TROY, Ohio — A small brick building in Troy boasts a storied history. Dating back to the 1860s, the Lincoln Community Center has grown with the needs of its attendees, adding a gym, a pool, more classrooms and earlier this year, the center reopened to offer even more.
After $3.8 million in renovations and the construction of a 21,803-square-foot expansion, Shane Carter, Lincoln Community Center’s executive director, said the facility is able to serve more students than ever, offering more and more ways to set them up for the future.
The expansion made the center 25% bigger, including new classrooms for the center’s after school programming, a computer lab, a second gym, a weight room and an art studio — that last room hosting the latest of the center’s new offerings.
“We knew we needed an art studio and a space for kids to be creative,” Carter said.
In October, the Lincoln Community Center debuted its first in a series of after-hours classes, mosaics.
“Anything that had to do with young people and adults and really being able to be hands on and creative,” Carter said.
He enlisted the help of an area art teacher to design and lead the curriculum for the month-long class, focused on exposing students to opportunities and experiences they may not find at school.
“Art class is maybe 40 minutes or its an hour and it’s once a week where here they have the flexibility and creativity to not only work with their hands but maybe even do something that may even spawn an interest in a career,” Carter said.
Executive director since 2011, Carter said the Lincoln Community Center and its offerings have always been close to his heart.
“I grew up in this center,” he said. “Really, it was playing basketball there. I learned how to swim there.”
Carter said the gym he grew up playing in has raised hundreds like him since it was built in 1938 and added more opportunities over the years to help educate and raise youth across the region, expanding on the center’s original mission.
“We’re very proud of our rich history and our roots,” he said.
The Lincoln Community Center dates back to 1865 when it was founded to help educate Black children in Troy. At the time, no school in the area would accept them in their classrooms, but the center’s founders had a hope for a more equitable future, naming the center after then-president Abraham Lincoln.
“They’re holding or surrounding a picture of Abe Lincoln after signing the emancipation,” Carter said, pointing to one of the earliest pictures of students at the center.
More than 150 years later, Carter said the center accepts anyone in Troy, children and adults alike from any background to partake in its recreational and educational programming, following in the spirit of the center’s roots.
“We were really crammed in our space with having one classroom and a small gym,” he said. “I’m just grateful for them to have a safe space for them to come and participate in all different types of programs.”
The center’s next after-hours course will be geometry. Focusing on the intersection of art and technology, students will design and build their own cities.