By Aimee A. Jones
Staff Reporter
aimee.jones@newtoncitizen.com

PORTERDALE — Emotions ran high among the townfolk of Porterdale on Friday as reality began to settle in that their historic gym was destroyed by fire. The smell of smoke clung to the air Friday morning as the Porter Memorial Gymnasium still smoldered from a Thursday evening blaze of an unknown origin.
Gary Wilkerson parked his pickup truck in the parking lot behind the Porterdale Gym and watched as the smoke continued to rise from the brick structure that was so much more than just four walls with a basketball court.
“I’ve spent many a day in there,” Wilkerson said, staring at the old gymnasium. “There are not many crooks and crannies in there I haven’t seen.”
The Porterdale Gym was constructed in 1938 and built as a gift to the city from Oliver and Julia Porter, the owners of Bibb Manufacturing Co. The facility was built with wood floors and wood bleachers that could seat as many as 5,000 people, by some accounts.
The bleachers were actually on the second floor with office space on the main level underneath the bleacher seats.
Most recently the facility had been used as storage and meeting place for the Porterdale Women’s Club. According to Porterdale City Councilwoman Rebecca Roseberry, all the records collected over the years by the Women’s Club were destroyed in the fire.
Even though the gymnasium has not been open to the public for several years, the memories of its glory days are still fresh in the minds of most people who grew up in Porterdale.  
The Porterdale Gym was the place that the children of Porterdale held physical education classes, where they played basketball, held wrestling matches and where they shared many memories. One of the fondest occasions recalled by Porterdale residents is the annual Christmas festival sponsored by Bibb Manufacturing Co.
The town’s activities would stop and all would gather at the gym to participate in the Christmas program. The centerpiece was a large Christmas tree surrounded by boxed Christmas gifts donated by the mill’s owners to all the town’s children.
“It was so fun to be in eighth grade because you got to pack the Christmas boxes with fruits, nuts and mint candies,” Wilkerson said. “The mill shut down for the Christmas program and afterward we delivered boxes to shut-ins. Everyone got one.”
The Porterdale Gym served also as a popular venue for sporting events and other special occasions. For 28 years, Crowell coached sports teams there. The gym was often used as a practice site for the Oglethorpe University and Georgia Institute of Technology basketball teams. The famous boxer Jack Dempsey refereed a wrestling match there. In the 1950s, the Harlem Globetrotters played at the Porterdale Gym three different times.
“The only time the Grand Ole Opry ever played outside of Nashville, Tenn., they played in the Porterdale Gym,” Crowell said.
He said that Annie Lee Day, the nurse at the town’s medial clinic, was good friends with Minnie Pearl and Day talked her into coming to Porterdale.
 “For many, it was way more than a building, and it stood for way more than a building,” said Roseberry. “For all of the buildings to burn, this was the worst.”
The fire started about 7:30 Thursday evening and took more than three hours to contain. Lanier Wise, whose back porch faces the rear of the Porterdale Gym, said he stepped outside and noticed something was wrong.
“I saw smoke coming out of one of the chimneys and I knew that wasn’t right,” he said. “So I walked over and saw flames through the windows. I ran over to City Hall and told them the gym was on fire.”
Roseberry said the Porterdale City Council was meeting for a work session when Wise came in and told them the news.
“We all just jumped up and ran, like we could really do something,” she said. “It was just shock. ... It was horrible. It was horrible standing there, helpless and seeing that what’s burning up is history.”
Wilkerson said he stood outside behind Julia Porter Memorial Methodist Church and watched the blaze that consumed the gym.
“It was huge,” he said. “When the fire finally burned through the roof, the flames were really high. It was real hot. I grew up here and I get chills just thinking of it.”
Crowell said he received a number of phone calls and didn’t believe the gym was on fire until he went to see for himself.
“I’d been there for five minutes and there was Darrell Huckaby,” who is a Porterdale native and Citizen columnist who often writes about his days growing up in Porterdale. “We sat in the car and cried together,” Crowell said. “It’s not just a loss to Porterdale, but a loss to Newton County and a loss to this part of the state. At that particular time in life, that was the place to go.”
Officials and citizens in Porterdale have been working for some time to bring the gym back to its former glory.
The city recently spent $30,000 to remove asbestos from the building. Approximately $500,000 from sales tax revenue has been earmarked for renovations to the facility. Roseberry said that Porterdale is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and the local Historic Society has been working to have the Porterdale Gym listed separately on the national register.
“We have been working so hard to bring it back — and we still are going to,” she said. “We have SPLOST (special purpose local option sales tax) money and insurance on that building. We have the original blueprints to the building. We still have grant money and we can get more.
“Porterdale has never been one to throw up their hands and give up. We need that building, even if it’s a reproduction, the town needs that building. ... It belonged to the people and it was connected to their heart.”