014.

51. Roger Anderson, Scenes from a Neighborhood , Wisconsin State Journal November 12, 2004.

52. Jonathan Gramling, “Neighborhood House Mural Dedication A Touch of Old and New” Madison Times, 2004.

53. photo by Randy Stoecker and Nadia Carlson.

54. Jonathan Gramling, “Neighborhood House Mural Dedication A Touch of Old and New” Madison Times, 2004.

55. Sandy Cullen, OakSong School may move, Wisconsin State Journal December 10, 2006 Maggie Rossiter Peterman, New way of learning, Capital Times April 12, 2004.

56. Richard Scheinin, Spotlight on young addicts , Wisconsin State Journal August 22, 2006.

57. Mark Wagler interview, 2015.

58. Help center thrive another century, Wisconsin State Journal April 27, 2006.

59. Neighborhood Centers Survey: Neighborhood House Data Resource Book, April 2004, gene Kroupa and Associates, Neighborhood House archives.

60. Gina Kittner, Neighborhood House Struggling, Wisconsin State Journal April 21, 2006.

61. Pat Schneider, Neighborhood centers seek elusive cash, Capital Times June 9, 2006.

62. Kate Schuman, Center Seeks Funds, Wisconsin State Journal February 19, 2007.

63. Neighborhood House 90th Anniversary Celebration, Wisconsin State Journal October 19, 2006.

64. Neighborhood House Community Center Serving Madison for 90 years. Heidi M. Pascual, Asian Wisconzine, 2006.http://www.capitalcityhues.com/012407AsianWisconzine.html.

65. Acorn fund carries on Weyenberg’s Greenbush legacy, Wisconsin State Journal July 25, 2008.

66  Photo from http://www.capitalcityhues.com/012407AsianWisconzine.html.

67. Announcements, Wisconsin State Journal April 22, 2008.

68. The MadKings – “Back in the Day” Drag King Show, Postby themadkings05 » Tue Jul 07, 2009, Isthmus,http://forum.isthmus.com/viewtopic.php?t=46452.

69. Kristian Knutsen, Madison eats agenda: Thanksgiving, pies, Norwegian smorgasbord, and holiday shopping, Isthmus, November 23, 2009,http://www.isthmus.com/food-drink/madison-eats-agenda-thanksgiving-pies-norwegian-smorgasbord-and-holiday-shopping/.

70. Joe Tarr, No room for hip-hop?, Isthmus, February 4, 2010, http://www.isthmus.com/news/news/no-room-for-hip-hop/#sthash.S0KUbGSv.dpuf.

71. Neighborhood House Faces Cuts. April 9, 2010 http://www.nbc15.com/home/headlines/90426994.html.

72. COMMUNITY CENTER ABANDONS PLANS FOR BADGER GAME DAY BEER GARDEN July 11, 2009 12:00 am • Pat Schneiderhttp://host.madison.com/news/community-center-abandons-plans-for-badger-game-day-beer-garden/article_c678ffd5-3a43-51e9-9f64-4e959334bf9f.html .

73. Neighborhood House Faces Cuts. April 9, 2010 http://www.nbc15.com/home/headlines/90426994.html; Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

74. Celilia Miranda interview, 2014.

75. Janet Laube interview, 2014; Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

76.  Lorri Wendorf interview, 2015.

77. Grass Roots: Neighborhood center still struggling to find its way, February 02, 2011 8:07 am • By Pat Schneider Cap Timeshttp://host.madison.com/news/local/grassroots/grass-roots-neighborhood-center-still-struggling-to-find-its-way/article_64f4146e-2e9b-11e0-988d-001cc4c002e0.html.

78. Warnke, Johnson Grass Roots: Neighborhood center still struggling to find its way, February 02, 2011 8:07 am • By Pat Schneider Cap Timeshttp://host.madison.com/news/local/grassroots/grass-roots-neighborhood-center-still-struggling-to-find-its-way/article_64f4146e-2e9b-11e0-988d-001cc4c002e0.html.

79. Cecilia Miranda interview, 2014.

80. Jane Addams Hull House to close January 19, 2012, Kate Thayer Chicago Tribune, http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-01-19/news/chi-jane-addams-hull-house-to-close-20120119_1_social-service-agencies-chicago-agencies-current-caseworker.

81. E-mail from Janet Laube, Neighborhood House archives.

82. no author, no title, Neighborhood House archives.

83. no author, no title, Neighborhood House archives.

84. e-mail from Tehmina Islam , March 20, 2009, to Strategic Planning Board.  Neighborhood House archives.

85.  Greenbush Neighborhood Association planning team, possibly from early 2009, Neighborhood House archives.

86. strategic planning session notes, February 2010, Neighborhood House archives.

87. Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

88. Nora G. Hertel, Can Neighborhood House get its act together? February 28, 2013http://www.isthmus.com/news/news/can-neighborhood-house-get-its-act-together/.

89.  Lorri Wendorf interview, 2015.

90. Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

91. Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

92. Former YMCA exec puts center ahead of retirement, Wisconsin State Journal March 27, 2014.

93. Andy Heidt interview, 2014.

94. Dan Foley interview, 2014.

95. photo from Neighborhood House archives.

96. Amanda Ryan interview, 2015.

97. Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

98. Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

99.  Lorri Wendorf interview, 2015.

100. Cress Funeral Home, Obituary, Linda Mae Weyenberg, http://www.cressfuneralservice.com/obituary/120559/Linda-Weyenberg/#bio.

101. Nate Warnke and Stephanie Johnson interview, 2014.

102. Gayle Worland, Second School, Wisconsin State Journal May 4, 2014.

103. Cecilia Miranda interview, 2014.

104. Movie and Meal, Isthmus, April 9, 2015, http://www.isthmus.com/events/movie-and-meal/.

105. Steel pan fundraiser, Isthmus, May 16, 2015, http://www.isthmus.com/events/steel-pan-fundraiser/.

106. Rummage and craft sale, Isthmus, April 10, 2015, http://www.isthmus.com/events/rummage-craft-sale/.

107. Informal conversation with Andy Millman, 2015.

Neighborhood House: 2016 – ?

100 Years of Neighborhood House

In 2016 Neighborhood House launched into a celebration of its 100th anniversary. Neighborhood House board and staff did their own research at the Wisconsin Historical Society, collecting photos that filled the walls of the Neighborhood House Community Room, complimented by some much needed new furniture. The gallery was unveiled with a reception on January 28th.

Neighborhood House followed up the opening reception a series of educational events with panels of former Greenbush residents hosted by the Italian Workmen’s Club on February 18 annd March 17 ¹. The entire history of Neighborhood House was presented by Randy Stoecker in a four-part series over the summer. All the attendees were well fed by the local Rocky Rococo’s pizza, owned by Sam Brown the Neighborhood House board president.

Then, on Saturday September 24, 2016–the exact date of the opening dedication of Neighborhood House 100 years ago–Neighborhood House held a day-long celebration of music, food, film, and fun inside and out. Performers included groups housed by Neighborhood House, such as the Japanese Taiko drumming Group “BENI Daiko” and the Oak Apple Morris Dancers, along with the Southern Wisconsin Bluegrass Music Association and Edi Rey y su Salsera. Rocky Rococo’s, Hong Kong Cafe, and OSS, along with cookies from Neighborhood House supporters, kept the crowd fed. Neighborhood House dedicated a new mural on the north wall of the building, painted by Dane Arts Mural Arts DAMA Summer Institute Youth and featuring images of Gay Braxton and Mary Lee Griggs surrounded by Neighborhood House community members. And the Mayor and Common Council of Madison proclaimed the day as “Neighborhood House Day.”³ As darkness fell, the movie Moonstruck played on a giant inflatable screen in the parking lot.

The Global Neighborhood

The tradition of Neighborhood House being an open space for groups of all different kinds to meet continues on today. Even a small sample of these groups shows the range of people that come together at Neighborhood House: Muslim Women’s Support Group, United Nigerians of Madison, Caribbean Americans of Madison, Ghana Association, Oak Apple Morris Dancers, Liberian Group, Bolivian Dance, Japanese Drum Group, African Association of Madison, MMSD Native American Group, Madison Judo, Latin and Hip Hop Dance. More important than the physical space that these groups share is that they all call Neighborhood House home.

This international focus is what makes Neighborhood House unique.²  For Godwin Amegashie, The chair of the African Association, “The fact that [Neighborhood House] has been open to the international community in Madison has been the most refreshing thing about it. Almost every international organization I am aware of has been meeting here or started meeting here…. The concept of this Neighborhood House which has an international appeal and has a very dedicated support network of people who, even though they do not live in the neighborhood…there is a mental connection to this place and that’s absolutely unique…. ” For Amegashie, Neighborhood House is also the place where the university-based international citizens and community-based international citizens can both feel comfortable.

This “larger than a neighborhood” aura surrounding Neighborhood House today allows us to reflect on the idea of “neighborhood” for a moment. The value of a neighborhood is in its ability to build face to face relationships and create a kind of semi-self-sufficient community.  It’s weakness can be in its insularity and discomfort with diversity.

Neighborhood House tries to bridge the local and the global, and has stretched beyond its immediate neighborhood to accomplish that. Mark Wagler, a Greenbush scholar, notes that “Neighborhood House has continued to find people who need services” even after its local neighborhood was taken away by urban renewal.  For Jonathan Gramling, the Neighborhood House accountant for a number of years,  “Its spirit of diversity, of providing services to a lot of immigrants into Madison, who lived in the Greenbush area…still continues to today. So you have the African Association, the Nigerian Association, It’s still fulfilling its function…. It’s still providing service to this really diverse conglomeration of people. So you have this continuity for 100 years and I’ve also liked it because it’s almost reflected the struggle of poor immigrant people that Neighborhood House has always kind of had to fight to survive, that often times its service area hasn’t been as geographic, that a lot of people who use it come from outside of the immediate neighbohood, … It’s almost like a community-wide, a city-wide neighborhood center.”

Another way to understand the importance of Neighborhood House across the city is, interestingly enough, through the newspaper obituary column.  Beginning in the post-WWII period, there are only a few years that go by without someone’s service as staff or board to Neighborhood House being mentioned in an obituary, as an online search of newspapers across the past 100 years shows.  There is a pride in being associated with Neighborhood House that literally lasts a lifetime.

The Next Generation and All Generations

In addition to being the home to unique cultural, dance, and interest groups, Neighborhood House provides programming for youth coming from the neighborhood and all over the Madison area. Movie and Meal Night is a popular community event, inviting families to enjoy dinner and a kid-friendly movie at the community center. Summer Camp continues to be very popular, providing children from all over Madison an engaging summer experience. From arts and crafts at the community center to playing at Klief Park to a tour of Camp Randall stadium, spending a summer at Neighborhood House can’t be beat!

We visited one of the children’s programs as part of this project, and here’s what they said about Neighborhood House:

“It’s not like regular school with social studies and math, it’s fun!”

“I like our mentors [at Neighborhood House]. Afterwards is when we get to play!”

 “I like that our mentors help us do our work and take us to the park”

“We have lots of fun here. I like to play in the gym” …”Me too” …”Me three,” …”Me four!”

“We do science club on Wednesday, and I like that”

They drew for us too:

Neighborhood House programs aren’t just for kids, as the center offers services for adults and takes the opportunity to give back to the community that it serves. The new computer lab serves people of all ages and offers a space to do homework, work on a resume, or learn new skills. In partnership with local businesses, the center hosts a Holiday Gift Drive, Thanksgiving Food Drive, Winter Wear Drive and a School Supply Drive, collecting donations to help those in need throughout the year. Andy Millman, the new director, is partnering with LOV Dane on programming with people with disabilities, and is also looking to rebuild programming with elders.

Neighborhood House is home to many organizations, events, and programs that use the center to share culture and build community. Richardson Addai Mununkum, president of the Ghana Association, believes strongly in the power of community centers, such as Neighborhood House, to bring individuals together in a very individualistic American society.

Neighborhood House keeps its website updated, showing all the new programs and current things happening in the community. On their website,http://www.neighborhoodhousemadison.org,  they have a brief history about the center, programs, volunteer opportunities, services, ways to support the center, and basic contact information. Neighborhood House also keeps up with social media, having a facebook page, twitter account and yahoo group.

As part of this project, we asked the people we interviewed to tell us one word that best characterized Neighborhood House for them.  They generated this word cloud:

Notes

1. You can see the first panel discussion in two parts at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K42Qzg6oZZM and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_KoW2ufZjg.

2. Gayle Worland, Neighborhood House celebrates 100 years of international welcomes, Wisconsin State Journal, Jan 17, 2016.http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/neighborhood-house-celebrates-years-of-international-welcomes/article_40558015-6bf5-5dff-b0eb-cea2a623ea7f.html.

3. The full text of the proclamation reads:

“WHEREAS, in 1916, Madison created a community center to help ‘Americanism,’ the integration of the City’s diverse population; and,

WHEREAS, many new immigrants comprised of African-American, Jewish, Italian, Irish and German immigrants settled in the Greenbush Neighborhood in the first half of the 20th century; and,

WHEREAS, the Neighborhood House relocated to 29 S. Mills Street in 1965, where it continues to provide services today and serve as a home to locals and newcomers from around the world including the Hindu Dharma Circle, the African Association of Madison, the Nigerian Association of Madison, the Caribbean Association of Madison among others; and,

WHEREAS, its mission of catering to diversity and integration is true today as it was in its early founding,

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the Mayor and Common Council of the City of Madison do hereby commend the Neighborhood House for its 100th year of existence and proclaims September 24, 2016 as ‘Neighborhood House Day’ in the City of Madison.

(Signed – Paul R. Soglin)
Mayor Paul R. Soglin
Signed and Sealed this 20th day
of September 2016 at City Hall.”