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Shared Memories of Jewish Community Center [Woodward]

I went to day camp at the JCC on woodward and learned to swim in the indoor pool there.  The pool , I believe, was built between the JCC and the church next door and may have connected the buildings.  I can still remember the heavy chlorine smell but I thought it was terrific at 7 years old.
- Edie Hoffman

I remember the first time I was in the JCC gym. I believe it had just opened, maybe 1955 or 56, I was 11 or 12. I remember the smells. The freshly waxed, shiny wood floor of the basketball court, the new basketballs, and the disinfectant smell of the locker room. The sound of the gym shoes squeaking on the floor and the bouncing basket balls. There was always the anticipatory excitement going from the locker room to the gym. Sneaking into, and being kicked out of, the Health Club was also a favorite activity. I also remember the snack bar, I think it was in the basement but I'm not sure.

This JCC played an important role in my early adolescence. There was the Saturday Night League basketball (my team was the "Tri-Squares," I have no idea where the name came from). Howard Schechter and Howard Golding, both of whom starred at Mumford High basketball also played in that league. The teen clubs, (Joel Schechter was our club leader), softball leagues, winter weekends at Camp Tamarack, and ice hockey on the adjacent playground.

I later belonged to the JCC in Cincinnati. This got me through graduate school, sanity intact. Too bad there's no JCC for my kids in Ventura California. They don't know what they've missed.

NN

I spent a lot of my free time after school (mumford) at the JCC. I was in an AZA chapter called Gershwin and we had a basketball team that played in a league at the JCC. We played there for several years. One year we even tried to get Rocky's Pizza (on 7 Mile Rd.) to sponsor our team and pay for the uniforms, but we were not allowed to have outside sponsors.

Ron