Last week, June 28, 2024 at around 7:00pm, the 40th anniversary of an event happened in Hickory. Lenoir-Rhyne to be more specific. On campus was a building, now gone, which served as the meeting place for two people.
That building was Cline Gym. Sometime after World War I, Lenoir College, as it then known, went on a campaign of expansion. With sports growing as an important part of college life, the school planned construction of a gymnasium to house its basketball team. It was about the same time that Rhyne got added to the name.
The original price in early 1920s money was around $10,000. But with other capital projects stalled for need of funds, what did the college do? They tripled the price by adding a third-floor dormitory to the plans. At the time though, it was all academic. A campus-wide moratorium on construction had been enacted since the college was considering a move to Gaston County.
Once the ban was lifted and the new third floor incorporated into the plans, building went forward with the Bears able to play their 1925-6 basketball season inside the new structure. Named for William F. Cline, one of the college founders and History and Latin teacher for ten years, the well-made facility withstood decades of use. Until P.E. Monroe Auditorium dwarfed every building around it when built in 1956, the gym was a center of activity. Once basketball games moved to their current location, the decline and fall began.
Photo: Cline Gym, reconstructed by the author (digitally) where it once stood. A true L-R romance blossomed there.
Built with that antebellum look, tall, round and stout columns with a concrete porch, the place was impressive in its heyday. However, by the point of the mythical anniversary, the place was being used for theatre rehearsal on the basketball floor and campus laundry facilities were in the basement, along with the photo department darkroom. Guess where all the photography classes were taught? As a building, you know things are not going your way when the drama people take over.
Back in 1984, rehearsals were taking place for an evening of stellar one-act plays. Dr. Ellis G. Boatmon was the man in charge, tackling the role of director of these summer theatre gems in addition to his duties as a member of the history faculty. Some say he enacted every important person in history during his classes. Don’t know. Never took one of them. Anyway, the role he was playing this day was cupid.
Ellis had an old little show in the middle of his one-acts called Cabin 12. It was about the angst of a father and son, but had a couple that was in Cabin 14, with whom the son fights. Small parts (but are there really?) and the director needed warm bodies. The guy he hit up was already in another one of the shows. The thought of playing opposite a college girl sounded intriguing to him. For artistic reasons, you understand.
She was in her last semester on campus before summer graduation, leaving in three years with a degree as a Playmaker. Said actress (privacy prevents use of her name) and her most recent role had been as a firebug, in Biedermann and the Firebugs, a kinda college show. Each had seen the other in THIS VERY MAGAZINE, when they were in shows at the same time. His got a good review. Hers was a kinda college show, and was misunderstood.
You can see it coming, can’t you. Yep, they met, swore they had seen each other in five or six previous instances and knew they were destined. Not always smooth but ultimately rewarding and still fun after all this time. They met at Cline Gym forty years ago last week. I was there. I saw it happen.
By the way, they tore down the building around 1996. As of the 40th anniversary of the fateful meet, nothing has been built there.
