Spruce Street YMCA

The former YMCA building still stands at 315 North Spruce Street near its intersection with Fourth Street in downtown Winston-Salem. 

Spruce Street YMCA location on Google Maps

The Young Men's Christian Association began in London, England. The first successful YMCA in the United States was in Boston, Massachusetts. Winston-Salem's YMCA was organized on October 7, 1888, in a meeting at Centenary Methodist Church. One hundred and thirty young men signed up at the meeting to become members of the new Association. The first permanent meeting place became the Gray Block on Third Street. After a few months, the YMCA membership expanded, and the organization rented new quarters in the Buxton Building on Liberty Street. In 1892 a fire destroyed this location, and the "Y" moved to the second floor of the Jacob's Block on the southeast corner of Third and Main Streets. By 1897 more space was again needed and the organization moved into Brown's Opera House at the corner of Fourth and Main. Brown's Opera House served the YMCA well until January 1906, when the Board of Directors authorized the planning of a new and permanent building for the Association. 

In 1907, Winston-Salem YMCA acquired a lot at the corner of Fourth and Cherry Streets for $12,500, and on July 11, 1907, excavation began on their first building. On October 13, 1907, the cornerstone was laid. The building was completed in early 1908 at a cost of $41,500. It was a modern YMCA building with all the amenities including a gymnasium, a library, a reading room, classrooms, offices, a bowling alley, a game room, a swimming pool, and thirty-six dormitory rooms. 

This was the city’s first real swimming pool but the pool was for members only and the dues were $10 a year in a time when factory workers worked 66-hour weeks for 10-14¢ an hour; they did not have money to spare for their sons to become members. So, the YMCA decided to offer free swimming lessons to every boy in the city. By the summer of 1910, about 75 boys were receiving swimming lessons at the Y but that was only a tiny percentage of the boys in the city. Due to discrimination at the time, women, girls, and blacks were not permitted membership.

The YMCA Board of Directors was certain the new structure would serve the community for at least fifty years. However, by 1923 it became apparent that the new YMCA would not serve the community for even twenty-five years, so when the opportunity arose to sell the land and the building, at a meeting of the Board on May 25, 1923, it was agreed to sell the property to W. M. Nissen for $225,000. Nissen built an 18-story skyscraper, the Nissen Building, on the site. The Board also authorized the purchase of two lots on Spruce Street, known as the Phillips property and the Shepherd property, for approximately $34,500 as a location for a new Winston-Salem YMCA.

This is the Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) that most early baby boomers (especially men) in Winston-Salem remember from their childhood; it was the “Y”.

The four-story brick and limestone structure with Classic Revival detailing served the men and boys of the community as the "Y" from 1927 until 1976 when the new West End YMCA (now known as the William G. White, Jr. Family YMCA) was completed. At the time it was built, it was thought to be the finest of its kind in the state, and among the finest in the entire country. By 1944 membership had grown to 2,000. The façade of the building has remained relatively unaltered since it was constructed. 

The cornerstone for the Spruce Street building was laid on May 15, 1927. 

The center of the building is divided by limestone pilasters into three bays centered over the two main entrances, the Boys and the Men's. The entrances led up to the first floor, a Reading Room located between the two entrances.

The Men's entrance led directly into a handsomely fitted Lobby which featured a Check Room and a semi-circular Attendant's desk; this lobby area burned in January 1984. The lobby was lit and ventilated by a skylight. To the right of the Men's entrance was the Men's Social Room with an oak-paneled dado and a fireplace; this room has direct access to the stairwell leading to the dormitories on the upper floors.

The Boys' entrance led directly into a separate lobby where there was an attendant's counter that was somewhat smaller than the one at the Men's entrance. To the left of the Boys' entrance was the Young Boys Social Room, which was oak-paneled and had a tile fireplace.

Offices for the General Secretary, the Industrial Secretary, the Boys Secretary, and the Physical Director were in the center of the building. 

At the back of the building, behind both the Boys and Men’s Social rooms and the offices were the main gymnasium and the auxiliary gym. The main gym featured basketball courts with an overhead walking/running track around the perimeter that served as a spectator balcony during special events. At the right end of the gym were large sliding doors that opened into a large room that served as an auxiliary gym that was used for special classes. Underneath the main gymnasium, on the basement level, was a natatorium or swimming pool. It was twenty feet wide by sixty feet long and was lined with white tile. A spectator's section overlooked the pool and was separated from the decorative tiled deck of the pool by brass rails.

The pool area was bordered on two sides of the basement level by showers and locker rooms. There were separate showers and locker rooms for boys, “seniors,” and “businessmen.” The locker rooms led into a basement lobby. Along the Spruce Street side of the building on the basement level was an 82’ x 22’ banquet hall that could seat 150 people. The banquet hall featured a fireplace with a tile surround and "folding partitions" were available that could be used to divide the room into five smaller rooms. Adjoining the hall was a modernly equipped kitchen.

The second, third, and fourth floors were devoted to 116 dormitory rooms. The dormitory was originally intended to attract young men who were entering the business and professional world who needed a downtown place to stay until they obtained a financial foothold. The rooms contained two closets but featured no decorative woodwork. The floor 

plan of the upper floors contained a central corridor with rooms along the outside walls and one shower room, washroom, and toilet for each floor on the inside wall. The hall was accented by a chair rail, and the door to each room had a transom. Each floor also featured a linen closet, a storage closet, and a trunk room.

Parts of the third and fourth floors are occupied in the center by two squash and racquetball courts and handball courts.

By 1946, approximately 62 percent of YMCAs were allowing female members, and shortly after women made up 12 percent of the YMCA’s membership. The dormitory renters had begun to change in character as early as the 1950s when the national economy boomed after World War II and men no longer needed to turn to the "Y" for a place to stay while they began their careers.  They began to find that small rooms with no kitchens and no women allowed were less acceptable than they were to men during the Depression. In addition, companies started contracting with hotel and motel chains for accommodations for their traveling salespeople, and transient dormitory renters reduced in number. This led to a rapid deterioration of the Spruce Street YMCA during the late 1960s and early 1970s and these conditions made it even more difficult to fill the dormitory rooms with satisfactory tenants.

The old Spruce Street YMCA building still exists and is on the National Register of Historic Places. It is now the home to condominiums and business offices.

During high school in the early 1960s, I was a member of the Spruce Street YMCA. Friends and I used it mostly to play racquetball on the handball courts. At the time, bathing suits were optional at the swimming pool, so we didn’t go there much. The showers were in a small completely tiled room with shower heads on all the walls; we used to turn them all on and aim them toward the center of the room to make it like being in a rainstorm. I went there again in 1968-69 when I first got into martial arts; I began training in judo under Thomas Mayerchak "Mr. Judo" in the Nito Judo Club until I joined the Navy. I have many fond memories of the old “Y.

Since 1968 the YMCA had been hoping to find a new downtown site on which to build a modern structure. In 1972, after considering several sites, the YMCA finally purchased a four-and-one-half acre tract of land on Glade Street between West End Boulevard and Sunset Drive near Hanes Park and sold the Spruce Street building to the City of Winston-Salem's Redevelopment Commission for use in the city's "downtown renewal" plan. In October 1973, the ground was broken for the Central YMCA building that still serves Winston-Salem today. In 2008, the Central Family YMCA was renamed the William G. White, Jr. Family YMCA in honor of the man who devoted so much of his time and money to supporting the YMCA movement both here and around the world.