Nachand Fieldhouse to be memorialized on flood wall

If buildings could talk, the Nachand Fieldhouse would overflow with stories.

“It’s like walking back in history,” said Bob Potter, the acting historian at Jeffersonville’s basketball landmark. “Basketball was the thing. In the 50s, not many people had TVs so on Friday and Saturday nights, this was the hub of basketball. It would be packed.”

He remembers how the building played host to sectional rivalry games between Jeffersonville and New Albany high schools. How fans crowded into its bleachers from courtside to the rafters.  And for those who couldn’t get a seat, how they huddled outside its doors just to be close to the action.

“The only reason people knew what was going on was because of all the cheers,” recalled Potter, who played for Jeffersonville High School in the early 50s. “Every one of these was a paid seat.”

With its special spot in Hoosier history, the 80-year old fieldhouse will join Schimpff’s Confectionery, Warder Park and other Jeffersonville landmarks as the next place to be memorialized on the city’s flood wall that border’s West Market Street across from Rocky’s Sub Pub.

“It goes back generations as far as how important the building has been to the history of Jeffersonville,” said Dawn Spyker, the city’s public arts director, about the basketball landmark. “It’s an iconic building that has so many memories for so many people."

The fieldhouse, built in 1937, is named after former Jeffersonville Park’s Director Charles Nachand. It was the longtime home to the Jeffersonville Red Devils basketball teams and hosted the area’s sectional basketball games until 1971. Now, it serves as a community center, where recreation and youth leagues play.

Most recently, it served as the spot where Republican gubernatorial hopeful Eric Holcomb hosted a rally with Indiana Gov. Mike Pence. But the landmark has been adapted for funerals, weddings and other special events.

“It’s all here,” said Sara Nord, the director of the Fieldhouse and former University of Louisville women’s basketball player who grew up playing on both the fieldhouse’s carpeted and wooden courts.

Spyker said the city’s public art commission chose the fieldhouse to be depicted on the flood wall after a public survey indicated it was one of the places that resonated with the community. She said after putting out a call for artists, the commission chose Columbus-based mural artist Jeremy Jarvis to paint the panel.

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Jarvis, who has painted murals in Cincinnati and Columbus, said he met with Spyker, Potter and former Jeffersonville Mayor Dale Orem to learn about the fieldhouse’s history and atmosphere during its heyday.

"A lot of the residents I met with said this was the place to go and congregate...They shared an importance for the outside as well as the inside," he said. "I wanted to make sure I got that aspect in and focus on the interior where the action happened, where basketball was played...and outside when you think of landmark, you think of how the landscape looks against the sky and trees."

His design, shaped like a basketball court, depicts the exterior of the fieldhouse on the left and a game scene with the building filled past its 5,600 person capacity on the right. A center court circle with the fieldhouse’s name and a "J" for Jeffersonville divides the two sides.

Today, the fieldhouse's walls hold Hoosier basketball memories dating back to the 1930s, including jerseys from past players, old newspaper clippings about the times Jeff High was suspended after illegal recruiting, and photos of Jeffersonville High basketball teams – with legendary players such as Cotton Nash and Mike Flynn – gracing its walls.

Banners of 16 high school teams past and present – from Laconia Acres to Corydon, New Salsbury and Charlestown – that once played in the fieldhouse hang from its rafters.

“It’s a piece of living history,” said Jarvis, who started on the mural this week and expects to finish it next week. “It made me think about the stories I want to tell down line.”

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Madeleine Winer is the Southern Indiana communities reporter for the Courier-Journal. Contact her at 502-582-4087 or mrwiner@courier-journal.com